BigEm's Study Log

Japanese Language
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Don't worry about hijacking haha, it's nice to have study chats with people of similar levels! (putting my reply here just to save some space, not to be secretive or anything)

I’m liking KMG as much as one can like a grammar learning book :joy: I chose it because it was pretty highly rated and I liked the lesson layout, but it is a bit dry. I used them the last time I tried to take the N3 (and crashed and burned due to stress), but now that I’m using them properly as a study aide things are going well. I didn’t look too hard at Tobira but I seem to remember something about their comparative formats (it’s been a long time, can’t quite remember the specifics) that didn’t resonate with me. It is definitely more of a textbook layout, and you have to do a lot of the legwork yourself with extra practice, but it fits with what I need it to be! If you’re curious as to what it looks like, here’s one of the section entries I posted for when I was asking a grammar question.

I’m relatively lucky as I can do a chunk of my studying at work (I have no classes at all on Tuesday, and most of the time prep for the rest of the week takes two hours tops), so it’s not too much of a problem with time as I’m prioritizing Japanese study over other things. I did have a crash when I worked from home, but that wasn’t really due to anything except mainly my laziness. It is essential to space it out, though - KMG is deceptive in that it looks like it’s not teaching a lot, but you really should be spending at least a few days on each grammar unit, even if there’s only three new points.

I’m so very behind on the bookclub I don’t think I’ll catch up before everyone else finishes :sweat_smile: but I might copy your strategy and wait until there’s a vocab sheet, assuming I get far enough that it becomes an issue. I’ve found having Japanese subtitles on anime helps the most for me to remember vocab more than straight reading as I’m more of a visual+auditory learner, so this might be the only traditional-style bookclub I join, but I might lurk a bit on some other ones in the future :joy:

If you’re working with Tobira right now or you do later on, lemme know how it goes - I’m curious as to how it works for someone at a similar level as me!

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follow up

I was trying to decide between KMG and tobira, but settled on tobira. Only working through chapter one, but I do like the difficulty of all the reading content. Feels very n + 1. For the grammar exercises, they aren’t anywhere near genki IMO. Much less prompting on what they actually want you to say/use, so I write something that seems correct but is way simpler than their answer.

Ah I see, so we probably are able to devote similar amounts of time then. I’m spending at least half my time preparing for interviews for Fall. Was a dev back in the states, so I’ll be trying to find that type of work in tokyo.

I definitely agree on the amount of time to spend on each chapter. If you just reviewed the tobira grammar sections and called it a day, there’s no way the grammar is actually learned.

As for the bookclub, yeah I’d say use each week’s vocab sheet. I think right now we are up to week 10. Tonight I will have caught up. The reading has become substantially easier using that as a reference. There are some pages where I don’t even need to use it. Also with all that grammar you are learning on KMG, the book could do wonders for reinforcing what you’ve learned. Are you reading any NHK easy articles?

Ah, I agree with the japanese subtitles! What site are you using? Animelon? I’m watching You’re lie in april atm. It’s feels so good to spend time on a grammar point and then to immediately see and then hear the grammar on the same day. I swear that’s happened like 2 out of the last 3 days.

I’m planning to reach ch 3 by at least the end of June, so I’ll pop back in with an update on how that’s going at some point! Ah last question, are you planning to take the N3 JLPT in december?

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Hi again! :)

Oh, I see, sounds like a good fit for you then to use Tobira. Lemme know if it’s still working for you later on! Yeah, I am putting quite a bit of my time into studying too, but I’m also trying to make sure it doesn’t drive out anything fun I could be doing with my time here. Good luck with the job search! I wish I could help, but I know very little about Tokyo job hunting and even less about dev jobs, so I wouldn’t be of much use :sweat_smile:

I don’t quite have any extra reading that I’m doing on a set schedule (other than attempting more of わんわん), but I do pick up a few NHK Easy articles every once in a while. Mainly, I’m getting quite a bit of reading practice just from documents being handed to me and the town newspaper, so I probably won’t need to buckle down on that for a while. My plan is to use the KM reading book eventually for more test-like practice, but that’s not going to be soon, don’t want to burn out.

So I was using Netflix (with an American VPN) to pop back and forth between Japanese, English, and no subtitles, but then I experienced the travesty that is the Netflix subtitles for JoJo and just couldn’t do it anymore. Now I, er, obtain mkv files of shows along with Japanese and English subtitle files and just do it that way. And I feel the same way! The other day I was studying the usages of 〜に対して it showed up in an episode and it just felt amazing that I knew what was going on.

Yup on the JLPT! That’s the plan atm, anyway. From what I can determine, the only Hokkaido testing site is Sapporo, which is also the largest and still occurring corona hotspot here, so hopefully things get better by then. I dunno how I would do it if they put my testing site in another prefecture, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it. Are you taking it too?

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:tea: Review of previous study period (June 14 through June 27) :tea:

New Japanese I’ve learned: ウズラ (Japanese quail; these little round chubby birds are very cute but pretty scarce - I’ve seen only a few on the backroads where there aren’t usually people)

KMV / KMG / RWtW eps / ハイキュー chpts / わんわん

Getting back into the swing of things with my grammar and vocab studying! So far, things are going well as can be expected (grammar is hard, but meh that’s par for the course). It’s getting easier and easier to understand/follow along in RWtW, which is a magical feeling!

Still not caught back up to わんわん, but I’m working on it. Also didn’t get any ハイキュー reading done, so shame on me, that’ll be a goal for next week, but I’m going to scale it back a bit as two chapters a period doesn’t seem to be working.

:spiral_calendar: Study period: June 28 through July 11 :spiral_calendar:

[*] [*] KMV Chpt 13, Chpt 14, 11-14 Quiz, Chpt 15
[*] [*] [*] KMG Section F, Section G, Section H
[*] [*] RWtW episodes 12 and 13
ハイキュー vol. 2 chpt 1
Read more of わんわん

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
[*] Go on at least 4 runs
Repot succulents

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:tea: Review of previous study period (June 28 through July 11) :tea: a bit late oops

New Japanese I’ve learned: not so much a new word rather than a new usage; apparently the words バカ and アホ have different rankings in ‘badness’ depending on the dialect. Here, バカ is less bad, but in Kansai弁, アホ is the lesser of the two. Just thought that was interesting.

KMV / KMG / RWtW / ハイキュー / わんわん

Ooff. Really missed the boat this time with vocab. In my defense, classes have been weirdly crazy, with a lot of the prep falling on me in cases where it normally wouldn’t. Hopefully this week will be a bit calmer so I can catch back up.

Reading continues to be hard to work into my schedule, but I’m going to try out some new organizational habits to get my life in some semblance of order, so hopefully that’ll help. Leaning back a bit on the RWtW episodes as I’m hoping to devote more time to reading. Nothing really noteworthy about anything else, just sorta chugging along. :steam_locomotive:

:spiral_calendar: Study period: July 12 through July 26 :spiral_calendar:

KMV 11-14 Quiz, Chpt 15, Chpt 16, Chpt 17, Chpt 18, Chpt 19
KMG Section I, Section J, A-J Quiz
RWtW episode 14
ハイキュー vol. 2 chpt 1
Read more of わんわん

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things (runs, yoga, core work, etc.)
Repot succulents
Weed front garden bed
Get Japanese driver’s license

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:eyes:
“Get Japanese Driver’s License” but crossed out, does that mean that you already got it??

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Sadly, nope :sob: it turns out that Japanese bureaucracy got in my way (see my complaining post and the update for the details if you like to be frustrated) and I won’t be able to get it until a week or so into August, so I’m leaving that for a later study period. But I thought it’d be weird to just remove it completely so I just crossed it out :joy:

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Yikes that’s rough. I’m sorry that they’re being unreasonable like that. I’ve heard that sometimes the people working just arbitrarily whether something is acceptable or not :sweat: :unamused:

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Thanks, I did manage to avoid the worst of the arbitrary-ness by not having to take their insanely specific driving tests, but yeah I think I got a super strict person this time 'round (or at least someone who wanted to pre-verify everything haha)

I’m just at the sigh-and-move-on point to conserve my sanity :joy: but there’ll definitely be celebration when I finally get the license!

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:tea: Review of previous study period (July 12 through July 26) :tea:

Fun new Japanese I’ve learned: ヒレンジャク - Japanese waxwing; a very pretty bird that I managed to catch a glimpse of this past winter despite it being very rare to see here!

KMV / KMG / RWtW / ハイキュー / わんわん

I’m feeling pretty good about my progress with the KM books, but as per usual my reading fell a bit short this period (not a habit I want to be in…). In my defense, I’m dealing with license bureaucracy and some newly-discovered rodent roommates in the ceilings and walls of my house (urgh) so I’ve been a bit busy. Summer break is about to start, however, so hopefully I’ll have some more time+freedom+motivation to catch up with that, assuming I’m not about to enter an extended campaign with pests. わんわん is currently on a break week, so I might be able to catch up with the rest of the group.

With the grammar book, I’m now starting the second part, which is less focused on verb form-type grammar and more on sentence phrase grammar, which has historically been easier for me to wrap my head around. I’m optimistic about this, but I’m trying not to get too cocky about it :joy:

Other than that, I’m just sort of moving along here as best I can.

:spiral_calendar: Study period: July 26 through August 8 :spiral_calendar:

KMV 15-19 Quiz, Chpt 20, Chpt 21, 20-21 Quiz (pt. 1 finish :tada:)
KMG pt. 2 Section 1, Section 2, Section 3, Section 4
RWtW episode 14
ハイキュー vol. 2 chpt 1
Read more of わんわん
Evaluate KM Reading schedule

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things (runs, yoga, core work, etc.)
Check+clean+seal up closets
Reorganize manga bookshelf to get everything to fit without stacking

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:tea: Review of previous study period (July 26 through August 8) :tea:

KMV / KMG / RWtW / ハイキュー / わんわん

Got a bit more of my reading done this last period, but didn’t manage to get my RWtW episode or the わんわん parts completed. I should have enough time to do everything else this upcoming week/period, so hopefully I can read a bit more then. I did an evaluation of when to start the KM Reading books, and as long as everything goes according to plan I’ll be starting that in mid-September once I wrap up the grammar book. Things appear to be on track in that regard :+1:

My WK one-year anniversary is coming up on the 13th! It’ll be interesting to see how I’ve progressed - I’ve been avoiding looking too closely at my stats so it’ll be a (hopefully pleasant) surprise to see all my data of how I’ve progressed.

Also, I did another trip that I finally posted a bit ago that I forgot to mention here, so if anyone wants to read more ramblings and look at pictures it’s right here. Other than that, I’ve been taking it easy, dodging rainstorms to go hiking and doing big ol’ cleans of my house. Still don’t have my license approved, so nothing too big.

:spiral_calendar: Study period: August 9 through August 22 :spiral_calendar:

KMV 1, 2, 3, 4
KMG pt.2 1-4 Quiz, pt. 3 Section 1, Section 2, Section 1-2 Quiz
RWtW episode 14
ハイキュー vol. 2 chpt 2
Read more of わんわん

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things
Check+clean+seal up closets
Reorganize bookshelf

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Lovely to see your photos - thanks for linking. :green_heart:

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:tea: Review of previous study period (August 9 through August 22) :tea:

KMV / KMG / RWtW / ハイキュー / わんわん

Just barely didn’t complete my KMV and KMG for this study period (I have one last little review test for KMV 4 and the KMG 1-2 Quiz), but that’s sort of to be expected - these last few weeks have been rather busy with work. I was able to get my RWtW and ハイキュー done this period, but not more わんわん. As the book club is about to finish, I’m considering just stopping it for a while until I’m all finished with KMG and KMV. Hmmm. Also, I realized I can just label my ハイキュー chapters by number and not delineate by volume (which I really should’ve done before… but ah well). This is the last period for KMV learning as I should be completing the book! Then it’s just reviewing everything via my Quizlet flashcards with a greater focus on the grammar, reading, and practice tests. (I’m still operating under the assumption that the December JLPT is happening in Japan.)

On the personal side of things, I still haven’t gotten my license (ugh) so things are rather calm here. The weather has been very nice, so I’m doing a lot of exterior house work and gardening to soak up as much sun as I can before winter gets here. I really really want to get a Switch to play games with my sisters as well, and with my recent salary increase it’s really just a matter of finding somewhere that isn’t scalping me to buy it - if anyone reading has recommendations of places other than Amazon.jp to buy it here, please let me know!

Just sort of chugging along. :steam_locomotive:

:spiral_calendar: Study period: August 23 through September 5 :spiral_calendar:

KMV 4.5, 5, 6, 7, 8
KMG 1-2 Quiz, 3, 4, 3-4 Quiz, 5, 6, 5-6 Quiz
RWtW episode 15
ハイキュー chpt 10
わんわん reading

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things
Seal up back windows’ exterior, prep for plasticing
Front area gardening - trim back pumpkins, cut grass

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Well… Some arcade games have switches available as prizes. There’s one sorta of near me that doesn’t seem too hard. I planned to allocated 2,000 yen in tries for it, but I stopped setting the 100 yen coins aside because corona. If you’re any good at arcade games, there might be one near you as a prize that would be far cheaper to win.

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Sadly (but probably good for my wallet), I’m not near any arcades and I still can’t drive, but I’ll keep that in mind the next time I head south! I’m neither great nor horrible at arcade games, but it would be pretty great if I could get one that way. Thanks!

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That’s a bummer : (

I hope you can find a good arcade and have better luck with your license soon!

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:tea: Review of previous study period (August 23 through September 5) :tea:

KMV / KMG / RWtW / ハイキュー / わんわん

Whooooo!!! Done with the KMV learning material! Now that I’ve finished it, I can give it a pretty good review - it had a wide array of vocab, some which overlapped with WK and some which didn’t, and it was good at throwing a bunch of different questions at you during the 練習 parts so it really encouraged actually learning the vocab and their usage, not just memorization. I’m still planning to study the lists via my Quizlets I’ve been creating, and I’ll be taking the practice tests later on, but now I have a bit more time to focus on grammar.

Speaking of grammar, I got a little behind on it this period… :sweat_smile: This week is going to be rather busy so it’s not too good that I’m going into it a chapter behind. Hopefully I can do some extra work done without burning myself out, but I’ll do my best. On the bright side I’m going to start the KM Reading book in the next period so I have a bit of a break there, and I’m dropping わんわん for the time being as it just isn’t working and the bookclub is basically over. :frowning_face: I’ll probably pick it back up later though!

In non-learning news, tomorrow is the day I’m going back in to get my driver’s license! I’m so very excited, and I’ve made a list of things that I’m going to buy once I don’t have to carry things back from the store anymore. So far it’s only reinforcing that I live a rather unexciting life as the list is rice, a stepladder, and a metal shelving unit :joy:

Hope everyone is doing well!

:spiral_calendar: Study period: September 6 through September 19 :spiral_calendar:

KMG 6, 5-6 Quiz, 7, 8, 7-8 Quiz, 9, 10, 9-10 Quiz
RWtW episode 16
ハイキュー chpt 11

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things
Clean+seal up back windows
Mail all those tax documents

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This is you about to tackle getting your license

You got this!!

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:joy: Thanks! I’m hoping it goes smoothly!

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Ah. Whoops.

In my defense, there was a four day weekend break and I normally do a lot of my studying around my work schedule, so dropping the ball at the beginning of last week really was rough to come back from. Also, I’ve been playing Animal Crossing with my sister, and that’s been really fun but I tend to lose track of time :sweat_smile:

I’m going to stick with my previous schedule, so I’ll do another full study period update this weekend, but since I missed my September 19 update I’ll just do a brief one here!

:spiral_calendar: Study period: “September 20” through October 3 :spiral_calendar:

KMR 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6
RWtW episode 16
ハイキュー chpt 12

:owl: Non-Japanese goals :owl:
Do at least 4 exercise things
Clean+seal up final back window
Mail ballot and tax stuff

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