Actually English fits this same pattern! Though some of our names come from Norse gods that got conflated with the Roman gods, because things were a bit messy when the Romans came into contact with the Germanic peoples. Wednesday is from Woden (another name for Odin), who got mixed up with the god Mercury. Tuesday is from Tiw (another name for Tyr), who corresponds to Mars. Thursday is from Thor, who corresponds to Jupiter. And Friday is from Frigg, who corresponds to Venus. Only Saturday still comes from Saturn (and in Japanese, 土曜日 comes from 土星). Monday and Sunday come from the moon and sun for both English and Japanese!
But yeah, all of those languages mentioned have a seven day week that originally came from the Romans, which is why they’re all so similar. Wikipedia has a long article about this.
I never thought that having a knowledge of Greek/Roman and Norse mythology would help me with a basic facet of Japanese, haha, but here we are!
Not much to comment this time around. Fairly basic review and I got 92% so not too many mistakes. I’ll need to investigate what determines the reading of 人 eventually as it sometimes trips me up.
@Shannon-8 Trying to catch up with you but you’re giving me a hard time! You sure are speeding along. I never miss my own reviews or skip a few hours without reviewing so you must be crunching it as well!
@ChristopherFritz The thing is that I was associating planet’s names from their constitution which was a wrong premise since planets were named long before people know what they were like up close.
@VikingSchism Yeah Neptune has got the best name, it clicked instantly.
Day 8: 写す: 21 out of 37.
Ok, let’s talk about this. This one keeps tripping me up. Not the reading but the meaning. There’s “to photograph” and “to be photographed”.
写す「うつす」to photograph.
写る「うつる」to BE photographed.
They’re different verbs with different endings. You are SUED if you photograph someone. This’ll stick in my brain.
天国「てんごく」this one is tricky, with ごく instead of こく.
中国「ちゅうごく」is another trap with the same reading as above.
Hmmm… Because of the る of する my brain might screw up Fritz’s tip… But when I pair that with Zizka’s… This could work!
I can’t remember whether I said, Ziz, it comes up again with “reflected” “reflecting” “to be reflected”–which kills me because one of the versions has a “copy” うつ reading.
I have this dumb thing I’m doing about “be” when the verb is “to be (whatever)”… (There was a decent thread about this recently, but their “rules” didn’t “stick” in my head)… Something that I kept getting wrong had ま when it was “to be…”, so I pictured a monster’s mouth, his “maw”, and then a bee flew in there, and let me beat it, finally. If the hiragana after the kanji rhymes with maw, then there is a bee (be) in it.
It works fairly well…
Unless I pause to honor the requested “intervention”, it’ll be tough to “catch up”! I’m just clicking through when things come up. I’m “letting the SRS system work for me”, trusting those “first instincts”–even if I don’t know where they are coming from.
Day 9: Time is Running Out! 87 Review, 32 out of 37 K. @Shannon-8 Ah but I would never ask you to wait for anything and slow down your progress. You’re doing great, keep it up!
直行「ちょっこう」non-stop
This one is giving me trouble becaues I’ve never seen that reading before and also because the meaning is hollow to me/not useful so it doesn’t want to get into my brain for those reason. 正直「しょうじき」this reading is also foreign to me so is the meaning if I’m being honest since it’s about “honesty”. じき as a reading has been very rare so far (in fact it’s the first time I believe). 直す「なおす」to fix NOW. Second time meeting this one so I messed it up. 活気「かっき」I always tend to write KATSU-KI so I’ll need to look out for this one.
One way to speed things along will be to preview the level’s content before starting the reviews. Will attempt it for level 7.
Also, Ziz, I hope that you’re making use of the ability to enter in your own synonyms when you’ve been recognizing a kanji for years with a different instant meaning to yourself that, while correct, isn’t one of the phrases accepted by WK. I’m trying not to be too liberal, but sometimes–Augh! I just need to type it “my way”.
Also…I just read @fallynleaf’s study log, and the list of useful scripts was most excellent. (I’m still too TamperMonkey shy and technologically clueless to load scripts into “my precious” phone)…
Making the つ in kanji readings a っ seems to happen often in jukugo words from what I’ve seen so far, though to be fair 活気 catches me out a lot (but it’s actually because of the meaning - I can always remember it’s something about liveliness, but I end up getting the word wrong so often)
Ooph… made it!
Believe it or not I was at 36 out of 37 for the whole day yesterday, every review. This means 12 days for a level which is a bit slow I think.
I’ll approach the next level differently. I aim to preview kanji ahead of being tested. My objective for this level is 11 days which is certainly doable as this level has 7 kanji less than level 6.
Kanji:
欠：けつ: lacking “ketchup” is ok.
由：ゆう：youth (yuu) is the reason our parents do something. I’m likely to forget this one.
札：さつ：I use French for this one: one bill is “sept sous”.
辺：へん：this is the area of the “hen”.
付：つ：you attach two things.
以：い：I have no idea about this one. The eagle thing doesn’t work for me. Idea?
必:ひつ：I’m certain this will be a hit(su)!
未:み：selfish kid being told we’re not there yet. Only thinking about “me, me, me”.
末：まつ：it’s the end that matters (まつ)!
校：こう：I knew this one from “school” gakkou.
(only writing the readings I’m not familiar with):
弱「じゃく」Jack is weak.
通「つう」you need to pass tsuu (つ）this!
高「こう」Koichi is tall.
強「きょう」no idea for this one.
Need to be on the look out for:
I missed ‘area’ with the hen, ‘certain’ that it’s a hitsu, pass through (remembered the reading but just typed ‘through’ instead of ‘‘pass through’’.
‘Not yet’ and ‘husband’ are very similar. I remember the dead husband with the cross on top of him.
I got the other ones. I should be ok until next batch of kanji.
L7 Day 2: 今月, 70% 100 review.
Ok, I need to get this straight in my head.
So this is 今月 because it doesn’t refer to one of the 12 months of the year.
But that doesn’t seem to work because it’s 何月「がつ」even though it doesn’t refer to a specific month? I’m stumped!
Also there seems to be 直る・直す and from what I can tell they both mean “to fix”.
～丁目 is difficult. I can’t find a way to remember this one.
未: the jet with the kid saying “me me me”.
末: this one is the ‘end’. The story about he modified jet doesn’t work for me. I guess I could go for “if it’s not ‘not yet’ then it’s the end” by process of elimination.
Otherwise, the kanji is going better than for level 6. I remembered ‘certain’ and ‘area’ this time around. ‘Strong’ and ‘weak’ I know. I just need to pay closer attention to them next time.
When you’re asking “which month?” you’re referring to a specific month - you’re not looking at it from a relative point of view if that makes sense? 何 here is kind of like a variable x, where x is a specific month. I guess it doesn’t help that someone could reply with a relative answer though… Still, they’re referring to a specific month in a relative way (if this month is June, and someone asks “what month” and the answer is July, you could either reply in a relative way: “next month”, or a non-relative way: “July” - in this case the relative answer is standing in for the non-relative answer)
What helped me differentiate between 未 (not yet) and 末 (end) was thinking about the big line as moving on a track towards a goal. So for 未 it’s not quite at the goal yet, but for 末 it’s reached the end.
You sure are speeding along. I never miss my own reviews or skip a few hours without reviewing so you must be crunching it as well!
直行「ちょっこう」non-stop
Need to be on the look out for:
～丁目 is difficult. I can’t find a way to remember this one.
