Maybe you can share some of those podcasts that have been helpful to you…?
@Yuuzuu @imnotshelley Congrats! 
@KyokaJiro Thanks for sharing! 
@oryantge Welcome! 
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I have officially mapped out my entire year. I know exactly how many lessons to do every single day to calmly reach level 21 by Saturday December 12th. Sweet Baby Jesus with a Mullet. What is my psychosis?
It’s fun to imagine when you have no master/enlightened/burn reviews coming at you… or no… *whispers (leeches…) I know it will be such a mental stretch in reality.
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I love the idea of dividing levels. I’m a big gamer and that’s why Wanikani and it’s levels keep me motivated 
It feels so nice to see your progression through those levels
(and of course the community is so kind so you want to keep on going just to keep chatting haha)
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Just hit level 10
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Yay! Halfway to 21!
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@KyokaJiro and @Marifly,
I’ve thought about a little bit and tried to find systems that have something to do with WaniKani and Japanese Culture or at least be something very, very Japanese.
I’ve had one approach where my mind really thought “outside the box” 
: WaniKani + Japan → Crabigator = water-related animal → Sushi → Japanese Tuna Grades for Sushi (1, 2+, 2, 3). I admit, that one wasn’t so good, another approach was to somehow transfer the part and chapter structure of The Tale of Genji to 21 Levels. This could potentially even work somehow, but I still think it’s not quite right.
That’s why I think that, as of now, implementing the Pokémon regions is the best idea. Seeing as Pokémon is 1. one of the most famous Game- and Anime-franchises,
2. the regions are inspired by actual Japan,
3. our moderator has a Pokémon as her avatar - this is, considering the circumstances, a perfect fit. The only people this doesn’t appeal to are Japanese learners who don’t take any interest in Anime and Games. And although this might only be a small percentage, I think there are enough of them in this thread. That’s why I would suggest to still wait a little bit, maybe someone has a better idea, and then to make a poll if everybody’s okay with the Pokémon regions. And naturally there probably won’t be 100% agreement, but I think that’s excusable, especially considering that next to the region names we can write the actual regions they were inspired by. In my opinion that’s a really good compromise.
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I’m in!
How exactly do I join?
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I got really excited about the Tale of Genji idea because I’m reading it now but it’s probably not very meaningful to most people out there.
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Respect that you’re reading it. In Japanese?
Although it might mean less than Pokémon to most people right now, it does certainly hold more cultural value. Even if a lot of people don’t know it yet, I’m pretty sure they would eventually. I didn’t know of the Tokyo Skytree either until Marifly made the thread, but it works great. So I don’t think that should be a problem.
I think you have already joined!
@oryantge, this for you as well: Both of you have to edit the very first post in this thread. By copying a users “info” line and altering it so that your info is in it, you add yourself.
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DONE! Thank you for clearing that up!
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No, I’m reading the English translation. My Japanese isn’t good enough for serious novels yet. I’m actually rather unclear on the cultural value it would hold in modern Japanese life. In America it seems like very few people read older books unless it’s part of a school assignment. And Genji is a long novel. Even to read a modern action-adventure novel that is more than a thousand pages is seen as an incredible feat by most of my peers. Then again, it was much easier to find an English translation than I was expecting, so maybe it’s more popular than I realize. Do you know anything about it? I’m afraid to look this up because I don’t want any plot points spoiled. There was an introduction in my translation but it spoiled a major event, so I stopped reading after the first few paragraphs.
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I think I’ve sadly been massively spoiled just by skimming through the Wikipedia article.
And I didn’t mean to know in the sense of having read it, but to know of it. Personally, I haven’t read Proust, Dante or Joyce either (because they are very difficult), but I know that they are some of history’s greatest authors. Seeing as Japan only plays a minor role in classic literature (at least as far as I know), “The Tale of Genji” is an absolute milestone and precursor for the whole of literature. So that’s why I think that everybody who is interested in Japan will stumble upon it sooner or later.
And now you see why I didn’t want to look at Wikipedia. I guess it’s fair to say that someone studying Japanese language and culture will hear the name someday, since that’s how I learned about it. I question if the chapter titles would hold much significance, though. Still, as someone who likes old books I appreciate the thought.
I read recently that women weren’t allowed to write kanji during this period, so the whole book was written in kana? That makes no sense though because I seem to recall a female character that wrote with kanji in the book, and it reads as a true-to-life sort of story. Maybe once I have finished it I can finally research some of this stuff.
I think that’s a good idea. I’m sure there were a lot of sexist and irrational rules to suppress women in Japan, so that wouldn’t surprise me too much, although not being allowed to write Kanji sounds really stark. Maybe the woman in the book was doing it in secret? Or she had special permission because she was part of the elite. Something like that.
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Yeah I would like to learn more about the world described in this book. It’s very different from western society. It seems less sexually repressive towards young women, in that men can take minor wives and so an unmarried woman having an affair isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It doesn’t touch on intellectual matters too much beyond courtly arts like painting.
The part with the kanji writing is pretty early on, when some older men are discussing their love affairs. One man mentions a very learned lady who advised him in his career, whose letters were written entirely in kanji (kana apparently not being thought of as very scholarly). His friend laughs and says such a woman would be too stuffy and her letters would come off as very formal and cold because she doesn’t use natural speech (a mix of kana and kanji I assume). I might be missing some context here, maybe it’s something to look up later.
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Woo! Looks good! Now I’m going to take a peek at the code I was missing 
Thank you!! I know this is just one small step in a likely (life-long) journey. Time to focus on grammar…I need to keep reading so I can recognize things more quickly!
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Thanks!! 