MissDagger's (Final?/Ultimate) Study Log

Japanese Language
141

60

:tada:

60

:dancer:

60

:partying_face:

60

:mirror_ball:

60

:crabigator:


I’ll do a (proper) level 60 post when I finish my last lessons, and when I’ve had a chance to get/bake a cake/something similar. Which will probably be in 2 weeks. I’m getting super duper (good) busy. :sunglasses:

Reading

I’m back reading Loopers and spending like 2+ hours a day reading, hoping to reach the end before I’m reading two parallel VN book clubs. :joy: Wish me luck!

I’m a bit behind on 神さまがまちガえる and will probably stay behind for a few weeks. Haven’t decided how I’ll do with Orange, I might just use that as a break day.

Honestly, it is hard to believe I’m finally here. I think at the start of this year I had hoped to reach 60 by the end, but I expected to go on one of my extended breaks at some point, but I just didn’t. :smiley:

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142

おめでとう！ :partying_face:

You’re profil pic’ smiling upon reaching lvl 60 is a nice touch !

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143

Your aim to speed-run the levels from 50 to 60 sounded really daunting and it must have been a struggle but I was rooting for you the whole time. And now you’ve officially reached level 60, congratulations! :smiling_face: :cake:

Looking forward to your level 60 post (whenever it will be, please don’t feel pressured in any way!)

I agree, it’s a neat change. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Congrats on reaching level 60!! :sparkles: :sparkles:

I swear you were only at 55 like last week, you’ve blazed through the last levels!
(or my awareness of time is heavily skewed :laughing:)

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Why not both? :rofl:

Anyways, @MissDagger おめでとうございます！You put in so much effort, it was amazing to watch (even though from afar)! Keep up the good work and see you in the reading clubs :+1:

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@Makushi_Rutsu Thank you! And I wasn’t sure anyone would notice the pfp change. Or maybe I should say what changed with it. Big grin now for sure. :smiley:

@Midnightblue Thank you! Yeah, there were definitely times I questioned my own judgement. And no worries on pressure on the level 60 post, I like writing long post (too) much, so I’m having to hold back because I want to be able to take pics of cake/whatever-it-ends-up-being. I have totally not been planing the post since eeerh… level 1? xD

Glad you liked the change too. Picking a pfp from a VN gives multiple facial expression options, which came in handy today. ^^

@Zakarius Thanks! Well, you’re not that far off. November 15 (evening) is when I got to level 56. xD So add one more week to that, and you’re correct. :joy:

@NicoleIsEnough Thanks! :blush: For a short time, I got to be a speed demon. :smiling_imp: And yeah, definitely will be hanging out in the reading clubs. :wave: :smiley:

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147

Congrats!! I missed your last few levels entirely haha because I was focusing on getting NaNoWriMo done, but I’m glad I returned to the forum in time to congratulate you! This is seriously an amazing achievement!

I’m really looking forward to your level 60 post! Please make it as long as you like! I’m a long post person myself :sweat_smile:, and I love to hear everyone’s origin stories!

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148

Thank you! I hope you got your NaNoWriMo win! :writing_hand:

Uh-oh, so you mean all those things I was maybe thinking of skipping, I should just put in it. :scream_cat: I guess I need to set aside a few hours for it. :joy:

I definitely have some fun stuff planned. :smiley:

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I did, thanks! Fourteenth year in a row! :blush:

Yes!! It’s the perfect excuse to talk for a long time about yourself! Give us a retelling of your full journey!!

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Me: Wait, how did you know I like talking about myself so much? :scream_cat:

This thread:

(I read too many youtube comments. :joy:)

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151

Congrats on reaching level 60, and

Please do:)

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152

Thank you! :smiley:

Just know, you guys are asking for like a novel. Or technically only like a novella or really long short story. All I’m saying is that since you are asking for it, I will give you so much to read. :joy:

But it’ll be good to have it all in one place instead of scattered across multiple different logs as I do now. ^^

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153

image

What is this? :face_with_open_eyes_and_hand_over_mouth:

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Congrats on the 60!! :tada: I’m patiently waiting for the cake the celebration post :slight_smile: .

You’re possibly including this in the post but what now, do you have plans of continuing WK for a while? At some point if you decide whether to keep doing it for a long time or drop it soon, having no WK srs frees up so much energy and time I’m sure you’re going to love it. Even if you decide to continue the daily items will decrease from now on once you finish your Lv60 lessons so it’s a win-win situation nonetheless. Definitely comes in timely for all the reading that is coming soon right? :wink:

Can confirm, mine took a few hours :eyes: .

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I think it might be called “my hard work”, but I’m a bit unsure. :thinking:

Thanks! I will probably write about it there, but I don’t mind answering now too.

I plan to review for a while. Not sure how long, possibly forever because I have lifetime anyway. But I’ll reduce review sessions to one a day sometime in late December, early January.

Indeed. :joy: I didn’t do it for the reading, but the timing fits super well for that too. Lucky me. :sweat_smile: (I think I’ll be fine, but I’ll probably have to keep my higher volume of hours reading.)

If I can, I might start composing it when I have time. Some of my plans are gonna make it a bit of work to do.

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156

And here you go, everyone, the ultimate update (but not the final one!):

Also, anyone who wanted it long (looking at all of you!):

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So because I’m rushing towards the end of Orange, there was no way I was gonna be able to wait another half week and then another week on top of that to finish Orange.

I just finished next week’s reading (and I’m starting the next one as soon as I finish this post).

So I will write my impressions here, as is my wont and move it to the right thread later.

Chapter 21 of Orange thoughts are now here: Orange 🍊 Chapter 21 - #2 by MissDagger

Couldn’t stop there, could I?

And now my chapter 22 thoughts are also in the right place: Orange 🍊 Chapter 22 - #2 by MissDagger

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So because I can’t leave well enough alone :joy:, I went looking for resources on listening and learning grammar with Japanese only for N3 and up. I also remembered that we at my Japanese language school would have finished N3 at the time I was graduating.

For some reason, I thought we weren’t quite finished yet, and then I thought more about it and we actually were. However I can’t remember if we actually got to the end of the Try N3 book we used. Close enough for sure. I also did not take that with me home.

In fact, I got rid of the textbooks because I didn’t have room for them in my luggage. I didn’t even fit everything I wanted to take home, throwing out a couple of things I wish I hadn’t needed to, but not really regretting it long term.

So the two skills beyond just reading that I want to develop more next year is some more grammar study, but mostly my listening ability. It is definitely my weakest ability. I could even write and speak better than I could hear when I left Japan in 2020. Now, I suspect my writing ability is pretty much gone, and my speaking ability is probably on par with my listening (or worse… :fearful:).

When I went looking for grammar youtube channels, I looked for N3 (having forgotten I “finished” that at language school) and could still be a good place to start, otherwise I’ll just go looking for their N2 lists. Youtube channels to check out and potentially start watching regularly:

Apparently I only found three I wanted to check out, and I can’t even remember how I found them. 日本語の森 I’ve heard of for as long as I’ve been on this forum, but the other two? Maybe I just searched youtube? :thinking: Turns out these are also from a Tofugu articles. xD

Listening practice things. So podcasts and similar. Some things that have been hanging around as tabs forever and ever. A lot of these will also be from Tofugu’s articles on podcasts for listening practice, focusing on the later beginner part of the beginner article and intermediate articles. I’m more intermediate, but late beginner is a spot where I should be able to listen where distracted and still follow along. Not sure that would be true for even lower intermediate.

Couple of random ones

Upper beginner

Intermediate (ordered by difficulty order decided by Tofugu)

Speed picks up here but still intermediate:

Upper intermediate and beyond (according to Tofugu still):

Also for those interested, I have already listened to a few episodes of The Bite Size Japanese podcast, it probably falls in beginner since she explains some terms with English.

So yeah, that would be it. I wanted to put all these links together so I wouldn’t have to keep the tabs open or let them disappear into the void that are my bookmarks. :sweat:

Hopefully once my early busyness at the beginning of next year eases, I can start the listening ability practice! :smiley:

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For grammar other than 日本語の森 I really like 三本塾さんぼんじゅく (which you most likely already know) and also ゆみせんせいの日本語ch（yumi ura）. I should work a bit more on grammar this year too so hopefully I post this as a reminder for myself as well :stuck_out_tongue: .

Also for podcasts you might be interested in this thread, you might find something useful!

And lastly allow me to lure you in to the new Listen Every Day Challenge starting soon :eyes: . Doesn’t even need to be a challenge anyways, I know I don’t do listening every single day but I do it very frequently and hang out there pretty much everyday (until I stopped posting again recently). Even if it’s just for listening discussion it’s pretty useful.

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Thanks for the additional recommendations!

I definitely have in the plans to join the listen every day challenge. Probably more definitely for the spring challenge. But I might join for February through March on the winter one. I’m just gonna be so busy early to mid January, that I already believe I’ll be doing reading catch up on the VN clubs when that eases, that I have no plans to try and keep up with an additional challenge too. :joy:

My plan is to get caught back up with the VNs by end of January, and then hopefully add in listening regularly at that point. By then, my WK reviews should be much lower too, so that will help too. ^^

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