Neon_Kitsune Attempts a Study Log of Sorts

Japanese Language Study Logs (Public)
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Hi, hello, and welcome! After being on the WK forums for the last year and reading through so many other people’s study logs, I decided that I wanted one as well.

My name is [female name redacted] and I’m [have vague memories of watching the original English Sailor Moon dub on TV] years old, and I live in the Southeast US. You’ve probably seen me around here, and I’m active on Bunpro’s forums as well. I can’t really say how long I’ve been studying Japanese because I’ve started and stopped way too many times.

The main reason for starting a study log is for accountability purposes because I have an awful habit of starting stuff and not finishing them (books, games, textbooks, you name it). Plus, people I know irl just don’t get it (“Oh, wow! That’s amazing you can read in Japanese!” “I don’t really understand, but I think that’s great.” “But why aren’t you learning Spanish?”) and it’s nice to have input from people that are also learning Japanese/languages in general.

I aim to update at least once a week or whenever I feel like I have something interesting to share. This will be mainly a Japanese study log, but I’ll probably throw in what I’m up to with my other hobbies and life in general. I’m not sure how to structure this thing quite yet, so we’ll see how it goes!

2026 Goals

Japanese

  • Left over 2025 goals (actually finish Genki 2 and Bunpro N4 vocab)
  • Reach Wanikani level 21
  • Finish Bunpro N3 grammar and vocab
  • Go through Quartet 1
  • Finish the renshuu N4 content and make good progress on N3
  • Read 12 manga volumes (one for each month)
  • Read one single book (a kids book will do)
  • Listen or watch Japanese for 100 hours (no English subs)
Other Goals

German

  • Go through A1/A2/B1 content on DW Learn German website

  • Rewatch YT grammar videos

  • Read 1 single book

  • Listen/watch 100 hours of non-ENG subbed content

  • Read 50 books, any language (not manga)

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Welcome to the log crew ! :grin:

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Nyaaaaaaaaaaaice to meet you, [female name redacted]! catwave
My name is [male name redacted], but you can call me @trunklayer! trunky_rolling

I can soooooooooooooooooooooo relate to this! trunky_rolling

Anyway, welcome to the log fam and best of luck with your studies! wricat

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Great to see you start a log!! :fox:

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Immediately set to watching! Excited for you to join the logging crew!

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Yayay exciting you’ve started a study log! I look forward to reading about your progress, best of luck with your studies ^^

Off topic, but do I spy a fellow XC3 fan? I adore the game (hence my username hehe) so it was exciting seeing your pfp when I joined here :blue_heart:

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Thanks for the welcome to the study log crew, everyone! People are so nice around here! :blush:

YES!! Xenoblade is one of my favorite series! One of my goals is to play the series in Japanese, but I’m nowhere near ready yet.

December 26th, 2025

Hmm… still not sure how to structure my updates yet. I’ll think of something eventually. Anyway, I don’t have anything interesting to say about my Japanese studies at the moment. I’m using this last week of 2025 to look over this year’s language goals (which I failed for the most part) and deciding what I can realistically accomplish next year.

Actually, there is one thing: since I’m so close to finishing the N4 grammar points on Bunpro, so I’m going to try to finish them up before the new year. Is that a good idea? Probably not. Am I still going to try to push myself? Absolutely! I’ll let y’all know if I make it!

Until next time!

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December 31st, 2025

And so, we’ve finally come to the end. I don’t want to get into it, but 2025 was a fairly awful year for me, and I’m ending it by being a little sick. A lot of bad stuff happened and, as a result, I didn’t accomplish much. I’m not going to go over my 2025 goals because I would rather not revisit them (I posted them in the goals thread on here and on Natively).

I did complete two of my goals, though! I finished 6 out of the 5 manga volumes I set as my goals! And just last night, I decided to push through and completed N4 Bunpro grammar!

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Even though I’m always overconfident at New Years, as is everyone else, and overcommit, I still wrote out a probably overambitious goal list. I’ll keep trying, though!

Besides making progress in Japanese, I also want to get back to German. I actually know German better than Japanese since I’ve been with it longer. However, it’s getting a bit dusty, especially since I haven’t really engaged with any German content for months now. I really want to rebuild my foundations and get back to understanding news podcasts/articles.

  • Go through A1/A2/B1 content on DW Learn German website
  • Rewatch YT grammar videos
  • Read 1 single book
  • Listen/watch 100 hours of non-ENG subbed content - the built-in Easy German eng subs are fine since they have DE subs too

I’ve also been wanting to get back into Spanish for a while now since I would actually have a use for it in daily life, and I want to learn Korean to mainly read web comics. But since I have my hands full already, my goals for both languages are the same:

  • We’ll see

I have various other goals and general things I want to work on (lose weight, drink more water, get back into writing regularly, etc.) but I won’t bore anyone with those details. The only non-language learning related goal I have is to read/finish 50 books next year (not manga). I was only going to aim for 25 books, but I asked my two oldest nieces it they wanted to have a book reading competition next year. We did a few in the past when they were in middle school and reading easy books and I was a busy grad student, and of course I lost. Now they’re busy college students, so I think the playing field has finally evened out and we can have a real competition!

Well, there you have it! I have put my overambitious goals for 2026 into writing and on the internet, so let’s see how it goes!

Happy New Year!! :fireworks:

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January 12th, 2026

I planned to hit the ground running in the new year, but rather than running, it was more like ungracefully flopping into it… kinda like a Magikarp using Splash (“But nothing happened!”). I got sick around New Year’s and then I had to go back to work after being off (I took time off because I thought I was going to be gone for the holidays, but plans fell apart due to Things). It seems like the stress of last year is following me like some evil, but also annoying, ghost. Just let me move on with my life…

Japanese

Trying to get back into studying for now. I’m really regretting adding the rest of the N4 grammar points on Bunpro because I have so many reviews now! :sob: I don’t know how those silly speedrunners do it (besides forgetting everything, that is). Even though I’ve added the rest of the Genki 2 grammar points, I still want to actually complete the textbook exercises. Last week I broke out the textbook for the first time in a long time and it seems like I’m still in Lesson 20. I thought I was past that! But I will finish it! One way or another!

Even though I got busy/lazy with actually posting, I have managed to read and listening to something every day this year so far. I don’t really have any goals for listening, besides listening at least 15 minutes a day, I do have some goals for reading. I’m trying to read through Satori Reader and my overflowing manga pile, both physical and digital. With that being said… I’m trying to speedread through the first volumes of Cardcapter Sakura and A Man and his Cat since they’re free on BookWalker. Yeah, I know, but just treat it like library books! I still don’t plan to buy anything for a while yet.

I did have one accomplishment so far this year: I completed another adventure mode path on renshuu! That’s my 5th one so far.

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Not-Japanese

Not really sure what to call this section. I haven’t been able to get back to German yet since I don’t really have a good routine for Japanese at the moment. I also haven’t got back to writing or going to the gym either. So many things to do, but procrastinating and doom-clicking news stories takes a lot of my time, it seems. Probably not healthy, I know.

Some people with study logs takes pictures of things while out and about, so maybe I will as well!

Last Wednesday I took my studying to my favorite local coffee shop and sat on their patio since the weather was unseasonly nice.

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On Thursday it was still nice so I went for a walk at a greenway that’s nearby which goes around a small lake. There’s several places I like to walk at, but I think it’s my favorite.

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I think that’s all for today. See you later!

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Rooting for you!!! :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

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If Douglas Adams taught me anything, it’s that the way to fly is throwing yourself at the ground and missing spectacularly! Hopefully this year starts to behave better for you, I’d give it a stern look but I’m not nearly imposing enough to help.

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January 31st, 2026

OOF. This “update once a week log” isn’t working out as well as I had hoped. But this is “Neon_Kitsune Attempts a Study Log of Sorts” and not “Neon_Kitsune’s Very Consistent and Regular Study Log” so I do what I can. First it was irl/birthday (!!) plans, then it was work, and then it was, um… laziness. Also news doom scrolling dragged me back into it’s cold, awful dungeon (have to stay WAY too informed, you know).

Japanese

:frowning:

I definitely didn’t hit the ground running this year, safe to say. I think I may have read/ listened to Japanese about half of the month, I lost count. I wrote earlier that I added the rest of the N4 grammar points on Bunpro so I could finally have those out of the way. I kinda got bogged down in reviews and that really stunk. Slowly digging myself out of that particular predicament.

It’s not all bad! I did manage to reach WK level 12 and I got the 400000xp Bunpro badge, so there’s that. Of course, like I always say, tomorrow’s a new day and also a new month! January was super weird, so I’ll try again in February!

Not-Japanese

My birthday was two weeks ago! Somehow I went from one of the worst Christmas/New Year’s to one of my best birthdays. I actually had plans with friends! The day before my birthday, I went with one friend to an area in my city that has some sort of historical house (closed for renovations), gardens, and some rather nice shops. We went to a place that makes dumplings and filled buns for lunch. As far as I know, it’s the only place in the area that makes such things. We also got crepes for dessert at another place, which was nice.

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On three separate nights, I went with other friends to see some very special movies at the theater. :grin:

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We also did dinner one night as well.

I usually never have plans on my birthday, so this was a very nice change!

As for the last week, my area somehow got hit by winter storms for two weekends in a row. Last weekend it was a mix of snow and ice. This weekend was all snow: I think we may have gotten at least half a foot of snow! Due to being in the Southeast US, we usually get ice mixed in with our snow (when we get any at all), but this time we got all snow. Like I said, January was super weird, and that includes the weather.

Here’s to a new month! Bye for now!

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GASP i forgot this event took place in January, i think i still have one more day to watch them in theaters here

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Maybe two weeks late, butttt, happy birthday! :partying_face:

This is so cool!! definitely best birthday material.
…and those dumplings look so good :drooling_face:

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