📚📚 Read every day challenge - Spring 2022 🌸 🌱

Daisoujou · May 7, 2022, 11:15pm

Appreciate the input @MissDagger ! It’s all more or less stuff I recognize but at the same time it’s hard to fully feel ok with it sometimes you know? Despite what I manage to do, I still fall over on my face with basics more than I’d like, haha. What can you do tho, just how it is I think.

Summary post

Still kinda feeling that way, but I read a little over 7000 characters today, so that’s decent. This route really has been sprawling out. I like what it’s been up to though. Over time the culture of the island and its weird little eccentricities have been explored. There was even a sweet little subplot in a couple scenes where the main character was around some 小学生 and helped one of them a little, who was sad about the death of a relative. It’s been meandering, but in a way that mostly makes things a bit richer.

Hard cut to that image lol. It mentioned before that this guy puts seaweed on his head for… reasons so I think that’s what is happening here.

But while I do like Summer Pockets a lot, and I have those side books, the thought of another VN sure is appealing about now. It’s been a long journey with this one. I had thought about reading a small one as a breather after this was over but maybe I’ll consider if I want to take some days to alternate mining from one before the end. We’ll see.

Came across たる/たるもの today, an N1 grammar point that attaches to a noun, “used in relation to qualifications and requirements for a position.” Basically used to talk about what someone should do because they are X thing.

Lots of interesting descriptive new words today, I particularly like どん引き（どんびき), sort of “being left speechless” though with a secondary image of pulling a film camera back for a wider shot.

MissDagger · May 7, 2022, 11:40pm

Language and stuff

Just because things have similar roots, doesn’t mean they will be closely related centuries later. For me, closely related languages are more like Norwegian/Swedish/Danish where it is possible to understand each other’s language without formal study or being good at languages. (Obviously it will depend on speed and clarity of communication, written vs spoken, etc. but generally.)

I don’t have enough experience with French, Spanish and Italian, but I would put them in a similar-ish boat because so much of the languages are similar (because of their close relation to latin), but again, not enough experience to be sure.

It all depends on scope/scale, doesn’t it? If I look at the group of all languages in the world, then sure, English and Swedish are closely related, but say within the group of germanic languages, I wouldn’t consider Swedish and English very close.

Perhaps I should have said “While Swedish is a Germanic language, I wouldn’t call Swedish and English closely connected.” But Swedish also happens to have neighboring languages that are incredibly similar.

Another good example: Icelandic could both be considered extremely close to Swedish/Norwegian/Danish, but also incredibly far away. As a Swede, I basically don’t understand a word of Icelandic (written or spoken), but historically, I probably would have because Icelandic was protected and hasn’t evolved much over the centuries, while Swedish/the Scandinavian languages have. Those four languages all stem from almost the same base. I think Icelandic is basically old Norse/Norwegian, but don’t quote me on that.

I guess, in the scope/on the scale I was talking about, I wouldn’t consider Swe and Eng super close. But use a different scale and sure they are. The more Japanese grammar I’ve learnt, the more similar I have found Swe/Eng grammar. Structurally, very similar; word-wise, not really. Except for direct loan words, obviously. Of which there are quite a few especially among modern vocabulary with computers and company culture stuff.

Beyond_Sleepy · May 7, 2022, 11:46pm

re:language and stuff

Yeah, I get you. Norwegian and Sweedish in particular are close enough it wouldn’t be at all a stretch to consider them dialects of the same language if we were one country. I have an easier time understanding some Sweedish dialects than some Norwegian dialects, spoken Danish is basically gibberish tho:p

dunlewy · May 8, 2022, 12:35am

I’m continuing to read “Hikoichi and the Young Lord”. When Hikoichi came to the castle at the lord’s request, the lord was a bit condescending and sarcastic about Hikoichi’s rumored wisdom. So he asked him to be playmate to the young lord, whom he called into the room. But 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, chidldren came into the room. The Lord will put Hikoichi to the test!

I read three pages, and these books are much harder than the Graded Readers, though there is more help as to grammar and vocabulary.

Some Grammar/Vocabulary New Points:

と ends a quotation

の (at sentence-end) indicates emotional emphasis

うむ hmmm

おもて
面 face, outdated use meaning " face", is a degrading or disrespectful way to say “face”

ため
試してみよう Let’s test

windupbird · May 8, 2022, 12:48am

Summary Post

Day 37: May 7th
What did I read?: クマとカラス
How much did I read?: 15 pages
How long did it take me?: 26 min

This is a really nice manga so far :3 It’s much more story-like than クマとたぬき (which felt like more of a 4-koma collection), and seems more…serious, I guess? But in a nice way - just a bear and a crow, traveling together, getting to know each other and helping each other out. It’s really sweet :3

And look at this art <3

I want to go wherever this is

Good words

井戸端会議 (いどばたかいぎ) - content-free chat; idle gossip
まれ - rare; seldom
ちぎれる - to be torn off; to come off
おぼろげ - vague; faint; dim; indistinct; hazy; blurry

polv · May 8, 2022, 1:21am

May 8, Sun home post

Week 6 of Spring 2022’s summary

I have done some Anki this week, and some Kanji learning as well.

Some of my reading strategies have changed, to accomodate for reading more.

And I really want to read lots from my favorite authors… (I saw more than a few above.)

I have listened to a few grammar YouTube videos as well (and some casuals). I feel I should also focus on listening better.

I also think about studying Chinese Hanzi; but with some sequential order of characters (like Hanzi/Kanji), while also focus on reading complete sentences.

I also think of using WaniKani app, but there are too many things I don’t like much - like, not enough Kanji, not enough vocabularies, not enough meanings, not enough readings (of Kanji, although this is debatable); nonetheless, I do like some UserScript ideas.

I also like autoplaying audios, although I would want to autoplay audios for sentences as well.
While I now take a lot of audio from Forvo (and WaniKani vocabulary audio), I wonder if there are values in chopping audio (in YouTube / ImmersionKit), just for single vocabularies…
I am doing level 14 on my Anki (started at level 11).

I also learnt a little more about IME - type pa-thi- for パーティー

A way to avoid downloading lots of audio at once, to put inside Anki + syncing to mobile devices

Apparently, [sound:https://...] works in AnkiDroid (Android), but not in Anki; and of course it works for autoplay as well (<audio> doesn’t work for autoplay)

Anki pecularity must be due to AnkiDroid and original Anki are made from different teams.

WaniKani vocabulary audios’ links can be found inside WaniKani API (and the links themselves don’t need an API key). Otherwise, they can be downloaded in batch.

Regarding Forvo, I made a web app with Forvo API, and upload (cache) to AWS S3, so I can always use it later without accessing Forvo. (I can’t make it too public, not knowing whether it is against terms and conditions.)

About language learning, when being in the actual society, I feel like it might be the issue of fitting in; rather than simply the vocabulary choice, or the language tone itself; but more than that.

It might ok to be weird (even regarding language), if you are a fun folk, I guess.

I guess it’s child’s play.

Pretty sure the first horizontal row must be HOMEOSTASIS. I have no idea about the other two, even after Googling (CAUSALCLOSURE, SYMPLECTOMORPHISM).

Anya must see English characters in her mind, otherwise it doesn’t make sense…

I keep reading 精せい神しん科か医い as 新しん世せ界かい. The latter must be what I really desire.

I wonder if WaniKani tilts toward USA (what about Indian folks and Japan residents; and Scandinavians?) I don’t even realize about the anime. (Then again, I am not a social person, nor an adolescent. And I also don’t really watch anime. Youtubers of non-virtual type will be considered, though.)

Though, it doesn’t write what it is. Furigana, when used, is also a culture in itself.

There are also pitch accents. When not aware / not practiced, it is prone to misunderstandings.

As for English (as a second language learner), I am used to visualizing phonetic symbols. (I am used to learning it early on by a series of textbook by BBC, English For You; then later on, several (e.g. Oxford) dictionaries.)

enbyboiwonder · May 8, 2022, 1:31am

Home

Have not been sleeping well lately and it’s really started taking its toll today, but I know from experience that if I let a habit slip for even a day I’m never really getting it back, so I hung in there with both reading and studying. I did basically the bare minimum with everything, but hey, that’s still something!

I read ch 14 of クールドジ男子.

This one follows Souma!

He’s looking for a cardigan to wear indoors and, when asking if they’ve got the one he’s found (size XL) in a size M, mistakes a display for an employee… His friend Haibara, to be exact, who cracks up at it.

If Mima’s birthday is in October and it’s coming up on summer break now, and last chapter Igarashi asked him if (rather, confirmed that) he’s 27 this year, that would mean he’s actually 26 now then, right, not 27 like his profile in the first volume says. Hayate (April) is definitely 20; Shun (Tanabata) may be 17, may still be 16, I don’t know the time of year any more specifically than 梅雨 (early June to mid July); I can’t remember if it was ever stated whether Souma (January) is a first-year or second-year, and in the case of the former, he’d still be 18, but the latter he would be 19. Not that it particularly matters, I’ve just been curious and trying to figure out what time of year it is based on their birthdays and grade levels since the first volume. And how they dress, though that hasn’t been much help.

Anyway, Souma says that he wants to hang out with his new friends over summer break, and Haibara suggests they go to the ocean. Souma thinks they’d each end up doing their own thing there, Mima staying under the beach umbrella, Hayate content to just stay on the beach, and Shun swimming far out to sea. When he later mentions it to Shun, he thinks much the same thing, putting Mima under the parasol reading a book even though they’re at the ocean, Hayate picking up shells and stuff on the beach, and Souma getting lost lmao. I’m not sure if we’re getting one then, but I still hope we get a beach episode!

At Mawarimichi that evening, Shun comments that he’d thought Souma was an S rather than an M, and Souma completely misconstrues his meaning until he comments that he himself is an L lmao. Souma lets him try on the cardigan, and it seems to fit him fine, though he’d prefer it a little looser. Come to think of it, Souma likes oversized clothing, so he probably would be a size S if he got clothes that fit the way they’re meant to, he just always buys the next size up so he considers himself to be a size M.

And I just realized I did not read this week’s chapter of 夜カフェ. I think I need a specific day to do it on and not just “sometime during the week.”

Also I’ve been thinking about bokuaka again (stumbled upon some fanart for them on tumblr), and apparently Fukuroudani gets introduced around ch 80, but of course the wiki doesn’t say what volume that is, so I can’t even make an estimate as to how long it’ll take me to get there!

Some vocab of note:

明ける (あける) [一, intransitive] to end (of a period or season)

saidahgilbert · May 8, 2022, 1:55am

Gave you the like.

But that is one of the meanings that WaniKani gives for this kanji

dunlewy · May 8, 2022, 2:23am

I haven’t gotten to that kanji yet. Also I didn’t know it was disrespectful.

2OC3aOdKgwSGlxfz · May 8, 2022, 4:21am

April 7th (Calendar Post)

Bookclub caturday~ Finished last available volume of Yuru-camp, so there’s one bookclub pausing for a while.

ゆるキャン△ => 14 pages (53 min)
シメジシミュレーション => 12 pages (28 min)
夜カフェ => 14 pages (65 min)

Fun panel from today’s reading:

potatonaught · May 8, 2022, 5:10am

May 6 and 7
Friday was a light day. I finished the recent stream of voice actor Kaji Yuuki doing a playthough of Tokimeki Memorial Girl’s Side 4th Heart. He’s playing the game trying to date the character Kazuma Ryouta, who he also voices! I read along to the text on screen as well as try to speed read chat—it flies by so fast because Kaji is popular.

Saturday was book club day! Read chapter 66 of Haikyuu.

I also added more vocab words to Spy x Family chapter 1. And read chapter 6 since the new episode is out. I’m glad SF won the intermediate book club vote. I’m excited to join that book club too.

natarin · May 8, 2022, 5:39am

May 7 Home Post

I got to play a bit more ZTD! I finally finished that nightmare science room it’s definitely harder to dedicate energy to it when I’m busy with finals but I’m fighting through. They’ll be over soon!

Redglare · May 8, 2022, 8:07am

Summary post

May 8th

・薬屋のひとりごと (88% → 90%)

Read the second half of chapter 29.
(Posting early so I don’t have to later)

KateTriesAgain · May 8, 2022, 2:37pm

Update May 8th:

I have no idea on which days I read during last week. It got… busy.

Slightly lengthy rant on what happened

Mostly because of work and everything else was a bit hazy due to exhaustion. We changed systems at the hostel, both the reservation software and the key system - we have keycards now! - and it was a bit stressfull. Both learning the new software while handling customers (we did learn it beforehand but using it during the job was a bit different then just the theory) and learning the keycard system was… a challenge. Which we kinda screwed up because we had trouble. Lots of trouble. As in, people locking themselves out, forgetting their card, conveniently ignoring the signs that the locks will be changed and then complain about dust and the sounds… Lovely, really. Led to an impromptu night shift on my part and my boss was also kept busy at night. Poor guy basically lived at the hostel for the past week or so, both supporting us and making sure it goes half-way smoothly.

As for reading - I didn’t read yesterday for sure (and god knows when I read during the past week) because the only point on my to-do list was to take a break. I succeeded. I chilled. I slept. I definitely did not do anything that involved a large amount of brain activity. And who knew a break worked because I felt definitely good today. I gave my offerings to the Crabigator, learned my vocabulary, did my laundry, heck I even did sport! Breaks. Revolutionary, I tell you. We should have breakdays every week.

And today I read the entire 4th chapter (part?) of もえる. All 14-ish pages of it. Without looking up vocabulary and most of the chapter felt a bit like a recap so it was an easy read for sure. Granted, I think I already read some pages during my nightshift but my memory is a wee bit hazy concerning that point in time.

My summary of もえる Chapter 4 without looking up unknown words

Yugawa and Kusanagi visit the place of the crime and kinda reconstruct what happened and what items/persons were where
Yukawa figures out it wasn’t plasma like most of the press and Kusanagi’s superior thinks
They take a ride around the part of town the crime took place in, just so Yukawa can get a feel for the place
They plan to visit a cafe later for some coffee so Yukawa can mull over what he figured out during the reconstruction
We find out that Yukawa hates children because he finds them illogical (?) and finds it exhausting to deal with them
They drive past the girl that searched for the red thread in Chapter 2 and which Kusanagi helped up after she fell
Kusanagi mentions the red thread she searched for and Yukawa (riding shotgun) apparently pulls the hand break (?)
they head back to the girl to ask her again about her, her mother comes out and they talk - with Kusanagi having to ask the girl Yukawa’s questions which is just hilarious
The red threat was very straight (真っ直ぐ) and no one except her saw it, including her mom
Yukawa is pensieve and tells Kusanagi that he has to go for a walk - something about the red thread is bothering him and he has to think about it

rikaiwisdom · May 8, 2022, 4:27pm

Summary Post

May 4-8
Final Fantasy VII

Haven’t updated these last few days. I’ve been keeping up with FF7 and it’s been going great, making more and more progress. I’m glad that the difficulty of the language hasn’t gone up overall even in plot development parts; it’s really, really accessible. I just arrived in Rocket Town, about 30 ish hours in.

I also ended up getting the Zero Escape bundle @natarin ! I’m not sure when I’ll start it exactly, probably on a whim some random day, but I could manage to get Textractor working in advance so that’s nice. Thank you for mentioning game2text as well, I didn’t know what it was and it’s amazing, I got it working with Anki already. I love that it automatically adds a picture on top of everything else, which is something that Textractor can’t do (I think?).

Also, I’ve been giving it some thought after the discussion last week, and this is how I’ll approach things from now on:

New plan

I’m dropping Houhou. I think part of what was contributing to the burnout was the WK-like SRS approach of having 4h and 8h steps before the 24h review. I just literally can’t be bothered to do that many frequent reviews any more. At this point I think those steps are just virtually useless to me, and it’s so boring to finish a group of reviews only to see another group coming up later. Now, this is something that can be customised and edited very easily in the app files (even someone like me, I have very little coding knowledge), but there’s also something that bothers me and I don’t think can be changed, which is not having a max number of new words per day. Everything you add comes up later for reviews, and you have to stop adding words at some point if you’re aiming for a max number of words per day. This contributed to the urge I felt to stop doing any Japanese once I got 20 words.
I’m taking up Anki instead, for multiple different reasons. You can add as many words as you want, it will only give you up to the max number you set per day, so you can keep consuming more Japanese if you want. Another reason is that I’ve been researching tools for a bit again and they’re seriously good. I don’t need to make my own cards other than editing a few things here and there if I need; Yomichan or game2text automatically add them for me with audio, context sentence, definition, pitch accent, etc, even pictures in the case of game2text. I knew these things existed but wow, now that I’m using them they save up so much time and effort. Also lastly, I don’t need to worry about reviews coming up later, because the number you see is the number you have that day, period. Once you’re done with that number, you’re done for the day. I don’t even think it matters at what time you do them or if you do them separately, as long as you do them they’ll all be counted the same at the end of the day. I also like that the review intervals automatically get longer or shorter depending on how well you remember (if you press easy, good or hard), and that cards still come up for reviews even long after 6 months (I personally never liked the concept of “burning” words, I can still forget words after that if I don’t see them for a long time), they can get multiple year intervals and I like that, especially if you’re aiming for a long-term deck. Probably not super useful to be honest, but still nice to have.
I’m swapping to a more immersion-based learning approach with less reliance on SRS. For this I’m going to discard the need to add any number of words altogether. I won’t be aiming for X number of words a day any more, I’ll add as much or as little as I feel like, even if that means not adding anything for days or weeks. I’m hoping that most of my learning will come from consuming more and more Japanese as opposed to doing more and more reviews. Reviews will be secondary and purely supplementary.
I’m taking the leap to JP-JP cards exclusively. This is something I mentioned I was going to try a few weeks back and honestly I’m enjoying it more, and I think they are proving to be more effective. This goes with my previous point as well, since I only add words whose definition I can read and understand completely. For now I can’t add everything I come across because I don’t understand every definition, so it will also be good to get used to adding very few words. I’m hoping that gradually, as I learn more vocabulary and understand more definitions, I’ll be able to add more words if I want to. But since my approach will be based on immersion and not SRS, this doesn’t bother me at all. I will still be looking up words in English if I don’t understand them in Japanese, of course, like I’ve been doing all this time, but only JP-JP cards will make it to the Anki deck.

Zakarius · May 8, 2022, 4:43pm

Tanuki Den (aka Homepost): Date 20220508

Tanuki Scroll XXXVIII: 蛸薬師(たこやくし)

Read today’s folktale, from Kyoto prefecture!

About a sick mother who is on her death bed and wants to eat octopus. Her son finds one and it makes her better.

Japanese found in the tall grass

Octo octo, octopus!

経本「きょうほん」ー Sutra book

This word looks a little lonely so here’s the kanji for octopus, I’ve seen it before but it took awhile for me to link it with octopus, so here it is with some other friendly タコたち to hopefully let it sink in better.

蛸蛸蛸蛸蛸

頑張って！with your new study plan, sounds good!

Daisoujou · May 8, 2022, 5:14pm

rikaiwisdom, and J-J dictionaries

Glad you’ve come up with some ideas! Sounds great, and I hope it all works out for you. I just want to comment on this part, not to in any way argue because what works for people is fairly individual, but because I’ve been thinking a lot about this point recently. I’m kind of in a midway zone of sometimes using Japanese definitions but largely still relying on English ones, but I’ve got a few Japanese dictionaries on Yomichan and at times I’ve gone “hey I can read all of this one, I’m going to put it in Anki in Japanese!”

But I have to say, at least for the step in the process that I’m on, and my own personal preferences, I’ve been kind of leaning away from it. In certain communities (that don’t intersect with Wanikani too much) the whole “monolingual transition” is a real sacred thing people shoot for early but it feels… slightly overrated to me? Like, if someone really wants to know exactly what a word means, there’s no beating Japanese definitions. Certainly can’t argue against that. And if someone’s Japanese is at a level where they can comfortably read most definitions, by all means, more exposure and better definitions are perfect.

But I get the impression lots of people force it at or before my level and I’m starting to feel like the Japanese definitions are slightly a trap, at this stage. If someone has the patience and energy to fight through them it can only be beneficial, but personally I’m going to burn out on the thing I want to read much quicker if I spend half of my time struggling to read words I don’t know in the dictionary. And controversial as it may be, most of the time I really feel like the English glosses, if looked at together, tend to be good enough to make the word make sense within the real context you’re reading it in. I just want a brief vague idea and then to let the stuff I read hammer out the details for now, and that seems to be fine. The Japanese definitions give me a little more reading practice (at… the dictionary, which is hard to be TOO excited about), but at the expense of taking a little energy I could’ve used on the thing I’m trying to read, and for the benefit of a level of nuance I’m usually not going to benefit from when I’m unlikely to even remember the word that well just yet.

And similarly, I’m kinda leaning away from J-J cards (or maybe just put both languages and read whatever I want when I review, I guess) because my anki time is already on the high end and I don’t think the benefits match up. But you and I are using approaching anki fairly differently, and this is only me musing about how I feel like doing things at the moment. I just liked the excuse to get some thoughts out there heh. I mean I’m not totally confident; maybe I’d come out the other side much better if I just buckled down and forced myself to use the Japanese a lot more right now and moved away from Jisho. Most of the people I hear about with ridiculously fast progress did the monolingual thing early, but at some points you have to wonder if it really made a big difference or if they simply did well at the entire undertaking because they’re the kind of person willing/able to trudge through a Japanese dictionary so early.

Still, again, I think your plan sounds good. This is me using it to entirely ramble about myself and my totally different position. Best of luck with the new methods.

lucylavelle · May 8, 2022, 5:32pm

May 8th!

Chapter 6 of 夜カフェ today. The story is starting to move along now, so this chapter was quite fun to read.

(Home Post)

polv · May 8, 2022, 5:54pm

May 9, Mon calendar post

Week 7 of Spring 2022’s planning

Committed, and paced - for the sake of discussion
- Night Cafe Ch.6
- Death Note Vol.3 Ch.13
Committed, with マイペース(my＝pace)
- Yuru Camp vol.1 - latter half = 3-4 chapters
- JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Part 2 - A few more chapters
Listening
- 3 grammar listening
- 1+ casual listenings

Actually, I started and finished Happiness Vol.2 Ch.6 rather quickly. If the book club decides to go slow, I would need to think how to best learn.

Regarding Night Cafe, it’s quite the opposite - reading is a struggle.

Death Note is just right. (And just-right pace due to book club, albeit not so prolific discussions.) JoJo might not be too hard, if not for self-paced, and temptation to read lots. Yuru Camp might be a little stretch, but not too hard.

Nonetheless, in order to go for a more extensive reading, I decide to read at least good enough to write book reviews (which of course I had to express in Japanese); and take note of fun parts in every chapters. My full reading list, with my note taking is here. I might also create another private (i.e. hidden) repo for exploring some non-public series.

There is also a thing about Kanji learning pace - currently mostly completed level 13.

I don’t yet know how fast really is my pace.
I might also learn Hanzi (and Chinese vocabularies), as an excuse to relearn Kanji, along with 異体字, 許容字体, 旧字体 and Chinese variants (which are not necessarily “font differences” only).
- 漢字辞典ONLINE and Wiktionary would be primary resources.
- There is 文字拡大, but I probably don’t really need it much.

rikaiwisdom · May 8, 2022, 6:32pm