📚📚 Read every day challenge - Winter 2022 ☃❄

Japanese Language Reading
#291

Day 6: January 6

  • 君の名は。page 31-32
  • からかい上手の高木さん page 1-24

からかい上手の高木さん is free again on bookwalker (first 4 volumes)! So I will try to go through this series while reading a bit of 君の名は daily ^^

Now that I have read some manga and got used to reading, からかい上手の高木さん seems so easy! In just 10 minutes, I read the first 25 pages of the manga. Even though it is easy, I’m still glad I didn’t pick it up earlier because of the lack of kanji. Now I can easily break down sentences and search for words, but if you are not able to do that, the manga gets a lot harder to read.

19 Likes
#292

Sorry for the late reply! Thank you! That’s a really goog hint and I’m very exciting to explore the website! どうもありがとうございました。:partying_face::pray:

5 Likes
#293

Summary Post

January 6
君の名は , 7 pages.

Random words
  • 排尿 = はいにょう urination.
  • 恥辱 = ちじょく shame, disgrace.
  • 怪訝 = けげん dubious, puzzled, suspicious.
  • なまる = to speak with an accent.
  • やけに = awfully, desperately, violently.
  • 内装 = ないそう interior design.

So this is the guy! :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes: I only listened to a very short bit of it but it’s indeed good, his ばあちゃん voice is so on point!! :ok_hand: I also like the solemn tone of the narrator :joy: . I definitely need to read these at some point.

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#294

Two more pages of 本陣殺人事件. I was so proud of myself and thought how much I already read from this book. Just to realize that I only read one chapter and I still need to read two whole chapters this week. :sweat_smile:

16 Likes
#295

Summary post

January 6 update:
Started reading 時をかける少女 again – read 2 pages today, which took almost an hour :confounded: The vocabulary somehow seems easier this time around, even though only a few months have passed since my previous attempt. But still, as I expected, the amount of lookups grew quite a bit compared to よつばと！ Not sure how long I’ll last at this rate – perhaps I’ll go back to the second volume of よつばと！ in a few days.

That’s great to hear! Thanks for sharing, your approach seems much more viable than what I’ve been doing :sweat_smile:
I think I’ll try to set aside some regular time and stick to it rather than try to read “when I feel like it”, which in my case usually means “at the very last moment.” Right now it’s only thanks to this thread that I haven’t missed any days yet.

19 Likes
#296

Summary post :bookmark:

January 6
・かがみの孤城. I finished the fifth week. I’m liking this book more and more by the day.

Progress: (27% → 34%)

Regarding staying focused: The best way for me to read this book on my laptop is by reading out loud. It works superb - it’s fun and engaging, and as soon as I stumble upon a word I don’t know, I have no choice but to look it up. There’s no glossing over a word with an unknown reading when you’re trying to read all the sentences out loud, hehe.

Word of the day: 定期的(ていきてき)
for having a funny pronunciation.

24 Likes
#297

January 6 Update

Today I read 蓮住荘のさんかく #1 pg. 24-57.

Challenge Thoughts So Far

For most of the challenge, I’ve been reading ティアムーン帝国物語 volume 2 (I’ve read around 8 percent over the past few days) but for the last couple of days I’ve just been chipping away at some of my manga for a change of pace, like まいりました入間くん volume 24 and 蓮住荘のさんかく volume 1, which I also own in English and is about the cutest thing ever. It’s also very easy, which is a plus! Iruma is pretty easy, too, but it occasionally has parts that leave me frustrated because I can’t quite tell what the (clearly important) nuance is, even if I sort of understand the sentences. Anyway, it’s been nice to read something every day - it’s fun and is helping me keep up with watching an episode of anime daily, too!

18 Likes
#298

January 6 :snowflake: Home Post

Decided to read more 錆喰(さびく)いビスコ today! I spent a while trying to figure out what カバ meant in the current context, like what, their cover’s blown? People called for backup? But no there were actually just literal sand hippos with guns chasing them through the desert because this book is a WILD ride :joy: so figuring that out made things a lot clearer. I’m realizing that the author messes with words a lot which is really cool from like a literary perspective, but it can definitely make my job harder. I think I’ve generally been able to figure things out though which is good!

I’m certainly enjoying the craziness :joy: The section I just finished ended with ビスコ picking up a dead hippo (described as one that five people would barely be able to lift) that had mushrooms in it from previous fighting and throwing it at their feet so it exploded into a giant mushroom that launched him, ジャビ, and the GIANT CRAB they’re riding over a huge border wall so yeah nothing really happening lmao; somehow fighting through all the unknown words isn’t so bad when I untangle stuff like that as a result.

Anyway I’m having fun with it so far! I still intend to continue ラストゲーム as well, so we’ll see when that actually happens :grin: very different reading experience from 錆喰(さびく)いビスコ, that’s for sure.

Cool words

矢継(やつ)ぎ早(ばや) - rapid succession
ジリ貧(ひん) - situation getting worse and worse
舞(ま)い上(あ)がる - to soar, be whirled up

Three different words talking about “clouds of sand”:
砂埃(すなぼこり)
砂煙(すなけむり)
砂塵(さじん)

18 Likes
#299

Day 6!
I read the second half of Volume 2, Chapter 2 of レンタルおにいちゃん.
It took me a little longer than intended because today was my first day back at work after Christmas so I was a bit frazzled by the end of the work day.

But I was really pleased because I didn’t need to look up any words at all today, which I don’t think has ever happened before!

(Home Post)

20 Likes
#300

鏡の孤城：5%-8%

Just barely made it under the line today, left reading until I should have already been asleep (so this will be a short update), which is really annoying because once I started reading i didn’t want to stop so soon :sob: Things are already happening! I’m already loving this book so much, I need to make sure I give myself more time to read tomorrow!

18 Likes
#301

Very belated home post

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Blank calendar - reply and quote whole post
Jan
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Calendar instructions

Once you have a calendar you will see a bunch of cells like 31[] which will render as 31

If you put a lowercase x inside the box like 31[x] it will render as 31
If you put an uppercase X inside the box like 31[X] it will render as 31

Socials: Bookmeter, Learnnatively, Goodreads

What I’ll be reading:

  • 鬼滅の刃 - currently reading volume 3, but I’ve also started going back through older volumes to breakdown sentences I don’t feel I got sufficiently.
  • ファイナルファンタジーIX (Final Fantasy IX) - playing through in Japanese, taking screenshots of sentences I don’t fully understand, and then afterwards writing them out in a notebook to do breakdowns.

Rough update so far:
Somehow I managed to defy all odds and I’ve just kept going since the last challenge, yesterday was day 128 I think.

My wrists are very painful so I won’t be able to reliably make updates, but I’ll be reading along with all your comments every now and then.

My default update will be 鬼滅の刃 everyday, although most days it will only be a few pages, some days just one.

Ohhh I’m delighted to hear that, just from the cover and little I know of 鏡の孤城 I’m really intrigued to try read it some day. Learn natively claims it’s a 27, compared with 鬼滅の刃’s 25. Maybe one day.

23 Likes
#302
Jan 月 火 水 木 金 土 日
Week 52
Week 01
Week 02
Week 03
Week 04
Week 05
Feb 月 火 水 木 金 土 日
Week 05
Week 06
Week 07
Week 08
Week 09

Alright, I’ll join in late too. I have been reading every day up to this point, and plan to for the foreseeable future – might as well hop in with the community and check out what you all are up to here and there.

My current reading tends to be somewhere between an hour and a half or two hours per day on the first Ace Attorney game, basically however long I spend before mining ~20 sentences. No hard schedule for this, but in the remaining time, I throw in a few pages of Zoo 1 by Otsuichi here and there. It’s my first real native Japanese book. I can handle it (with a lot of lookups), but I’m at that level where after 3 or 4 pages, I get pretty exhausted. Happy to be reading though, and this is perfect milestone timing, as just yesterday, I finished the first of the book’s short stories (roughly 40 pages in this edition). The first story was decently interesting, though certainly upsetting at times, with a lot more real serious depressing topics and not exactly the sort of “horror” I was expecting. I also wonder how much the excitement of reading a Japanese book is going to cloud my judgment for a bit, haha.

Today I started a little on the second story, Seven Rooms, which appears to be starting from two people mysteriously awakening in an (I assume locked, but we’re taking it slow) unfamiliar room…

21 Likes
#303

Well, I could only make it through 1 page of よつばと! tonight - but it was a long page! Happy with my progress. Although I have the vol. 1 grammar guide, I only use it after trying to parse the sentences myself, and I usually have it already!

21 Likes
#304

Summary post

Day 6: January 6th

365日にっぽんのいろ図鑑
Time spent: 22 min
Today’s color: 鉄紺 (てつこん) - kind of a navy blue with a hint of green?

This is my favorite color, it’s so pretty :star_struck: The resoluteness of iron and the calm quiet of indigo come together to make this beautiful dignified color I think is sort of what the book said :sweat_smile: Words do be hard to translate

Some good stuff I learned
  • くろがね - an old word for iron (the kanji are 黒金, so it’s literally black gold)
  • 帯びる (おびる) - to have a trace of; to be tinged with​
  • 藍染 (あいぞめ) - indigo dye
  • がかる - to have a trace of; to be tinged with​ (this book is into synonyms)
  • たくましい - indomitable; indefatigable; strong-willed; resolute; bold​
  • 物静か (ものしずか) - quiet; still; calm
  • 重厚 (じゅうこう) - profound; deep; grave; solid; dignified; stately; solemn; massive; composed
  • 色合い (いろあい) - coloring; shade (of color); hue; tone; tinge; tint​; flavor; nuance; feel; sense; look

まいにち暦生活 日本の暮らしを楽しむ365のコツ
Time spent: 10 min

Today’s reading felt extremely appropriate: it was about today being 小寒 (しょうかん), which is basically the beginning of midwinter (寒の入り かんのいり). Supposedly, it’s when the winter cold starts to get intense…that was definitely the case where I am, I believe this was the first day this winter that the temperature has been in the single digits (Fahrenheit). It definitely dropped like 15 degrees since yesterday. :cold_face:

What else did I read?
囀る鳥は羽ばたかない Vol 1
Amount read: 22 pages
Time spent: 1 hour 8 min

I really didn’t intend to read that long but it kind of got away from me xD I feel like something just clicked today because I was very intrigued. Seriously, it was like some switch flipped in my brain and I didn’t want to stop. Yashiro freaking kills me lol

Oh he’s so soft :pleading_face: Thank you for blessing us with this cat

:astonished::exclamation: My color book failed to mention this!

23 Likes
#305

Let me try to summarize the reading I did for the first six days of the challenge. I started off with the usual Animal Crossing and book club books. On the 3rd I visited the Chicago-land Kinokuniya. I decided to purchase City because I like 日常(Same Mangaka). I also decided to get a copy of よつばと！ based on how often I see it mentioned here. And I took note of how popular Chain-saw Man appeared to be at the store. I had picked up a copy of the first Chain-saw Man when I visited Kinokuniya in July but never opened it.

泣き虫

The night before going to Kinokuniya I was navigating the house in the dark and walked into the edge of a half opened door, falling back onto a radiator. It felt pretty bad the next day, but manageable. Then, while driving back from Kinokuniya, I sneezed and a rib snapped. Haven’t been very mobile since, and sitting at my “translation station” is very uncomfortable. I’m going to blame this for lack of updates for now.

I started flying through よつばと！ and Chain-saw Man with just the Kodansha Kanji Learners Dictionary at my side for emergencies. Maybe at some point I’ll find my way of detailing progress but for now I’ll just say I’m already 4 chapters (142 pgs) into よつばと！and 4 chapters (131 pgs) into Chain-saw Man. I opened City but quickly realized its more complicated than just having a Kanji Dictionary with you. I’d need to be at my Translation Station. I’ll save that one for later, maybe it will get voted into a book club one day.
Also today, re-read for clarity, chunks of 極主夫道 and picked up the first four volumes of Teasing Master Tagaki-San because they’re free on Bookwalker right now

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#306

Oh no that sounds awful, I hope you’re not feeling too terrible, and you recover quickly.

Hope you enjoy よつばと！ I know tons of people have read it here since it’s the standard beginner thing, but I found it quite lovely all the same. I appreciate you mentioning Takagi, too, going to go pick that up myself!

15 Likes
#307

仕方がない(probably incorrectly) keeps coming to mind.

993 messages in the volume 1 thread. I figure, finish the volume once on easy, tread through the thread, re-read on hard mode.

Took a quick ~3 page look at Tagaki. Is that also Urushi? Author has their type I suppose.

8 Likes
#308

Home post

Day 5:

日本語: I read a lot of 伯爵と妖精 29.
Read-aloud: We read three (!) chapters of 7SEEDS.

中国語

中国語: I read a beginner entry on Mandarin Bean and one page of 擅长捉弄的高木同学.

23 Likes
#309

Main Post

January 6th:
Read pages 12 to 13 of Naruto.
Learned ポテチ (potato chip)
It’s interesting that the character’s first names are in katakana, but their last names are in kanji or hiragana. Almost didn’t recognize Uchiha うちは because I was expecting it to be in kanji. Also, I had a laugh over realizing a character is named Salad (サラダ).

20 Likes
#310

great idea about reading out loud, I’m going to try tonight. Thank you for the idea.

6 Likes