This weekend I treated myself by playing a whole lot of ときめきメモリアル GS(Girls Side) 4! This game is so addictive and fun haha. And while it does seem less like serious work than a novel, it’s still a lot of reading! Lots of everyday vocab that is repeated fairly often too which is good for learning (repeated more often if you are like me and have replayed the first year about 4 times so far, because the stats system is deceptively tricky to get the hang of.) and also your character writes short articles in the game which you can then read. For anyone who doesn’t know the tokimeki series, it’s essentially a high school simulation game, where you are a high school student and you study and take part in school activities and date people. This one is the girls side series, so the MC is a girl and you are dating guys. This play through, I’m trying to win over the lil cute button below, who is adorable and has also encouraged me to do a lot of googling of kansai-ben to figure out what the hell he is saying sometimes lol (the screenshot below isn’t a good example of this but there’s been a few screens where it’s taken me some deciphering.)
His older brother has just been introduced who might be even more cute This game is evil! I get the feeling I will be doing many playthroughs to ‘collect them all’
some fun vocab/expressions from the weekends ときめきーing
月とスッポン ー two things that are superficially similar but completely different - literally ‘the moon and a turtle’
文武両道 (ぶんぶりりょうどう）- being accomplished both academically and in sports
おおきに ー (kansai ben) thanks a lot
I was thinking this when you mentioned it before, but that’s awesome that you’re playing Tokimeki games. I got curious about the series when Tim Rogers made this ridiculously lengthy video on it… didn’t come anywhere close to watching the whole thing because it’s 6 hours long, but what I did see intrigued me. Glad you’re enjoying it!
Haha yes, that’s where I heard of it too! I have a friend that is slightly obsessed with Tim Rogers who put on the start of it when we were hanging out. I don’t think I got through the whole thing either but I remembered him saying that he thought that an early dragon quest game (I forget which) was best for beginners of Japanese and that the tokimeki memorial series was his pick for intermediate learners. So when I heard there was a new one coming out for switch I was excited to play it and it’s so far living up to being fun and also feeling very useful Japanese wise!
中国語: I read an intermediate entry on Mandarin Bean and one page of 擅长捉弄的高木同学.
Yesterday was a day of pushing on studying, so I spent more time looking at language textbooks than reading. Still, that work will make it easier for me to read later, so hooray.
Depending on the type of dye used, black can wash out with repeated washings or fade to a lighter colour. It could also be the type of fabric used to make the clothes that can’t hold the dye that was used for black. TMII am actually wearing underwear that has faded to a sort of brown-ish tinge right now.
While I’ve heard 告白 used this way (confess to a crime) I mostly hear 自首 in crime dramas (closer to like ‘give yourself up’) along with 白状 and 自白. So many words for confession!
(I know too many crime words. My tutor teases me about it ;_; )
This color is for nobility only And apparently it changes with the light - in dim light, it looks kind of pale brown, but then when you step into the light - bam, green. I like colors like that
Some words I learned
禁色 (きんじき) - restrictions on the use of colors by ranks of Heian era courtiers
のみ - only; nothing but - literary equiv. of だけ
ものの - although; though; despite the fact that …
晒す (さらす) - to expose (to the sun, public, danger, etc.) this is how the definition is written in Jisho and it makes me chuckle for some reason
摑み (つかみ) - grip - I’m including this one because I couldn’t even look up the freaking kanji in Jisho using the radical search, like it literally just…wasn’t in there. Google translate app saving the day. Thank you for teaching me this completely obsolete kanji, book xD
まいにち暦生活 日本の暮らしを楽しむ365のコツ
Time spent: 8 min
Today’s reading was about 寒中見舞い (かんちゅうみまい) - a winter greeting card you can send between January 8th and the first day of spring if a) received a New Year’s card (年賀状) while you were in mourning or b) you just forgot to send your 年賀状 at the appropriate time xD This card should a) apologize for the lack of 年賀状 and b) tell them to take care of their health during the cold season.
What else did I read?
囀る鳥は羽ばたかない Vol 1
Amount read: 17 pages
Time spent: 37 min
Finished chapter 2 - now I’m only one chapter (and a little) behind the book club. Thank goodness that club has a slower pace xD I’ll catch up eventually!
Day 10: Read pages 143-148 of Kiki today. I feel like I get the most reading done in the late hours of the night/early hours of the morning . Not good for my sleep schedule lol
Today’s article was 快進撃が続いた町田啓太「最近よく『言霊ってあるんだな』と思うんです」 because my news aggregator recommended it to me last night and it looked easy. Also 言霊 (power of words) caught my eye since I recently finished watching the spooky TV series 言霊荘.
Some words I looked up
快進撃 - steady progression
大河ドラマ - type of long running NHK period drama
土方歳三 - Hijikata Toshizou, a historical figure, 1835-1869
流鏑馬 - horseback archery
並大抵 - ordinary; run of the mill
先駆け - leading the charge
Pretty easy breezy read, as expected for a 2-page promo interview. He seems like a nice guy, very positive.
After day 5 I kind of forgot to keep track of how many cards I was adding to my anki deck (I know that every time I read よつばと that I definitely added cards). I’ll try to keep a closer count on that as I progress as it feels kind of important to me.
I can see I’ve slowed down a little but hopefully once I get in to a better routine it’ll be a little bit easier
to do more.
This game is evil! I get the feeling I will be doing many playthroughs to ‘collect them all’ 
And apparently it changes with the light - in dim light, it looks kind of pale brown, but then when you step into the light - bam, green. I like colors like that
. Not good for my sleep schedule lol