📚📚 Read every day challenge - Winter 2022 ☃❄

[natarin]

@natarin

March 14 Home Post

Alright it’s no longer almost midnight so I have time to post I’m absolutely at the point I get to playing games like this in English where I just desperately want to keep playing because I need to know what happens lmao. It’s really cool experiencing that even in Japanese! Staying up late playing a game in a language I’m learning for the sake of the content is a really cool feeling, though my sleep schedule doesn’t appreciate it

999 chaos

I’ve been having a billion feelings So much happened yesterday: the サンタ photograph scene but sadder?? 一宮(いちみや) going just completely off the rails?? 四葉(よつば) and the whole ニルス situation was completely different than I thought, unless they’re still playing me which is very possible

I’m really at a point where I just don’t know what to do with my theories anymore Like サンタ’s sister probably got killed in the first nonary game, so maybe he’s ゼロ? That’d be a time for sure, it definitely seems like ゼロ is part of the group in classic spike chunsoft style, but also maybe ゼロ isn’t quite the villain we thought? I can see how most of the participants could be connected to those events and might deserve what’s coming to them, but like… 淳平(じゅんぺい)? 紫(むらさき)? Idk what they could possibly have to do with it so

On a lighter note, 淳平(じゅんぺい) was very relatable trying to remember this code:

At this rate I’m aiming to finish up the first game by the end of spring break, so that’s exciting! Time to play some more lmao

Words!

試行錯誤(しこうさくご) - trial and error
空恐(そらおそ)ろしい - having vague fears
野(の)ざらし - weather-beaten
突(つ)き止(と)める - to determine (a culprit), to pin down
天誅(てんちゅう) - divine punishment, well-deserved punishment
でっち上(あ)げ - fabrication, hoax

@windupbird

But I feel like I’m really beginning to understand that just because I could theoretically be doing something more doesn’t mean I’m obligated to do it if it’s not what I want to be doing more.

That’s a really good way to think about it! I definitely feel you, it’s so easy to get lost in your own head and the sense of not doing “enough” to the point where you lose track of how much you’ve already accomplished. Hobby perfectionism is a constant battle, but awareness is the best way to fight it off (also happy birthday?? )

But yeah everyone here has accomplished so much! Even if it doesn’t always feel like it, making an effort and participating in things like this in any capacity is something to be proud of, regardless of how much that may be. I’m very glad to have been able to read and grow with all of you, and I hope we can continue to do so at any pace

[lucylavelle]

Day 74!

Chapter 31 of Yotsuba today - It was about stargazing so I got to learn the names of several constellations.
I wish I had an english copy to see how they translated one of the jokes!

On page 102 Miura-chan says 星座 (せいざ) but Yotsuba thinks she says 正座 (also せいざ) and kneels down. I can’t imagine how they made that make sense in a translation!

(Home Post)

[natarin]

March 15 Home Post

I played more 999 today! It’s basically my entire brain right now, really any free time I have I’m like “zero escape??” so that’s fun I finished up the route from yesterday and started in on another one, so good progress all around.

999 things!

The Zero Lost ending didn’t mess around, the body count of that ending?? My god, so much went wrong in so many ways, and I still don’t have any real answers But I got credits?? That threw me a little, since I still have more endings to get, but it’s being a little coy:

I don’t know, is it? I sure don’t think so, considering I’m still playing lmao.

Sometimes Zero Escape is just goofy (despite everything), 淳平(じゅんぺい) and 紫(むらさき) were talking about taking the elevator to the bottom deck and 紫(むらさき) was scared, and this time I picked the option to be like “oh it’s because you’ll be alone in an elevator with a guy right?” and that spurred just an absolute nightmare of a conversation with 淳平(じゅんぺい) misinterpreting everything 紫(むらさき) said as sexual while she’s just genuinely scared of it being flooded, absolute hot mess of a miscommunication

I think at this point my best guess is that サンタ is ゼロ, he was unaccounted for in the last ending when ゼロ was talking and he would seem to have motive so that makes the black and white Santa conversation hit differently though, ouch

I wanna play more but alas I have work in the morning, so tomorrow it is

Cool words

死(し)に損(ぞこ)ない - person who has escaped death
この期(ご)に及(およ)んで - at the last moment, this late in the game
命乞(いのちご)い - begging for one’s life (man you can tell it wasn’t messing around from these words huh)
道(みち)を誤(あやま)る - to be misguided, to be led on the wrong path
陰謀説(いんぼうせつ) - conspiracy theory

[windupbird]

@pocketcat

When people ask me why I’m learning Japanese my standard response lately is, “for shits and giggles”, because really I don’t have any real need to learn the language.

Lol I feel this, like…because it seemed fun? I was bored? And there’s a very weird part of me that gets joy from decoding foreign scripts? lol

@chrisosaurus

Semi-recently I looked at my Japanese and got really self-critical about my lack of speaking ability, I felt crappy because I’ve been working so hard on my Japanese and yet I couldn’t hold a basic conversation.

@chrisosaurus

I hadn’t spent anytime working on speaking, as that wasn’t something I wanted to focus on, and yet my inner critique came at me.

Ohhhhhhh god don’t even get me started on speaking!!! Big same!!! So much same!

I got started

I have been to Japan 3 times but I literally can’t say a word ><
(Anxiety + lack of practice is a killing combo)
My reading is miles ahead of my listening which is mini-miles ahead of my speaking, which makes me feel weird and lopsided as a person sometimes. But it’s like, obviously, I don’t work on speaking, so why would I be good at it lol. I haven’t made that my priority, and that’s my choice to do. I mean, I do want to get better someday, I want to travel there again and really be able to speak because having been there 3 times without being able to talk beyond ありがとうございます is sort of embarrassing (but at the same time those trips were some of the best moments of my life, sooo…there’s that thing I was saying about no one way to have a good experience again haha). But that next trip is obviously not happening in the near future and I really have no need for speaking otherwise, so I’m not motivated to focus on it. And it’s ok to not have that be the priority right now.

@chrisosaurus

Even if I stop before reaching some ‘finished’ state, my time wasn’t wasted, and I am not a failure.

Best mindset. I need to put this on a plaque or something, I think.

@chrisosaurus

In the long run, whatever I can stick to will give results (fun > efficiency).

This too…for those times when I feel like a failure because I don’t ever crack open a grammar book and legitimately study But reading is a form of learning too. And it’s the form I’ll actually do xD Is it efficient, not at all, but I don’t need (or necessarily even want) it to be efficient if I’m enjoying the process.

@chrisosaurus

Sorry for long replies, no expectations they’ll actually be read

Omg no do not apologize, I am the queen of long posts I always read them

@chrisosaurus

I’d been meaning to ask @windupbird as they also mentioned time. Do you track time using a simple timer or … ?

Yep, I’m pretty simple I just use the stopwatch function on my phone and write down the times when I stop. I like tracking time because I’m very much oblivious to time otherwise, so it helps me see more of what I’m doing, if that makes sense? haha. Like I’ll be like, oh, I just read 4 pages, that’s not very much, but then when I look at it from a perspective of time spent, it feels more reflective of the effort that I made.

@fustian_garb

I have absolutely not been keeping up with my daily book since the challenge ended

Oh good, I’m not the only one xD I agree, I think knowing that it’s time-limited makes it easier to complete or stick to somehow.

@Zakarius

Happy birthday!!

@natarin

(also happy birthday?? )

Thank you!!

[pocketcat]

@natarin

死(し)に損(ぞこ)ない - person who has escaped death

"Let's talk about words!

Hadn’t seen this phrase before so at a glace I read this more literally as “failing to die” 損なう in my dictionary has several entries but notably:

③（動詞の連用形に付いて）㋐…するのに失敗する。「ボールをとり―・う」「書き―・う」
㋑もう少しで…しそうになる。「死に―・うところだった」「おぼれ―・う」

But it also suggests that it can mean someone is about to die Which brings me to the dictionary entry for the phrase as a whole:

①死ぬべき場で死ねなかったこと。死のうとして死ねなかったこと。また，その人。
②老人をののしっていう語。

Which, oof. Mean! 老人をののしっていう語。= talking shit about an old person

Also 命乞いのちごい reminds me of 命拾い which is actually a similar meaning to 死に損ない but my dictionary phrases this as “getting out a dangerous situation without losing your life” (paraphrasing) but the latter is more like “not dying when you should have”.

[Axazel]

Woah!! Thanks for sharing your research process

[lucylavelle]

@pocketcat

When people ask me why I’m learning Japanese my standard response lately is, “for shits and giggles”,

I’m really pleased to hear that there are several other people here who aren’t actually exactly sure why they are learning Japanese.
Given that my reason is a kind of fuzzy “Teenage me thought it would be cool but lacked the resources, so adult me decided to go for it.”

[rikaiwisdom]

I think my post would get very large if I quote everything that I resonated with in this last conversation you all were having, but I really enjoyed reading it, thank you .

Very long rambling

I’m also someone that doesn’t really have a reason to learn Japanese either. In fact it’s something I was struggling with from time to time, especially when I’m not being as productive and all the intrusive thoughts about “why are you learning this in the first place” start coming for days. It’s weird because I can’t really give one specific reason why I’m doing this, I just resort to “it just keeps happening”. A big part of my interests since I was a kid belonged to Japanese culture, fell into the Japanese bubble of influence one way or another, or has an established and/or important scene in Japan; it’s just something that keeps coming back over and over, it’s constantly there. And when you spend a significant portion of time surrounded by another culture, at some point I think it’s natural that you drift towards learning its language. Probably not the best analogy but I see it like someone that really likes music, listens to music constantly, goes to concerts frequently… I think there’s a high chance that they look into learning an instrument themselves at some point. Of course there are many people who are very very into music that never do, and many people who are very into another culture who never learn its language, that’s completely fine.

There are so many of us that are learning “just because”. I think it can be something counterproductive at times because having a goal might give a specific direction or plan, hold your hand for a while. But at the same time I think that it’s not a bad way to learn at all. The sense of curiosity alone is big enough to ensure that you keep going, however slow or fast. I can’t know for sure because you never know with these things, but I have the conviction that I will never quit learning Japanese precisely because of that. The overall curiosity and interest is enough to push me forward, sometimes it’s very slow and sometimes it’s very fast. And it’s certainly more enjoyable, I feel.

Now, of course playing piano for 15 minutes a day and without a very defined plan won’t make you a concert pianist, in the same way that a short Japanese video on YouTube a day won’t make you an interpreter at a UN council, but I think it’s important to make the distinction between things you do professionally and things you do purely for fun, as hobbies. Sometimes you really like a hobby and you are naturally moved towards making it your career, sometimes you really like it but don’t really want to dedicate your life to it, other times it’s just something you do for some minutes in your spare time, and so on. I feel like there’s a huge spectrum of possibilities and that different hobbies mean different things for everyone. Whenever I see a heated online discussion, even more so in Japanese language forums, about what “you should be doing”, I can’t help it but think that there’s a lot of self-projection going on and pushing someone’s conception of that thing onto another’s. There are better methods than others, of course, and that’s worth discussing, but what Japanese (or any hobby) means to someone isn’t necessarily what it means for another person, and even more so when our perception and conception of things changes constantly.

This is a long way to say that I think it’s fine to let things configure themselves naturally, when there’s so much to take care of in life and that influences us every single day. There’s work, studies, physical and mental health, social relationships, a big etc. I don’t think it’s productive to bring shame and guilt into learning something. Sometimes you just have to take care of yourself, there will be a time when you can come back and bring 300% into it and go much much faster. I know I had periods of time when my productivity learning Japanese was huge, especially the early years when I was in a better spot mentally. But right now I have to take care of myself, and I sometimes can’t put that much effort because it takes a toll on me, so I need to go slower for now, and that’s perfectly fine too. And of course, it’s important to acknowledge the fact that time spent on something is time not spent on something else. People who pour all their time into Japanese are going to be really good earlier, but will need to sacrifice something in the process. And in the same way, people who don’t pour all their time into Japanese are not necessarily doing worse, they are just prioritising other things that they will have instead. Time is a precious resource and everyone gets to decide how to invest it best.

So in my eyes we all are doing great, everyone is moving forward at their own pace in their own very unique circumstances. I think it’s natural to compare ourselves to others from time to time, I know I do, but I think it’s also important to understand that we all come from very different backgrounds; what would fit perfectly for me could be horrible for another one of you or vice versa. That’s probably why I really like the nature of this thread, because there’s no pressure to follow one specific course but yours alone, and still have fun sharing with other people meanwhile.

[pocketcat]

@rikaiwisdom

Whenever I see a heated online discussion, even more so in Japanese language forums, about what “you should be doing”, I can’t help it but think that there’s a lot of self-projection going on and pushing someone’s conception of that thing onto another’s.

100% agree with this. I have avoided most JP learning communities I’ve come across due to the toxicity. I do this in my off hours - good vibes only.

@rikaiwisdom

but I think it’s important to make the distinction between things you do professionally and things you do purely for fun, as hobbies.

Also huge agreement here. I’ve been asked on multiple occasions if I intend to move to Japan. Like, sure, maybe, if an absolutely golden opportunity presented itself. But as it stands I’m paid better and have a pretty awesome work-life balance where I am now and I know it. Doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy and appreciate from afar, with visits when I’m able. There’s a chance some translation work relating to my specific field might come up, and sure, I’d be open to that, but mostly I just want to read my books and watch my TV shows and go down weird rabbit holes on the Japanese internet.

[fustian_garb]

@lucylavelle

I wish I had an english copy to see how they translated one of the jokes!

My favourite manga is finally getting an english version and I’m going to buy copies for my friends and have a sneaky look first at how they translated some of the many puns in it.

I also feel a bit cheated that it’s coming out in English because it was always like, this is the thing that I could never have had if I hadn’t learnt japanese!

[natarin]

Yay I like words

Noooo leave the 老人(ろうじん) alone That all makes sense! One of those things with a whole range of meanings depending on context, but it’d probably be pretty clear whether said person is actually dying or not haha.

@pocketcat

“getting out a dangerous situation without losing your life” (paraphrasing) but the latter is more like “not dying when you should have”.

Considering the situation in which 死(し)に損(ぞこ)ない was used, that makes sense ニルス had absolutely no right still being alive with I think six bullets in him?? wild

[lucylavelle]

Day 75!

Chapter 32 of Yotsuba today. Yotsuba was so cute in her raincoat
I actually read a little bit in to the next chapter too, since there were a few pages between the end of chapter 32 page and the chapter 33 splash page!

(Home Post)

[natarin]

March 16 Home Post

Played some more 999! I’m most of the way through another route, though it seems like the ending might be on the longer side? Idk, we shall see

999 things

Yayyy 四葉(よつば)'s been less angsty this playthrough which is good for my heart; it seems like my instincts about the background with her and ニルス and サンタ were mostly right, but that raises a lot of questions. I’m not super good with ages but instinctively I thought ニルス and サンタ were probably a little younger than 淳平(じゅんぺい) and 紫(むらさき), but it seems like that’s not the case?? I mean if they were both involved with the nonary game 9 years ago I would think they’d need to be a bit older, especially considering サンタ’s little sister was also theoretically involved. So… idk

Also very concerned about them not showing what サンタ’s sister looked like or saying what her name was yet, feels like that’s gonna be really important My crackpot theory is that 紫(むらさき) is his little sister for some reasons that make sense in my brain at least, but I don’t know if it’s gonna go there It’s 999 though, wouldn’t be surprised. But like 四葉(よつば) got cut off before she could say the name of the girl who died (who is theoretically サンタ’s sister in my mind), and I feel like the only way that would make sense is if she was gonna say 茜(あかね)? Like he doesn’t know anyone else’s names so

I’m still having tons of fun with it, my goal is in sight

Wordsss

からかう - to ridicule, to tease (ah like the manga girl)
見(み)せかける - to pretend, to feign
威風堂々(いふうどうどう) - being majestic, with great pomp and circumstance

[Axazel]

I’m too excited to wait for the intermediate book club to start, and for the next round of read everyday Spring…

So I started reading 透明カメレオン!

It’s really weird to be able to read 90% of the words, but not understand what’s being said. My husband said it’s because there are a lot of expressions. For example: 背中越せなかごし which literally translates to “beyond (one’s) back”, but in context reads more like “without having to look” or “with (one’s) back turned”. It doesn’t come up in the dictionary either, which didn’t help!

The full context for those that care

「ありがとうございました」ました、の部分だけ声が遠いのは、言い切る前にそっぽを向いたからに違いない。僕ほどの経験者になると、背中越しでもわかる。

Ah yes, the love and pain of reading

[lucylavelle]

Day 76!

Chapter 33 of Yotsuba today - cute and fun as always!
I really want to get back to player Pokemon Legends Arceus - but the evening keeps disappearing somehow…
Hopefully I’ll get a bit of time over the weekend!

(Home Post)

[natarin]

March 17 Home Post

It’s late so not a long post, but surprise surprise I played more 999! This route is definitely long, but man a lot is happening. Can’t wait to continue tomorrow

[Thud]

Main Post

Finished the last chapter of Gal & Dino volume 1. Cute, funny and wholesome. Took lots of screenshots and sharing some more today.

Volume 1 ch10-15

The extra stuff in the back was also pretty nice to read. In the end it is a pretty low effort manga I could read without worry. For the next manga I think it would have to be tanuki vol 3.

[lucylavelle]

Day 77!

I read Chapter 34 of Yotsuba today, which means I finished Volume 5. It was a lovely chapter to end the volume on I think, especially with the final page being everyone falling asleep on the train.

I learned the word for Hermit Crab - やどかり - which also means “renting a house” which I think is kind of cute!

(Home Post)

[natarin]

March 18 Home Post

I keep posting so late but my reading has been far more consistent than my posts so that’s something! 999 continues to be a truly wild ride, though I’m not sure I’ll actually finish by the end of spring break since the endings just seem to keep getting longer but that’s okay!

999 thoughts

This ending has been real information-heavy, but man I still have so many questions. It turns out my crackpot theory might not be so crackpot actually The girl who died in the first nonary game was in fact named 茜(あかね), which super can’t be a coincidence. Especially considering whatever like freezing-sickness she has going on, it definitely seems like something’s up.

There’s also been a lot of talk about サンタ potentially being ゼロ and certain people’s numbers being different than we thought, which would explain some things but wow it would have so many ramifications, I’m not sure they could all be accounted for. And honestly my primary suspect at this point was サンタ, but people talking about it when it seems like there’s so much game left makes me think that might not be the case. So idk

Regardless I am completely fascinated and like all I wanna do is play so I can find out what’s going on Zero Escape is powerful

[lucylavelle]

Day 78!

I’m taking advantage of having some free time today to do extra reading
So today I read the first half of Chapter 2 of Happiness, as thats the ABBC assignment for this week, and then also read Chapter 6 of Volume 5 of Teasing Master Takagi-san.

Today I found that I was able to read a lot of stuff quite smoothly, with only a few cases of needing to look things up, or stop to decode a bit of grammar.
Its nice to have these moments of really feeling like I’ve made progress.

Though now I’m going to go and play some Pokemon Legends: Arceus.
…which will definitely involve plenty of vocab lookups and failing to understand grammar

(Home Post)