Had this in my drafts and failed to finish the post that night. I guess it still counts though. I overestimated myself and couldn’t do any of the challenges while I was home. Back now and will post one for the 22nd a bit later!
There were many meetings today to choose a theme for a new event.
First, I spoke with one designer and a senior artist.
There were many suggestions for the theme.
Then there was a meeting with all the artists and all the designers.
One designer explained the various themes to everyone, and everyone exchanged ideas.
Then they chose some of their favorite themes.
Finally, there was a meeting with one designer, a senior artist, and the bosses of the artists.
The designer gave a presentation of some of the teams favourite themes and the bosses gave their opinions.
Finally, a theme was chosen.
That’s a relief!
I have a holiday day tomorrow, so I am happy.
But I had to finish a lot of work so I worked a bit of overtime today to get it done.
So tonight I was really tired and fell asleep while I was studying.
I had a nice bean burger for dinner.
Then I also had a jam roly-poly.
Jam roly-poly is one of my favourite desserts.
@alygator おかえり!My mind can be slow, too, so you’re not alone. 延長する would be extend. (Not sure if you didn’t know the word for it or had a brain fart. Heaven knows all the times I’ve had them.) @lucylavelle 作家は皆、「書くのが下手だ」と思うでしょう。私もそういうことよく思いますが、上手になりたいのなら、かけなくちゃなりませんね。時間があれば、ぜひ書きます!
I think it was a combination of both! Hahaha. Thanks for the help! I didn’t know the word for extend and I just couldn’t get myself to think of how to say that sentence with my limited grammar. So I ended up giving up midway!
Regarding your last question, the topic is kind of niche so it’s hard to come by jobs that are related in Japan that doesn’t require Japanese. The one I applied to a month ago wasn’t in Japan unfortunately. My other option is studying again like a masters degree or doctorate here… But I haven’t really thought about that route yet. Not that keen to study again.
Today was a day off, so I relaxed.
I had a lesson with my teacher this morning.
We practised listening comprehension and practised how to use ‘〜うちに’.
We also had fun conversations.
I love our weekly lessons.
Tomorrow I’m going to a town where I used to live.
My daughter is going to a birthday party there for a childhood friend.
While she is at the party, I will do an escape room with my husband and go to a restaurant we used to go to often.
I’m looking forward to it.
I was on a trip with my husband this weekend, so while I did manage to write on both days, I didn’t manage to post an update yesterday so I’m doing a double one today!
Today my daughter wanted to go to a birthday party for her childhood friend so we went to Oxfordshire.
Seeing the town we used to live in was nostalgic. (Pretty sure I’ve butchered this line )
Then my husband and I went to Swindon.
We went to eat at a restaurant called Chopsticks.
Then we had some nice waffles and did some shopping.
After that we did an escape room.
It was a bit scary because the theme was a haunted house.
But it was really fun.
I thought the different puzzles were really interesting.
We escaped when there were only 45 seconds remaining.
In the evening, we swam in the pool at the hotel.
I enjoyed it because I haven’t been swimming for a long time.
Today I went to Taco Bell for the first time.
I chose the crispy chicken burrito.
My husband had the Volcano Burrito.
And we both had cinnamon twists.
Afterwards, we went shopping.
I bought new shoes, a daisy print dress and T-shirts.
In the afternoon we went to the town where we used to live.
We went to see our old house and went to the Folly Tower.
We saw the statues of the rabbit, mole, squirrel and troll and enjoyed the view.
I relaxed today.
I went to the Royal Horse with my husband.
I had the halloumi sizzler.
My husband had a Korean BBQ burger and shared it with me.
I finished watching a TV programme called Severance in the afternoon.
I think it’s a really interesting story but the end is a cliffhanger so that was a bit disappointing.
I hope the next series is also good.
Fell behind on my posts, but I’m going to try to end on a (somewhat) strong note! My first entry was written over two days; I wrote one sentence before passing out for the night () and finished it the following day.
With today marking the last day of both the month and this challenge, I thought I’d reassess where the challenge goes from here. I’m still interested in hosting it, but I also want to keep improving it. This time I switched up the scheduling, and I’d love to hear from others how they felt about that. So, if you have the time, please consider voting in the following polls.
Scheduling
When should the output challenge take place and for how long?
Keep it a two month challenge in line with the others (reading/listening)
Go back to being in the off-months of other challenges
Try a different schedule (ex. every other month, regardless of other challenges)
0voters
Improvements
What changes would you like to see from future challenges?
A list of mini challenges I can freely choose from
Daily prompts so I don’t have to choose what to speak/write about
Other ideas (leave a comment with suggestion)
I don’t think changes are necessary
0voters
Thank you so much for the feedback! I hope to see you in the next output challenge!
Last day of the challenge already! Despite February being short every year, it always manages to surprise me somehow.
I managed to write every day, and stuck to my usual routine of 1-2 lessons per week to practise speaking, so I think I can count this challenge as a success!
Big thanks to everyone who took part, especially @softlyraining and @alygator I hope to see you both again for the next challenge!
Next challenge thoughts
I haven’t voted in the polls yet because I’m not sure what my answers are.
As far as scheduling goes, I’m going to carry on joining in whatever gets decided so I don’t want to end up swaying the vote!
I think I have a slight preference for it being in the off-months of the other challenges, because I usually carry on with the read every day challenge throughout the off months, but take a break from doing daily posts for the listen every day challenge - so doing this challenge on the off-months meant I was always doing 2 challenges at any given time rather than 3 for two months and then only reading for the off months.
But this is very flimsy reasoning I’m really happy to go with the flow so whatever gets decided, I’ll be happy.
Re: Improvements - I really like the idea of daily prompts, but I would probably mostly stick to writing my diary entries and only occasionally join in with a prompt if one really caught my interest.
Some people are less willing to be boring and announce that they went to work and had dinner every day than I am so I think it might be helpful for people who struggle to think of a topic, or are only just getting started with doing regular output to have a prompt, or some mini-challenges to help them.
Well, I certainly had my days where I did the bare minimum, but I still somehow spoke or wrote every day these last two months! My coursework kept me so busy, and frankly I wasn’t sure if I could pull it off. I’m happy I pushed through!
Thank you so much to all who participated, including @lucylavelle and @alygator. It’s always a treat to read your posts. I hope you’ll stick around for the next challenge (whenever that may be)!
Replies
@lucylavelle Thank you so much for your thoughts! I admit, doing all three challenges was incredibly tough for me. At first I posted in all three pretty regularly, but by the end of January or so I really only posted my updates here. I’ll of course wait and see if anyone votes in the polls or responds before making a decision, but I’m glad you’re on board either way! I’ll get to work on a prompt list (which would honestly be a help to myself, anyway). Your posts aren’t boring! I learned the word for dental hygienist in your last one.
Thanks to 5-min freestyle recordings I have done at the end of last year, then now Anki quiz on listening (vocab + sentence) to handwriting; writing in Hobonichi everyday is now doable. I simply wrote whatever I thought about at the particular time, and dropping down to Kana if I have to.
Nonetheless, I didn’t write about a topic, or focused writing. Actually, electronic writing altogether, so I have nothing to be checked by online persons.
I also missed conversations and chats.
Practically, I also wrote some very short book reviews, so that might be a real world use of production skills. I haven’t really participated in Japanese social media. Anyway, correctness and comprehensibility would need to be improved.
Thanks for pointing that out! Changing the poll type reset the results, but I made a note of your preference.
The bare minimum is still something! I agree with you about book reviews: I try to write a mini-review on bookmeter whenever I finish something, even if it’s a simple comment. Improving one’s abilities for that would likely make for a more engaging experience on the site, so it’s a nice goal to aim for.
Glad you were able to get in some regular practice during the challenge!
Hello folks! I’m sorry I haven’t been able to update since last week.
Although I did quite well for January (29/31), my real life and mental condition got in the way in February (15/28). See home post here.
I just wanted to say this was a really good exercise for me to have some sort of output everyday (or at least attempt to do that). I think a gained a lot more confidence in applying the kanji and grammar I’ve been learning from WK, Bunpro and Minna no Nihongo because of this.
And of course, I really enjoyed reading (and sometimes listening) to outputs from @lucylavelle and @softlyraining . Thank you for the company throughout this challenge and I’m sorry I was missing in action almost half of the time in February!
I would still like to join the next challenges! I did vote in the polls but honestly like @lucylavelle . I will just go with the flow with whatever gets decided! I will be in a major life transition as I take a break from work while looking for other opportunities so I’m hoping I will have more time.
Hi, everyone! With the start of challenge season just around the corner, I wanted to give an update for the next output challenge.
While the winter challenge pushed me to consistently output in Japanese more than I had in some time, my engagement in the concurrent reading and listening challenges fell to zero. Since the regulars here seem pretty flexible, I’ve decided to start this challenge back up again in June, after the other two challenges reach their designated ends. This also will give me time to put together some changes for the June challenge (March was considerably hectic for me).
Thank you for continuing to follow along during all of this experimentation! I look forward to continuing this challenge with everyone in a few months!