Start KaniWani/KameSame when I started burning kanjis?
Attend language exchange regularly?
Participate on HelloTalk Voice Room?
N3 December?
Background
2015年
Long long time ago, L chance upon a friend who happens to speak Japanese. L has been into anime and jodramas for sometime quite a while but learning the language has never crossed her mind. The acquaintance showed off his Japanese skills, and L was super impressed. From then on she thought if the friend can do it, she can also do it! Off she started taking a Japanese language course which was held every Saturday.
JLPT N5 - December 2015
JLPT N4 - July 2016
End of 2016年
She moved overseas to pursue a career growth. Life went on, L has stopped learning the language. Who would have known fast-forward in about 8 years later, stopping her language study would breed into some regrets.
2023年10月
She embarked on an 18 days Japan trip with a JR pass in her wallet, and went here and there. She stayed on hotels, capsule hotels, and did a short homestay with a Japanese elderly couple. As someone who always plugs in an earphone whenever outside, the earphone remained at the corner of her bag throughout the trip. Everyday, she hears and sees Japanese. Everywhere. She conversed with people in Japanese, tried her best to ask around in Japanese. It was a wonderful chapter of her life.
2024年1月
Listed on her new year resolution list - Continue Japanese Study.
Thankfully, hiragana and katakana’s are still intact, problems arise as she couldn’t remember most of her N4 kanjis anymore. Thus the WaniKani journey begins.
Uh-huh. So much for having a study log when nothing was being logged! Self-pity party aside, here’s a rough update log:
What
How
Type
Dates
Remarks
Kanji
WaniKani
SRS
January 2024 - present
Current level 22
Grammar
TRY! N3
Book
April 2024
Dropping this. The practices are mostly connecting the dots, putting two and two together like joining puzzle pieces together. What’s lacking is not asking me to compose own sentences. Might be good for exam but not for the end goal. Dropping for now
Grammar
Quarter 1
Book / ToKini Andy YT
June 14, 2024 - present
Picking this up, waiting for the books to arrive. Meanwhile watching ToKini Andy YT. Total 6 chapters, can you do 1 per two weeks??
Vocabulary
Anki
Online
April 2024
Dropping this. Not the most disciplined person so creating own deck from the words encountered in the wild proved to be difficult. Need a better way of doing this - look at Torri or iKnow or Kitsun for the core decks. For the favourite phrases (not words) from the wild, can put on notes for now and will add on whichever srs platform later
Vocab
???
SRS
-
???
Speaking/Listening
JP-EN language exchange
In-Person
once in blue moon since 2022
Zero attendance. I did attempted to attend one from meetup.com. However, upon arriving on the venue, mostly guys were present so I chickened out. I entered the next door Korean restaurant instead, I had the おすすめ Sundae Gukbap which I never had tried in my life and it was super.
Updating my almost non-existent study log. Yes, I failed to update the study log for months but I was studying nonetheless. Heh, excuses
September - November 2024
Stopped WK altogether, shifted focus and allotted more time for N3 vocab and grammar
Vocab - subscribed to Kitsun.io, and completed the N3 vocab stack (I hibernated those I know already which was quite a lot also thanks to WK)
Grammar - completed the Try! N3 book, Quartet 1 TokiniAndy, watched those lengthy N3 all grammar summary videos at YT
Reading - wasn’t able to read any materials aside from the N3
Speaking/Listening - attended quite a few Japanese-English Language Exchange events on Meetup.com. Made a few friends that I hang out with from time to time. We’re even going on a trip to Hokkaido next Feb. Having friends with same interests and speaking the same language kept me motivated in my study
1 week Fukuoka & Nagasaki Trip last October - I was able to read a lot of Kanjis and tried to speak only Japanese throughout the whole trip. Nagasaki is so beautiful, not very crowded, and they all spoke to me in Japanese so I’m very grateful (nobody also 上手’d me). Nagasaki is also a tourist destination but I guess they just prefer to speak Japanese. I want to visit a non touristy place next time (if anyone even reads this and you have recommendation, please let me know!)
December 1, 2024
Sat for JLPT N3
Vocab and Kanji Section - it was very good. I really think I owe it to WK for the Kanji part, I mean I don’t even know the word sometimes but I can deduce its reading and meaning.
Grammar and Reading - it was very tiring, the longest section, but it felt good and was able to comprehend. I got extra time to review some of my answers too.
Listening - I was half guessing the first part, I lost all the confidence I got from the first two sections. I should have focused more on taking listening mock exams.
Do I think I’ll pass? I shutdown all my thoughts and just wait for the results to come out
What’s next?
Resume WK and clear up the backlogs, I was late on turning on the Vacation Mode and I think I have about few hundreds in reviews. Why? It really helped me on my Kanji, and knowing your Kanji before your vocab than knowing the Kanji within the vocab - personally felt more comfortable to me. When I was doing Kitsun the N3 vocab decks, I saw a lot of Kanji that I don’t know, it takes a while to stick those Kanji with me, and I forgot them after a while too. Focusing on the vocab without knowing some of the kanji - you don’t get to know much of its radicals as much. With that said, I want to continue WK to build a strong Kanji foundation
Enjoy the journey. N2 July? I’m not sure yet. For now, I just want to watch a bunch of good jdramas, animes. Read some mangas. Go on a trip again to Japan.
Self-pity party aside, here’s a rough update log:
