📚📚 Read every day challenge - Summer 2021 🏖🏖

Temps are in the 90Fs here already… :sob:


Reading log

Didn’t read yesterday since I ended up going to bed early. These 530 am meetings are a killer. Also the bookwalker app continues to frustrate me, which finally prompted me to get 銭天堂3 and コンビニ人間 on kindle. Accidently read the first few pages of コンビニ and enjoyed it, but I promised myself to finish the book I’m reading first so I might put in some extra time this weekend and just finish it.

Almost done with my year long wk backlog as well. 200 items to go! That should free up some time.

11 Likes

A few more pages of Sailor Moon volume 3 read (kanzenban version btw). I don’t try for full comprehension on this manga and I’m glad for that because whenever the bad guys speak there are so many words that I don’t know. A bit too many to really make it worth it to me to look up.

So had a few pages were I didn’t understand as much, but I’ve also noticed mostly what the bad guys are saying in detail isn’t so important. The gist is good enough.

12 Likes

Today I read a whole chapter for the first time! I decided to read the first volume of ひげを剃る。そして女子高生を拾う。(manga) without looking any words up when I read it the first time. Since I’m watching the anime as well I could still pick up the main plots of the story, even though I could not understand most words. The second time I go through the volume, I will go through every sentence and write down the words I don’t know and learn them by using Anki. The third time (and onwards) I will try to read the text and hope I understand everything and then I move on to the next volume.

So far this method is working great for me. I learnt 味噌汁 is miso soup based on the furigana and knowing the kanji for soup (汁)! I also learnt that 美味しい is tasty through the furigana ^^

I hope I can at least read another chapter this weekend. Just reading through it without having to look up all the words is really helping my reading pace for hiragana and certain words made of kanji that I came across a lot, such as 女子高生.

12 Likes

Today I’ve found novelgame.jp where you can play short VNs in browser.(There is also downloadable version of games)
人ひとりを救うチカラ is like danganronpa reversed: you decide who lives and endings come with a twist.

Yes, it’s a short manga about Flan trying to befriend Marisa.

6 Likes

aaaaand today was one of those “omg reading Japanese is so hard” days. Read the next chapter of ボ−イズ and while last chapter it felt like I was getting almost everything and just having fun, this chapter felt like a slog and there was a whole dialogue where I was really foggy on what was going on. As I was getting near the end of the chapter I could really feel myself getting mentally exhausted by trying to understand. It’s frustrating! This is definitely the thing that I’m reading at the moment that I find hardest, and I’d thought earlier that it probably made sense to stick to one chapter a week because of this. But it’s also probably the thing I’m reading that I’m most invested in and that makes me want to read it every day! But maybe Friday night after a stressful work week is the time for something easier haha…

11 Likes

Summary post

June 11 Set a new personal record. Getting up early proved to be a good decision

・Read 100 pages of SAO 7. page 30 → 130. I’m pleasantly surprised to say the least

I think part of the reason it went slow the previous two days is because I had totally forgotten how much N2/N1 grammar there are in the SAO books. And tons of vocab unknown to me. But getting used to that and not looking up every single word I don’t know, I’m doing some nice progress. Definitely not my “deep-read” book, meaning I’m going for speed and won’t add the words I don’t know to SRS them. That would take too long and I’m going to encounter those words again sooner or later anyway. I can’t remember everything, but I’m still learning a lot :3

All the advanced grammar is making me wonder how I much I actually understood from SAO 1, which was the second book I completed (after Hyouka) :thinking: Feels weird to compare SAO 1 and 7 - I spent 3-4 months on the first, and at this rate I’ll finish 7 in less than a week. That feels pretty wild xD

・Read 5% of Honzuki 5. 10% ->15%

・Read 12 pages of Urara Meirochou 2. page 33 → 44. The lack of furigana in this manga is making look-ups very slow, and there’s lots of unusual kanji being used whose readings I don’t know. (Also because it’s a 4koma manga, those seem to take forever to complete for some reason.)

Even particles are occasionally written with kanji

image

(まで)


@Naphthalene I think I’ve found my 多岐 strategy xD I can’t focus on just one series, so at this point I’m intentionally reading several different books/manga at the same time so I can switch between them for a change of pace.

12 Likes

2021-06-11

Started reading 蜘蛛ですが、なにか?5
Getting used to the style. The language seems quite conversational, very unlike 氷菓 that flaunted literary language sprinkled with traditional proverbs natives themselves would have to look up.

Overall it seems far more pleasant to read. And the fact that I’m into the story also helps :wink:

Well today I only read 3 pages in 30 minutes but I was taking my time. I feel I’ll be reading it much faster soon.

9 Likes

11.6.
Today I read some more if リセロ 17, finishing up chapter 2. Loving all the pictures, as always. Lots of drama, too.
On a completely bookclub-unrelated note, I also read a couple pages of 使ってはいけない日本語 (I’m always surprised a new how smooth a real that it. When I’m not reading it my brain convinces itself that it’s dry and boring. I mean the author seems very conservative and proper and we probably wouldn’t get along… But the explanations are always short and too the point and pointed, and I like that.) And the last chapter of 世界一周とんでもグルメ, completing the book. It’s actually by the author of 銭天堂, which I probably chose the wrong kanji for. I understand why people liked it so much now.

I thought I’d read a bit more before bed, but… that’s just really not happening. :joy:

8 Likes

Wiki post

June 10 Update
I meant to update this yesterday but just managing to read took all my energy. I finished one chapter of Naruto and it took about an hour with keeping track of new vocab. Nothing too challenging.

June 11 Update
I powered through the remaining 5 chapters of volume 2 (of Naruto) today in like 3 hours. There were a couple of sentences that I struggled with especially when Kakashi and Sakura got to explaining complicated concepts, but otherwise it was a smooth read. I only looked up words I absolutely could not gather from context and had fun with the action scenes in between.

And, just like that, another volume done.

Where I am (New England) it was 95 F for 5 out of the last 7 days, so June is definitely summer, and it usually lasts until end of August or mid-September, depending on the year. End of September through early November is usually fall and the weather has cooled down significantly.

7 Likes

Main post

Day 11 :ballot_box_with_check:
Satori Reader: Kiki-Mimi Radio, Episode 16.


Another chill day.

8 Likes

Summary post

Day 11: June 11th
What did I read?: サメーズ -サメとアザラシ- :shark:
How much did I read?: 20 pages
How long did it take me?: 30-something minutes, probably (my dumb timer stopped)

Well, I was going to read something a little more substantial today. But.

Open for cute shark shenanigans

I learned a new kind of shark today.
猫鮫 (ねこざめ) - bullhead shark but literally it’s a cat shark and look at how it’s drawn in this manga

It’s a cat shark :sob: So cute
Also met this shark, his name is シュモク (as in 撞木鮫, I’m assuming) and he’s my favorite
chara_shumoku

He asks his friend to go to a trendy undersea pancake restaurant with him, and his friend low-key eats the waiter while he is trying to decide what to order, but they get their massive towers of pancakes eventually anyway and he posts a picture of them on Twitter where he has over 50,000 followers.
Why is this my favorite thing :joy:

What am I going to do when I am tired and I have no sharks to read :frowning: I only have like 40 more pages of this left…

11 Likes

June 11. Time: 30 min. Manga Pages: 2
What: Manga からかい上手の高木さん (Volume 1), current pick of ABBC. Chapter 7, Pages 8-9

9 Likes

Finished ABBC and BBC today.

I’ve also tried to find doujin Touhou manga online and it was a mistake. I’ve found several, all of them were NSFW. And gonna be honest, if you replace faces and clothing of the characters with faces and clothes of characters from any other franchise, no one will be any the wiser.

I will try finding doujins tomorrow, but this time enabling super strict SFW mode.

7 Likes

I didn’t have much time to read yesterday so I just read five pages of あさこ volume 1.

9 Likes

:ballot_box_with_check: Day 12

I read all of chapter 6 in カラフル! It was another short one. The plot was too good to stop and look up the words I didn’t know. When I go back and look some up, I’ll later update here with my favorites :laughing:

10 Likes

I have come here to read Japanese.

J :+1:
U :+1: :+1: :coffin: :birthday: :coffin: :coffin: :syringe:
N :coffin: :coffin: :coffin: :coffin: :boom: :rice_cracker: :horse:
E :horse: :horse: :horse: :scream_cat:
J :station: :japanese_castle: :speech_balloon:
U :sa: :volleyball: :school: :electric_plug: :smile_cat: :motorway: :sake:
L :bridge_at_night: :brick: :men_wrestling: :hotel: :racehorse: :orange_book: :baseball:
Y :baseball: :brain: :brain: :brain: :racehorse: :art: :bone:
:canada: :parking: :switzerland: :station: :bookmark_tabs: :pill: :shinto_shrine:
A
U :house_with_garden: :us: :stars: :small_airplane: :radio: :parking: :star2:
G :hospital: :crab: :dizzy_face: :mountain_snow: :crescent_moon: :cloud:

Reading shall commence now, sorry I’m late, I’ve added the missed days to the end.


|| CAPTAINS LOG :: JUNE ||

.☆:STARDATE:☆.

20210612

Read a random news article, I didn’t have much time to read, so I really probably should have started a different day but it had already been long enough that I had waited to join here - anyway, it was about some economic thing… I think, I barely understood it… sad times :frowning_face:

20210613

Read another news article - I swear I will get onto something a bit more substantial soon I swear :pray:
This was about how the virus is getting on and the numbers and with how vaccinations are going, I could only grasp the jist of it, alas the comms array is still not good :frowning_face:

20210614

Okay, so I’ve been wanting to read Berserk in Japanese, I didn’t think it would be that difficult to find, lots of sites have their manga online in Japanese (legal ones, of course). But Berserk… doesn’t seem to be anywhere, well maybe I could buy some physical ones in Japanese, um yeah they’re about as expensive as it is to get them in English (meaning, they’re pretty much nowhere to be found and very expensive) WHY MUST IT BE THIS WAY, WHY and those that I can find are like “Free postage but erm you pay the import duties” which basically means those charges are gonna be costly, made that mistake before… anyway, I am at a loss for now. I just wanna read incredibly violent and dark stories in Japanese goddammit. :sob: :sob:

BUT, I suppose there is a nice side to all this in that I’ve been browsing (and reading) a lot of Japanese on Japanese sites with not that much trouble - a lot of it has been in hiragana and katakana, but shhh it’s still reading Japanese.

20210615

The search for the illusive Japanese Berserk may have to be postponed, this is proving much more difficult then I had previously thought, BUT on my search I found… something.

覆面レスラー。。。

_人人 人人_
>.>棺桶<.<
 ̄Y^Y^Y^Y ̄

I’m probably finding this much more hilarious than I should, but this is wild.

A casket… for a head!? :joy: :joy: :joy:

On the plus side too I’m understanding a lot more than I thought, there’s only furigana on select kanji, but thankfully I’ve recognised most of the the non-furi kanji I’ve seen so far.

This is a very happy accident.

Progress: PAGE THREE.

20210616

Did I almost forget to read today? Yes, yes I did.
But it was my birthday today… :point_right: :point_left:

NO EXCUSE! YOU MUST READ THE JAPANESE

Okay, okay, I read one page of Casket Face!

PAGE PROGRESS: :four:

20210617

Managed one page only despite not being busy, took me forever… I’m seeing words that I know but somehow can’t read them, I’m tripping up on hiragana, it took me longer than I care to admit to realise that な wasn’t kanji, katakana is just… let’s not go there.

My brain does not want to work today.

Page progress: :six:

Wait… six from four is TWO, I’ve read TWO pages today…

Huh, guess I can’t number today either…

20210618

Is it possible to become more stupid?

Because that is what I have become. I have become more stupid.

My brain is nothing but DOODOOMUSH

Page Progress: :sparkles: :eight::sparkles:

It’s been a week already?? I seem to be getting worse at reading, not better :sob:

20210619

Somehow I added another week into the June checklist calendar and now I’ve had to set it all right… Let’s never mention my mistake again.

In other news, I had my 5G implantation vaccine today, and this thing obviously does have nanomachines in it because I have magically become more SMART.

I read six whole pages today… no, don’t mention that there’s little writing on any of the pages, let me be happy with myself… and I didn’t have to use a dictionary once, the kanji is now hard-wired into my little nanomachines buddies swimming round in my brain.

PAGE PROGRESS: :one: :four:

20210620

Ehhh, what’s this, me reading early??

Well it’s Dad-Day so I don’t think I’ll get time to read after I’ve gone to see my dad.

Maybe I’ll get some more reading in later today, maybe I won’t, but for now:

Pagey Progress: :one: :six:

20210621

Those nanomachines are still doing the good work, I managed to read one whole page (almost) fluently, as in, read without pausing to ponder what a word meant - it just flowed and I understood… What is this?! … actual comprehension?

Also finding that WaniKani search function is a hell of a lot easier to find kanji with than the Jisho one, maybe it’s just because I’m used to WK, but I never seem to be able to find the right radicals on Jisho.

Progress Page: :two: :one:

20210622

Bit busy so not had a load of time to read, but I managed to get a few pages in!

I had to look up one word that I thought I’d never seen before.

It’s on WaniKani.

I burnt it several months ago.

woops

Back in the review pile it goes!

Page Progress: :two: :four:

20210623

I’m gonna have to think of something to read next because I think I’ll have finished Casketman tomorrow.

My reading has gotten faster, which is promising! And I’ve learnt a few new words (as well as re-learn some old ones… my burn pile has shrunk a little :sweat_smile:)

Though… this isn’t exactly how I imagined I’d learn the word “出産中”…

Page Progress: :two: :seven:

20210624

Today is a sad day, and a happy day…

Sad because I have finished CasketHead and now I have no more masked wrestler ridiculousness.

Happy because I have finished CasketHead and have completed something, okay it was only 30 pages, with minimal writing… but there was some kanji I wasn’t expecting in there! Like - 教之, never thought I’d see これ written in kanji when I learnt it on here.

Last page progress for Casketman :cry: : :boom: :three: :zero: :boom:

Now, I just have to figure out what to read next :thinking:

20210625

… I haven’t found anything to read yet, BUT, I did end up reading the article on ウィキペディア about Senbei, because… well I don’t actually have a reason, it just sort of happened.

The only downside now is that I am hungry.

Very hungry.

20210626

I was gonna look up another Japanese food and read about it in Japanese and descend into the Japanese food wiki rabbit hole, but then I realised this would be a bad idea -

A - because it would mean I would get hungry
B - this would mean I would look for places to buy this food
C - this would be detrimental to my wallet

As tasty as the tasty food is I MUST RESIST.

But anyway, I instead clicked on random article, or おまかせ表示 as it’s called on JP-WP. And I… this is the article that came up: 中世の馬

SO yeah, I’ve been reading all about Medieval horses, because WHY NOT?

I haven’t read the whole thing (this page is BIG, medieval horses must be a popular subject), so I’ll probably try and read the rest tomorrow because horse… onward to the horse!
:horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse::horse:

Additional note: I somehow forget to update this here study thing earlier.

20210627

I read more about the horses.

I think I know more about medieval horses in Japanese now than I do in English. Not finished the page, but I’m not sure if I should continue or find something new (or you know, start an actual manga like I’ve been meaning to this whole time.)

I was curious about how do horses speak in Japanese…

Turns out it’s ヒヒーン ヒヒーン ヒヒーン.

_人人 人人 人人_
:horse: . ヒヒーン . :horse:
 ̄Y^Y^Y^Y^Y^Y ̄

20210628

I have read more about ancient neigh-neighs.

I am the ancient neigh-neigh.

Reading from JP Wiki:

PRO
The sentences are generally longer and more confusing than manga ones, which makes my brain work harder to make sense of it all.

Lots of effort = good. Brain works harder, brain learns more.

CON
Reading manga is generally non-paste-able, so when I find a kanji or kanaword I don’t know I have to look up radicals and manually search for the word and end up learning several different meanings and uses for it.
Wikipedia is paste-able, which is easy and makes me lazy.

Lazy effort = bad. Brain gets lazy, brain doesn’t learn anything :frowning_face:

20210629

Horse, horse, horse… :horse: HORSEY! :horse:

Horse, horse, horse… :horse: HORSEY! :horse:

Horse, horse, horse… :horse: HORSEY! :horse:

Honestly think I should read something else tomorrow other than about ancient horseys because I am HORSE.

20210630

Today’s random JP-wiki article: メガ素数

So as well as reading Japanese I have to read big intimidating numbers… which wasn’t as bad as I first thought upon translating 「メガ素数」as MEGAPRIME, which sounds like the top evolution of a Transformer.

There were a few new Japanese words that I’ll probably never have to use… I’ll make sure to alert everyone if I ever come across a メガ素数 or a 確率的メガ素数 in the wild, with 確率的 I didn’t even know what “Stochastic” meant, so +1 for new English word learnt too… anyway - but I was surprised really at how I could read the (majority) of the article without (much) difficulty.

Except this: Φ3(-123447524288)

What even is that thing?!

Or it’s terrifying big brother: {isplaystyle {frac {2^{4031399}+1}{3}}}

:scream_cat: :scream_cat: :scream_cat:

Additional edit: Seems that its terrifying brother is so terrifying it doesn’t want to show, that’s probably for the best.

Additional edit #2: Seems the terrifying brother is now showing itself, this is indeed troubling, it has gained sentience.

-//-

|| CAPTAINS LOG :: JULY ||

.☆:STARDATE:☆.

20210701

Today’s article: 川根唐沢駅

This was difficult… SO MANY PLACE NAMES.

This kanji cluster was awkward: 静岡県榛原郡本川根町

I know each one of these kanji, but together like this is kinda daunting, then because it’s place names it’s hard to know how to even begin to read it. But I got there!

Sadly 川根唐沢駅 is now submerged under water due to a dam, we will miss you 川根唐沢駅ちゃん。

Also discovered this kanji by accident (typo): 鹹

It seems that it’s mostly redundant in Japanese because of 塩, since searching any word with 鹹 in it comes up with Chinese results, but I thought it looked pretty cool.

20210702

Today’s article: 蜂須賀治昭

A feudal lord… yep this is gonna be hard. And it was hard, very hard. So much kanji, so many names (MORE NAMES - ANCIENT NAMES)

I managed to read the 経歴 section, but I’m gonna pass on the 系譜 section. I think my brain is going to explode if I have to try and decipher any more names… especially old names.

Maybe it’s just because my brain is in mushy pea land right now but this kanji I found: 翁, the meaning of it is “Venerable Old Man” and that amuses me.

Also the Extra Curricular Activity Assignment is to translate this:

No, please no… :scream_cat: :scream_cat:

20210703

Today’s Article: 四国方言

I was hoping for something that wouldn’t have lots of people names or place names… what I got today was something with lots of place names.

Buttttt, I feel like I already knew most of them so I could read them (and it helped that the same place names got repeated a lot).

Katakana is still awkward. When it’s just one word in a sentence I can read it, but when it’s a load of katakana words together it just melts my brain - and I don’t know why.

Come on brain you can read hiragana efficiently now, so why can’t you read the katakatakata?

20210704

Today’s Article: 廾部

It’s a radical!

Hopefully now I should never forget this radical (spoiler: I probably will) because I can’t even remember what this radical is called on WaniKani.

廾 - Fence? Twenty? Well? I have no idea, but here it says the English name is “Two Hands”. I just remember it as “Curved H”.

It says the Chinese meaning is: 弄字底, which if I try to translate into Japanese is “play with kanji bottom” :joy:

20210705

Today’s Article: 孫田菜奈

Volleyball… something I know absolutely nothing about. Thankfully the article isn’t too heavy on the VB lingo.

It always amuses me how the blood type of pretty much anyone in the public eye in Japan is known.

[指高 - 227cm]

My first thought on reading this was “whoaa, her fingers are 227cm long”.

20210706

Today’s Article: 大阪府立大学農業短期大学部

What even is that?

It’s pain. That’s what it is.

Everything hurts.

20210707

Today’s Article: 九州電力

I could read the title without having to do that think-translate thing, which is like YES, since I’ve been questioning my Japanese abilities over the past few days (wait, I’m always questioning my Japanese abilities…). And the rest went smoothly, I recognised the place names which is nice, soon I will know allll the Japanese place names.

Or so I thought, until I reached the 水力発電所 list… and then I remembered that place names mean pain.

(I also lost my way navigating through the history section).

I learnt this useful word though: 再生可能エネルギー

20210708

Today’s Article: ネコ亜目

:smiley_cat: :smiley_cat: :smiley_cat: CAT!:smiley_cat: :smiley_cat: :smiley_cat:

The kanji words were pretty difficult, especially by the time I’d gotten to the evolution history part.

20210709

Today’s Article: 北海道道633号函館港線

I like how Hokkaido Road is HokkaiDOUDOU.

!! ☆New kanji☆ !!
. . . . 函 . . . .

Oh… it’s archaic :frowning_face:

Well, now I know how to read 函館 if I ever come across that place again.

北海道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道道

20210710

Today’s Article: 三浦仙三郎

I got confused at first and thought that 三浦仙三郎 was a brewing company.

I got rather confused through most of it really, there’s a lot of long names and kanji all mushed together.

Butttt, I learnt about sake, and now I want sake. Though sake is expensive… one day I will have enough money to drink lots of sake in an onsen in the woods that is staffed by sentient cats and laugh about the merriments of life.

20210711

Today’s Article: ハンバー川

…wait a minute, the Humber river is near(ish) to where I live! I know that river!

Quite amusing reading something close to home in Japanese.

This article really tests my katakana reading skills, things are never spelt how I imagine them to be in katakana.

20210712

Today’s Article: クロセチン

Kinda short, so I should probably read another but I will probably mean to and then probably forget to. So I’ll see how that goes.

No idea what Crocetin is, but now I know what it is in Japanese at least.

New colour: 赤レンガ色

And kanji of レンガ: 煉瓦 - guess brick is usually written in katakana, I don’t think I’ve seen either kanji before.

New kanji to add to my kanji fortress.

20210713

I had the sudden realisation I didn’t read anything yesterday.

It turns out I have.

Now I have no idea what exactly transpired yesterday - did yesterday even exist?!

anyway

。。。

Today’s Article: 最手

I can’t say I really understood this very well, after reading it I still wasn’t sure exactly what a 最手 is other than something sumo related.

I had to look it up on kotobank and the description there made a lot more sense:
〘名〙 天皇に召し出された相撲人([すまい]びと)中の最高位。また、その人。ほつて。

20210714

Today’s Article: 都ホテル 博多

I’ve only been able to read the intro and the first section of the overview part, since my internet has been out all morning and I’ve had to been playing catch up with work and everything. So I’ve had little time to read today.

I think being under a time constraint made me understand quicker somehow… (that or I am actually getting better at reading but don’t want to admit that to myself).

20210715

Today’s Article: 追分ファームリリーバレー

First reaction: Cute name for a farm!
Finding out it’s for horseys: Yay, happy horsies! :horse: :horse:
Finding out it’s for breeding race horses: …this place is no longer cute. :frowning_face:

Starting to see a pattern in these random articles: Horses :horse:, Hokkaido and Fukuoka.

On the reading side of things this went well! When I see words I don’t recognise I’m getting better at figuring out how the kanji are [¿¿] spelt [??] which makes it a lot easier to look them up… but some I can figure out the meaning of - what is going on, I can make sense of kanji?! 何TF?

20210716

Today’s Article: まなべゆきこ

The only kanji I had to look up was her husband’s name, but other than that it was all pretty smooth reading.

YES! Progress!! :smile_cat:

20210717

Today’s Article: 大沢啓二

This is a big article… I couldn’t read all of it, so I’ll probably read some more tomorrow (doubt I’ll be able to finish it then either, there’s so much info).

I was wondering when something baseball-related would crop up, the WK baseball vocab comes in handy at last!

20210718

.>>>. 野球の日V2 .<<<.

I haven’t finished the article, so no homerun for me :frowning_face:

But I’ll probably start a new one tomorrow before the baseball takes over my mind like the horses did.

Baseball… on horseback… Basehorse? Horseball? … :thinking:

20210719

TodayのArticle: 神経細胞

This is gonna be another two dayer I think.

So many science words, I had to look up pretty much all of them - but could work some out (yay).

Learn along with ニューロンちゃん:
IddyBiddyNeuron

Some things that still surprise me about reading from JP wiki:

  • I have yet to notice a ます or です everything is る, which then makes me question why pretty much every “Learn Japanese” thingy thing always starts by teaching in ます form when nearly everything I read or see or hear uses the plain (is that the right name for the るる?) form when I’d find it so much easier to learn verbs and what-not as they are and then learn all the other forms and conjugations and changes and such, there’s been many times when I’ve seen a word and been like ‘I have never seen this word before’ yet I have, I’ve just got so used to seeing it along with ます and have never know how it looks just by itself. It always feels like teaching English words as ‘Bigger’ and ‘Biggest’ and yet never introducing the base word ‘Big’ until much later and then you’re like “oh, it’s all the same word”. At least, that’s how it feels to me, feels like I’ve learnt everything backward and I’ve had to unlearn to relearn so I have a better footing on the whole language. Maybe it’s just me, but anyway, there are more bullet points to be had!
  • Japanese comma placement is weird.
  • I really wish I knew where that central dot spacer was on the JP keyboard because it is used a lot.
  • Surprised by (with looking on EN wiki) how few JP articles there are on things I’d be sure to have a JP article.
  • Kanji is still hard.
20210720

:brain: :brain: :brain:

My neurons are reading about neurons to grow into bigger, stronger Japanese-knowing neurons.
Yes, grow my little neurons, grow big and STRONG.

I haven’t finished the article, but I think I will continue reading this tomorrow because it’s pretty interesting once I try and make sense of it.

Will I ever need these words ever again? I don’t know, but they’re cool:

  • 細胞体
  • 軸索
  • 樹状突起 // Dendrite… wait… wasn’t he in Sailor Moon??
  • グリア細胞 // Glias Cells!! :smile_cat: :smile_cat: almost

:brain: :brain: :brain:

20210721

I have finished reading about the neuron!

I am also so happy to learn this word: 大脳皮質 (Cerebral Cortex)
No real reason, just that I think it’s a cool word.

:brain: —> :brain:

In other news I am very glad that my name begins with a Z, it makes editing the performance chart so much easier, all I have to do is click edit and my name is there, right at the bottom, no having to scroll through all the names and try and figure out where my name is or how it’s spelt.

20210722

Toneigh’s Article: パーソロン

Seriously Wikipedia, what is it with you and horses?

Wait, last Thursday’s article was about a race horse breeding farm… this Thursday is about a famous race horse… this must be some kind of prophecy involving horses. What are you trying to tell me Wikipedia?

:horse:

Side note: the title really challenged my ソ+ン recognition.

20210723

Today’s Article: 七人の自由学芸に紹介されている青年

Title’s a bit daunting but I got there!

Italian names in katakana does not make easy reading.

Also noticed I still read dates like: 1483年, as fourteen eighty-three nen.
It’s just a tad easier than reading it as いちせんよんひゃくはちじゅうさんねん.

20210724

Today’s Article: アンチクライスト・スーパースター

Wait a minute… アンチクライスト.。。。 スーパースター? I know this!

Never expected Wikipedia to land on Marilyn Manson!

So much katakana… (though not sure how much this article counts because a lot of it is in English).

Sooooooo:

☆!! ボーナス表示 !!☆

Second Article: 肘関節

Last article had so much katakana, this article has so much kanji cluster

Perhaps I should have just pretended that the Manson article had a lot more Japanese on it, because… I’ll just copy paste some of the words:

  • 尺骨滑車切痕
  • 腕橈関節
  • 内側側副靱帯
  • 橈側手根屈筋
  • 長橈側手根伸筋

One good thing though, the words are much easier to understand what they could mean over the Latin names for bones/animals/etc.

20210725

Today’s Article: オー・カナダ

オー・カナダ!!

オー・カナダ!!

24 days late for Canada day, but oh well… オー・カナダ!!

20210726

Today’s Article: 流杉パーキングエリア

Gotta say, I was a bit confused at first, like why is this even a Wiki-Article? - but ウィキくん is really selling it to me, I mean:

駐車場

  • 大型 15台
  • 小型 26台

トイレ

  • 男性 大2(和式1・洋式1)・小5
  • 女性 5(和式4・洋式1)
  • 車椅子用 1

Nice, I can park in a big car or a little car, and I get the choice of a Japanese toilet OR a Western one, pretty spoilt for choice there. Plus both the upline and the downline are equally balanced, in terms of spaces/toilets, so I know I’m getting a fair deal whichever way I’m travelling.

But the thing that really sells it:

  • 自動販売機

Fricking. Vending. Machine.

NGL, I’m a wee bit disappointed it doesn’t list what’s in the vending machine, but come on, a vending machine is a vending machine.

★★★★☆ Nice.

UPDATE: Looking at the picture of the place it has not one but TWO vending machines, and one of them has BOSS on the side. Photo date states June 2020 so there’s a good chance that those very same vending machines are still there. This article delivers the goods.

Also, never heard of Toyama before (please don’t tell me it’s on WaniKani, that’d be embarrassing) but it looks like a really nice place, those mountains!

20210727

Today’s Article: ムノート

Kinda short, which is a good thing since I’m back logged today with a load of work.

How did you know ウィキくん?

20210728

Today’s Article: 大木駅

Chooo-chooooooooooooo!

Do Japanese trains go チューチューゥゥゥゥ ??

My journey has led to learn カンカン!カンカン!is associated with trains because of the crossing gates. But that is not the choo-choo.

There’s a nursery rhyme song called 汽車ポッポ , do trains go ポッポッポッポッ?

Or is that train just called Poppo?

Train Noise Mystery: UNSOLVED

20210729

Today’s Article: 生涯学習の振興のための施策の推進体制等の整備に関する法律

What even is that title!?

Even into English it’s just… WHAT

In Kana: しょうがいがくしゅうのしんこうのためのせさくのすいしんたいせいとうのせいびにかんするほうりつ

Yes.

20210730

Today’s Article: 異種指向性マウス白血病ウイルス関連ウイルス

Revenge of the extremely long titled Wikipedia page.

Except that this one is harder than yesterday’s, so much kanji.

I hope tomorrow is easier.

20210731

Today’s Article: 橿森神社

A friendly short title.

Don’t think I’ve seen this kanji before: 橿. Looking it up it means oak, it’s a nice looking kanji.

:deciduous_tree::shinto_shrine:

-//-

|| CAPTAINS LOG :: AUGUST ||

.☆:STARDATE:☆.

20210801

Today’s Article: ド・ラ・ヴィラ・チュレ植物園

Yep, katakana for any language is always difficult to work out.

What is it about making hiragana spikey and square that makes it hard to read?
It’s only similar to making lowercase into uppercase, so why?
What is the secret to being able to kata the kana??

Oh, it’s August now.

20210802

Today’s Article: リー郡 (ミシシッピ州)

一ミシシッピ
二ミシシッピ
三ミシシッピ

Mississippi is even a fun word in Japanese too.

Thanks to this article I’ve got a better understanding of the difference between 郡 and 州.

20210803

Today’s Article: HD 148427

English title, but Japanese contenttttt…

Points of interest:

  • Ophiuchus is へびつかい座 in Japanese, would have thought that it’d just be katakanazided, but it seems to be an almost direct translation, snake-charmer… not sure why the seat kanji is there since Ophiuchus is holding the snake standing, but still, pretty cool.
  • Space words! Yes! 太陽系外惑星 = exoplanet, very cool.
  • I was hoping parsec would get its own cool kanji name but it’s just: パーセク
20210804

Today’s Article: 福岡国際空港

Hey look it’s Fukuoka again!

What noise do aeroplanes make?
ニュュュュューム!

My search for onomatopoeia is yet again: INCONCLUSIVE
I even searched in Japanese this time :slightly_frowning_face:

20210805

Today’s Article: さなえのHARBOR CAFE

  • おもしろ但馬木曜日 : what makes it interesting? I need answers.
  • ※毎週木曜日は「まるリクDAY」の為、一部コーナーは休止。: What is Maruriku Day? I need more answers.
20210806

Today’s Article: 増穂パーキングエリア

~/~ Parking Lot Wiki MEGA VOLUME II ~\~

This parking lot looks bigger than the last one, but hold up:

  • 大型:5台
  • 小型:10台
  • 身障者用
    • 小型:1台

There’s less spaces?! Buttttt this parking lot has an ace up its sleeve:

  • 男性:大5・小3
  • 女性:8
  • 身障者用:1

This bad boy is packing almost double the amount of toilets, but at the price of less spaces. Tactical choice there but I think it works out, you’re almost guaranteed a free toilet on arrival. But we all know what’s important here - does it have a vending machine, the all mighty 自動販売機?

Yes. Yes it does.

BUT WAIT

There is no mention of a vending machine on the outbound station… if this is true then, I’m sorry 増穂パーキングエリア but 流杉パーキングエリア is the clear winner here.

Yes, you may have to wait and perhaps even fight for the toilet at 流杉, but no vending machine? This is a devastating blow to 増穂パーキングエリア. A blow that I’m not sure it can recover from.

On closer inspection of the picture provided the vending machine provided at 増穂 is a Coca Cola one, 流杉 is sporting not one but TWO Boss vending machines, I think there is a clear winner here.

Sorry 増穂パーキングエリア, but I think you’ve lost.

★★☆☆☆ Unsatisfactory Parking Lot.

20210807

Today’s Article: アンドロメダ座ラムダ星

Yessss, another space one!

I wonder why in the title Lambda is ラムダ but in the article they use λ. :thinking:

Though the Chinese name (here in Japanese) is very cool: 飛行する蛇神.

20210808

Today’s Article: 伊勢慶友病院

伊勢 - I have repeatedly gotten this word wrong on WaniKani so many times, yet when I see it here in a group of other kanji I could instantly read it - logic? I don’t know how that works, but I’m hoping this means I won’t get it wrong anymore.

There is so much kanji on this one.

20210809

Today’s Article: 蟹江警察署

Didn’t expect to get much use out of 蟹, but here’s 蟹江!

:crab: :crab: :crab: :crab: :crab:

20210810

Today’s Article: 産業活力の再生及び産業活動の革新に関する特別措置法

I see… it’s another one of these law articles. Again, the English title makes as little sense as the Japanese.

On the plus side I recognise each one of these kanji… but putting them together and trying to make sense of it all is the hard part.

-MEGAKANJICOMBOS-
Include such highlights as:

  • 共同事業再編及び経営資源再活用を円滑化する
  • 産業活力再生特別措置法
  • 資源制約対応製品生産設備導入(Q)計画 (This one includes the mysterious “Q” kanji)
  • 創業及び中小企業経営資源活用の円滑化

I have no idea what any of this means.

Though again, on the plus side, I don’t think there’s been a single kanji in this article that I don’t recognise. I suppose that’s halfway there.

20210811

Today’s Article: ベズイミアニ山

Mountain!

Big Mountain Hidden Volcano

:mountain_snow: :mountain_snow: :volcano: :mountain_snow: :mountain_snow:

20210812

Today’s Article: 月牙泉

Moon fang lake has got to be one of the coolest names there is (okay, it says that “Moon Fang” in Chinese refers to a crescent moon, still, very cool).

It looks like the “we want a big desert space in our game world but need somewhere for the player to restock their items and SP/MP/PP etc. so here’s a magic oasis town” in every JRPG ever.

Also this place isn’t just good, this place is 最高のAAAAA.

20210813

Oh I see, yesterday was actually the last day… oh well, here’s a bonus additional day read!

Today’s Article: 寒冷前線

Pretty helpful article for weather related Japanese.

I was hoping there’d be some cool cloud names:

積乱雲 = Cumulonimbus
層積雲 = Stratocumulus
積雲 = Cumulus
高積雲 = Altocumulus
巻雲 = Cirrus
巻層雲 = Cirrostratus
乱層雲 = Nimbostratus

Not that I really need to know any of these, but it’s rather cool nevertheless.

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Main Post

A few days since I updated here, but I was reading:
Wed - Read 3 ch of Yotsubato - took about 1.5 hrs
Thurs - Finished last 2 chapters of Yotsubato - read 1hr
Fri - Browsed about 10 pages of various manga I had on my kindle account to see what I might pick up digitally next. Counting it as reading - typically read 3-4 pages to get a feel for difficulty and interest level, then sorted it into a collection to tell myself whether or not to read it soon - took about 30 minutes, at like, midnight - spent my usual evening reading time in an extended call with the in-laws.
Sat - So far - I read one story from the Tuttle Treasury of Japanese Folktales - took about 45 minutes. I understood a fair bit with minimal looking things up, which was a nice contrast with when I last tried to read one of those. I started with 金太郎 - I vaguely recalled the story from my childhood - very vaguely, my recollection was ‘strong boy lives in the woods’, ‘raised by a bear?’, ‘No…but something about a bear? Right?’ - there was, in fact, a boy and a bear, so I was not completely wrong.

On to my next volume of Yotsubato!

Edit:
Well - I guess I was motivated - Read 4 chapters (ch 8-11) of Yotsubato! vol 2 - took about an hour/hour and a half? idk - I was tired at the end and took a nap after I finished chapter 11. I need to go back and see if I can get an explanation on something from one page, but I got the point enough that I moved on in the moment.

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Welcome aboard! :durtle_hello:

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Thanks! And thank you for making this thread, I’ve been meaning to get into reading more Japanese for awhile but it always escapes into that magical land of tomorrow.

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June 12. Time: 15 min. Manga Pages: 1
What: Manga からかい上手の高木さん (Volume 1), current pick of ABBC. Chapter 7, Page 10
Sometimes weekends are busier than week days, today is the case.

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