Japanese Language Learning for the rest of us.

I receive a few of random visitors looking for help on Japanese Language Studies. And it’s no wonder. Doing a quick Google search on Japanese Language Learning or instruction will turn up a bunch of crap from ‘Learn Japanese Fluently in 2 weeks!’ to ‘Come learn in Japan in 6 months with your pre-college student visa!’. Apparently, learning Japanese for English speakers is limited to marketing nonsense of instant fluency and kids in Highschool/University who want to travel. Anything outside of that and you must be too dumb or too old?

I didn’t start studying Japanese until I was about 29. I’m well out of university. And while it didn’t take me 2 weeks, I’ve studied for 6-9 months and I’ve become pretty proficient. I can recognize and write over 2100 Kanji characters and I can understand most of what I read (Yes, including the elusive ‘newspapers’ which everyone says are more difficult). My conversational skills are still lacking, but that’s on my to-do list. I never said I was fluent, yet. I am by no means a super-smart person, but I’ve obliterated the common BS about it taking 10 years to learn the kanji and read, which is utter nonsense.

The top picture is a box of over 2000 Kanji Flash cards (of all different shapes and sizes*) I’ve written myself.

Hmm, that box doesn’t look as impressive, so I’ll make a mess for you to make some point.

If you’re really interested in learning Japanese, and want to do it in the shortest amount of time, get Remembering the Kanji by James Heisig (just the first one, and later, the kana one). And spend about 30-60 minutes a day with it. That’s it. Some smart person said ‘Determination is simply remembering what you want,’ That’s so true. Some other smart person said, ‘People overestimate what they can accomplish in 2 days, and underestimate what they can accomplish in two years.’

Here’s a picture of what all of those cards contain (and a small glimpse of my awesome Japanese calendar on the wall next to it.)

The rest is getting an SRS (I use Anki) and following the advice on All Japanese All the Time. Khatzumoto is the man, listen to him. The rest will come naturally.