Nihon-go Progress

[tmcg]

Midway through Lesson 4-06 in Rosetta Stone Japanese Level I. I started on December 13th (it logs your test results with dates), so I'm pretty happy with that speed. I can write a few kanji without aides to show me stroke order and direction. I can write complete simple sentences using kanji and hiragana. I can't read or write katakana, and I'm finally going to have to crack and learn to do that. I think my hiragana are solid enough now that learning (the similar but not directly analogous) katakana won't mess with my head too much. I'm not sure how many kanji I know. More than a hundred to say the meaning of in English; a much smaller number to associate a Japanese word I know with, so that I could actually use them in a sentence; and only a handful of simple ones with all their On, Kun, and Nanori readings.

I could not hold a simple conversation in Japanese. There's a written children's story online that I still can't make heads or tails of. And I couldn't figure out what akaspeedo 's kanji icon means, although it was an excuse for a fun foray through the kanji dictionary. {g}

The little starbursts of aural comprehension when I'm watching movies in Japanese are really cool.

(It just shows how in denial I am about katakana that I spelled it "katagana" before fixing it just now. Sigh. But I just found out that in addition to borrowed words, katakana are also used to spell rude words, which makes them seem much more fun. And sometimes they're used for emphasis. Interesting. I just watched Kurosawa's Scandal, and there were katakana all over the tabloids and ragsheets and advertising posters. And Western exclamation points!)

Comments

[helcat.livejournal.com]

I need to hang out with you more. *chuckles*

Greater than once a year seems like it ought not to be that hard!

[terrymcgarry.livejournal.com]

We will prevail! It shall be done somehow!

[akaspeedo.livejournal.com]

Does that mean I should tell?

[terrymcgarry.livejournal.com]

Yes! I kept meaning to ask in every comment I posted in your LJ, and never once remembered to do it. I think you posted about it early on, too, so I felt sort of guilty asking for a repeat.

[akaspeedo.livejournal.com]

"Double happiness."

I can't remember if I ever said. Wah.

[terrymcgarry.livejournal.com]

Oh, COOL!!! You animated it! That's fantastic!

Great meaning, too. And now that's one I'll always know for sure. :)

[fionagh.livejournal.com]

I'm with you on the joy of knowing what someone's saying in Japanese movies and not having to rely on the subtitles. It's very fun! Congratulations on learning kanji, that's great! We will have to visit Japan together and get lost with our Japanese skills. ;)

[terrymcgarry.livejournal.com]

It would be way cool to tackle Japan together. We never did do that smash-and-grab of Paris. At least I'm pretty sure I'll get to Japan in 2007, if the Worldcon bid wins. (Reminder to self to presupport it.)

I would so, so love to be able to understand Japanese movie dialogue entirely without the subtitles. (Bless DVDs that give you the option.) That, and being able to read Japanese short stories in the original, are my basic goals, aside from just enjoying twisting my brain around such a rich and alien way of communicating and thinking.

Kanji!

[azurephoenix.livejournal.com]

I'm looking for the Kanji for 'cocaine'... can you help?

Re: Kanji!

[terrymcgarry.livejournal.com]

Hey Steev...I looked it up at Jeffrey's Japanese English Dictionary (http://www.rut.org/cgi-bin/j-e), and it returned only "kokain," which I'm pretty sure would be rendered in Katakana, the characters used for borrowed foreign words. It didn't give a kanji for it.

If you want to use the Katakana characters for ko, ka, i, and n, I might be able to find a chart where you can look them up if you need to. I thought I had a link for one, but I can't find it.

There are some other options here:
http://www.rut.org/cgi-bin/j-e/inline/dosearch?sDict=on&H=PW&L=E&T=opium

There's a kanji for "mayaku" there, which means "narcotic drugs."

Hope that helps!