Learning Japanese [Diary 1]
It’s been almost two months since I got back from Japan, I started learning Japanese a week after my arriving, and day by day I feel more attached to the language and to the culture it exposes.
I’ve read somewhere that writing about your learning progress may help to stabilize what you’ve learned and I’m trying here to give that a shot!
Resources
When I started my journey I felt overwhelmed by all the available services and materials for learning Japanese, it was a bit hard to choose between them, but I didn’t allow the excitement to trick me, I planned to select a few resources and to stick with them, I had enough dispersive activities in my life, and honestly, I’m done with that.
I chose japanesepod101 to be my primary resource; it’s a bit expensive but worthy; My husband subscribed to Japanese with Yuta and I watch his videos from time to time, I find his tutorials unique and informative especially on explaining the language features from the cultural perspective.
I also run into Wasabi website, their posts are fine and helpful, but their videos aren’t that good; however they provide Japanese short stories and that what got them on my list.
Japanese VS Korean
I’ve studied a bit Korean long time ago and I can’t stop myself from comparing Korean to Japanese, ah let me admit that I love both countries and I can’t stop comparing them to each other in general.
When I studied Korean, I noticed that writing and reading are sorta easy, the alphabetic system is so simple and it was designed to empower the low class people centuries ago, so you don’t even have to be a genius to master it within weeks.
But in Japanese, things are totally different, reading and writing are tough, there are three writing systems you have to learn, and I’m assuring you they weren’t designed to make your life easier, mastering Kanji alone is a life long project!
In another hand, Korean language has many vowels compared to the consonants, I mean this is a language with 14 consonants and 10 vowels!! you can barely distinguish between some of those vowels which make Korean pronunciation a bit hard.
But in Japanese, there are as same consonants as Korean — 14 — however, there are only 5 vowels.
Is it worth it?
Learning new languages is always worthy, in my opinion, that’s one of the best investments on yourself, it doesn’t only open new doors for you — jobs, communication, video games and movies — but it also improves your mind, it allows you to see the world from a new perspective and thats the most exciting part about it.
I started to study Korean and Spanish as a hobby, then I stopped before perfecting any of them, but I don’t regret it and I don’t consider it a failure, I didn’t learn them just to be able to speak them, I wanted to understand the linguistic features and their impact on culture and people beliefs.
Things are different with Japanese because .. I have practical plans ahead, but still, I’ll be satisfied even if all I’m getting is learning more about Japanese culture and history.
