Languages: Japanese, Part III

Continuing from where I left off last month.

So, this is what I set out to do:

  • improving usage of katakana //very limited success//
  • familiarizing myself with hiragana //rather well done, though not as well as I’d have hoped for//
  • learning at least one word-list per week, preferably two //done as part of another bit of reading/studying//
  • processing one chapter of Heisig’s masterpiece on kanji a week as a minimum //done for weeks 2, 3 and 4. missed one, but today’s not over yet, so it’s a so-so thing//
  • listening to more Japanese-language music (== less Capsule 🙁 ) //mmm, should be done//
  • finding at least one audiobook to listen to even though I’ll understand very little at first//found several audiobooks, and listened to them a few times as well//

こんな夢を見た。
That’s basically the beginning of that one story I’ve concentrated on most. A direct translation would be along the lines of “I saw such/this [kind that I am about to tell you of] a dream.” I liked it very much, for rather obvious reasons (beginning a story for such a sentence being one of them).

Besides that, I’ve managed to start making some rather interesting connection. They are quite useless right now, but they are interesting to me in principle.

Also, I’ve taken notice that when I concentrate well enough, my level of (unfortunately, written) Japanese is on par with my French skills. This does mean that my French has fallen to an awful low level, but also that given enough time (very much time) and a dictionary and a grammar book, I can write some rather sensible things (with less mistakes in the Japanese version due to the French employing a rather non-comprehensible /for me/ way with prepositions). That being said, my written Russian is likely to be even worse, though I’ve not put that claim to the test. Spoken being a completely different tune, I’m still rather sure in myself if I’d line my spoken skills right now as follows:

Estonian > English > Russian = Japanese = French

Which really isn’t saying much, but I still found it interesting.

In any case, for the next month… something has to be set down in writing:

  • カタカナ reading improvement
  • ひらがな reading improvement
  • one Cpt. per week from Heisig’s book on 漢字 (this means, Cpt’s 4, 5, 6 and 7)
  • reading through that story which began so promisingly with “こんな夢を見た。” [Author: Natsume Soseki, Title: The First Night]
  • listening to that same thing a few times over
  • more music 

That should sum it up rather well.

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