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#1 2011-01-11 14:31:05

J Ross
Member
From: Vancouver,Washington USA
Registered: 2010-12-18
Posts: 74
Website

Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

I'm having a great deal of fun learning Japanese albeit a slow process with so many other things happening at the same time.
Having experience with European languages does not prove too useful so I have no leg up on it unfortunately.

I'm curious how many here speak Japanese or maybe read and write it and how long it took you to learn .
Also,how did you learn.    Live in Japan,books,school,etc?

Jim

じぇいむず

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#2 2011-01-11 17:16:26

Jam
Member
From: Oxford, England
Registered: 2009-10-02
Posts: 257

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Hey Jim, I studied Japanese from scratch at uni. That had me studying abroad in a Japanese Uni, when I came back I practiced with friends and kept studying kanji and grammar. I ended up working teaching English in Japan for a year after I graduated and now I work in a Japan specialist travel agency here.

I'm still studying now (I don't think anyone ever does with a foreign language!), I recommend the "Kanzen Master" series. I would also recommend "Kanji Box" which is an online programme you can access through facebook.

Send me a PM if you have any questions.

Incidentally, as your name isn't Japanese, it would usually be written in katakana, the script for foreign names and loan words. As it's the same as mine, it looks like this:

ジェームス


(or you can make it zu at the end)

ジェームズ

Cheers,

J

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#3 2011-01-11 18:23:52

J Ross
Member
From: Vancouver,Washington USA
Registered: 2010-12-18
Posts: 74
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Thanks for the information. Much appreciated.

You are so right on the name being Katakana and not Hiragana. I shall change that now.
As for programs I use: On the compute I'm using Rosetta Stone and for audio,Pimsleur Series 1-3. I also use 5 or 6 different workbooks and guides as well as use the internet when I can.

It is working out fine so far although I only wish I had more real time conversation. I have been visiting the Japanese market more often but as it is a 40 mile round trip that does not happen often LOL.


ジェームス

Jim

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#4 2011-01-13 08:07:23

No-sword
Member
From: Kanagawa
Registered: 2008-07-09
Posts: 115
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Hey Jim, I have a similar story to Jim (this is going to get confusing fast, I can see). I studied Japanese for a year at a community college-type deal (this was after I had already finished regular college), then came to Japan to work and have been here since.

It's hard to say how long it took "to learn". I'm still learning! When I arrived in Japan I could have simple conversations in bars but couldn't get my electricity hooked up or read books intended for adults. A couple of years later I could do both. But I still can't WRITE more than a couple hundred kanji without cheating. You get better at what you practice, and don't at what you don't. So think about what your goals are carefully.

If I had to narrow it down to one piece of advice, it would be that the more you practice with a real person, the more you will "get" the language. The trick is finding native speakers who don't mind you using your time with them for practice. (Because, just because someone is Japanese, or any other language, that doesn't mean that they have time or inclination to teach their native language to everyone who wants to learn it.) Paying for lessons is one of the best ways of doing this because then you are guaranteed that your practice will be the FOCUS of your time together. There are Japanese teachers who teach online via Skype now; I don't know how good they are or if they are worth the money but I'm sure they are better than a CD of sample sentences.

But if this isn't an option for you, maybe there's a Japanese consulate near you that runs friendship events or something. Maybe there are exchange students in your area looking for "language exchange" partners; that's a deal where you meet up for, say, an hour, and spend the first 30 minutes speaking English and the second speaking Japanese, so you both get a chance to practice. lang-8.com is an interesting site, too; it won't help with speaking but it might be a good way to meet internet-style penpals (remembering your other thread).

Hope this helps.

Last edited by No-sword (2011-01-13 08:10:59)


Matt / no-sword.jp

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#5 2011-01-13 12:07:42

Jam
Member
From: Oxford, England
Registered: 2009-10-02
Posts: 257

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Hey Matt,

How did you get so proficient at reading old Japanese? Is there a method/text you can recommend, or is it just a case of the more you do, the easier it gets?

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#6 2011-01-13 12:47:28

Kiku Day
Shakuhachi player, teacher and ethnomusicologist
From: London, UK & Nørre Snede, DK
Registered: 2005-10-07
Posts: 922
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

I was born in Harajuku and spoke English at home and Japanese with grandparents and in the world outside the home (e.g., kindergarden) until I was 5. Then my language became Danish. I kept a very simple Japanese till I was 19. When I went to Japan to study shakuhachi, I think I went to Japanese class for 2 years part time (twice a week) then 3 x 3  month full time... and then again part time. Later I did intermediate Japanese and advanced Japanese at uni. SO much hard work! I do appreciate it a lot now tho - although I keep on forgetting now that I have not been as much in Japan the past 10 years.

Regarding names. I was 18 before I was able to spell my name right! HA! But the reason was that my father had to get out of Japan quickly (FBI came to fetch him) and I was left with a Japanese passport that had romanised my name (even the non-Japanese names)... So my horrible long full name:

Kikutsubo Galathea Mikhailovna Mizuno Day
became:
Kikutsubo Garatea Mihairofuna Mizuno (they somehow missed out my family name and Day was not included. Probably ran out of space).

I had to go to family court to change the spelling. smile


I am a hole in a flute
that the Christ's breath moves through
listen to this music
Hafiz

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#7 2011-01-13 16:44:51

No-sword
Member
From: Kanagawa
Registered: 2008-07-09
Posts: 115
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Kiku, your dad was on the run from the FBI?!

Jim: I wouldn't say "so proficient" so much as "so-so proficient" wink It's just a case of "the more you do it, the easier it gets," as you say. When I decided I wanted to learn, I was working in a high school, and they had a bunch of sample textbooks for the subject "Kobun" (古文, classical Japanese) that companies would send them for consideration... so I borrowed one that looked readable and took it from there, gradually accumulating more books as I went. A dedicated "kogo" dictionary is one thing you need pretty early on, for example... I like Ono Susumu's dictionary from Iwanami but I think virtually any will have the info you need.

It really helps that in Japan it's easy to buy cheap paperbacks that have old texts + modern translations/commentary, for reading practice. (Iwanami Bunko's books in the "yellow" category, Kodansha's Gakujutsu Bunko, etc.) I wish there were English-language publishers who worked the same way... I think the closest we have is a Penguin edition of Beowulf in the original; everything else seems to be priced for university libraries.

(If you mean the old handwriting thing, basically the same deal... I found a book about the subject and then just started grinding.)


Matt / no-sword.jp

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#8 2011-01-14 05:30:40

Jam
Member
From: Oxford, England
Registered: 2009-10-02
Posts: 257

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

No-sword wrote:

Kiku, your dad was on the run from the FBI?!

Jim: I wouldn't say "so proficient" so much as "so-so proficient" wink It's just a case of "the more you do it, the easier it gets," as you say. When I decided I wanted to learn, I was working in a high school, and they had a bunch of sample textbooks for the subject "Kobun" (古文, classical Japanese) that companies would send them for consideration... so I borrowed one that looked readable and took it from there, gradually accumulating more books as I went. A dedicated "kogo" dictionary is one thing you need pretty early on, for example... I like Ono Susumu's dictionary from Iwanami but I think virtually any will have the info you need.

It really helps that in Japan it's easy to buy cheap paperbacks that have old texts + modern translations/commentary, for reading practice. (Iwanami Bunko's books in the "yellow" category, Kodansha's Gakujutsu Bunko, etc.) I wish there were English-language publishers who worked the same way... I think the closest we have is a Penguin edition of Beowulf in the original; everything else seems to be priced for university libraries.

(If you mean the old handwriting thing, basically the same deal... I found a book about the subject and then just started grinding.)

Interesting stuff, thank you mate. When I was teaching at a junior high I tried that, we had tonnes of those books hanging around, but I decided I would work on my standard Japanese first for the JLPT. Have you found any really old texts on shakuhachi? I imagine they would be quite interesting and a lot of the people on here would be salivating over the prospect.

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#9 2011-01-14 05:43:52

Kiku Day
Shakuhachi player, teacher and ethnomusicologist
From: London, UK & Nørre Snede, DK
Registered: 2005-10-07
Posts: 922
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

No-sword wrote:

Kiku, your dad was on the run from the FBI?!

Yup, those days the communists were the enemy... long story... smile

Jim, there is quite some cool reading on shakuhachi out there. When I was at Osaka Geidai, the library was amazing. Had some good originals... some copies of originals... and lots of reading on shakuhachi from the 20s, 30s etc. Even writing from the 20s and 30s was enough of a challenge for me. Just reading through the journal Sankyoku is very cool! You can get a lot of information on the changes that happened these days to the shakuhachi world. You should try to have a go at them. It is very interesting!
I hope I get the post I am applying for at Nichibunken... if I do I will certainly dwell for some time in their library. Hope my reading skills haven't disappeared by then.


I am a hole in a flute
that the Christ's breath moves through
listen to this music
Hafiz

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#10 2011-01-14 08:50:28

Jam
Member
From: Oxford, England
Registered: 2009-10-02
Posts: 257

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Hi Kiku, sounds great. Fingers crossed you get the post you're after smile

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#11 2011-01-14 20:05:28

No-sword
Member
From: Kanagawa
Registered: 2008-07-09
Posts: 115
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

I managed to find a modern-printed facsimile of the Kyotaku denki kokuji-kai in a regular secondhand bookshop in Yokohama -- probably my finest hour as far as searching for interesting printed shakuhachi material in the wild goes.

If you search for "尺八" at the NDL's Digital Library from the Meiji Era, you can find a few interesting things (a lot of notation for sankyoku, for example).

Waseda has online copies of the Shichiku shoshinshū and a book about Ikkan-ryū.

But, to be honest, most of the interesting information has already been scoured from the easily available primary sources, and repackaged in Japanese or English books or websites... like the big ones Mejiro sells, or Torsten Olafsson's site (which is just amazing). There are surely other primary sources out there, lost or hidden, but it's gonna be fully involved player-researchers "on the ground" (if you like) who make the personal connections needed to uncover them, not dilettantes like me...

Last edited by No-sword (2011-01-14 20:09:42)


Matt / no-sword.jp

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#12 2011-01-16 07:15:18

Kiku Day
Shakuhachi player, teacher and ethnomusicologist
From: London, UK & Nørre Snede, DK
Registered: 2005-10-07
Posts: 922
Website

Re: Japanese:How long did it take you to learn?

Yes, Torsten is amazing and he keeps going on and on...
He will do a speech on shakuhachi this coming Wednesday in Charlottenlund, north of Copenhagen... if anyone is interested... smile We can take the train up together from the Central Station.


I am a hole in a flute
that the Christ's breath moves through
listen to this music
Hafiz

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