It seems I was a little slow to pick up this news, but basically all the things I (and, apparently, countless others) have put in the suggestion box year after year for JLPT are finally being realized. If I don’t pass lvl. 2 this Winter, I’ll be able to take it again middle the following year, instead of having to wait until Winter. The only complaint I don’t see addressed is the lack of timeliness in grading my tests. This is the computer age, people!

Another thing that is cool, that would have helped me this year or would’ve helped last year, but will likely be too late for me, is they’re adding a new level in-between 2 and 3. The gap is HUGE, I tell ya! 3 is easy, and 2 is suicide. I’m taking suicide level this year, and would’ve appreciated N2. Oh well. One minus that I actually kinda understand is they won’t be publishing the answers anymore. Oh how I loved taking the tests in those pastel-colored booklets. Enjoy them while they last, kiddies.

娘　はい、何ママ
お母さん　私のどらやき知らない？
娘　知らない
お母さん　私のどらやき知らない？
黒人さん　知りません
お母さん　（笑い声）なんでみんなここにいたんじゃない？あなた、あたしのどらっ
ちょっと、どこに行くの、あなた？
ちょっと！
お父さん（犬）　ヤバいヤバい
お母さん　あたしのどらやき？！
お父さん　食べました
アナウンサー　家族関数は無料ソフトバンク

Youtubeで短い（４０秒以下）英語のムービーを見てください。広告がやくにたちます。
何を聞くのを書いてください。そうするように、何回も見るかも知れませんね。はじめにすごい難しいから、がっかりしないでください！

英語ネーティブ話すメールともに、リンクと書いた会話を送って、その友だちが直してもらいます。毎日したら、めっちゃめっちゃうまくなりますよ！僕の日本語先生にそうされてよかった。

例：
http://youtube.com/watch?v=wYX_zhlTDr8
http://youtube.com/watch?v=7UHKB6nQrzM
http://youtube.com/watch?v=vQrDEYT9JwY
http://youtube.com/watch?v=VcQIwbvGRKU
http://youtube.com/watch?v=WEJJUGJZxpU
http://youtube.com/watch?v=qObhmS8zX8M

昨日、Newport Beachと言ういいところに行く途中で、Costa Mesaにある日本のスーパーのミツワで泊まってから、買い物をした。漢字が上手になるように、がんばって日本の本を読むことにした。だから、そっちの本屋でいい本を探していた。「人間の関係」の本を見るとたんに、興味をそそった。作者の「五木寛之」を聞いたことがなかったけど、日本に有名な作者だそうだね。

哲学の興味があって、日本人の思い方が知りたいから、作者のことも本のことも知らないでのにとにかく買った。今日読み始めた。難しい！ほぼ本より、天使辞書のほうを読んでる！（笑）

Hey folks, I decided to start doing some heavy reading in Japanese. A book called ningen no kankei (Human Relations) by Hiroyuki Itsuki. He (yes, I thought Hiroyuki was a dame’s name at first; I was wrong) is apparently quite popular in Japan, mostly for his fiction, but lately he has been writing more philosophically-oriented things.

Anyway, as I read this, I write down new words I have to look up to help me learn the words, making the reading go (hopefully) faster as I go along and learn the vocabulary. I noticed that google documents lets you share documents with anyone through a link, so I thought “hey, if helping others is easy and convenient, why the hell not?” So, if you want to go down the same fool-hardy path as me, I believe this will be a GREAT help for you. I look up almost all the kanji-containing words I see.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=piKF_Z6L4JhH4s2uS0bY0eA&hl=en

Aさん　ソフトバンクは何を始めたって？
Bさん　無料通出来る「友達をふやそうって」言うプロジェクトです
Aさん　やるな。おい、聞いているのか？
こくじんくん　すみません、聞いてませんでした。
ねえちゃん　だめじゃない。そんな消極的じゃー。ねぇ、おとうさん。
わんぱぱ　だめだぞ！

Anyway, here’s the best I can come up with for what they’re saying.. I don’t know why TV is so hard for me! update: I fixed this to the right translation (thanks かなちさん！)

お兄ちゃん:すみません。遅れました。
お父さん(犬):遅い！
お母さん: 遅れるなら、電話してね。
お姉ちゃん: 家族関数がご利用なんだから。
お兄ちゃん:ちょっと瞥見で電話してて
お父さん(犬): おまえには瞥見などない！

• Dangling participle. Sure, it sounds stupid to say “where are you at?”, but the reason is because the “at” is redundant, not because it’s at the end! Combine subordinate clause, passive voice and this stupid rule and you get the hilarious classic erroneously attributed to Churchill, “This errant pedantry is something that will not with up be put!” Indeed.
• “They” should work as his/her. Consider the alternative! Wouldn’t you rather just be wrong than unforgivably awkward? This rule achieved a new demonic power to horrify when combined with political correctness since once upon a time, you could at least choose one gender and run with it. Now we have all sorts of strange solutions like randomly varying the genders or just using she, but the masculinists frown upon the latter.
• Pronoun order. Consider this sentence: “I wanted to go to the store to get some food for me and my girlfriend.” Wrong. Even though “my girlfriend and me” sounds very bad for some reason. This grammar is an artifact from when English was an HONORIFIC language, like other Indo-European languages. German has du resp. Sie, French tu resp. vous, and so on. It wasn’t even that long ago, but we finally dropped the less polite thou/þu. The problem is the logic behind this rule no longer applies. The system has been abolished and we’re stuck with this anachronism. So, English, I’ll strike a deal with you – if you bring back you/thou, I’ll put myself last in lists of people.
• I don’t always include all the connecting words when drawing analogies and making comparisons. It doesn’t sound incorrect, though it probably is. Example: “The Pet Shop boys are as well-loved in Russia as Jerry Lewis, France”.

Here’s my page on typing runes on your computer. It’s good whether you’re a Windows baby, a Mac fag or a Linux ass. It’s also avail under my code > type runes on your computer.

Here is how you learn Japanese. It’s not easy.. at first, it’s downright impossible, but it’s the most genuine way (short of moving to Japan, of course). Here’s what you do (please click “read more” below if you don’t see the clip):

1. Watch this, try to pick up as much as you can.
2. Watch it again, but relax a little bit.
3. Watch it again and try to write down or type everything you hear (you don’t have to write down the kanji.. roomaji or カタカナ are fine)
4. If necessary, keep on watching it again and again until you can write down everything you hear.
5. Translate what you have.
6. Watch it again, pretend you didn’t have to do all that (yes, the pretending is important psychologically) and that you’re just watching Japanese programming and understanding it.

This should help by vastly improving your listening skills (the most important language skill of all! any monkey can spit out sentences!!) and, if you weren’t able to do it, to give you a good idea of how far you have to go. For example, if you just couldn’t comprehend anything, you might need to just do a lot of practice speaking and listening. If you can’t tell where one word begins or where one ends, or you can’t seem to find anything in the dictionary, either you need more listening practice, or you simply need to learn more verb conjugations (the main source of “I can hear it, but it’s not in the dictionary”) or more particles. If you hear fine and can figure out most of the words, but it’s really slow go, then you need to just learn a lot more vocabulary (this is where I am) and the best way to help is to keep on doing this!

I recommend watching UTB Hollywood as much as you can on youtube (their channel and their MySpace, and you can even watch their stuff on their website) and, if you’re in Southern California, watch KXCI channel 18 from 6:00AM to 7:00AM on weekdays and I guess in the evening on weekends. If you are absolutely in the beginner’s stage and couldn’t complete this exercise, it’ll still help you, since you’re training your brain to hear the sounds and the speech patterns. Just remember, you can’t learn through osmosis, but some skills simply require constant exposure, so don’t be disappointed if you can’t understand a single word at first. There was a point in time (when you were a baby) when you couldn’t understand your native language.