For all not native Japanese speakers!

[Harumaki]

Hey guys,

I'm currently in my 4th year studying Japanese and Japanese culture on the university of Leiden. I'm engaged with a Japanese girl and speaking only Japanese at home at the moment.

The reason I make this thread is, because I am interested in hearing/reading the experience of other non-Japanese who learned this awesome language.

Well, my experience:
Since I am in my 4th year and using it every day, I became pretty font of the language itself. Words I didnt hear before can be understood and grammatical constructions are almost all seen at least one time before, so my language skills are almost fluently.

BUT, come on, xD Japanese is soooooooo hard to learn! It has so many synonyms and homonyms, it makes me wanna cry of frustration sometimes
There are soooo many ways to say something in a different way, unbelievable! But maybe it is the level of difficulty to reach a fluent level which makes it attractive to me

How did you experience it? Tell me about your hardships of learning Japanese! aka Mission Almost Impossible!

Thanks in advance for reading and replieing <3

[chryuop]

Let me see if I well understood. You have been studying Japanese for 4 years and have a full immersion experience with your girlfriend. Man, what else you wanna know from others? You got the perfect situation to learn Japanese.

[Columbine]

I think the OP is just asking how other people find the experience of learning a difficult language.

For me it's all about what I call the "click points". You grind and grind at the language, trying to learn it and then, sometimes without you even noticing it, something 'Clicks' and ~finally~ there's a bit of the language that suddenly makes internal sense and you don't have to go through the rigmarole of conscious thought to use it. Probably because it's so difficult, that just makes it all the more rewarding. I don't know. For me it's certainly like banging my head against a brick wall, but every now and then the wall seems to vanish and I can move onto... the next brick wall. Certainly I think that to become fluent and literate in Japanese (luck aside) takes more stubborn determination, patience and passion than it would to say, become fluent and literate in French.

[chryuop]

Ok, I kinda misunderstood what he meant then

Personally I have been studying alone with a Japanese teacher who helps me by sending me some lessons and exercises. I admit that Japanese read in a textbook and exercises is a very easy language.
Drama started when I started reading books in Japanese and exchanging emails with Japanese poeple. You face a completely different "language" from what textbooks get you used to.
For now I am sponging the expressions that I get from pen pals and try to understand how to adapt those structures to different occasions.
Weird thing is most of the times I get to translate all the words in a phrase, but when I go get them all together I miss the sense of it

[Harumaki]

nice reactions,

Columbine, I can understand your 'brickwall' very clear. Damn, You really do not want to know how often I have been throwing around my stuff because I got pissed off from all these synonyms Japanese uses :S And saying normal stuff in sentences that are 3 times as long and completely incomprehensive xD

[kyo_9]

hmm.. I think this is my 5th year learning or using Japanese language in my daily life.. I currently living in Kansai district where people around here ought to speak using Kansai dialect which is very different from what I've been learning before.. at first, I honestly thought that I cannot understand a thing what the japanese are saying, but luckily I can catch up little by little, and now, I also can speak a bit using this interesting dialect~

[Mortry]

Originally Posted by Harumaki

Hey guys,

I'm currently in my 4th year studying Japanese and Japanese culture on the university of Leiden. I'm engaged with a Japanese girl and speaking only Japanese at home at the moment.

The reason I make this thread is, because I am interested in hearing/reading the experience of other non-Japanese who learned this awesome language.

Well, my experience:
Since I am in my 4th year and using it every day, I became pretty font of the language itself. Words I didnt hear before can be understood and grammatical constructions are almost all seen at least one time before, so my language skills are almost fluently.

BUT, come on, xD Japanese is soooooooo hard to learn! It has so many synonyms and homonyms, it makes me wanna cry of frustration sometimes
There are soooo many ways to say something in a different way, unbelievable! But maybe it is the level of difficulty to reach a fluent level which makes it attractive to me

How did you experience it? Tell me about your hardships of learning Japanese! aka Mission Almost Impossible!

Thanks in advance for reading and replieing <3

I was thinking about going to Leiden too, but then choose Japanese as a minor, because the kind of jobs that you can do with only Japanese as your study, don't suit me

In the brochure of the study, it says different kinds of jobs that you can do when you've finished the study:
-Journalism
-Working for the government
-Teaching

Are there any other jobs you can do with only the study you're doing?

[Harumaki]

Originally Posted by Mortry

I was thinking about going to Leiden too, but then choose Japanese as a minor, because the kind of jobs that you can do with only Japanese as your study, don't suit me

In the brochure of the study, it says different kinds of jobs that you can do when you've finished the study:
-Journalism
-Working for the government
-Teaching

Are there any other jobs you can do with only the study you're doing?

well,

I am sure you can do other jobs with it, I am thinking about more researching. Since You can choose courses which handle research about learning a second language and the opportunities and difficulties can come hand in hand with acquiring a second language or maybe the linguistic direction.

There are ofcourse also directions as religious studies from Japan (shinto, buddism, zen, confuciasm, catholism, etc etc) but if you want to study more religious stuff, you are expected to understand classic Japanese, which really really really is difficult :S (i failed that course once xD)

Or how about studying Japanese literature and film or anime/manga? The professor for these courses even is Dutch, which provides an easy communication :P

But, the direction I will go to is taking a master AFTER my Japanese study to brighten my knowledge. My master will probably be something with management or marketing so I can be of use for a big company later on

Ah well, You can go whatever direction you want to go, you just need enough interest and motivation to actually go for it

Hope I helpen out a bit :S

[duo797]

I've been studying Japanese on and off since I was about 13 or 14. I started seriously studying Japanese around my senior year of Highschool and am a Japanese major with a minor in chinese as of this semester (my second of sophmore year). I'm going to be taking a semester abroad in Hikone next year and hope to do a homestay so I can speak as little english as possible. I was at a very very very basic level of understanding until I came to college. I don't know what exactly happened but definitely once I got into an actual college class my understanding (including topics I studied outside of class) dramatically increased. That's my story in an abridged version, I suppose.

[buggedout]

Iv been learning japanese for around 2 years now still finding it incredibally difficult to string together sentances properly have to remind myself almost everyday how to say certain things its so difficult but I love hearing the language and want to speak it so badly I just keep trying.

I think the mane thing is I have yet to be in a situation where I have to use japanese but going to japan in 2 months so hopefully Ill subconsously know allot more than I think

has any one got any tips for learning Im currently using flash cards and a language cd and phrase book any help would be appreciated