ようこそ！

Hello, hello again, Tumblr! It has been a while.

For quite some time, I've been itching to get back into the Japanese immersion groove and have been struggling for the most part to take my grammar studies and output attempts seriously. Life (mostly work) happens, you know? I guess this time, I want to make sure that I'm making it an interesting and enjoyable process, and what better way to do it than to just start!

I'm always looking for any excuse to make my hobbies collide, this time It happened while testing out new stationery which I have been very into for the past few years again, heavily influenced by fountain pens, inks, and notebooks. Japanese stationery is off the charts as you all probably know. It was the easiest rabbit hole to fall into, it's practically impossible to miss.

Anyway, I've wanted to try the Midori A6 grid notebook simply because of it's minimalist design and slightly larger grid size which I thought would be perfect for Japanese writing practice and grammar study. I'm using the 日本語教師JLPT文法解説まとめ list and an Anki deck from the same resource to guide this learning journey.

I placed the notebook inside a Hobonichi Hiroko Kubota cover, The Tone of Illuminated Flowers, which I had in storage that I felt needed some love. I enjoy looking at the calming floral illustration painted with gouache, my favorite painting medium.

Of course, I had to use my Pilot Custom 823 for this writing exercise. Nothing better than using the fine point of a Pilot pen paired with my favorite brown ink, Taccia Cha, to write small characters with (though I need more practice)!

This is a no pressure notebook, despite it being a somewhat serious way to grammar study apart from doing Anki reps. I fully intend to enjoy the writing process so that I can slowly internalize everything I have ever learned about grammar while immersing in the language.

Slow and steady wins the race after all.

If you're new here or you've been here for a while, welcome or welcome back!

When I feel sad, I listen to Fujii Kaze and feel better.

Hello, it has been a while!

The year 2023 has been strange for me in many good and bad ways. It was mostly good, but my brain likes to make things spicy sometimes. I miss writing here and discussing how I was progressing with Japanese, but I also felt that because I took a long break and pursued other things both career and education-wise, people would be less interested in what I was up to.

I would be lying if I said I didn't feel lost in the past year, but I'd also be lying if I said that I wasn't blessed a hundredfold. When I stopped and thought about it, I was blessed more than I ever thought was possible, imagined, or even dreamed about. Started my new remote career which I enjoy due to the amount of things I learn from my kind coworkers, and acquired a full scholarship for my Master of Business Administration. Yet some days, I still felt incredibly lonely, and often still do, even though I should have been very grateful instead.

In all the chaos in my heart and mind, I forgot that I started this blog for myself; I enjoyed putting my thoughts into words and rambling about the things I liked no matter how small. It was my online affirmation notebook of the simple successes I celebrated every week or so. It wasn't much, but I'd like to start writing again, hopefully, more consistently and with less pressure on myself to do so.

There are lots of things I wish to work on in the new year. I know that it could have been on any other day of the year, but it just feels like a fresh start, a new page, and I’d like to start by being kinder to myself.

Here's to better days ahead! ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ✧

P.S. I may not have done a lot of language learning in the past year, but I certainly did not skip a day of Anki! ♡

Today is my 3rd year of learning Japanese through immersion!

For the most part, I was just in maintenance mode as I tried to take care of myself and reassess my goals. Basically, I went through a lot of burnout when I realized I couldn't really make a career with my pursuit of fluency in this language. I then tried to pursue baking and started a small business which was fun, but ultimately wasn't very profitable because of how expensive the ingredients are. I made another career change which has been fulfilling so far because of how nice and helpful everyone is around me, the only drawback being that it's on a graveyard shift, which makes it difficult to immerse when I feel sleepy during the afternoons when I finally wake up.

I think a lot of things in my life changed for the better tho, and I'm still grateful for a lot of people in this community who continue to inspire me to pursue great things and to keep going despite everything crazy going on.

I still am doing daily Anki reviews and currently have 19,567 learned words in my deck now, most of which I've decided to suspend because a lot of them were way past the 1-year interval. I also feel the need to "refresh" and "start from scratch" by basically doing all new cards once I find a schedule that allows me to immerse again. I haven't studied many new cards either and have just been waiting to mature all of my cards so I can suspend them in preparation for the refresh I'm hoping for.

I also thought that because I barely spent time with the language I would just forget all of it, but to my surprise, any time I pick up something to read or watch a drama or an anime episode, I could still understand a lot of what was going on (with some Yomichan cope of course, lol). I'm not sure if that's because I had already put in 3000+ hours in the language before I finally decided to take a huge break from it, but nonetheless, I'm glad I don't have to do much in terms of getting back on track whenever I feel like dedicating time to it again.

That's it for my little update. Hopefully, a fresh start and some really interesting content can get me back into reading and watching. I still love this language and I don't think at this point I can ever unlearn it.

1/09/22

久しぶり! It's been a long time since I've written one of these.

I've taken quite a long break from both immersion and blogging, but I think based on my effort from August, I'm finally rested enough to start again.

So, let's dive right into it!

First off, what was I up to in the time I was away? It's honestly going to be a bit of a weird overview this time around, since I'm compiling six months worth of kinda immersing, but I feel its only right to also show my struggles with learning a language. I also pursued some things in real life such as opening a new business that I have been putting more focus on. It's a small venture, but I believe it has potential to be better, so please keep me in your prayers.

All graph images are from a Discord bot that I use to track my immersion for points in a language learning server called The Moe Way. Please feel free to join!

MARCH

February was a great month for me. I read and listened far more than I had ever before and I was and still am very proud of my effort. I think because I was about to hit my two year immersion mark, so I was pushing myself to the limit everyday.

I am quite the competitive person for things I truly desire, and so of course I wanted to beat my previous record. Unfortunately around my birthday in March, I came into a very rough patch which left me really questioning what it is I truly desired to achieve with my whole pursuit of Japanese. It didn't seem like the two whole years of dedication I've had (and the several other years I've tried to get past the beginner stage) for this language would come to fruition soon and if at all. This started my relapse into depression and my descent to, and I'm really sad to say, hopelessness.

Now at this stage I was still immersing quite a bit, but not as much as I had hoped. I still immersed everyday, but with varying consistency levels. I was also very much struggling to stick to one reading material at a time, not because they are disinteresting, but because I was losing my motivation, albeit slowly. By the time the month ended, I didn't even feel like it was worth talking about on my blog anymore, which was not the correct response obviously, but it was my reality and I had to deal with it in some way.

Reading material: Sakura no Uta, Stardew Valley (in Japanese), Steins; Gate, Summer Pockets

Listening material: Youtube, American Life Podcast, Hiikibiiki, Anata no Ban Desu, JP News

APRIL

I didn't give up just yet. With every new month, I always saw a sliver of hope and a chance to try again. The burnout was cruel though, and all my energy tapered off halfway through the month. This still wasn't a bad effort. If anything it looked like my minimum immersion amount when I was just starting, so looking at it now, I can at least still give myself a pat on the back for trying. I also hung out a lot in Discord voice chat and joined immersion streams a lot more so I didn't feel as if I quit entirely.

Reading Material: Fate/Stay Night, Umibe no Kafuka

Listening Material: Youtube, CardCaptor Sakura

MAY

May was my whitenoise era. I talked to my Discord friends a lot, tried every possible thing I could if I found the energy for it, but ultimately was just not in the mood for Japanese, and even if I was, I could not understand anything to save my life which felt like how it was when I was at the height of my depression for every language I knew. The disappointment I felt in myself was unreal and I'm glad I at least had some friends who understood my struggles.

Reading Materials: Shingeki no Kyoujin, Fate/Stay Night, Umibe no Kafuka

Listening Materials: 1 Litre no Namida, CardCaptor Sakura, 100 Man no Onnatachi

JUNE

I don't even have a graph for this month. I mostly just hung around with friends whenever they streamed. I was so excited by a bunch of new reading material, but I was in whitenoise hell and couldn't even enjoy them.

Reading Materials: SpyxFamily, Hakuoki, Fate/Stay Night

Listening Materials: 461 Ko on Obentou, Youtube, Hajimete no Atsukai, Kung Fu Panda 1 & 2 dubs

JULY

Once again, don't have a graph. The worst month of my language learning journey. I swear I have given more effort to studying with textbooks than whatever happened this month. Did however try reading out loud on stream again, and just had fun laughing at my silly pronounciation mistakes with a friend.

Reading Material: Ohayou Ibarahime

Roudoku Material: Akaya Akashiya Ayakashino

AUGUST

And so we finally arrive to August. I felt so much shame and disappointment, nearing my 2.5 year mark without much to show that I tried really hard to correct it with some success! Again, of course it could be better, but with the help and encouragement of friends, at least I'm trying again.

I read 105,126 characters of Fate/Stay Night on the 10th of August and that gave me so much hope that not all was lost. I also crossed the 1M character mark on it which is a really good milestone to reach after struggling for so long. I may still have tripped this month, but it was still way better than the month previous.

Reading Materials: Fate Stay/Night, Sakura no Uta, Shingeki no Kyoujin, Stardew Valley

Listening Material: Porco Rosso

Moral of the Story?

Burnout is real. Depression and anxiety are the worst. Take care of your mental health. Learn when to take breaks and when to distance yourself from things that make you feel bad about your progress.

Find people who you can trust and rely on. Find new hobbies! Pursue new goals! Don't quit and never stop trying.

I love this language. I may have struggled, but I am stronger for it. One day, I'll find my footing again, but for now, just knowing that I have come so far and that I can still have fun and improve this skill is more than enough.

-☆-

Hello!

I'm not sure if your message cut off, but I really appreciate that you took the time to write.

I don't know, sometimes I feel like I put too much pressure on myself and still think its never enough, so when I got put down after working at it consistently, I felt really upset and took it to heart because they were important to me and I valued their opinion.

I'm not gonna lie, its taking me a while to get back up on my feet, but I'm trying my best to be kinder to myself. Anyway, I'm just taking it slow for a bit, mostly hanging out with friends who understand.

I hope you, and anybody else who feel this way, take comfort in the fact that you are not alone, and that there will be people out there who will appreciate you no matter how bad you feel about yourself and your progress.

Hi!

I have not been doing this recently because I'm on a break, but I would usually wake up at 5 am and immerse for about two hours before I need to do work. This means that no matter what happens, I've already secured a decent amount of immersion time in the morning alone. Throughout the day, I would listen to compressed audio, podcasts, or YouTube videos and I would watch an episode or two of a show or do my Anki reps during lunch time. In the evening, I would usually sit down and read for a few hours more before going to bed.

Everybody's work/study/home situation is different; this routine was something that worked for me, but maybe not for others. I encourage you to assess your own schedule and find the gaps to fill with immersion. Every extra hour helps a lot in the long run.

Hi, I'll add it to my watch list.

Hello, thanks for asking.

5/19/22

Hey, it's been a while. I've been getting a few messages asking where I was, and I'm so sorry for causing some concern. You are all so sweet for asking.

I'm just taking a bit of a break, because I felt that I needed some time to reassess my goals, catch up with other stuff I enjoyed and missed out on in the past two years I've been immersing nonstop, and move on to other things I've decided to pursue in my life that frankly doesn't involve Japanese.

Truthfully, I also felt really discouraged about my ability for a while and hearing unsavory comments from people I know in real life made it really hard for me to continue without a break. I know I shouldn't have let it affect me, but its something that's pretty difficult for me to swallow because Japanese has been something I've loved for years and it has meant the world to me to be able to finally pursue it regardless of how much people think its useful in my real life pursuits.

Learning this language is my therapy - its my happy medicine without having to take another antidepressant or sleeping pill - and it really bothered me that people who knew me didn't see how much it helped me get out of my head.

I'm still immersing albeit lightly (a bunch of comfy movie nights with friends, made some attempts at reading novels again, and I also started getting into both the anime and manga of 進撃の巨人), still keeping up with my Anki reviews (passed 13k mature cards!), picked up and devoured two out of six books of the fantastic sci-fi series, Dune (a god-tier recommendation from my friend, Kam), and have started obsessively listening to Australian bands and more jazz like I used to a few years ago.

I've been scared of making a post like this, but I finally felt some semblance of courage come back. Life isn't always sunshine and rainbows, and I think its only fair for the people who have kindly watched me grow in this blog to know that I've been struggling, and that I'll be alright.

I'll be back, maybe not stronger, but strong enough to start the ball rolling again. Thanks for sticking around, it means a lot.

Hi!

Always, always, choose immersion over Anki, in this case, more listening material. Just pick out some anime, drama, tv shows, audiobooks, podcasts, and YouTube channels you like and listen to those. You will improve over time, I assure you.

If you want some easy listening material, I always recommend condensed audio - you can find a bunch in this site under Condensed Audio:

If you were planning on using the audio deck to practice hearing pitch better, I recommend practicing with this site instead of Anki, then continue immersing more to hear them better.

Alternatively, if you really want an audio deck (and I'm going to assume that you have the basic vocabulary card setup with Yomichan that already comes with audio), then you can just take your existing cards (or duplicate them) and convert them into audio cards by going into Cards in the Anki Browser, and instead of having the Word or Sentence in the Front Template, have the Audio field in Front instead. That's the easiest way to turn your cards into audio cards that I know of.

11/03/22

Two years of immersion! ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ✧

It’s still a bit unbelievable to me how much time and patience I’ve had with learning Japanese, but it should really come as no surprise that the days went by so fast, because the journey has been equally fun and rewarding. 

STATISTICS

Somehow, I beat my 1.5 year immersion mark by 7.77 hours and immersed for 742.39 hours for the past six months, averaging 4.12 hours a day, placing more focus on reading to improve my listening.

How I've divided my time in the past 6 months.

Finally added a Anki and Grammar tracker to show you that I really do put more focus on immersion rather than Anki. Arguably, I should really be spending the same amount of time with grammar, but intensive reading and looking up patterns monolingually is very much part of grammar study in itself, so I’m cutting myself a bit of slack. I promise myself to do better, don’t worry.

ANKI

Further breakdown of grammar and word memorizing in Anki. This does not include the time I spent just reading through grammar books in the first year of immersion, and the roughly 1.5 years I spent dawdling with N5-N4 grammar points in uni and after graduation. I finally realized that I really hated doing grammar in Anki and have stuck to reading them again and again instead. Who knows though, I’m always in the mood for them when I get frustrated, so I keep them around.

Reached a total of 12,213 vocabulary cards. Still using Auto Ease Factor and 10 480 1440 learning steps, the combination of which has allowed me to have decent retention and the ability to learn 50 new cards daily without drowning in reviews. It also significantly lowered the time I spend in Anki. 

I still enjoy mining everything useful I see - its going in my backlog if know it in my NL and English. The suspended cards here are words I can’t pass easily in the learning stage - there are words I can guess either the meaning or reading of in the first try, and only learning those words first lessens the burden of remembering two things per card. My brain only has to remember one thing at a time now and it is such a relief! When I finish my backlog eventually, I will return to all these suspended cards, which by that time would hopefully become words that I only need one thing to remember. It’s a pretty good strategy if I do say so myself.

Still lots to learn, but its getting pretty blue now!

Reading = Massive Language Learning Gains

Never in a billion years would I have thought that I could actually sit down and read in Japanese, and I’m very proud to have now read a total of 11,592,202 characters, mostly from visual novels which has absolutely been a gamechanger for language learning.

Surprise, surprise, reading boosted my comprehension so much that I can actually listen better. If you know the words, you are able to recognize them better when listening, therefore improving listening comprehension. I was never able to follow Youtube videos or podcasts very well before, but these days, I can put something in the background and still catch meaning (depends on content). Still have so much to improve on, but I’m very pleased with my progress.

Progression of Average Reading Speed

I also made some new graphs that covers my average reading speed from the time I started reading books in Japanese. These are so pleasing to look at and I’m glad I’ve made them, since I can easily see how far I’ve come. There are still genres I need more time with, but nothing a bit more reading and consistency can’t fix. I also still have to actually get into novels more, but I keep struggling finding something that keeps me interested for longer than an hour, which makes visual novels really 神 since I can read for 7+ hours and not feel bored.

I’ve also started to read out loud to practice good pitch pronunciation. Like generally outputting, its still very much a work in progress, but I’m glad to have started at the very least.

-☆-

I still stand by every resource I've ever listed on my blog, so if you ever need any specific app or tool or immersion material recommendation, I probably already have mentioned it, if not, feel free to ask and I'll be more than happy to help you get started!

Thanks so much for sticking around with me for the past year or so. Running this blog has been just as fun for me, and seeing people jump in on the immersion bandwagon because of my posts is pretty cool!

Hello thank you for stopping by!

Here is MyDramaList of all of the dramas I've watched in Japanese so far:

Special mention to the following:

朝ドラ - 15 minutes x 156 episodes, stories inspired by pioneer women in Japan slaying in their careers. You'll passively learn so much about different regions, their culture, and dialects. My favorites so far are なつぞら, あまちゃん, and あさが来た.

イタズラなKiss 1 and 2 - romantic comedy that develops from their high school years up to when they enter the workforce. You'll learn a vast range of useful words from it. I've watched it multiple times and have not gotten tired of it yet!

花より男子 1, 2, and movie - an absolute Asian drama classic and must watch

1リットルの涙 - for the best cry you will ever have

パーフェクトワールド - you won't cry maybe but heartwarming AF

僕のいた時間 - if you want to cry even more

恋はつづくよどこまでも - the cutest romcom in a hospital setting

Code Blue 1,2,3, and movie - flight doctors being metal AF (thank you medical frontliners!)

ごくせん, 3年A組 ―今から皆さんは、人質です―, 家族ゲーム - teachers being metal AF

今際の国のアリス - excellent survival drama

私たちどうかしてる - for food porn romance and the tea in your drama

僕はまだ君を愛さないことができる - the best 親友 young adult romance

逃げるは恥だが役に立つ - fluffiest marriage contract romance

好きな人がいること - even more food porn romance

着飾る恋には理由があって - the best accidentally living together young adult romance

Is it obvious I like romance? (*˘︶˘*).｡.:*♡