Bae Yongjun Notes

I guess I never put up notes from the rest of the series, so this post is merely for that purpose.
Nothing informative unless that's what you were after.

오늘　今日
무슨　何
요일이에요? 曜日ですか？
월요일　月曜日
화요일　火曜日
수요일　水曜日
목요일　木曜日
금요일　金曜日
토요일　土曜日
일요일　日曜日

며칠　何月
일월　一月
이월　二月
삼월　三月
사월　四月
오월　五月
유월　六月
칠월　七月
팔월　八月
구월　九月
시월　十月
십일월　十一月
십이월　十二月

~일　～日

None

~~~

공항　空港
어떻게 가요?　どう行きますか？
타고 가요　乗ってきます
자동차 自動車
택시　タクシー
버스　バス

지하철　地下鉄
기차　汽車

비행기　飛行機
배　船
한국　韓国

호선　号線
번　番


~~~

몇 시　何時
출발해요?　出発しますか？
한시　一時
두시　二時
세시　三時
네시　四時
다섯시　五時
여섯시　六時
일곱시　七時
여덟시　八時
아홉시　九時
열시　十時
열한시　十一時
열두시　十二時

십오분　十五分
삼십분　三十分
사십오분　四十五分

오분　五分
십분　十分
이십분　二十分
이십오분　二十五分
삼십오분　三十五分
사십분　四十分
오십분　五十分
오십오분　五十五分

정각　丁度
반　半
오분전　五分前
십분전　十分前
십오분전　十五分前

~~~

저는 OO이에요.　私はOOです。
축하해요.　おめでとう
사랑해요.　愛してます

환영해요.　歓迎します。
새해 북 많이 받으세요.　明けましておめでとう
힘내세요!　頑張ってください
생일 축하해요.　誕生日おめでとう

좋은 여행 되세요.　楽しい旅行を
안녕히 주무세요.　おやすみなさい
여보세요?　もしもし？
식사 하셨어요?　食事しましたか？

다녀오세요.　行ってらっしゃい
괜찮아요?　大丈夫ですか？
수고하셨어요.　お疲れさまでした
감기 조심하세요.　風邪を引かないように

~~

오늘 날씨는 어때요?　天気はどうですか？
맑아요.　晴れです。
흐려요.　曇ります。
비가 와요.　雨が降ります。

눈이 와요.　雪が降ります。
안개가 끼었어요.　霧が立ち込めました

바람이 불어요.　風が吹きます。
태풍이 불어요.　台風が吹きます

더워요.　暑いです。
추워요.　寒いです。
따뜻해요.　暖かいです。
시원해요.　涼しいです。

~~

누구세요?　どの方ですか？
할아버지　おじいさん
할머니　おばあさん
아버지　お父さん
어머니　お母さん

오빠　お兄さん（女性から）
언니　お姉さん（女性から）
남동생　弟
여동생　妹

형　お兄さん（男性から）
누나　お姉さん（男性から）

(no new words)

~~

칠하세요.　塗ってください
빨간색　赤色
주황색　だいだい色
노란색　黄色

분홍색　桃色
초록색　緑色
갈색　茶色

흰색　白色
보라색　紫色
검정색　黒色
파란색　青色

~~

주세요.　ください
불고기　プルコギ
비빔밥　ビビンバ
김치찌개　キムチチゲ
된장찌개　テンジャンチゲ
냉면　冷麺

김밥　のり巻き
삽개탕　蓼鶏湯
칼국수　カルグクス
갈비탕　カルビタン
매운탕　メウンタン

하고　と

(no new words)

~~

하고 싶어요?　したいですか？
하고 싶어요.　したいです
보고 싶어요.　見たいです
가고 싶어요.　行きたいです
그럼 어디로 갈까요?　ではどこに行きますか？
쇼핑　ショッピング
백화점　デパート
낚시　釣り
바다　海
등산　山登り
산　山
목욕　入浴
목욕탕　浴場
영화　映画
영화관　映画館

축구　サーカー
축구장　サーカー場
산책　散歩
공원　公園
야구　野球
야구장　野球場
독서　読書
도서관　図書館
식사　食事
식당　食堂

(no new words)

(no new words)

~~

My Korean and Me

It's been a while, not that you were paying attention. [Because I don't think there are any "you"s I'm actually talking to.]

I finished the Bae Yong Jin Game, kind of. There are three levels that get harder as you do them - i.e. they take away certain things. And I got to level three, and I'm suck at the doing month/day/day of the week. Because I can't remember all three. And I... kind of gave up.

Right now, I'm at the point where I can't really say... anything in Korean, but I know all the sounds. So I can pretend like I'm saying something, but anybody who knows Korean will know that I can't speak a word. And now that I'm at that point, it can only get better from here. So I'm going to lay out my plans for Korean now.

Right now I'm going through the video lessons on this one website. It's in Japanese. Which, I really like. Because it means I'm learning some new Japanese - mostly "boring" grammar terms, but it's still Japanese - and since Japanese and Korean are a lot more similar than Korean and English, it gives me a lot better of a feel for the language, because of comparisions I can make.

Besides that, I have a few other sources for studying materials, but I'll wait until I'm finished with the Japanese site.

I'm also going with the AJATT method - except AKATT?
I'll use the sentences from the Japanese site, as well as Naver example sentences. Naver is a wonderful resource, not to mention it's so... user-friendly. That is, the url links often have the English of whatever you're clicking, so even if you don't know that the Korean you're clicking on means "news", the English in the link will tell you.

This was supposed to be some kind of informative post about where I'm going with Korean, but it turned out not to be structured how I really wanted. Ah, my blogging skills need some work.

Back to note taking on Human Sciences in relation to the Theory of Knowledge...

To Be Continued...

Foreign Languages have undoubtedly played a large role in my life for the past few years.
However, recent events are causing me to put them on the back burner
It's not something I want to do. But I must.
Hopefully my little stretch will last no longer than a week or two.

Day 4

Not into talking much today, just update.
I did two lessons.

Lesson 5:
좋아해요?　好きですか？
네　はい
좋아해요.　好きです。
아니요　いいえ
좋아하지 않아요.　好きではないです。
개　犬
닭　ニワトリ
고양이　猫

돼지　豚
뱀　蛇
소　牛

쥐　ネズミ
토끼　ウサギ
호랑이　虎

원숭이　猿
비둘기　鳩

Lesson 6:
얼마예요?　いくらですか？
엔　円
일　一
이　二
삼　三
사　四
오　五
육　六
칠　七
팔　八
구　九

십　十
백　百
천　千
만　万
-> Steps 3 and 4 didn't have new words.

Day 3

Todayy was Day 3 of Bae Youngjun gameplaying.
I only did one lesson today Lesson 4, of course.
선물가게는 어디에있어요?　お土産屋はどこにありますか？
똑바로　真っすぐ
왼쪽으로　左に
오른쪽으로　右に
가세요　行って下さい

가다가　行って
사거리　交差点
에서　で'

우체국　郵便局
영화관　映画館
은행　銀行
백화점　デパート

병원　病院
커피숍　コーヒーショップ
식당　食堂
슈퍼마켓　スーパーマーケット

I'm actually kind of excited for tomorrow's lesson. I finally get to learn the I like ~ and I hate~ kind of sentence pattern.

This weekend, I'm going to try and do my first short-story piece for here.
I'm debating how exactly I should do it.
My first thought was to go with 人殺し権 (http://www.lin-rido.com/hito.html), since I've already read part of it, and intensely dissected it. But I still have a long way to go before finishing. It's almost 400 segments long - I think. I added them up a while ago.
My other option is to do some of the short stories from... http://hukumusume.com/douwa/. They're elementary-school aged and several of them have attached audio.
My idea for formatting my post is as so: http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/r09200829/49142985.html
Except I'll add boxes for readings of kanji. By boxes I mean... you put your mouse over the word and it'll pop up a little definition in a box. It's an alternative to using ruby tags.
I might add some key vocab if I'm up to it.
We'll see if my weekend will allow for it though... Later.

Bae Yongjun!

Bae Yongjun~
I didn't really mention it in my last post. But I kind of like him, in that... I like him as a celebrity. Which, shamefully, puts me with a lot of middle-aged Japanese housewives... I also think knitting and cooking and enjoyable. Destined to be a housewife? I think not.

Anyways, the real purpose of this was just to give my new learned words from the game. I actually did 2 lessons today.... x:

Lesson 2:
가방　カバン
여권　パスポート

지갑　財布
돈　お金
휴대폰　携帯電話

밥　ご飯
빵　パン
우유　牛乳

시계　時計
전화　電話
신문　新聞
편지　手紙

Lesson 3:
어디에 있어요?　どこにありますか？
왼쪽　左側
오른쪽　右側
위　上
아래　下
책상　机
의자　椅子
탁자　テーブル

싱크대　シンク台
냉장고　伶蔵庫
소파　ソファー

텔레비전 テレビ
옷장　たんす
책꽂이　本棚

가스렌지　ガスレンジ
세탁기　洗濯機

Spacing indicates the different steps.

In other news, I'm really liking a lot of the content that Japanese bloggers have to share about Korean. It's true that about half the time I'm at a loss for what exactly they're saying, but all the more incentive to work hard on my Japanese before working hard on my Korean.
If I can figure out how, I think I'm going to add a little side feed about the Korean-learning Japanese bloggers. They're all under my "Japanese Blogs 1" folder, but there are a few blogs unrelated to Korean, so I would first have to go recatogorize everything. Or I could just move them to my Korean folder and then do a general Korean feed? Ah well, I'll figure it out.

ペ・ヨンジュンと学ぶ韓国語DS

The festival was a lot of fun. I don't actually have that much to say about it. Other than... it was supposed to start at 7, but apparently 7 means 9? We got there about 9 and it seemed like most people were just starting to arrive. I guess it ended around 1, I had to leave earlier than that. I wish I could've stayed longer, but hey, at least I got to go at all.

In other news, Japan recently released a game called... ペ・ヨンジュンと学ぶ韓国語DS (Learn Korean with Pi Yongjun!). And I started playing it today. I tried a different game earlier, and it was alright, but so far, I think I like this game better.
It has little "steps" and lesson setups as you go.
So far.. Lesson 1... here is what I've learned:
Step 1: 안녕하세요　こんにちは
죄송해요　すみません
괜찮아요　大丈夫です
Step 2: 고마워요　ありがとう
안녕히 가세요　さようなら（送る側）
안녕히계세요　さようなら（去る側）
Step 3: 잘 먹을게요 いただきます
잘 먹었어요　ごちそうさま
Step 4: 천만에요　どういたしまして
또 만나요　また会いましょう

I suppose that's all I ought to do for today.
It's pretty simple, but there are somethings I hadn't learned before.

Now back to studying the ever important Chemistry...

Updates Part 2

First, I'd like to address a piece of news I just found out. Actually two.
The first one is... Korean version of Zettai Kareshi (Absolute Boyfriend). I watched the Japanese drama probably... a year ago? I enjoyed it, and it was one of the first dramas that I tried converting to MP3 to listen to outside of the actual drama. I mostly ended up listening to the first episode, but I liked it. Now I hear about a Korean version, so I'm really excited :3 Source: http://www.dramabeans.com/2009/09/jeon-ji-hyun-considers-korean-remake-of-zettai-kareshi/
Second is... Today I'm headed to a big Indian festival. It's called Navatri or something. One of my best friends is Indian, so she invited me to go. I'm pretty excited. This afternoon I'm headed to her house and it's for a few hours in the evening. I get to wear the traditional Indian clothes too~

I'm not quite sure why I consider these to be news as opposed to other things I'm going to address. I actually started writing this last night, but got too busy to finish.
I'm hoping to make more of an effort to write short little blubs about what I've learned, especially in relation to Korean. Sort of what I did at the beginning of this blog with LSK. Just go back to doing that.
I'd also like to expand a little out of merely languages. I don't have much to comment on in the world at large, unless you'd like to know all about Taiwan. I was actually just thinking of including little reviews of the various podcast episodes I listen to.

Maybe one day soon I'll have a little bit better of a structure for this blog, instead of just useless ramblings which I can't even classify.

Oh right~ besides doing podcast reviews, I'm thinking about maybe adding "short-story-reports" of some of the various things I read in Japanese. Perhaps it will give me more incentive to stick with reading just one thing.
I'm also going back and reading Katekyo Hitman Reborn! (KHR) in Japanese from the beginning and going to take notes on character's speech styles and stuff like that. I found a BBS the other day that's for roleplay of KHR in Japanese, and I've been reading through it occassionally. It doesn't take long, the "roleplay" blurbs are pretty short and it's interesting to see people's takes on different characters, even if it's completely out of character.

Now back to typing up Chem flashcards. Hopefully I can report in about the Indian festival tomorrow~

Quick Updates

Ah, I haven't updated in a while.
I told you, summer affords me more time to blog.
I should be doing chemistry homework right now actually.

Quick notes of interest:
1. RTK is going pretty well. I was adding 30 cards a day for quite a while, but this week I've been adding only about 10 more.
2. Feeling a lot more confident with Hangul. Following the Let's Speak Korean lessons.
3. No exchange student :(
4. College applications. Not really of interest, but it's something I need to work on.

I'll try and give a better update this weekend when I'm not in the middle of chem homework.

Uwaaa~~~ [Ignore]

うわああぁぁ～
留学生がすごいです～
超嬉しいね～
Translation: I'm super happy because I'm finally getting an exchange student.
I've tried to convince my parents for three years. My mum was okay with it mostly, but my dad was against it.
But he finally gave in. In the nick of time ;)
I keep wanting to tell everyone.... except I've already done that, like 3403234 million times.
They're probably sick of hearing me talk about it.
So I'll unleash my excitement here.
I'm just sooo excited.
Her name is Kei. She's from Hiroshima-shi. She's a year younger -w-;; Like most of my friends.
She probably won't go to the same school as me :<< cello =" awesome,">_<; But this is more for me getting my feelings out than for people to read it.)
I don't know when she's coming yet, but it has to be soon - since school starts soon and all. And if she doesn't go to my high school, then the school she's going to has already had orientation. Hopefully they would let us come and tour her around the school though. I've only been there once to take the ACT I think. But at least I speak English and could help her out.
Gaahh~ Just thinking about it makes me all happy~lah!
I'll even learn Tennis for her owo;; Or at least maybe we can kick a soccer ball around outside. It'll be good for me -w-;; I'll probably spend less time online - another good thing for me. And my Japanese will get better I am hoping~ >///< I'm so excited I can hardly wait.
The contact person hasn't been able to get ahold of the schools yet. Probably won't be able to anymore today. I really hope she can tomorrow. I'm worried that she'll end up having to come after school has already started. That would really suck D; Especially with the way American schools are run. But I'll be there to support her >3
I can't even wait for meeting her at the airport. I'm gonna have flowers and a giant sign that says~"OOOOけいさん！アメリカへようこそ！” -w-; I forget her last name right now, but then again, it's probably better I don't post it here, neh?
On top of that, I've been emailing Rei-chan a lot. She told me my Japanese is getting better owo;; Of course I was like ah ha, no not really. but I have been studying REALLY HARD all summer - and that I've been studying too much (汗）. I've finally gotten down to working on my EE.
Ah lah~ I hope I can be a really good host sister to Kei T_T; I'm worried I'm going to over do it though >_<;
I'll probably come back and edit this if I want to rant more about Kei-san~
I can't call her Kei-chan just yettt ;P

Dzongkha, Tibetan, and other Related Langauges

Ever since a few years ago when National Geographic featured an article on "Bhutan", I've been thoroughly interested in the small Buddhist nation. For quite a while since then, my meager reserach has provided me with a few facts. The first of which was that I probably wouldn't be able to make a trip to Bhutan any time soon. While traveling to any country isn't cheap - Bhutan has an added fee of around 200 USD per day just for being in the country? (I'm not sure if this is only a tourist thing, or if you could get in without this fee by studying something). Up until now, my research revealed that "Dzongkha" was the national language - however, just today I read that Dzongkha isn't actually well established. In fact, students prefer English to Dzongkha, and I'm not actually seeing what is the normal language spoken. There have been mentions of Nepalese being outlawed. I've also seen that Tshala (spelling?) is spoken in the eastern regions. One of the more frustrating - but surely interesting if you have the time to study it - of smaller countries is the lack of uniformity. When you go to Japan, you know you're going to find Japanese speakers whereever you go. But you head to Bhutan and can't even find a clear langauge spoken.
So instead of seeking out Dzongkha resources (of which there are few), I think I'm going to stick with learning Tibetan first, which I read today is actually not that closely related to Dzongkha. However, both use the same writing system - which is what attracts me to the language in the first place.
Another stumbling block is that well, Tibetan is closely related with Buddhism. While this is to be expected, my curiousity strikes if it would ever be possible to study Tibetan without an intensive study of Buddhism, that is to say, I'm not against learning about Buddhism, but I don't practice Buddhism. I'm a Christian and I don't have plans to convert any time soon. Some of the few things I've glanced over that allow you to learn Tibetan are usually closely associated with Buddhism - such as a temple offering classes. I wonder how it would be viewed as a Christian going to a Buddhist temple to learn Tibetan? My purpose in learning Tibetan isn't for comprehension of Buddhist texts though, and I have a feeling that's what such a class would focus on.
This whole religon infused with culture is something to be expected. I've already faced some personal dilemmas about it. I love Buddhist and Shinto temples and cultural festivals, yet they're quite readily infused with the religon. Is it okay for me to appreciate such things without practicing the faith - and actually having an entirely different faith.
Another thing on my list of things that would be nice to accomplish is to walk on this path thing around Japan that connects a bunch of temples. I'm forgotten what its called, but it sounds like fun. I probalby would only walk part of the way, but honestly, so much fun, and so pretty I bet~
Aahh, anyways, I'm being ridiculous right now.

I need to get back to my reading "Words and Rules" and working on my EE...

But I can speak ___, too!

>_<; First of all, not that anybody reads this - except for the friend I gave this link to, I apologized for second posting in a day. I try to avoid doing that.
But, competition really gets to me linguistically. When I heard that somebody my age speaks five langauges, my first instinct is to question what languages. Then, if they don't match up (i.e. it's not like Dutch, Norweign, and Swedish), to question how well they actually know those languages. Fluency is a term thrown around, especially when you're trying to make yourself look cooler.
If I really wanted to sound all great, I would say oh, I speak French, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Thai - or something like that, even though my Korean isn't even above reading hangeul, and my Thai is limited to hello (but nobody would know that since the number of people I've meet who can speak Thai is about 0).
But I don't even like to say I can speak French or Japanese or Chinese or Korean.
My French...is laughable. I had a desire once upon a time but a teacher destroyed that.
Japanese - my comprehension is probably less than a grade school student.
Chinese - I don't get far at all. My listening skills are about negative? My reading skills are a little higher because of Japanese, but still pretty low, I see characters and say, "Oh that means ALL" but I have no idea how to say them.
Korean - is the most laughable of any that I would mention. I can tell you exist, hello, goodbye, hi, nice to meet you, I'm a women, you're a man, very simple things. I'm trying not to learn it - trying hard not to give in. But then I hear that someone speaks five langauges and I say I'M GOING TO LEARN KOREAN TOO.
And then there's also that, "Well.... let's just go learn German". Which isn't easy, but since it is related to English, it's not necessarily as "hard" as my Asian langauges. It's not going to be as easy as learning Norweign for a Danish personthough.
I'm really wondering if these young people who speak so many langauges actually can? What do they qualify as being able to speak these languages?
My self-confidence doesn't allow me to say I'm good at any language I'm learning - perhaps theirs says otherwise?
I usually try and console my "slow pace" (which is better than the people who are nowhere), by saying, I'm young, I've got time. In fact, I just stumbled upon a book by Kato Lamb I think the name was. Famous polyglot - who learned at an older age, so I think I'll be fine.
I'm commited to my one language at a time thing for now, because I've got time.

Common Misconception about Learning Another Language

This one is going to be short - and angry bear with me.
I'm so sick of hearing that people "want" to learn a language.
Every time somebody hears I'm learning Japanese, they say "Oh, that's cool. I want to learn Japanese too." I look them straight in the eye, and say, "No, you don't." If they question me, I just tell me "If you wanted to, you would be."
The only people I would accept an excuse from is someone who is already learning another language - this is why I can say I want to learn Korean, without having begun learning it. However, if their learning is school-based, i.e. "Oh, but I'm learning Spanish in school" - then it's not really an excuse. I started learning Japanese even though I had French class everyday. The exception to this is of course, if somebody is honestly interested in their school-based language. That is to say, they are actively pursuing knowledge of the language outside of a classroom setting.
Moving beyond all these exceptions, to learn a language doesn't require skill. All it requires is motivation.
If I wanted to learn Korean, I could, very easily. I'm already in the right direction - that is to say, I listen to Korean music, all the time (it's all I've listened to for ... eight monthes now?) - except this does nothing for my Japanese (I can't find any Japanese music I'm really into...).
I digress, my point here is, if you want to learn a language, you can. Don't make excuses. Don't say you don't have time - that means you don't want to learn the language, you're making excuses. Last year, I didn't particularly "have time" - I just spent every second of my spare time immersed or studying or whatever.

On a side, not as angry note, the RTK method has been going well so far. I'm not -that- far into the kanji, and I know some kanji outside of the ones presented, but today I found a kanji and I knew it's meaning from RTK. A lot of these kanji are seeming pretty useless - I've never seen them before (or if I have, I haven't paid much attention), but I'm sure they'll be handy when I'm tackling novels.

日本語レベルアップしました！

While in some ways I feel like I'm making absolutely no progress on Japanese - and it's become a game of vocabulary overall, I'm starting to feel more adapt. Even though there's still a lot of glancing over texts because I only know .1% of the words, I think I'm moving more up to .2%. (This is all an exaggeration of course.)
Most of the time I'm too lazy to pull out a dictionary - unless I'm reading something online that allows me to hover over it with Perapera-kun (oh, it's so bad). So when reading manga I usually just skim over it. Reading it in my head, happy that I "know" readings (because they're given there for me with furigana), but I miss alot of the meaning. And I get tired after 5 pages - or 10 depending on how long the text is. Yet I keep pushing myself to keep reading. Not all at the same time and I take breaks sometimes, but I am constantly giving up. That is to say, I read, give up, but come back read, give up. The key here is that I am constantly coming back.
About the only time I'll pull out the dictionary is when I've gotten sick of seeing the same thing over and over and having no idea what it means.
My listening is still pretty iffy. Sometimes I get things, sometimes I don't. I definately always get the really simple stuff - the go betweens, introductions. But once they start discussing the stock market I'm gone. Granted, even if it was written it would go over my head if it was about the stock market. But, for example, I understood Shouichi talking about his past in relation to Byakuran in the last chapter of Reborn. If I heard that being said, I wouldn't have understood much I think. So I need to improve my listening. For now, I've got a text and audio version of the first Harry Potter book. I'm going for it because I already know what happens so it helps me understand things through context. Looking at it written really helps out though. Hopefully I can move on to things that I haven't heard before, but can read and listen and then just listen and understand.
In other Japanese news, I'm going to attempt to try out Remembering the Kanji, again. I think I've tried it a few times. But I give up at SRSes too easily. But alas, I'll try it again anyways. And if I give up, oh well.
That's about all the news I have. Except that I just started reading a book called "Words and Rules" by Steven Pinker. I'm only a few pages into it, but it's interesting.

The Curse that is Summer

So I mentioned before, I have enough time to blog, and blog daily.
But summer also comes with one of those "too much time" curses, where you can just put everything off, and keep putting it off, until you... feel like doing it, which pretty much never comes - there's a reason you put it off in the first place.
So I have this paper to write over the summer, right?
4000 words max. Fishing for about 3500 words or more ideally.
The topic is... elasticity of demand for textbooks in Japan. How fun and exciting.
I picked it because... I was looking at chemistry textbooks to purchase and had already decided I was going to do something related to economics. Bad, bad idea. I think it's going to turn into more of an analysis of the market structure.
I have about two weeks to write it now because i've put it off so much.
I've done a little research, but I need to figure out a way to not site wikipedia for where I got my textbook companies from. Since everything is pretty much in Japanese, it makes life so much harder.
I picked it BECAUSE it was Japanese, but ehhh, I'm almost regretting it now.

In other news, my lust for Korean is getting no weaker. Especially after adding those blogs. At least if I learn it now though I'll be learning it off of Japanese. So following a language laddering kind of idea. 한글 just looks too pretty to pass up. ... so did Tibetan a while ago. And the list grows longer. I'll probalby leave off Tagalog and Bahasa Malay or whatever it is until a long while off, just because they use roman letters. Everything is cooler when I have to learn a new writing system. It doesn't help that I found a way to stream Korean television. It's very nice quality streaming too. It's not a huge variety of channels, but it has the main ones. The ones to watch dramas on... Oh Korean dramas. I was watching a channel and super soap opera came on. It was soo soap opera-ie. I don't even know what they were saying, but I could just tell. It was the epitome of soap operas. Koreans are good at those.

On the other front, Japanese. I haven't been neglecting it. Share makes sure of that. I'm so addicted to share. Like I was when I first started using torrents. It just didn't feel right not to be downloading something xD; So I discovered my new query word, "日本語吹替" aka Japanese dub. While I love my Japanese dramas, I just haven't been into them lately. So instead I'm watching American dramas which I wouldnever watch in English, in Japanese. Well actually I watched Heroes in English and I would watch House if I happened to pass by. But now i'm watching Gossip Girl, definately not something I would pick out normally. There's also quite a few Stargates, but ehh, not into that. Right now I have the first episode of season 3 of Heroes playing in the background. I never watched all of Season 3, so might as well watch it in Japanese. Also, I found an audio version of the first harry potter book in Japanese. So that'll go really well with my text version I found. I'll have to cut it into chunks, but it'll be fun. Then I'll have read it in three languages! Too bad I can't find more Bradbury in all three and with audio. Oh well.
I'm not further than I was a few days ago in Puchimon. But it's alright. I can go at my own pace.
And Chapter 252 of Reborn! So intennsee.

And that's it for me.

SUMMER TIEMZ

So the only reason I can keep posting is because it's summer.
And for some reason I'm oddly not being lazy.
Usually I try to blog and just give up. (Note, many first entries and then I just disappeared o: but... I came back!)
And oddly enough, I thought that, oh summer time, I'm too boring to be able to blog daily. I mean, I don't have anything happening, right, right?
Soo, while I prefer novels and short stories and things with lots of words, I also enjoy a manga here and there. And frankly, it's easier to read when it comes to Japanese because a) I love you furigana-san! and b) pictures if I don't understand words (and am too lazy to look them up... which is 99.9% of the time! Usually I only look up stuff if I can use rikai-chan - ah bad habits). Anyways, so of aalll the bajillion mangas out there, my favorite is SAYAONARA ZETSUBOU SENSEI. No, the title isn't really in all caps - of course not, it's in Japanese. But, I just had to emphasis it. Japanese name: さよなら絶望先生. I actually started out on the animu, because I saw an art piece of dA about it and it talked about the animu. So I watched first season and found out, there werez a manga! My luck of course, the manga was... in Japanese, and only a few chapters were scanlated. So I held off on it for a while, because my Japanese was like... かっ漢字?!@ I couldn't read kanji except for.. numbers. Of course, I still have quite a few kanji I look at blankly. Anyways, then I went to Japan, and bought all the volumes, because, even if I couldn't read it, it was still pretty. I'm still reading volume 7... but I will finish them all one day. And I'm barely understanding anything, but I feel like I do because I know how to pronounce everything with the the furigana.
Because of my love for SZS, I've been searching an English speaking SZS community... much to no avail. English speaking SZS lovers are few and far between. I suppose there's a good deal more that have watched the anime, but were I wanting to discuss anything about the manga... I would find myself lost. About the only semblance of a community I've seen is the SZS thread in /cm/.

Beyond my woes of finding English speaking ZETSBOUSHITA'ers, I keep turning back to Korean. Not that I've given up Japanese - that would be ridiculous (though I do make excuses that I'm studying more than I have just because everything I use is in Japanese). It's just... I see the little 한글 (Korean letters) and keep saying, awww it's so cute, I should be able to know what it's saying! In fact, just yesterday I probably added 10 blogs about Korean to my google reader (But they were in Japanese! That's my excuse....)

I've read the same page like ten times in Puchimon. Never getting time to actually hit the next button...

Nothing more interesting to add for the dayyy.

Reconsider my future?

Since I'm just a high schooler, fully dependant on my parents, I have only a vague notion of taxes, health care, and all the other things that go along with "adult life". It's something I ought to have a better idea about since I'm headed to that stage in life pretty soon.
But since last summer, I've envisioned myself going back to live in Japan - as I'm sure a lot of people have before me and will after me. Not immediately after college - well actually yes.
My minerature gameplan (likely to change since I'm young): 1. College, finish with double major in East Asian Studies and Chemical Engineering (or Chemistry, depending on the school). 2. Head to Japan to teach English for two or three years, most likely with the JET program (during this time, since I'll be in Japan; I would take advantage in order to improve my Japanese to a more proficient level). 3. Return back to the States, go to University of Washington and get master's degree (or.... double master's degree?) in Techincal Japanese and Chemical Engineering (or find a similar program at another university) 4. Head back to Japan and work. 5. Visit Ninshan, China for vacation ;D
Anyways, as for the part four, my grounds are definately... unknown. All I know is that I want to be working with Japanese people and be able to use Japanese as part of my job (and NOT be relying on English). To me, this lends itself to the idea I should be working for a Japanese company. I suppose I could work for an American company in Japan, but I haven't researched much into this (it's seven years away and I think I'll be able to put things more in prespective when I know more about the Chemcial Engineering industry). However, my mum thinks it's better if I work for an American company. I think I'm going to face challenges either way. First of all, being a female, I think I'll probably face challenges in just that aspect alone. But there's the idea of a glass cieling for females. I'm not sure how prominent this idea plays into being a scientist/engineer though. I'll admit I'm young and don't know much about the industry and how things work. But beyond that, working for a Japanese company would also present "anti-foreigner" problems. Again, I don't know how this plays out in the industry. Although depending on the amount of foreigners in these kind of positions, I think there could be some hostility. I know that there are at least a lot of Chinese students who come to study scientific things so if they continue their work in Japan, it could very easily been seen as a "threat".
But these aren't really what are causing my wavering.
I've read a lot about the xenophobic attitudes, but I figure, I'll just have to suck it up and deal with it. I'm going to be an outsider no matter where I go. I almost feel better about the idea of being an outsider in Japan, because I know they're not doing it because of anything other than that I'm not Japanese. Here in the States, I know that the reason I'm an outsider is my passive personality and horrible social skills (or at least, that's what I percieve to be the cause for my general outsider-ness).
Anyways, that still isn't it. But I just read an article about some new laws that are relatively restricting on foriegners (see: http://zichi.blogspot.com/2009/07/new-laws-for-foreigners-in-japan.html ). I'm almost worried when I get to Japan I'll be left out of the loop on something important and I'll end up getting kicked out of Japan. What if I overstay my visa by one day?
The future can be very intimidating. For now, I'll just take it one step at a time. Off to college it is... let's hope I can pass my exams.

Podcasts

Books are pretty cool.
I've always been a bookworm.
When I was 5, I would have a bunch of books all in my bed, and just sleep on top of them.
Before I could read books like the Chronicles of Narnia and Lord of the Rings, I used to take them and flip through them and show off to my sister that I had read them ;) Then she asked if there was a character named Aslan in Narnia - and I thought she was trying to trick me, so I said no. Haha.
My room currently has over 500 books in it. (Yes, this is a lot for one room - I have one large bookcase, a small bookcase, two bookshelves in my closet, and two stacks of books in my room). This does not include books I have moved into the attic/ given to my mum for her classroom. And I can add one more to that number, having just purchased the Tale of Genji (a beautiful copy too, even the cashier thought so).
Anyways, while I wish I had all the time in the world to read more books, I don't. So what I've been using as a quick fiction fix is podcasts. I've listened to a few for a while now, but I haven't had anybody to share my enthusiasm. (I could join the various forums associated with them, but ehh, I'm not a big forum person.)
So the first podcast is Escape Pod (http://escapepod.org/). This was pretty much my first delve into the online short story world, I think anyways. Escape Pod is a science fiction weekly short story podcast. It used to also deliver fantasy, but branched off. Anyways, I've listened to every single episode, but I first tuned in around episode 70 I think? This past week they just released episode 208, so they've been at it for several years now. But I really enjoy listening to the escape pod stories. This past week's episode was really entertaining for me. I'm trying to think of how I found it, but my mind draws a blank.
Spinning off of Escape Pod are Podcastle and Psuedopod, both under the same company (?) Escape Artists. I now also subscribe to both of those feeds for fantasy and horror stories, respectively. Also great short story podcasts.
Beyong Escape Artsists podcasts, I tune into Drabblecast (http://web.mac.com/normsherman/Site/Podcast/Podcast.html). It's super quirkly and wayy out there. But really, if you're weird, quite enjoyable. Besides the main feature story, episodes usually include a "drabble" (100 word story) or a piece of drabble news (with "interviews"). One of the great features I really enjoy in the Drabblecast is the background music. The host, Norm Sherman, knows when it's right to add in some music. Just like music adds to movies, this music certainly adds to the podcast. Norm Sherman also adds in some of his own quirkly music too sometimes - another treat.
So these four podcasts pretty much make up for any lack of fiction in my week.
I also subscribe to a literary magazine, Cicada, which comes out every two monthes.

Sadly, during the school year I'm not able to get much reading done. Whenever I set out to read I usually end up falling asleep by the end of the second page because I'm so tired from lack of sleep (read: 5 hours every school night). And lately, I've been avoiding English novels like the plague. But my Japanese isn't good enough for novels. And well, I could be reading in French, but with such bad memories related to French, I can't bare it.
I'm going to suck up my fear of English for the next while though as I read the Tale of Genji (: A long journey is ahead of me...
I wish I could find a list of classic Asian literature, but it's not so easy to find. I'd really like to read something from South-east Asia if I could find something. But let's face it, when I'm searching Wikipedia to find Asian literature, I'm a bit at a loss. I'm also not sure how much literature from South-east Asian countries has actually been translated. While there are quite a few people translating popular langauges like Chinese and Japanese, I'm not meeting anybody who can converse in Laotian or even Thai. Perhaps that'll just be another reason for me to learn those languages ;) But for now I have to get past Chinese and Japanese before I'll let myself tackle another language (but Korean keeps creeping in... even just today I was looking at a website in Korean.) After I hit the major three, I'll be free to go wherever else I wish, linguistically speaking.
While the section on wikipedia is relatively poor in the Literature in Thailand section, I just checked to find there's not even a Literature in Malaysia section... now I have absolutely no clue where to go.
Ah well, I still have a whole Tale of Genji to get through before I need to work about finding a new book to read. And probably that'll be next summer. It won't stop me from picking up a few other books though I'm sure.

I gave up on Korean

It's a bit tragic (not).
I didn't really give up on Korean. It still tempts me every day. And my google reader now has its own section dedicated to Korean/Korea. However, I'm being much more reasonable by "giving up Korean". I plan to come back to it later. After I master Japanese (that is to say, can read all the novels stacking up in my room/favorites folder), I will come back.
I made a website. http://fuyuhakansou.namidaame.com/
I've wanted to make one for a while. I made one three or four years back and gave up on it. I'll probably give up on this one too. But for now, it's just nice to look at. I had been putting off making a website for the last two years because I didn't want to have to go figure out how to code it all again. I took web design my last year of middle school, and then a web design II class my freshman year - but I got out of it halfway through because... everybody in my class was really scary? I sat next to some kid who talked about the gang he was in. And the other side of me, the kid talked about spending his weekend being high on drugs. I really wasn't fit to be in the class. It was mostly a joke anyways. We had a book and we just copied the code right out of it and made a few changes and it was "done". I studied CSS the entire summer before for absolutely no reason (it was to skip web design I, but I really didn't even need to study CSS). Anyways, back from my tangent, I finally made one because I found some cute templates that were really what I wanted. I never really learned to make frames (my teacher from middle school gave me a rundown on them before my Web Design II class, but it was pretty brief and that was four years ago). So when I found the templates, I just manipulated it to fit what I wanted. And ta-da! I have my current website.
And I know have a kanji-ified name. That is to say, I have a fake name I can use. 萎冬葉（しょうふゆは）, which... means withering winter leaf. And according to WWWJDIC's name dictionary it's a real name. Well a real surname and real given name.
I also found out what I'll need sent to me in care packages when I'm living in Japan (see: distant future). Cheese. I'm sure the stores will have maybe cheddar cheese or a few other select varieties, but not all the varieties I enjoy. Considering how many times I've eaten something with Cheese in Japan... I think I had a total of zero times? Maybe once. And in China, zero.

Back to my volume of ぷちモン.
また、
冬葉

LSK 04

Not really in the mood to type much. I think tomorrow or Friday I'm going to do a view of the lessons, because these expressions aren't really getting under my tongue.
So, "_____에서왔습니다" means I am _____ nationality. "어느나라에서왔습니까?" is how you ask what nationality someone is. "미국" is my home country (aka USA). And final expression is "안녕히가세요", which is farewell.
So if I don't post tomorrow, it's because I didn't watch a new video. But if I review, I'll post. I may not review either.
Even though I'm learning Korean, it's only small steps. I'm not seriously considering serious study of the language while my Japanese is at such a lower intermediate level and my Chinese is at a beginner level. Perhaps I ought to reconsider studying Korean at all - it would be a smart move. But I'm stubborn on this fact. And particular occurances have reassured by desire to learn Korean for particular reasons.
I will most likely post on Friday if I do not post tomorrow.

LSK 03

Keeping it pretty short, because my day was pretty bad.
So I learned how to say "I am from ~" or rather, I think it's more like "I am a person from ~" (저는)_____사람입니다. The 저는 is in parenthesis, because it can be omitted. The phrase was a bit difficutl the first few times, but I've got the hang of it now.
I also learned, "이느나라사람입니까?" which means "Where are you from?" or, like the phrase before, more literally (I think) it is "You are a a person from where?" I'm not too good with this phrase.
I also learned "고맙습니다" as thank you. However, this was only gone over twice in the video, so I don't have it down at all.
And that concludes my Korean for the day.

LSK 02

I told my friends at school, that... indeed, I had picked up learning another language.
My one friend who is also -kind- of learning Korean was amazed that I could write... except all I wrote was 입니다. And then I found out when I got home... I was writing it wrong. Oh well.
And another friend didn't believe that I was learning Korean because of movies and dramas. Oh well. I will admit that there is the slight other reason, but if it was purely for that reason, I would have either picked up trying to learn it long ago, or been able to keep away from it.
My entry today's going to be relatively short. Then again, I hope most of my entries are long like my first entry.
So today, on the second episode of LSK, I learned "저는~임니다" which now adds the subject "I" to the phrase "입니다" from earlier. At first, the 저는 was a little bit awkward. But hearing it several times helped me to get it better. The other phrase was much harder. 만나서반갑습니다. Something along the lines of it's nice to meet you. The only way I was able to get it was after one person put a pause between 만나서 and 반갑습니다, but it's still a little bit awkward. Now off to watch 태왕사신기 (Legend). It's the first period drama I've ever seen. I watched the first part of the first episode yesterday and it seemed pretty interesting. Let's just hope I can still manage to get my chemistry homework done while watching. At least I don't have to worry about math. (No math teacher for a few days~)

Reality Check

I doubt anyone's going to come across and read this. But if you manage to, I'll give a short introduction.
I'm a high school student. I'm in a rigorous academic program, so time is quite spare. Not to mention I play two instruments - cello and viola. But this kinds of things will -NOT- be what you will read about if you play on reading this.
My true area of interest is foreign languages. It began with French, which I started learning in elementary school (but it was mostly learning the colors... for four years). I moved and did not have French for my fifth grade year. Middle school, I took French every year. My French teacher was extremely hard - and we were supposedly on a high school French 3 level by the time we finished. However, high school saw the downfall of my French. The teacher was horrible, my French actually de-proved instead of improving. So I sought to satisfy my yearning for Foreign languages in a different way.
And thus, I began trekking on learning Asian languages. I'll admit, it began with Japanese because I was interested in Anime. However, my Japanese didn't take off until a year ago, around the same time I applied for a summer program in Japan. About the same time I became more serious about Japanese, a friend of mine told me about her Chinese school*, and that it had a class for English speakers. I joined in four weeks late - but I spent the entire next week learning the lessons I had missed.
I developed an interest in Asian dramas around this time as well. (And left the Japanese anime that had brought me into the world of east Asia behind me, mostly. I still enjoy a few manga - but I'm no hardcore addict - and it must be in Japanese.)
However these two langauges are still not the focus of the blog - maybe.
I started this blog because I commited... the horrible act of trying to pick up another language.
Some people juggle several langauges all at once. But most of the blogs I've read advise NOT to do this. The AJATT is a fairly popular method, and a lot of langauge-learning blogs out there are going with the idea of native input. However, the main point of native input is to surround yourself with the langauge.
And if you decide to pick up more than one language, you're already halving what little time you have to spend with a specific language.
That being said, my primary langauge is Japanese. My room has signs all over it in Japanese (mostly with sayings like 頑張って to remind me to study, or telling me that English is not allowed in my room), I use firefox in Japanese, iTunes in Japanese, most of the time half or more of my tabs are in Japanese, I rip the audio from my favorite drama episodes and listen to it while doing chemistry homework, etc. I think you get the point.
Chinese has been put to the way side. Much to the disappointment of my Chinese teacher. I feel pretty much like a failure in Chinese class. But there's only four of us, and I'm the youngest and the only one still in school. One person took Chinese at univeristy for four years. Another lived in China for several years. And one is an older second generation Chinese-American. And then there's me. It's only my second year - but I probably only know about two month's worth of Chinese.
Asian dramas do not just have Chinese and Japanese. There's still Korean. I've looked at Korean and my first thought was "There's no 漢字/汉字, I'm not interested." That was true, until I started watching more Korean dramas and movies. I love the dramatic movies that make you cry - and Korean movies are well-known for doing just this.
And then I was doing an assignment for my economics class, and since I had used Japanese newspaper last time, I decided to use a Korean newspaper. However, the side displays with Hangul looked very interesting.
And then, I watched April Snow, a Korean drama. And realized, that a particular person whom I may have a particular interest in.... is Korean and, as far as I know, speaks Korean.
It all came down to one thing - it wouldn't hurt to learn... a litlte Korean.
So I downloaded a few episodes of Let's Speak Korean. And I'm going to watch one a day. Learn the phrases. And avoid romanization at all costs - I've heard that Korean isn't very easy to romanize, and I would rather not depend on it. Let's Speak Korean is great for this - because there is no romanization what so ever.

So today, I watched lesson 1.
I learned how to say "Hello": 안냉하세요. I know a little bit about the Korean script since I've read about it a bit before decided that "I was going to wait until I was a lot better with Japanese and Chinese before touching Korean (that plan failed). So I understand how it works. And I hope that by looking at the script I can make sound connections.
I also learned that you introduce yourself by the phrase "~입니다." I don't yet know if that is more of a "My name is..." or if it's just a "I'm ...".

And that concludes my post. It's 10 PM, and I need to go finish reading the stranger and practicing for my French oral tomorrow. (I'm in my last year of French, and it couldn't have come sooner.)


*I don't even know how many people know what Chinese school is. Whenever I mention it, people seem to assume that Chinese school is a normal-day school taught in Chinese. It's not! It's like Saturday school where - usaully - second generation Chinese-Americans go to learn to read and write Chinese.