My journey into Japanese and Russian

[devilyoudont]

There are courses on memrise which teach hiragana using full words written in hiragana, but they don't teach the hiragana in order, which seems to be how you are approaching it. (I also learned in order)

There are a lot of different keyboards available for Japanese, but the ones Japanese natives seem to prefer usually involve a separate key press for the diacritical marks.

There are several characters that can be written in a few different ways (きさそり off the top of my head). Just like English can write lowercase "a" and "g" in multiple ways, the same is true for Japanese. Just as in English, certain forms are more associated with computers or handwriting, but the division between this is for handwriting and this is for computers is less strict in Japanese than in English (hardly anyone writes something that looks like a typed lowercase g). There were many recent reforms of spelling and writing for Japanese. The reforms took place basically between 1900 and 1950. This may be why it seems like there are a number of variants for certain kana and kanji floating around, and why the restriction of this version for handwriting and this version for printed text isn't so strict--in other words, the reforms were so recent historically, that certain variants haven't had time to "naturally" die out.

On the other hand, the recentness of this reform is why Japanese spelling (in Kana) is currently so regular!

I believe I learned both hiragana and katakana in less than a month, but it was so long ago I'm not 100% sure.

B2 would correspond to around N2 for the JLPT. I have heard that levels below N2 are basically worthless for getting work in Japan, but do not have direct experience.

2ch (now 5ch) is the biggest forum in Japan. They do also have anime forums.

[Ezra]

Just out of curiosity how long did it take you to fully master the Hiragana? And the Katakana?

Hiragana was much easier for me. One of the reason might be that it is just much more prevalent in Japanese text. When I finished a textbook I used, I had no problem with Hiragana, but only lately I stopped to forgot this or that character of Katakana.

[Sarafina]

It's harder to correspond CEFR system with JLPT because it doesn't account for writing and speaking production. But generally people tend to say that N2 is roughly equivalent to B2 and N1 is B2+.
https://www.jp-sjs.ac.jp/eng/course/com ... ive/level/
https://jlptsensei.com/about-jlpt/

N2 is generally regarded as the mininum profiency for most jobs but N1 can be used as a proof of advanced language profiency which is necessary for jobs of more advanced positions/for entering Japanese university.
According the JapanTimes, "...recruitment specialists and Japanese language teachers interviewed by The Japan Times stress that passing the N1 or N2 level of the exam is of paramount importance for foreign nationals hoping to land a top job in this country."

"According to Shinohara, around 58 percent of job offers on his site require that applicants speak “fluent” Japanese, and 39 percent say their applicants should be able to speak “business-level” Japanese. Fluent can be construed as N1 level, while business-level could be translated as N2 level, he explains."

“It may not be a requisite, but having an N1 or N2 certification will go a long way for anyone seeking a job here,” Shinohara adds.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/ ... 2iNgtVKh0x

[indeclinable]

Thank you all for your illuminating answers, they have been very clarifying.

I'm currently at the 5th (or "n") line of the Hiragana. Basically I can identify them when they appear and I have memorised the stroke order. Active usage is still a bit rusty though, I can only actively write the characters of 1st line and some other characters of the 2nd and 3rd lines when I hear their respective sound... like I hear "a" and I'm immediately able to write あ. With the others I have to take a pause and reflect.

While going casually through Assimil's 3rd volume, the one concerned with Kanji, I saw that in the bibliography Wolfgang Hadamitzky's Kanji und Kana. Die Welt der japanischen Schrift in einem Band LERNBUCH UND LEXIKON is praised as a necessary reference. This seemingly knowledgeable YouTuber refers to it as the "Kanji Bible".



It seems that Langenscheidt has also a two volume edition of Hadamitzky's Kanji und Kana. Is there any significant difference between them?

Since it's really cheap I've begun to consider buying it but I wonder if it's not redundant to have it when I already posses the mentioned apps as well as Assimil's third volume. What do you think?

In any case Mr. Hadamitzky has also made freely available online work-sheets for practising Hiragana and Katakana as well as some Kanji. They should prove useful.

Also it seems that my second-hand volume of Assimil has some missing/damaged pages (182, 467 and 506). Does anyone have the 1996 edition of the second volume of Le japonais sans peine and would be willing to send me a scan of those pages?

[brilliantyears]

We used Hadamitzky's Kanji & Kana book at uni. By "we" I mean we were told to use it, but for some reason I never actually did (and I regret that). Yes, it's generally considered one of the best books for the jōyō kanji.

By the way, some advice for learning the hiragana/katakana: while learning, try to stick to the あ い う え お order as much as possible (i.e. か き く け こ) in your head. It'll help you later on when you need to look stuff up in dictionaries, book stores, etc.
Learning the hiragana and katakana completely took me about 2 weeks, but we were forced to get it over with asap

(I didn't say this before btw, but I'm super excited to see another Japanese/Russian combination around )

[indeclinable]

Second update. I think I've got a good hold of Hiragana but I still struggle a bit with Katagana. The Kana.pro website is a blessing, I'll continue to exercise with it as long as necessary.

Since I got bored of "reading" a combination of phonemes without real meaning behind it. I decided to burn my ships and dive in head on with the Kanjis, at least some of them, to practice reading and hearing a meaningful coherent text and memorize the readings in context.

I decided to memorize two songs:

1) The TV-sized version of Sid's Rain (Opening 5 of FMAB)



2) The TV-sized A Cruel Angel's Thesis (Opening of NGE)



I found some online transcriptions of the lyrics with Kanjis, but they differed among them in the furigana. I did my best to assign the reading that I can perceive in the song but I would like to ask for help in proofing this. Also I'm not sure how reliable are the transcriptions I found and I don't want to end up memorizing something that's wrong.

Here are my two attempts of a transcription with furigana. If they're useful I'd be happy to upload the pdfs somewhere.





If you know any other cool (and short) song and have it's transcription with furigana, and preferably translation, I'd be thrilled to hear about it.

Another question: Is it possible to use Kanjis with furigana in this forum?

[devilyoudont]

Some search terms that might be useful for you to look up song lyrics:

try the song title with karaoke

I searched 残酷な天使のテーゼ + カラオケ and got this video:



Another useful search term: 歌詞 (lyrics)

Hope this helps

[vonPeterhof]

There's a few mistakes in the "Rain" transcription: 思いだ in line 5 should be 思い出（おもいで）, 包まれた should be 包まれて, plus the character used for ほほ in line 7 is a Simplified Chinese one (should be 頬). The only error I noticed in the 残酷な天使のテーゼ transcription is the furigana on 熱い in the chorus (should be あつい).

https://www.lyrical-nonsense.com/ is a pretty good website for anime and J-pop song lyrics. No furigana, sadly, but there's generally a romaji transcription available, plus often translations into several languages. Since it's a relatively new website its song selection tends to skew towards more recent works.

[indeclinable]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'm back after a few months of adaptation in my new job (I still hate it but they pay well and I have reasonable "free time" or "pauses" to review my Japanese). Having memorized Hiragana and Katakana, now I'm able to read them pretty fluently.

After a few weeks of fruitful reading of Assimil I quickly realised that the transcriptions and translations were more of a distraction and a handicap than a help. The dialogues were a bit monotonous but useful. So I went to the library and took a look at the two most suggested methods: the Genkki and Minna no Nihongo.

I quickly became disappointed with Genkki as it relies too much on grammar explanations and on English. So I went ahead and bought a used Minna no Nihongo (1ed) which is monolingual. I have liked it very much, but I seem to have a problem with how quickly it introduces Kanjis. Just on the preliminary lesson on pronunciation, the useful phrases and the first dialogue you're introduced to the Kanjis 71, 189, 26, 450, 264, 455, 255, 63, 68, 503, 466, 60, 2, 378, 82, 47, 532, 541, 355, 179, 176, 162, 160, 622, 590, 109, 44, 158, 308, 163, 220, 164, 70, 26, 109, 50, 44, 392, 487 (Hadamitzky's numeration), and they were a pain in the ass to find, even with the indexes.

I am on the understanding that there's a booklet of the Kanjis included in the Minna no Nihongo. Is it worth buying (if I already have the Hadamitzky)? Do the Kanjis appear in the same order as they do in the book? Does anyone have a list of Kanjis of the Minna no Nihongo as they come up in the text (preferably according to Hadamitzky's numeration)?

Although I like the training I get in looking up Kanjis I feel that I lose a lot of time doing it.

Basically what I have been doing is memorizing and transcribing the dialogues of the Minna no Nihongo in order to memorize the Kanji, its writing and its reading in context. I know that at some point I'll have to memorize all the readings (at least the ones Hadamitzky gives) but I'm trying to delay that moment. I keep watching a lot of anime as well as the YouTube channels you guys suggested me.

[dampingwire]

I have liked it very much, but I seem to have a problem with how quickly it introduces Kanjis. Just on the preliminary lesson on pronunciation, the useful phrases and the first dialogue you're introduced to the Kanjis 71, 189, 26, 450, 264, 455, 255, 63, 68, 503, 466, 60, 2, 378, 82, 47, 532, 541, 355, 179, 176, 162, 160, 622, 590, 109, 44, 158, 308, 163, 220, 164, 70, 26, 109, 50, 44, 392, 487 (Hadamitzky's numeration), and they were a pain in the ass to find, even with the indexes.

FWIW I've not heard of Hadamitzky's before.

Minna no Nihongo does introduce "real Japanese" right from the word go, and keeps on doing so. It does, certainly in the first two books, pretty much always supply the reading, certainly in the lesson vocabulary list, and probably in the lessons themselves as you go along. So where you see 本 you will also see ほん, either as furigana in the lesson or in the gloss in the lesson vocab list. So given the furigana you can head over to your favourite online dictionary (tangorin.com or weblio or whatever), drop in the furigana (romaji will do here if you have keyboard issues) and pick the right kanji from the small number of options that pop up. tangorin will show you the kanji and stroke order and a bunch of other things.

If that fails then you can scan or photograph the page, turn it into a pdf and throw it at google docs and ask it to let you edit it. It will go away and think for a minute or two and then present you with a pretty accurate copy-and-pasteable transcript of the page. That's a quick way to get your kanji (and a quick way to transcribe the bits you want to keep - although you may prefer to type the sentences afresh at the start to get your muscle memory going).

It occurs to me that you may not know that each of the MNN books comes as two books. One is the grammar explanation book (available in multiple languages and which includes the lesson vocabulary) and the other is the main Japanese-only textbook. Perhaps you only have the latter? If so you won't have the vocab list but flicking through my copy, I see furigana over every kanji, so the above hints should still help.