January 22nd 
Dear language diary…
Korean Update
I’m getting slowly getting back into the groove of working with Korean.
I did another two sections of reading and vocabulary from 本気で学ぶ韓国語上級 this week, which means I already finished the entirety of chapter 6! I just need to go back and do listening and dictation with sections 4-6 and then I’ll move on. This chapter went much quicker than the last did, since the topics and vocab were more daily life related vs. history and geography in chapter 5, which was about the history of Jeju Island.You know what, though? All knowledge is good knowledge, I’ll take it all!
The entire chapter was about various superstitions and the last page had a list of “common superstitions” in Korea. Apparently one is “If a man eats chicken wings, he will cheat on you” - because he will get wings and fly away. 
Ladies, if your man is eating chicken wings you better be careful!
Japanese Vocabulary & Kanji 
The biggest way that I still study Japanese these days is by actively trying to expand my vocabulary. I do 2 new anki cards a day with interesting vocabulary I found in books and saved, and the Japanese translations of the Korean vocab I learn also keep me busy and engaged (sometimes I feel like I’m doing double duty because I won’t know 1/4 of the Japanese translations on a day of lessons in キクタン韓国語). But, the other day I was in a stationary store and found some pens that I used to use back during the pandemic to practice writing kanji from the 漢検 漢字学習ステップ textbooks and a wave of nostalgia washed over me. Suddenly I was enveloped in the haze of memories of never-ending lockdown…
The kanken ステップ textbooks are basically a textbook series based around the 漢字検定 levels that teach you the kanji that correspond with that level, the stroke order, the readings, and some vocabulary that correspond to each reading. I learned the material from level 9, 8, and 7 cover to cover and used an anki deck and the aforementioned super special pens to review everyday! Level 9 is pretty much early elementary school level stuff, but there were still plenty of words in there I didn’t know! Studying with genki as a foreigner is great, but you still end up with some gaps I guess - they’ll probably exist forever but native textbooks that kids use are a fun and interesting way to fill some of them.
Anyhoo, that thorough learning process took me approximately 1 year per book, which is kind of crazy. But, I believe in slow and sustained growth (and learning Korean at the same time haha) so I’m actually fine with that speed. I think it’s a nice anecdote of how long it can take to learn things when you have multiple hobbies and a job and other obligations etc. etc.
So, fast-forward back to the present day, me standing in the stationary store. I was overcome with an intrusive thought - “I could buy these pens and start studying with those 漢検ステップ books again! I do have levels 6 & 2 sitting on my shelf! I could go straight to level 2 for the real hard stuff and learn the types of words I’m trying to learn at the moment and have fun using anki to do written kanji reps again!”…As if I wasn’t just posting days ago that I’ve been in a funk and I want to embrace my limited time, energy and brainpower in the year 2025….
Anyways, long story short the intrusive thoughts won. So, I ended up starting a new little anki deck based on a single page’s worth of vocabulary in ステップ2級, and I’m planning to do one(!) new card a day and adding more when I run out. Or maybe not - kinda feeling like I’ll end up a 三日坊主 with this one but let’s see. I’m posting here so it’ll be so embarrassing if I quit, right?
If you’re wondering what type of kanji and vocabulary shows up in level 2 and why I’d want to learn it, here is a sneak peak of some of the vocabulary associated with the level 2 kanji 艶 and the English definitions from my J-E dictionary app:
艶書 - love letter
艶美 - voluptuous, seductively beautiful
妖艶 - bewitching, captivating
凄艶 - weirdly beautiful
艶消し - frosted glass, matted, disillusionment, letdown
If you can read kanji and are familiar with the kanji in the compounds above, you can get some interesting insights about 艶. My dictionary says that it means: “glossy, luster, glaze, polish, charm, colorful, captivating”, which does apply to the words above, but seeing it used in different ways gives me a deeper understanding of the meaning - it’s something charming, attracting, enchanting, fun, and maybe even a little sexy.
It’s not super likely that I’ll use those words in a conversation or hear them ever, but I may read them in a book. In fact, this week while reading the level 27 book I just finished I came across the phrase that someone was wearing an expression without つや on their face - so they were maybe not amused, but understanding what つや is let me understand more deeply how they were not amused and how they felt about the situation they were in, and knowledge like that allows me to read literature (well, all books really!) with better comprehension and get more out of it.
So, let’s see if I can keep up that new little addition to my routine and see what other gains I can get from it!
