finished level 27 of wk but going to pause new cards for a bit. I’m making a lot of mistakes of old cards lately and I think going a bit slower will help.
Finished lovely complex. Started doremi again. Will pick up another show that has jp subs as doremi has none.
Finished another satori reader story. Still having mixed feelings about this app but I think it’s the best option for now as I am not in the mood for picking up native novels.
de
usual reviews
finished an audiobook (die gleißende welt)
read abit of der schwarm
a bunch of youtube content
Mostly that at this point, I think I should be reading real native content instead of it. Satori reader is convenient in many ways, I can easy see what kanji I know and should be able to read, if I have a question I will get an answer within a week from the staff there. But more and more I don’t get stuck and even the hard level stories feel not hard enough to be that challenging. It’s still decent reading practice , and I did pay for a year so I continue to use it at least, until I truly run out of ocntent.
(Also frankly the stories are boring. That’s to be expected I guess but there are a few good ones and I don’t know why the rest are such a drag comparetively. But then the comments seem to all enjoy the stories so what do I know)
It’s there to be a bridge, so it makes sense that you feel like you are/should be outgrowing it. The real benefit to it is the narration and the notes. Based on what you’ve logged on Natively already, and the way you’re feeling, it may be time to move on. Life’s too short to read boring stuff, if you’re not meaningfully benefitting from it, imo.
The stories there are hit or miss, in terms of being interesting (at least when I used it). I loved some, couldn’t be bothered with some, and got bored midway with others. Everything has its fans tho, and the Satori forums/comments are the place for them, so of course everyone there likes them. Outside of there it’s pretty common for people to feel they’re a bit boring.
(my c key seems to be broken it either doesn’t work or outputs multiple cs, and I don’t catch and fix it everytime, sorry!)
jp
wk level 28
reading: I thought about what @暁のルナ said but I don’t think I’m quite ready to give up on satori reader yet, I feel I still get value out of it. Also having something with audio is useful to me as sometimes I need to study in a noisy room and it’s hard to fous without audio. I started the sarin attack series and I think it’s one of the hardest ones on the site.
for native content I am working on either finishing or dropping my ongoing manga volumes. I also started an untranslated novel by Sayaka Murata マウス. I enjoyed her works I read in translation. The last proper novel (well, light novel , but there was nothing light about the language…) I read took me more than a year, it was far above my level and I don’t think I got anything out of it long term. I was simply looking up every other word and piecing them together. So I was hesitating to start native novels again. But I think it is going better now.
Anyway, I decided for myself to set a goal of 1 hour of reading each day. What I am reading doesn’t matter as much as I am reading for 1 hour each day. So it can be a novel, visual novel, manga, satori reader etcc.
Watching / listening: I watccched another episode of doremi. Aiko is definitely more understandable now. I want to start another harder series next to this but not sure what yet.
de
reviews as usual.
I am reading Der Schwarm and reasonably enjoying it, but I was thinking I want to finish the physicccal books on my shelves instead. I have a lot of german books my father bought…
I’m also going to start trying to get some writing done each day this week…
wk level 28, i decided i will not go past level 30 until new years.
reading: some manga (csm & yotsuba), some satori reader (2nd fujiki story), 30% through マウス which is way more than i expected. I did succeed in 1 hour reading minimum everyday except today. I technically do not have enough time in the day left to hit it today even if I didn’t sit down to write this
de
reviews are the usual
I think I will drop Der Schwarm. I enjoy it but not quite enough to read 1000 pages of it.
For writing I failed completely. Maybe I’ll have to talk to a german ai to get me started lol. While it might make mistakes I mostly just want to “activate” that part of my brain.
If you’d like you could write to me as well? (e.g. as private messages here)
I’m usually quite busy but if you don’t expect long essays from me then I can try to promise to respond more or less quickly.
I really appreciate the offer but I do actually have german speaking friends, but I feel too awkward to write to a person right now Like I will try and my brain will just be empty beyond the simplest stuff
Then why not start with the simplest stuff?
I’m currently practicing numbers and time of day with one of my Japanese language partners, can you find even simpler stuff?
just kidding - please don’t feel pressured or anything!
This friday my cat is having his surgery. Things will most likely go fina, the only real risk is anesthesia. Afterwards he will stay with the vet for a few days. However, I imagine I will still be stressed the whole week. Whether this translates to my studies as focusing on it more to distract myself, or not being able to focus on studies at all, remains to be seen.
jp
level 28 still
reading: 40 percent through マウス , I read less than last week but that’s mostly because I read more of other things. Such as manga, and a visual novel (code_18 which is part of a series I like , but widely considered unremarkable)
watching/listening: nothing. that’s fine, only so many hours in the day , but I’ll try to get in some this week.
de
I’ve been thinking about german, I really need speaking/writing practice more than anyhting. And when I did a little, I immediately could tell its more “effecticve” than anyhting else. I think I would get quickly better at it if I committed to it…my thought is…should I even? My german athropied because I don’t need to use it. Even if I get better at it now, unless I keep it up everyday it will atrophy again, and if one day I will need it again, I will have to restart. Truth is moving to Austria is in my longterm plan, but currently it is not an immediate concern with other stuff going on in my life. Combined with limited time, I think I’d be happy just getting some german in every day until more focused study is neccessary. I already watch german youtubers in my free time, and a goal of mine is to go through my fathers german books he left me, so I don’t need to make myself write or talk on top of it (for now). I think I’d rather spend that time on japanese (…for now).
If you feel too awkward to write to a real person, do you have an idea what would make you feel better about it?
Like I’m struggling the same with Japanese, I’ve still held off trying a language exchange app or finding a teacher. I think for me it’s mostly the fact that I have very specific requirements and expectations, and don’t want to burden the person by it (even though i know it’s irrational, especially if I’d be like paying a teacher).
I think it’s a matter of - I have german-speaking friends I regularly talk to in english. Going hey can we talk german is fine and they would likely agree. but it would just make our conversation harder , and I feel like I’m wasting everyones time? And to talk to someone specifically just to practice german , I don’t know, what do you even talk about then?
Well, like I said, I don’t consider it a priority anymore, at least for the immediate future.
Kitty update: his surgery itself went well. But we are having some other issues, like him not eating as much as he should. We are in contact with the vet so I’m not too worried.
jp
as I suspected I didn’t get much done. This week is also going to be busy.
WK: just level 29
Reading: I didnt touch Mausu, but I read some manga, some code_18 and a bit of satori reader. I am not sure if I kept to my 1 hour of japanese reading everyday goal, because I didn’t time myself. But if I didn’t I don’t think I missed it by much.
Listening/watching: a couple of episodes of doremi.
Well I didn’t write here for a month. Suffice to say it’s been a bad month and let’s leave it at that.
Also: is there a way too move this thread to the japanese subforum? I think any updates on german will be minimal from now on.
(I am still reading german but…not in a way I feel like I want to log)
So what have I done for japanese the past month…? Well a bit more than the bare minimum, to be honest. I am up to date with my reviews (done with wk level 29 but waiting a bit to get to 30), I have been reading, but not as much as I was planning to. I plan to return to my 1-hour-a-day reading eventually, but not this week.
More specifically
still around sixty percent of マウス. there has been a timeskip and combined with other htings going on it made my excitement for it lower than other stuff.
read a bunch of code_18 though hard to gauge how much
read an hour or two of higurashi visual novel, though I dropped it again. It’s one of my favorite vns and it still feels a bit too hard to enjoy fully. So I am waiting on it.
Thank you!
Also I noticed in my last post I mentioned my cats troubes, so if anyone is worrying my comment about bad month was about him : he is completely fine
I thought I had written here the week before last but it has been way longer. Huh. I changed the category to Japanese as I said I would.
At any rate starting this week weekly updates are back in. I have some goals for the end of the year:
Finish WK deck level 30 → not a problem, if I really wanted to I could do this in a few days, but I’m taking this slow
Finish マウス → I took a big break and only really picked it up back this weekend. That said I have like 30% or so of it left, so shouldn’t be a problem.
Finish おジャ魔女どれみ → I’m more than halfway through, as long as I watch an ep every few days, should be ok.
Finish at least one route of code_18 → this is by far the hardest thing I’m reading and the hardest thing on my to do list. Still, it doesn’t feel like it’s not doable. Except that I have no idea how long one route really is. So we’ll see
Finish part 1 / first 11 volumes of Chainsawman → I love the manga, so unless I suddenly don’t feel in the mood for it for a month…this will be done
Finish the digimon adventure 02 movie → I started this and then completely forgot because other things got in the way.
As for what I did on the days I didn’t write here, I have another place I do daily checkings, and most weeks I just did my reviews, and maybe read some manga. Not ideal but what’s done is done.
I got stalled at book 4 or 5 but own through either 10 or 11 (I forget). If you wanted someone to read it with I’d be happy to have a deadline to finally read through what I have.
Question: when reading in japanese, do you sound out kanji words? Often I will recognize the word, but not the reading. I would probably remember the reading if I stopped and thought for a bit, but I don’t want to slow down my reading too much and rather just move on.
at least, until I truly run out of ocntent.
Like I will try and my brain will just be empty beyond the simplest stuff
