What do you think of ラブコン as a show so far? I was thinking of watching it at one point
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to be honest it’s not my kind of show so I’m not really sure I can judge it well? I wouldn’t really pick it up if it weren’t for the kansai ben aspect. I don’t really enjoy straight romances. However I like the lead character and I feel like it’s a pretty realistic depiction of highschool kids so far. It’s also funny, like it doesn’t make me laugh out loud or anything but it’s pretty constantly amusing.
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Having watched about 2/3 of it, I’d chime in that it’s a well done romance for the genre. But you have to be willing to deal with the “tall girls can’t date shorter boys” drama because that is at the heart of the entire series.
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Yeah I can see the insecurity stuff getting old, but I think it’s not unrealistic for that age to have such hangups, so so far it isn’t bothering me. I enjoy how natural the interactions between characters feel. The banter between the two leads feels really true to life.
All that said I only watched 2.5 episodes so my thoughts my change.
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You can add ジョゼと虎と魚たち | L26 to the list of Kansai-ben content. Among everything I’ve watched/read until now, this is the story with the highest concentration of Kansai-ben (and more specifically Ōsaka-ben) that I know. All characters speak in the dialect.
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Thank you for the recommendation!
For this weekly update, I have to admit I’ve not been doing great, for no real reason beyond that I was too preoccupied with other things.
jp
Wanikani reviews as usual, still on level 24, which is the longest any level has taken me by now. However my accuracy is down so I don’t want to add too many new cards.
I did some satori reader chapters but not too much, honestly not sure why I’ve been feeling so low on motivation lately. Well, I do sort of know. I’ve not been enjoying my wanikani lessons, because I do not do consistent reading to see what I learn in action. I will just have to set time aside everyday to read consistently without waiting for some vague inspiration to pick up japanese.
de
I fell behind on my reviews here a few times this week, which overall isn’t a big deal. But kind of more of a sign of how demotivated I’ve been.
I’ve read around 80% of the third earthsea book. I meant to finish it before today so I can start the krimi book club pick. Issue is, I don’t like this book very much. It’s the sort of writing I don’t enjoy in any language, and the plot didn’t grab me either. I will finish it, but added to the general sluggishness this week, it’s a bit demotivating once again lol
on the bright side, things can only go up from here.
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1000% this. I’ve tried relying on motivation many times in the past and it always fails eventually. You have to build a habit. Read every day, even if it’s just a single page of manga, or a single paragraph of text. After a couple of months the habit will be pretty well formed and it will be a lot easier to start/continue reading when you don’t have the motivation. It will be like brushing your teeth or getting up for work; it’s just something that you do without needing motivation.
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If you’re still looking for Kansai-ben content, the current Light Novel Book Club pick 京都寺町三条のホームズ | L29 might be a candidate? Some of the customers speak the dialect. Though I should mention that I’ve only read the prologue so far, so I have no idea if the rest of the book is the same. Just thought I’d mention it before I forget/in case you want to join us.
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And also sadly it’s the risk with this author, it seems… In the context of Die kleine Hexe I stumbled upon some news reports about him having written a book in his young age that glorified the Nazi regime, which he never clarified or even dissociated himself from:
OTOH there is Krabat which clearly shows he changed his mind over time. So maybe one shouldn’t overestimate the other book. But still sad that he never opened up about it.
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Dr Seuss wrote anti-Japanese propaganda cartoons, but also the Sneetches. People are multifaceted and have the ability to change. But also their uncomfortable works should be challenged (and not like, 50 years after writing them…).
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pretty alright week!
jp
Started level 25 of wanikani
Satori Reader: read at least a chapter a day, still not as much as I’d like, but realistically I was simply busy with other stuff.
Manga: Keeping up with the yuri club pick, but not feeling much like reading manga lately
Watching: watched a few eps of lovely complex. Not much but that’s mostly because I’m not a big anime watcher in general, I watch little even with english subs unless I’m obsessed with a series.
Kansai-ben: lovely complex and the yuri club pick both have kansai-ben. I think I’m getting relaively comfortable with it.
de
Finished the third earthsea book, keeping up with the krimi club pick.
I skipped reviews a few times this week which I’m ok with as I did them on the weekend.
Overall: I think I can still make a bit more time to study over other things but definitely better than the past few weeks so I’m content.
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Forgot to post yesterday but here I am now
jp
Going through wanikani level 25 vocab. This level feels much easier than the past few but I’m still taking it slow because of leeches of the past 3-4 levels that keep popping up. I would like to increase my speed again soon though. But wk reviews have turned from something I dread to fun again which is all I can ask for.
Satori reader: finished the second kona story, started secret. secret was called the best story by a few comments I saw online so we’ll see how I’ll like it. To be honest, I’ve been bored by Satori reader stories for a while, which is why I set myself the challenge to finish them all during my stay away from home. If I hadn’t paid yearly, I might not have bothered to continue my subscription. It’s a good site with a lot of content, but you get diminishing returns.
Manga: I think need to drop the gl book club pick. I voted for it and was excited to read it, but I am not enjoying it and it feels like a chore. Not sure what it is about it, and maybe I should push through and finish the volume anyway, but I keep not picking up any manga because I feel obliged to read this one if I do read any , which makes me not want to pick up anything.
Anime: I only watched like half an episode of lovely complex this week. I watch during slow hours at work, and mostly I didn’t have any last week. I think the 6 eps I watched did accomplish what I set out to do, which was familiarize myself with kansai ben. I still would like to continue it as I enjoyed it more than I thought I would.
de
gender reviews as usual , I’ve skipped a few days again which as always I don’t particularly feel bad about. When I get busy, this is the first thing that slips my mind. I was thinking I should start muting words that I am unlikely to use in speech myself, as that is really the only time knowing gender is critical.
Reading: Enjoying Achtsam Morden, I’m thinking of picking up another german book just so I have something german to read when I’m done with the book club chapters. However realistically I’m trying to keep up with two other separate (english) book clubs so might not be realistic…
really, there aren’t enough hours in the day
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If you’re not enjoying it, I wouldn’t recommend pushing through it, especially if it’s causing you not to pick up other manga. Life’s too short to read manga you don’t like imo, unless you think you have something specific you’ll gain from doing so. Fwiw this is the first book club I haven’t dropped, and I enthusiastically voted for most of the ones I participated in as well.
Of course, feel free to post about what you’re not enjoying too, if you can figure it out.
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Yeah, I agree with ルナ; drop it if you’re not enjoying it and it’s preventing you from reading other stuff you do enjoy. There’s definitely merit in pushing through and finishing it, but how worth it that is is definitely user-dependent, and you know yourself better than we do.
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I feel this so hard. Until a couple months ago I was doing basically the same thing. I would only read a couple pages a day because I didn’t feel like reading what I was reading at the time but I was adamant that I had to finish it.
It’s super freeing to just put something away when you don’t want to read it. You don’t have to completely drop the book if you still want to finish it at some point, but it’s probably a good idea to put it on the back burner for the time.
And hey, the book club will still be there if/when you decide to continue reading it!
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Just a quick update for this week.
Jp:
- level 26 on wanikani
- dropped the gl club manga after the comments here (thanks!), read a few chapters of various other manga instead.
- around 40 chapters of satori reader story “the secret”
- several eps of lovely complex
german:
- gender reviews as usual
- keeping up with achtsam morden
- started transted audiobook Die gleißende Welt, very pleasant narration might be one of the few times I will listen to the whole thing at regular speed instead of fastened
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This week was busy for me, i wasnt at home pretty much at all this sunday, and the rest of the week was excitement about a newly adopted cat.
So, another quick one:
japanese:
- level 26 still on wk , did my reviews daily as usual
- a few chapters of satori reader , and one episode of lovely complex
german:
- gender reviews and keeping up with the book club, didn’t read any of my extra audiobook this week
And lastly, cat tax:
Hopefully I’ll have more to report next week.
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jp
level 27 in wanikani. I could probably go faster but I’m enjoying the slower pace lately. It’s crazy to think I now “know” around 900 kanji, that seemed impossible just months ago.
Reading: more satori reader chapters. It’s a well designed app but the stories really aren’t interesting to me at this stage. Still I feel like i should keep reading because i have a years subscription… and I don’t feel ready to tackle native novels I am interested in yet. So I’ll keep up with it for a while longer. My original goal was to finish all satori reader chapters left during my vacation, but it really isn’t gripping enough for that. I do one or two chapters and get bored.
I watched less than a complete ep of lovely compex, barely worth mentioning. But I want to incorporate more anime, I really feel like it’s the most helpful lately. This week, I want to watch a few more eps.
No manga this time.
de
Only 8 new cards left in my gender review deck! Still gonna keep reviewing, but workload should decrease. It’s still less than 15 mins a day, except that I do skip some days so it adds up…
Keeping up with Achtsam Morden.
Once I’m home hopefully next week, I will think of a way to incorporate some output. Maybe just writing stuff privately, or even a chatbot honestly, I just need to get into the habbit of it again. I think I had enough input practice to start it.
Also want to return going through my grammar book…
Other than that I am keeping up with some english book clubs and also the kitty 
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I will be travelling tomorrow (finally back home!) so I’ll write an update early, as well as how much or little I reached my goals for the vacation.
vacation review
The “vacation” (i was still working but in a different place basically) ended up being much longer than I anticipated, so you’d think I would hit all my goals and then some. I did not, but it wasn’t a total failure either.
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Satori reader: my goal was to finish all finished narrative stories. I have almost reached this. I finished all the finished narrative stories except : 1. the river sanzu whcih is jsut 20 eps, i could probably force myself to finish it now for finishing sake, but I wont 2. the news style ones, which I only semi incuded in the goal anyway, more like “extras” 3. the hard versions of some stories I already finished, I’m not sure if I will read those at all at this point.
So all in all, not a complete success, but pretty close for satori reader. -
Kansai-ben: I watched around half of lovely complex. My goal was simply to familiarize myself more with kansai-ben, so I’d say it’s a success.
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Manga: I ran a couple manga throguh mokuro so id have something non-satorireader to read. This was not really a concrete goal, but I would have expected to have read more than I did. I mostly read manga as entertainment, not study, and at some point during my vacation my entertainment time got taken up mostly by something else. So while its somewhat dissapointing, I’m not too bothered by it. I did read some manga though, just not as much as I thought I would.
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For german, my goal was to keep reading and finish all new cards in my deck, which was a success.
Now when I’m home, the first week is probably going to be rather busy but afterwards I want to set myself some new goals, especially with german.
now the general week updates
jp
- wanikani level 27, sitll going through kanji.
- Watched 2-3 episodes of lovely complex
- Finished satori reader story “the secret”. I kind of hated it. I can’t believe this is the story I heard so much praise for…it has an interesting hook but then the bulk of the story is basically random flashbacks to mundane things. Koibito is much better in the same genre.
de
- more reviews as usual.
- Finished Achtsam Morden this morning. I will start Der Schwarm next, I know it’s a book club without a set schedule, but I’d still like to “catch up” this week.
- Listened a bit to my current audiobook as well.
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oof, I said last week this one would be busy, but I didn’t know the half of it. Without going into too much details, when we came home, there was surprise water damage which we had to deal with, as well as the more expected things like vet visits for the new cat (he will need surgery apparently). On top of it, work was super busy too, I worked like 10 hours overtime over the weekend. But at the end of the day, I could have made some more time I think…
jp
reviews as usual, still level 27
a few chapters of satori reader
and a few eps of lovely complex. 5 eps left now.
de
usual reviews
I tried continuing my audiobook, but despite loving it before it couldn’t keep my attention, I think my mind was too scattered this week. I also tried the Der Schwarm audiobook, which I also couldn’t focus on. However I watched a lot of german youtube content (mostly book reviews).
I wanted to set new goals, but honestly I’m both mentally and physically exhausted. Even next week I think I will take it easy. I will focus on things that I find relatively easy like watching things in target language. I think I can do more of that without being burnt out.
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