Hi there, 零時 here. My goals for this post is to keep a sort of record of where I am and where I’ve been as it often gets lost as you progress in a language (or when you think you aren’t progressing). I’ve been quiet on Natively since joining in 2023, gradually tracking all my books mostly and some tv shows in Japanese. Not sure how often I’ll update this but I’ll try.
My experience with Japanese so far
I had a brief interaction with Italian in primary school but while I liked learning it I didn’t really have the passion for it. I then reached high school where I got to choose Japanese for the first half of the year and French for the second. I didn’t mind French, but Japanese I absolutely enjoyed. I had watched Pokemon growing up but that had been English dubbed and that was the only anime I knew so far. Through some friends who were also learning Japanese I got introduced to anime and manga. This was all using English translations and English subtitles but it gave me my first glimpse of Japan. I got to travel to Japan for a few days the previous year with my family and that sparked my curiousity too even though I knew literally nothing. I continued Japanese as a subject through to the end of high school. The last year of high school I did over mulitple years so I started studying Japanese in my free time gradually with the reduced workload. I started one degree in uni then changed to currently where I am now is studying Japanese and Chinese as majors.
I’m making it my goal this year to read more in Japanese especially novels/ラノベ so we’ll see how that goes. I’m comfortable reading with a dictionary at around level 30 on Natively. I tend to like Queer works, and psychological series as two major genres though I haven’t explored the latter as much in Japanese.
Other languages experience and interest
I am doing a duel major in Japanese and Chinese. I tried learning Cantonese but I felt that while there was people I could use it with, there wasn’t an interest in the media produced, so I decided to go with Mandarin which my uni offers. There’s plenty of 耽美 books and such that I want to get into. I’ve read 魔道祖师 in English and it’s a goal to read it in Chinese. So far I’ve been reading Imagin8’s Journey to the West graded reader and I’m up to chapter 85/100. I’ve also read some series on Little Fox Chinese. I’m probably HSK 3/4 on the old system.
My background on my mum’s side is basically completely Polish. I was never taught the language growing up but I’ve always wanted to learn it. The newer generation of kids across the board aren’t seeming to be taught Polish compared to older kids and older people. It’s a shame because while my babcia can speak good English my mum, uncle and her often speak in Polish to each other. And there’s plenty of family still in Poland who speak little English.
Some other languages in the future I’d like to learn possibly are Russian, French and some Nordic language. But current me is currently focussed majorly on Japanese, and a little bit the other two langauages I’ve mentioned.
Thanks for the follow! Wow you’ve read a lot of books, I bet I can learn a lot from you.
The two Queer novels I’ve read so far in Japanese is 恋せぬふたり | L30 and セマンティックエラー | L32 both which were pretty good. Not sure if you’ve read those because your read list is so long. I’ve written reviews if you wanted more of a summary.
Nice to meet you! I’m also learning both Japanese (N2) and Mandarin (~HSK 5) (and Korean, and Spanish, and sort of French… I have a problem) but Japanese and Korean (B1+) are my main languages at the moment.
You’ve probably already heard of it, but I highly recommend Heavenly Path’s resource list for finding level-appropriate Chinese reading materials. It was really helpful for me when I was around your level. They have loads of quality 耽美 recs! What are your favorite 耽美 besides 魔道祖师? I have the same goal to read it in Chinese eventually, haha.
I’ve kind of stalled out with Chinese for the past couple of years, but I hope to get back into it properly later this year or next year, once my Korean is at a better level.
I already wishlisted the first one when I checked your book list!
I just wishlisted the second one too. Translated from Korean, huh? That’s the first time I would read a Korean book (but I heard they had some good BL, so it sounds promising!)
I do read a lot You can check who read what on a given book page by looking at the activity list at the bottom. It doesn’t really work for popular books since you’ll get a thousand entries in there, but generally it’s good enough. (Doesn’t work for people whose profile isn’t public, but mine is)
Yes I have heard of them, I’m even in their server
I was thinking of trying 秃秃大王 when I’ve finished JTTW graded reader.
Honestly I’ve been more in the Japanese field and I’ve been “saving” Chinese works for when I can read them in Chinese. The only danmei that I’ve read is MXTX’s works (in English). That and sometimes it’s hard to find translations. I’m up for recs though.
this my absolute all-time favourite TV show (my profile photo is from there!) and since I discovered it and saw that there was also a novel adaptation I have been thinking about starting to learn Japanese to read / watch it in the original version.
Since you seem to have liked the novel (I wasn’t sure about the quality of the adaptation), I’ll just add that to the arguments in favour of adding Japanese to my learning routine
Hi, nice to meet you! I did a bit of profile investigation (can’t help it, I love seeing what other people are reading) and it looks like you’re enjoying 暁のヨナ | L28? @暁のルナ is another fan of that series, I know; been on my list forever. I know I’ll also likely be checking out the queer series you mentioned; セマンティックエラー | L32 I hear consistently good things about, so maybe it’s about time I finally gave it a shot myself…
Ah, you’re living the dream. I’d love to add Mandarin one day and get access to all that 耽美.
Yess it’s such a good TV show! 高橋 is one of my favourite characters of all time too
I liked to novel too even though it didn’t add as much, it was a faithful adaptation and it gave an insight to the inner thoughts of characters.
I see you’re mainly learning Korean. I know it’s hard to juggle languages, so pick up Japanese when you can.
Hello, nice to meet you too. Don’t worry I like looking at other people’s profiles too.
Yeah I’m enjoying 暁のヨナ | L28 and I’ll slowly get through that. I like reading manga from different series at the same time as long as I’m reading something. Been reading more books the past couple of days though. I’ve been trying to read more 少女 manga as well, getting recommendations from ‘Colleen’s manga recs’ on Youtube. I’m making a list from one of her videos.
Yeah セマンティックエラー | L32 has different focuses than the drama if you’ve seen that. But I did enjoy it.
That was my first in-Japanese manga (after Crystal Hunters)!! I’d already read in English, but still had to read them side by side to fully get it. It’s still my favorite
I somehow have much less of these on my finished list than it feels like I’ve read. I think it’s partially cuz a lot of yuri is basically shoujo (in terms of artistic and storytelling conventions), but without officially having the label (bc a lot of it is published in independent magazines, or online sites with no demographic affiliation)… Which is to say: I too need to read more shoujo
Interesting to hear of 恋せぬふたり | L30 - another addition to my ever growing reading list
Wow it’s not the easiest for one of your first manga, good job. I don’t usually use an English translation when I read manga, so I can only hope I’m understanding it correctly…
Well the “list” I’m making on Natively is basically 100 少女 manga you should read based on the recent discussion about the mangaka of ダンダダン | L26 having to read 100 少女 manga but none of them being named. So Colleen from “Colleen’s manga recs” made her own list. You can also just watch the video, it’s this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TX7j5TUy2hI&t=2s&ab_channel=Colleen’sMangaRecs
Indeed, and thanks… Tbh it was often more like playing detective work to try to understand what was going, and constantly looking stuff up (plus I had just read it in English). These days I’m in an online book club that reads 1 chapter aloud each week. Sometimes I can understand it on the fly, but other times there’s just too much unknown/forgotten vocab. I’m looking forward to rereading the whole series, once it’s finished
I mostly don’t these days either, but it can be a good way to verify whether your comprehension is correct or not. Feel free to ask if there’s any parts you’re stuck on/not sure of
なぜ読まなければならないの？ Did it have something to do with writing ダンダダン? (if so, I definitely didn’t see that reflected in the anime).
Checked out your list - a lot of that is stuff that’s already on my radar… so maybe something from there will be my next read, when I finish Sailor Moon
I’d say as someone who just watched the anime (and loved it), the author did a really good job with Momo, which is one of the reasons I liked the show so much. I think I’m drawn to shonen/seinen plots, but I can’t do token female character, random panty shots of incidental female characters, or the girl’s whole character is that she’s a girl. That, unfortunately, limits my shonen manga/anime pretty considerably. I don’t know what’s to come in ダンダダン, but if reading 100 shojo manga series got us Momo I think more mangaka should also do it.
Now that you mention it that Momo one of the things I really enjoyed about the show. Momo was a full character, and an active lead. And their relationship is pretty well and convincingly developed. I’ll have to think on that if I do watch S2 (which I’m very iffy on, after the last 1/3rd of S1)
Have you considered アオのハコ | L21 (anime here)? It’s sports rather than battles, but the romance is very slow burn shoujo-style - and both are done quite well.
You can check who read what on a given book page by looking at the activity list at the bottom. It doesn’t really work for popular books since you’ll get a thousand entries in there, but generally it’s good enough. (Doesn’t work for people whose profile isn’t public, but mine is)
this my absolute all-time favourite TV show (my profile photo is from there!) and since I discovered it and saw that there was also a novel adaptation I have been thinking about starting to learn Japanese to read / watch it in the original version.
