(Almost everyone at my 21st B-day party at Manekineko)
The fall semester has begun and I could not be any more busier than I ever have at Hakuoh. I am currently taking 10 classes, though I am only supposed to be taking 7. Each class is worth 2 transfer credit hours back at IUPUI. I am taking two business classes I shouldn't be taking, but I am only taking the classes because 1) I have friends in them and 2) I want to improve my listening (and hopefully speaking) in Japanese. The last one is Intercultural Communication, taught by the vice-president of Hakuoh, which reminds me of a lot of culture class mixed with geography and history.
I remember I asked Brian about our language abilities and he compared where I was at in late July to where Matt was at when he left Japan and he considered Matt the second best at Japanese after Kyle. I didn't think that was true, because Brian's command on the language (i.e. his knowledge of vocab and how to use it) was incredible and since I have a terrible habit of forgetting vocab (I consider my range of vocab not where I want it to be) I therefore have a harder time in conversation by having to use simpler words and explanations when I know I could do better. But, in thinking about this, I thought of some things that I've been thinking about for a while in general about languages. I'm sorry if this seems like a rambling, but I need to get this out because it's been bothering me and I can't concetrate on another assignment until I write it.
I'll start with my thoughts on Japanese so far. I've been here for (what will be in 30 mintues) 6 months, and I have felt I've been significant progress to my overall Japanese ability. I have received so many compliments this semester so far from teachers, students, friends all saying "うまく なった” and other words in Japanese that express that one has reached levels of decent comprehension. I personally think there's always room for more improvement however. I always refute compliments (it's more Japanese that way, but actually, what's interesting is if you compliment a student, chances are they just say "thank you" instead of being modest and denying it. I don't know if it's because they received it from a foreigner and in general we accept compliments instead of denying them, but I know a LOT of things in "culture" books I've read aren't true at all. At least based on my experience) because I feel myself that I have let myself down in terms of studying before I came here.
Let me explain a little more: when I came here, I couldn't understand anything spoken. Listening (as I knew BEFORE I left the states) was my weakest ability. This just proves that no matter how long you're studying something, if you aren't somewhat serious in it, you can't really say you've studied something for a long period of time. I've "studied" Japanese for 6 years (maybe going on 7, I don't know) as I had it throughout all of high school, but I really only became serious (somewhat anyway) once I got into college. I skipped first year (tested out of it) and had second year Japanese in college. I went from "always A or better" to "steady B man" in the transistion. So, when I came here, I studied.....well....listening. That's what I do a lot of now. Sure, I wasn't picking up meaning earlier when I started listening when I first came to Japan, but I listened to the tv, to my teachers, to my friends and found what words and phrases that were commonly used and such. I wanted to remove my former attachment to the textbook, as textbook grammar teaches the meaning of what it is in English, but not normal usuage a lot. So, I listened well and responded how the Japanese probably would in certain situations. What I found was that my knowledge of vocab and my listening were previously seperate items in my brain. Over time, listening and picking out words, then sentences, then meanings, eventually the two items became connected and I could finally listen well.
My speaking was shaky at first, but got better over time and my response time has gotten a lot more faster and natural. My speaking rate is a lot slower, and I don't know if that's because I don't want to make a mistake or that's how my brain is able to process two languages at once. Brian told me the best way to use and speak Japanese is to abandon English. By abandoning your own native language, you can begin to use another language well. I haven't entirely abandoned it because I use it on a regular purpose (now mainly reading internet things and writing this blog), but I don't speak it much outside of my アルバイト (part time job) and English language lounge. Brian admired my speaking at a much earlier rate than he did (he said he was too embarassed to speak Japanese when he first came over), but with anything (including dating, but I have yet to encounter that in Japan....yet) you have fail A LOT. And I mean a lot. The thing is, native speakers of Japanese will correct your usage. It's just natural. Lot's of practicing and correcting....that's how one becomes good at languages.
Now, onto the subject of English. Until I came to Japan, I really....REALLY took my native language for advantage. Recently, I envied the new taiwanese exchange students on their spoken Japanese and kanji reading ability (yes, it's INCREDIBILY good). Really, to any native of English, mastering Kanji is something that can only result in something positive but it is also the hardest skill (remembering wise) for us English natives. But, like I said in an earlier entry, while they understand the meaning of the kanji (because it basically remains unchanged from the chinese kanji parts) the 読み方 or reading of it is very different and causes problems for them too.
I envied the skill of kanji rememberization (I HATE making lists for rememberizing and doing them because I either forget and bastardize the ひらがな or I rememberize the list, but can't use the word in daily conversation or use it in conversation at all), but what was more envied by the new taiwan exchange students (espeically Katie and Rin-kun whom speak English really well) was having the ability of speaking and understanding like a native in English. English is the world language now and is important for technology, business, and diplomacy. Japan is trying to get its ability in English to where Taiwan and Korea currently are approaching in the study of English. I do think it's a lack of effective programs for teaching English as students are putting so much effort into it and sometimes not getting enough out of it. I mean, I know friends of mine that practice/study English so well that it puts me to shame to most of the studying I have ever done in Japanese. But, in general, it is generally agreed that American students aren't as serious as most students in Asia or other parts of the world.
That aside however, I came across some interesting points in researching about English...comparied to Japanese (and some other important Asian lanaugages like Chinese and Korean):
-Japanese has 2 phonetic systems each consisting of about 48 characters and kanji (chinese characters) approaching around 2000.
-English has 1 phonetic system (i.e. alphabet) consisting of 26 characters.
-The Japanese phonetic systems originally came from kanji, which have meaning.
-The English phonetic chacters have no meaning in the sense of now (I am sure they had something at the time when the language was like greek or latin). T is a t, and has now special meaning .
-The number one mistake for Japanese people speaking English is pronouciation (second: intermediate grammar usage-- like runned instead of ran). The reason: English is much like Chinese. Chinese is more tonal than English, so by saying a vowel with a raised tone at the end changes the word's meaning entirely. English....well, we don't have sounds that all represent the possible combinations of pronouciations of words. For instance, my popular example of ロード (pronounced roudo) while having the pronounciation for the Japanese in カタカナ, it has four meanings in English. The first is the obvious "road". The second is "load" (Japanese in general have problems with l's and r's). The third and forth are "rode" and "rowed". Say these four words. Don't they sound similar (outside of load)? They do, to the Japanese students. The accidents that seperate the prounouciation are very slight.
I could continue on with observations I have observed, but several things have distracted me and I forgot some parts I was going to comment on. Perhaps, that can be saved for another entry sometime. Sorry that this post is another "wall of text", but I promise more interesting writing (and pictures!) in future entries. My last comment about languages is I am currently considering taking up Chinese, but I haven't mastered Japanese decently enough yet to merit a huge percentage jump in my time. Now, I am off to finish a 文書！ お休み～！
