Study
I am utterly bedulled by wading through the kanji character list I have to learn for the JLPT Level 3 test in December. I am really only at Level 4- level 3 is meant for those with 300 hours of study and 300 kanji, with a total of 1,500 word vocab (kanji readings and meanings) when compounds and non-kanji words are included. The grammar is definitely above my head at the moment, with just three months until the exam (an interval which includes my trip back to Blighty, of which considerable journey time planned for Crap Magazine reading shall now be converted to diligent Japanese study (I will probably thus get many more hours sleep). I went for the higher level cos I thought it?d motivate me out of my study deadlock, a hangover of not doing the summer study schedule I?d planned (i.e. a 2 hour level check in Starbucks with Kay rather than a 5 week intensive course in Tokyo). I have, however, been hitting the kanji at the expense of my much more satisfying Minna no Nihongo course, especially given the cancellation of most of my recent lessons with Matsuo-sensei. Kanji is difficult to remember and difficult to apply outside of the academic setting- the chance of stumbling across the few compounds you?ve learned (swan, second generation, true intentions etc) is small, plus they?re unlikely to come up in a reading context where you can understand anything except that single kanji among hundreds of other, more difficult ones (graduating secondary school pupils are meant to have mastered the standardized jouyo kanji list of 1,945, 1006 of which by the end of elementary school). My study method has been built around a hand-printed off index list of the Level 3 needed kanji. Next to the kanji I?ve drawn the stroke order diagram, extracted from a jouyo textbook. Then I?ve practiced drawing it out in an exercise book ruled for this purpose, writing the readings I need top-to-bottom in the space adjacent to each kanji box (capital roman letters for On readings and hiragana for Kun). Then, on the index list, I?ve written in the compound vocabulary and verb meanings as contained on kanjisite.com?s Level 3 guidelines. I was going to try and use mnemosyne, a piece of software that flashes the kanji at you at increasing intervals as you better memorise them- you can get three-sided cards to test you on both readings and meanings. Today?s gem: The same compound with different readings and slightly variant meanings:
??- CHUU-KAN (On)- daytime
??- hiruma (Kun) ? by day
But I have failed to engage the software- am not home long enough to use it there, plus can?t enter kanji using my Brit keyboard and at work I can ?t download the program cos I?m not an admin. I?m regretting not having stuck to radical-learning more before I started learning full kanji- the most successful kanji-learning programs for foreign learners do seem to be based on mnemonic (Heisig) and radicals.
The art of writing kanji is something of a dying one. Many adults cannot write difficult kanji because predictive keyboard entry is so frequently used- even I can write a fairly decent email or text message in Japanese if I know the hiragana for a word. The government does provide the Kanji Kentei (?????????? Nihon kanji n?ryoku kentei shiken; "Test of Japanese Kanji Aptitude") which tests the ability to read and write kanji. The highest level tests about 6,000 kanji- Mr Kobayashi at Tsuchibashi JHS was studying for a high level recently. Kozue was telling me the other day how Koshiro?s mother has roped her into a tanka (short poem) class- she is by far the youngest out of the brood of old biddies, the teacher being the only male (but still almost 90!). I guess a lot of traditions are guarded by the elders, often accumulated and cherished when they have some spare time after retirement- but I see evidence of real generational gapage, even more so than one might do back home, given the rapid changes seen in Japanese society in recent decades. Yesterday, for instance, one of the lessons at Nisshin Elementary School was given over to practice for the upcoming Sports Festival (??? or undoukai)- they are going to perform the kama-odori, which I first saw performed by kids of the various hamlets at Seppetobe. It?s not easy, and the old man who?d come to school seemed a bit taken aback at the reluctance of the younger ones to learn it, and their slowness in replicating his fast-paced demonstrations. It was the girls? first time, because they aren?t allowed to perform at Seppetobe (although Yoshitoshi, my part of town, does)- so the poor things were struggling the most with their little sickles and scythes. They do just seem a bit pansy-like, though, as do the teachers who are virtually all strangers to the town, drafted in by the prefectural system. I?m convinced on of the little girls there has her eyebrows plucked, plus there are some real fatties. Reminded me affectionately of the lazy children of England, who I had previously always put in an entirely different box to the regimented, rigorously exercised mini-troops of Japan.?
Fukuda, the Prime Minister, has resigned although he?ll stay in office until the result of the leadership election thus triggered. It looks like he may be replaced by hardliner Taro Aso, spotlighted for a panoply of controversial statements he?s made in the past- slighting burakumin Diet members; saying as economics minister that he?d like to make Japan a place where ?rich Jews? would like to live; praising achievements made during Taiwan?s colonization, racist comments on American vs Japanese intervention in the Middle East and various other nationalistic trumpets. I don?t seem to be able to get much commentary on this from Japanese friends, surprise surprise. The terrifying impending election of either Obama or McCain (I had one of those moments of strangely clear intent to take an overdose if Palin and McCain and the fucking idiots that make up?ok, I?m going to stop here) garners nods of name-recognition but similarly little commentary.
Despite long swathes of time having not blogged, I don?t feel there?s an awful lot to write. Perhaps I?ll be inspired soon.