A long day becoming night . . .
Damn it's getting late and I'm still at Uni despite the usual Wednesday desire to pike after third period. The thought of an entirely Japanese language class is usually fatiguing after the early morning entailed by first period Anime class.
I stayed up late watching 耳を澄ませば (Trans. badly, as far as Karl is concerned, to Whisper of the heart, where literally translated it would be something like 'if you listen hard . . .') which was the movie for today's class. I'd never heard of it before coming here - I think it's a lesser known Studio Ghibli work as it was only produced by Miyazaki Hayao, as opposed to being directed by him. It was pretty good. Pretty standard young romance type flick, but nice to see it in a Japanese context; an environment that I am becoming increasingly familiar with.
In the class I just had - Japanese Linguistics - we started looking at regional dialects of Japan. Some are so way out they sound like a different language and even the Jap students can't understand them . . . others just have slight variations in intonation compared to standard 'textbook' Japanese, but it's pretty hard for me to distinguish this kind of stuff accurately, and imitating correctly it is also difficult. For the first time, the teacher tried to speak English to me - he's a pretty kooky young guy . . . I understood what he was trying to explain already anyway . . but hey! He also keeps telling me I can write my assignments in English but I figure it's better from my langauge skills to try in Japanese . . . I assume his English must therefore be reasonably passable - especially as a linguist - he probably understands far more than he'd be willing to admit or speak - like a lot of Japanese people - and like me with Japanese really!
My usual translator friend, Kaori, was abent from class today, but it was enjoyable to note just how much I could understand these days without help!
I am attempting to start of new regime of study - really focussing on trying to do a solid hour or so of Japanese language related study everyday! I need to be more proactive on the langauge front!
In my Sunday post I mentioned that I should have been studying, instead of posting and chatting to a certain someone in Auslandia, I never really got around to it and (thankfully most everyone else was unprepared as well) as a result did not go very well in the test - luckily some of the kanji I studied two weeks ago, when I was being diligent, came back and I think I'll manage to pass it! But I want to be doing well, not average!
On an English note . . . Today I was elated to realise that I'm actually half way through chapter 4 of Thucydides (bloody great tome of dense, 2 millenia old prose about the Pelopponesian War that we have to read for International Relations), not as I mistakenly remembered, only half way through chapter 3! Thus I am now in front on the reading stakes (having, only last week, been the slackest, having barely started!) and it seems likely I will manage to get it all done in time for the proposed text next week. It's a ridiculous amount of reading for exchange students in a country in order to study a language other than their mother tongue, but it's been quite enjoyable in the main. Apart from Karl, the others are much less inclined to agree . . . Thank goodness for my training with The Simarillion!!
Why am I still here ? I'm going home!
In further updates on the homestay idea . . I have enquired about it at the ofice and presume my interest has been 'duly noted'.
I stayed up late watching 耳を澄ませば (Trans. badly, as far as Karl is concerned, to Whisper of the heart, where literally translated it would be something like 'if you listen hard . . .') which was the movie for today's class. I'd never heard of it before coming here - I think it's a lesser known Studio Ghibli work as it was only produced by Miyazaki Hayao, as opposed to being directed by him. It was pretty good. Pretty standard young romance type flick, but nice to see it in a Japanese context; an environment that I am becoming increasingly familiar with.
In the class I just had - Japanese Linguistics - we started looking at regional dialects of Japan. Some are so way out they sound like a different language and even the Jap students can't understand them . . . others just have slight variations in intonation compared to standard 'textbook' Japanese, but it's pretty hard for me to distinguish this kind of stuff accurately, and imitating correctly it is also difficult. For the first time, the teacher tried to speak English to me - he's a pretty kooky young guy . . . I understood what he was trying to explain already anyway . . but hey! He also keeps telling me I can write my assignments in English but I figure it's better from my langauge skills to try in Japanese . . . I assume his English must therefore be reasonably passable - especially as a linguist - he probably understands far more than he'd be willing to admit or speak - like a lot of Japanese people - and like me with Japanese really!
My usual translator friend, Kaori, was abent from class today, but it was enjoyable to note just how much I could understand these days without help!
I am attempting to start of new regime of study - really focussing on trying to do a solid hour or so of Japanese language related study everyday! I need to be more proactive on the langauge front!
In my Sunday post I mentioned that I should have been studying, instead of posting and chatting to a certain someone in Auslandia, I never really got around to it and (thankfully most everyone else was unprepared as well) as a result did not go very well in the test - luckily some of the kanji I studied two weeks ago, when I was being diligent, came back and I think I'll manage to pass it! But I want to be doing well, not average!
On an English note . . . Today I was elated to realise that I'm actually half way through chapter 4 of Thucydides (bloody great tome of dense, 2 millenia old prose about the Pelopponesian War that we have to read for International Relations), not as I mistakenly remembered, only half way through chapter 3! Thus I am now in front on the reading stakes (having, only last week, been the slackest, having barely started!) and it seems likely I will manage to get it all done in time for the proposed text next week. It's a ridiculous amount of reading for exchange students in a country in order to study a language other than their mother tongue, but it's been quite enjoyable in the main. Apart from Karl, the others are much less inclined to agree . . . Thank goodness for my training with The Simarillion!!
Why am I still here ? I'm going home!
In further updates on the homestay idea . . I have enquired about it at the ofice and presume my interest has been 'duly noted'.
posted by Eleanora Martinez at 10:50 AM
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