Ore sanjou! I have arrived!
Hello everyone!
I go by the name of Zombiehead, though some call me Chris, and Alex has given me a bit of blog space to help you learn Japanese, as best I can anyway. Personally, I’ve only take a bit of actual classes on the language, meaning one year college course really, which I had to drop for reasons I won’t get into. I have however continued my self teaching and it is from this self teaching method I shall assist you, the intrepid learner and possibly myself. So in a way, we are learning together.
Learning Japanese here in Alaska, where I am currently, is quite difficult because, except for the university classes, the only exposure I get to it is through Anime, Manga, and J-Drama and the occasional tourist who stops by the store I work in. But I shall try my best.
Predominantly the way I learn is through vocabulary lists, not really themed or anything, but ones I find immediately useful, and then I try figuring out how to use them in a sentence and such. Any other study tricks or anything shall come up as they occur to me.
Now some of the things I use for self study are as follows
The Genki Series of Textbooks (http://genki.japantimes.co.jp/index.en.html) These books are the ones my japanese teacher had us use and frankly they are fantasticly handy and useful.
Tuttle’s A Guide to Learning Hiragana and Katakana: (http://www.jbox.com/PRODUCT/TUTTLE007) To be honest, this is mainly just for practicng the Hiragana nd Katakana writing systems. Which is important. While kanji is going to be the primary obstacle (though don’t think of it that way, be positive now) it is important to be sure to remain sharp with the basics.
Ichinichi 15 Fun no kanji Renshu (Jou) ~ Fifteen Minutes a Day Kanji Practice (http://www.jbox.com/PRODUCT/ALK002) And this is for studying the kanji part.
The iPhone (or in my case the iPod Touch) has all kinds of nifty apps you can utilize. I recommend
Kotoba (Which is a fabulous dictionary program)
iKanji and iKana (great for practice with the writing)
I believe links for these have been posted already, so I won’t waste any time.
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