I AM FREE!

well, sorta. JLPT is over since last Sunday, and while I’m still not 100% sure that I’ll pass (50-50 chance, could also be 60-40), I’m happy to say that it wasn’t as frustrating (exciting?) as last year. I had the same proctor (who didn’t seem to have recognized ‘The Girl Who Haggled For Time’ — aka me — from last year, or so I hope!), but thankfully enough what happened throughout the exam wasn’t a deja vu of my Great Booboo.

We’re not allowed to talk about the exam, they say, because our test will be invalidated if the Japan Foundation finds out we spilled the beans. But what do you know, gaijins are pretty cool people and doesn’t afraid anything, so they talked about it anyway, specifically these two items in the JLPT1 listening section which pandered to the otaku audience — there’s the Evangelion-esque question which I’m pretty sure you’ve heard of by now, and also a Dragon Quest parody question, where this one loli was asking her beloved oniichan how to get this special Ice Necklace item. THANK GOD FOR OTAKUS. I was so amused by the Eva-esque question that I almost didn’t catch the question being asked (and it’s the last one too). The whole GAR talk between the Captain and Asuka still replays in my head LOL.

That said, I still don’t think I did well in the listening. After all those practice drills… *sigh* Might be too early to say, but doubting the answers I have to about half of the listening items sure isn’t a good sign. I’d be jumping for joy if I get about 70% or higher!

Reading & Grammar is pretty safe, though I didn’t ace it like I hoped (damn!). Ran out of time to thoroughly read the last two short essays and ended up doing some [semi-founded] guesswork. I got 148/200 last year despite my booboo, and my semi-conservative estimate for this year is 150/200.

The kanji section was a breeze (thank you Kanzen Master!), with just a few mistakes (at most 5, if not, I’m not going to forgive myself!), but the vocab section… I weep for it. I’ve already noted 5 mistakes, which is likely to increase (x2 = 10++ points), though I am hoping for a 75%. Please?

If all’s well that ends well, then I’ll get that Highly Coveted JLPT1 certificate (and my additional monthly allowance!), if not, then I’ll just have to let it go and move on, move forward and continue studying. In fact, I have to do a bit of studying right now because I have an exam for our Business Nihongo crash course tomorrow!

How did everyone’s JLPT go? absolute0, cuteproxy, kritik, 0rion, double… who else took the challenge?

Credits to crowdesu for the above pic.

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and it goes by the name of JLPT1.

still got a heapload of vocabs (語彙) to study/memorize, those with very subtle nuances (like telling the difference between 活気,活躍,活動,活発, and 活用, how they’re used) especially, and re-memorize MOAR kanjis. They’re making my brain bleed

I’m confident with my reading/grammar, but have to make one last quick review of the grammar patterns just to make sure. My listening skills however, is still poor as ever. I can see myself flunking this right now, but ahh negative thoughts go away. Every bit of point will help, so I just have to do my best.

頑張れ！ファイト！

6 more days before doomsday, may the force be with us all.

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This sure is one timeless commercial, oh [in]famous Dragon Katol. The line “Dragon kung umuwsok… leymowk seyguradong teypok!”¹ never gets old. So… katol.

If only she had Dragon Katol, tsk.²

Katol is the Tagalog word for mosquito coil or mosquito incense, and apparently, it was adopted from the Japanese word 蚊取 [katori], its Japanese counterpart (literally it’s “to get [取り] mosquito(es) [蚊]“). Discovered this by accident, as I came across 蚊 [ka] (mosquito) in the Kanzen Master kanji book I’m using for my JLPT1 studies, which eventually led me to 蚊取 [katori]. One little Google search was all it took to confirm my hypothesis: Mosquito incense = katol, so katori = katol?

“Katol is one of the few Japanese words that have entered Filipino vocabulary, although most do not know of its origin.”, according to the Tagalog Lang site. True enough, almost all of my officemates didn’t know this, and neither did I. Do you?

Makes me wonder if there are any other Japanese loan words in Filipino. Perhaps suka (vinegar) is one of them… 酢 [su] = vinegar => su-ka? *ba dum psh* In any case, feel free to share what you know about them Japanese loan words, may it be in Tagalog or other languages, it’ll make for a real fun discovery

Further Reading

On the Etymology of Arigatou, where I managed to confuse the heck out of people with all the kanji talk.

Fellow chef absolute0 also talked about the Etymology of Mouryou back when he was still blogging

1. Translated as: “Smokes like a dragon, mosquitoes are surely exterminated!”, done in the stereotypical speaking-Tagalog-with-an-American-accent way. Otherwise that line would’ve simply been “Dragon kung umusok… lamok siguradong tepok!”
2. The image became even more punny when 蚊噛み came to mind, something I made up on a whim. 蚊[ka] (mosquito) + 噛み[kami] (bite) = Kagami. Get it? Okay you may laugh now.

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Just added the English version of this as I write this post, with other additional side-comments. So yeah, be forewarned that this is not an exact 1:1 Japanese-english translation.

もうご存知かもしれませんが、私はアニメと漫画が大好きです。
…というわけで、日本語を学びました。
でも、最初はそうではない。
By now, I think you already know that I love anime and manga.
In fact, this is what drove me to study the Japanese language, though it wasn’t exactly my motivation at first.

子供の頃から、アニメが大好きです。私が見た物は「アニメ」だということはそのときまだ分かりません。CediとかRemiとかトラップ・一家物語とかセーラームーン。。。
I’ve loved animes ever since I was a kid, back when I didn’t know that they were actually called as such. There’s Cedi, Remi, Princess Sarah, Trapp Ikka Monogatari (Trapp Family Singers), Sailor Moon, among others.

テレビでタガログ語に吹き替えたアニメを見たから日本語を学ぶ必要ないと思った。
All the animes I watched then were dubbed in Tagalog so I never found the need to study Nihongo.

小学生の頃、Star Mandarinという中国語のチャンネルのおかげで、もっとたくさんのアニメを見ました。Ranma1/2やSaint Seiyaや Musashi no Ken や CaptainTsubasa　やてっかまんブレイド　や　エフ。。。
I was able to watch even more animes during my elementary years thanks to the Star Mandarin chinese channel — Ranma 1/2, Saint Seiya (may I suggest Pegasus Fantasy in our next AniOke, pretty please??), Musashi no Ken (Soldier Boy!), Captain Tsubasa, Tekkaman Blade (all I can recall in this anime is D-Boy), F (epic F1 racing), etc.

そのとき、だんだんアニメで聞こえた曲が好きになりました。「この曲を歌いたいなあ！」と思いましたが、残念ながら、私は日本語を読むことができない。AnimeのOpening曲とEnding曲で歌詞があっても、意味ない。
Eventually, I grew fond of the theme songs in the animes I watched, and even wanted to sing along with them (most of the classics have lyrics after all). Unfortunately, I can’t read Nihongo, so even if the opening and ending sequences had lyrics, it’s all for naught.

小学四年生の頃、あるクラスメートが日本語の本を持ち込みました。どうしてその本をもってたのかは覚えられません。
One time during elementary 4th grade, a classmate of mine brought a “Study Japanese” book to school. I couldn’t exactly recall why he brought it with him.

これは日本語を学ぶ機会だと思ったがそれより、これは「好きな人に好印象を与えるチャンス！」だと思いました。
Instead of seeing this as the golden opportunity to study Nihongo however, I thought of it as a chance to show off and make a good impression on my crush.

だって、その本を持ってきたかれは私の好きな人でした。ライバルがあるから好印象を与えるために、彼が持ってきた本を借りて、ひらがなとカタカナを暗記しておきました。若いから、記憶力がいい、今より、ずっと。簡単に言えば、日本語を学んだ理由は最初不純でした。
Why, you ask? Because the guy who brought that book to school was my crush. I had a rival, so in the quest to win his heart (or just get his attention), I borrowed his book and memorized hiragana and katakana. And I did. It was a breeze because I was still young, memory works like a charm and all that jazz. Long story short, my initial motivation to study Nihongo was impure.

言語が利用しなければ簡単に忘れてしまう。だからカタカナをはっきり覚えているために、特別な日記を作りました。日記の記載事項はカタカナで書かれているが実はTaglishですタガログ・English.
It’s easy to forget what you learn from another language if you don’t practice it (katakana in particular for Nihongo, which I don’t often see compared to hiraganas I often see in song lyrics). It’s for this reason that I thought of making a “special diary” where I would write all my entries in katakana (though the idea only came to me during my 1st year high school summer vacation). The syntax is in katakana, but the semantics is in Taglish (Tagalog-English).

たとえば、”Pumunta ako sa Manila”, or “I went to Manila”を書きたいなら、カタカナで、「プムンタ アコ サ マニラ」や「アイ ウエント ツ マニラ」を書いてます。
Say for example I want to say, “Pumunta ako sa Manila” (or “I went to Manila”), I will write “プムンタ アコ サ マニラ” (read as PUMUNTA AKO SA MANIRA) or “アイ ウエント ツ マニラ” (read as AI UENTO TSU MANIRA).

この話をある同僚に話したら、「わ、すごい暗号化アルゴリズムじゃない！」と言いました。日本人が私が書いたものを読めても意味がわからない。外国語みたい。と、Filipino人が私を書いたものは日本語で書いたから、日本語だと思って、いみがわかっても読めないから、結局私のかいたものはわかってない。ま、日本語とTagalogを理解出来る人なら、別の話です。
I shared this katakana diary story to my one colleagues, who gave me the reply “Wow, that’s some awesome encryption algorithm!” Even if a Japanese gets to read my diary, he/she won’t be able to understand a thing. Whatever a wrote will seem foreign. On the other hand, if a Filipino sees what I wrote, he/she will immediately think that it’s Japanese, and will immediately think he can’t read and understand it. Of course it’s a totally different story if the said person knows Japanese and Tagalog.

それは私の日本語の冒険の始まり。もちろん、アニメもね。機会があったら、アニメの話をします。
ありがとうございます。
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I met Nihongo (how my Nihongo adventure started). You can also say it’s the start of my anime journey. Will talk about anime next time, if I get the chance.

Thank you (for reading)!

Oh, and just to show you a living proof of the said katakana diary (kana memo? *ba dm psh*):

pardon the sucky handwriting

See I didn’t know how to Japanize ‘ed’ lol. This was written back in 2000 btw, during my vacation in Manila, where I was also able to watch a few episodes of Daa! Daa! Daa!, Card Captor Sakura, Boys Be and Gate Keepers live on TV (thank you BS2 and wowow)

In case you’re curious about what’s written in those entries…

Show ▼

I showed this diary to my fellow chef Seleria and she told me I’m a freak orz

Now, to get some discussion going, let me ask, what’s the most crazy/freaky/innovative Nihongo (or any other language)-studying idea you’ve had? Just curious, and who knows, other people could benefit from it too!

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Quite some time ago, whenever someone asks me about the best way(s) to learn Nihongo, I’m sure to give “playing Japanese games/visual novels” as a response, because, according to me, it’ll boost up both your listening and reading skills — hitting two stones with one bird! pun intended. Part of this scheme of mine is watching chinese subs, which, as my know-it-all self once said, can help clarify what’s being said since you have sort of reference to the dialogues, which term/kanji matches the dialogue (assuming the chinese translator knows what he/she is doing).

Japanese language can be really vague, with their homonyms and all, similar to Chinese. Take for example “ken”, which can either refer to sword (剣), fist (拳), right/privilege (権), matter/case (件), Prefecture (県), etc. There are times when you can easily figure out what is being referred to by context (or the ‘kanji compound’), but there are also times when things can get really ambiguous, like when two or more of the homonyms are applicable, for intentional or unintentional pun/confusion.

And then came one eureka moment (albeit a few years late), as I realized that the reason why my listening skillz sucks so much up until now is because of this scheme.

Even in the medium where I’m supposed to rely on my ears and my ears alone, I was still dependent on visual text cues — TOO DEPENDENT. With the presence of [chinese] subtitles in what I watch and the text in the visual novels/otome games I play, my listening wasn’t improving because I’d unconsciously think, “I suck at listening anyways, so I’ll just read the text!“, and end up not paying attention to what’s being said. Here I thought I was hitting two birds with one stone, when actually, I was hitting two birds and failing at both.

Certain skills are born out of necessity, the kind you won’t acquire unless you stray away (or be strayed away) from something you used to depend on. Disability for example, allows people to acquire new set of skills that make up for this loss, going beyond it even.

When Usui of the Juppongatana lost his sight, he had to rely on his other senses, heightening them a thousand-fold. Yomi of Yu Yu Hakusho grew two sets of ears after he became blind, heightening his senses (and spiritual power) dramatically as well. Yin was born blind but was gifted in piano, and even gained the ability to see people by using water as a medium (assuming that her blindness actually contributed to that ability). When poor Shiryuu of Saint Seiya blinded himself, his other senses… didn’t really improve much, did it? Oh, he became immune to Gemini’s Illusion technique, good enough. Disability Superpower, so to speak.

Of course there’s no way mere mortals like you and me can gain such Superpowers, but I thought of the whole sense dependency at play here in my catching two birds with one stone technique which can rival chestnuts-roasting-on-an-open-fire technique with its mouthful-ness. The moment I distanced myself from text and the visuals, I started focusing on what’s being said, relying on my ears, giving it my undivided attention. The improvements I’ve gone through isn’t all that dramatic, but what’s important is that I’m improving, a little slowly, but surely

Do note however, that simply listening (passively) is not enough. Let Ryan show you the way.

Further Reading

Ryan on Raw Watching (useful tips if you want to get into raw watching and you’re still not so l33t. Reminds me that I’m slacking off in note-taking when watching raw too, oh boy.)

I’m not a l33t, I don’t hold any claims of understanding what I watch (and read) 100%, and I’m not just saying this to avoid accusations of being a Raw Watching Connoisseur Poseur.

My take on raw watching / blogging, with tips I haven’t exactly been doing these months because I haven’t been watching / blogging raw the hardcore way.

Credits to danbooru and rk for the above piccies.

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Not quite anime/manga related, but I thought I’d share this anyway. This is not the first Nihongo speech I delivered in the office, but since this is the most ‘ready for posting’, I decided to have this published first

Lengthy Intro

LISTEN TO MY SPEECH

We have this ‘daily Nihongo speech’ activity in our department where all the members take turns in delivering a speech in Nihongo, supposedly to enhance our communication skillz, and the topic can be just about anything under the sun. While many of my colleagues think of this as a total pain in the ass (thinking about what to talk about, not to mention in Nihongo, is no easy task, not unless you ask someone else to translate it ^_^), I consider this to be a “chance to shine and allow the people to show the ‘other sides of you’, either to entertain, inspire, or to simply let other people get to know you better” :3

The day before my flight back home, it was my turn to speak, so I still had the chance to give my ‘last speech’. Yayyy!

The night I was cramming making my draft, my housemates/colleagues and I still didn’t know if the initial plan to let us go home by Wednesday that week would push through, and that’s like two days away gee whiz. The feeling was not unlike a cliffhanger, so to speak, and since I was being trolled by/trolling Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 during that time, I actually thought of giving a speech juxtaposing the ‘cliffhanger feeling’ I had with Tokyo Magnitude 8.0. But then there’s not really much of a point in talking about that, especially if the news regarding our departure would be confirmed the following morning. As such, I decided to talk about ‘letting go’ instead, a topic that would be totally relevant to my situation if we’re indeed going home that week.

I usually share my speech in Nihongo alone, explaining just a few words and phrases in English, but this time around, I thought the best way to do this would be to go Japlish, Japanese then explain whatever I said in English so that all people could understand what the heck I’m saying.

The Speech Proper

And, the speech… (feel free to correct my Nihongo please, I know I still need a lot of help, especially coz I just go about saying whatever without really paying attention to consistency and all that, shifting from semi-polite to not-so-polite form every so often .__.)
間違いがあったら教えてください。

「成長のために’Letting go’が必要だ」と私は最近実感しました。
“‘Letting go’ is necessary for us to grow”, as I’ve realized as of late (I’m so quoting otou-san on this)

英和の辞書で、「Let go」という言葉はいろんな意味を持っています:
The English-Japanese dictionary shows us the various definitions/Japanese equivalent of [the multi-faceted] ‘let go’, which are as follows:

手放する[tebanasu-suru]。。。 To part with
解放する、自由にする[kaihou-suru, jiyuu-suru]。。。 To let something/someone free
捨てる、あきらめる[suteru, akirameru]。。。　To throw away,To give up
自制心から自由になる、自分を解き放つ[jiseishin kara jiyuu ni naru, jibun wo tokihanatsu]。。。 To free oneself

どれもこれも本当のことを表します。
Each and every one of which speaks the truth (doh)

こんな「Letting go」の経験があるでしょうか？
I wonder if you’ve ever had this kind of ‘letting go’ experience?

例えば:
For example:

（一）物事がうまくいかない場合、自分とほかの誰を責める代わりに、「まあ、しょうがない」を考えて、改めて新しい始まりをします。
When things go wrong, instead of blaming yourself or other people, just think/tell yourself “Well, can’t be helped”, and start anew.

（二）失恋した時、「自分は何かをするべきだった」とか、「もう少し時間があったらできたと思う」とか、「時間を戻すことができればこんなこととする・しないか」。。。「もし～だったらどうなるか」という”What ifs”を考える代わりに、「しょうがない、神様の意志ではなかった」を考えて、諦めます。そして、感情的なお荷物を運ぶより、自分の経験から学んで、成長します。
When you experience heartbreak(s), instead of thinking “I should’ve done something about it”, “It would’ve been possible if only I had more time”, or that “If only I can turn back time I would’ve done this / wouldn’t have done that”, instead of thinking of any other “What ifs”, simply resign and tell yourself, “It can’t be helped, perhaps this wasn’t the will of the Lord / wasn’t meant to be” — bringing with you not ‘emotional baggage’ but rather learnings from the said experience, and be able to grow in the process.

頑張ってるより、簡単に諦める方がいいという訳ではない。最後まで一生懸命やり遂げる方がいい場合もあります。でも、手放すする方がいい場合もある。
Not to say that we should just give up instead of doing our best in what we do; there are times when we should exert utmost effort to finish what we’ve started, but then we’d have to understand that there are also times when the best thing to do is to not really do anything, and just let go.

「letting go」はもちろん簡単ではない。大抵、私達は「何かできるはずだ」そして「できないはずはない」を考えます。それにしても、手放す/let go が必要だ。
It’s not easy to let go of course. More often than not we’d like to think, “there has to be something I can do about this”, “there’s no way there’s nothing else I can do about this”. But we need to let go… we have to.

手放す戦った後のみ、重責から解放して、自由になる。そして、強くなる。生き返った気分でありながら、新たな困難に直面する覚悟を持ってます。
It’s only after the hard-fought struggle with letting go that we’d be freed from the heavy burden we’re carrying, and be stronger in the process. We’d feel alive/reborn/refreshed, ready to face new challenges ahead.

そういえば、今朝私達は明日マニラに帰ることになる、と上司がおっしゃってました。また新しい「Letting go」の経験です。心残りが少しあります。ほかの同輩達と話す機会がほとんどなくて、話す機会も作らなかった。「Team Building活動があるといいなぁ」と時々思います。
Speaking of which, earlier this morning we were told that we’re going back to Manila tomorrow, and this is once again, another ‘letting go’ for me. I have a few regrets during my stay here, I never had the chance to talk to most people in the group, and I never really did make those opportunities myself. I also thought that it would’ve been great if we had a teambuilding activity, but alas

*sigh*

Oh well, such is life… have to ‘let go’~
(adlib in English yeah…)

人生は、問題と解決の繰り返し（のサイクル）だといいます。そして、頑張ると「Letting go」の繰り返しだと言っていい。
Life is said to be a repetitive cycle of problems and resolutions. I guess we can also say it’s a cycle of ‘doing your best/hanging on’ and ‘letting go’.

And now, for something random and cheesy (something I found in alc as I was looking up words/phrases for my speech):

より楽な愛を選び、困難な愛をあきらめるのは何も悪いことではありません。
There is nothing wrong with choosing a less draining love and letting go of a tough one.

- end of speech -

…and that’s about it

I was looking at my audience as I shared about this, and was glad to see people nodding in response, or going “ouch” or other responses that’s enough to tell you it struck a chord with them. It was OZM desu Funny thing is, there’s this “letting go meme” that was born out of my speech, as people were using the “let go” phrase in a whole lot of different contexts, as tongue-in-cheek lulz. Later in the afternoon, our superiors gave us a mini farewell party, the invitation email to which read as: “In response to the call to let go, we’re gonna have a pizza chow time later in the pantry, to ‘let go’ of our teammates who will be going back to Manila”

One of my colleagues thanked me for the speech during our pizza chow time, and I can only hope they really appreciated it!

Credits to もか and あとり for the wonderful images

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In a matter of days, I will be facing the toughest [language] challenge yet… the grueling JLPT1! It’s this coming December 7, and I’m soo running out of time to CRAMM!! I brushed up on my grammar and kanji (a little listening) in the past few months, though I’m not sure what percentage got retained in my poor brain (I’m crossing my fingers that my listening skills have improved since the last time x__X). I’ve become pretty confident about my grammar, but the writing/vocab section (where the ‘kanji exam’ is) is still making me cower in fear T__T And of course, the 70% pass mark.

I might be exaggerating things a bit, but the writing/vocab section is really difficult, especially if your kanji knowledge is not quite solid. It’s going to test your kanji/vocab foundation with the ever confusing and misleading choices, far unlike JLPT3. JLPT2 was still pretty manageable, though it made me realize that I have to practice both writing and reading kanji to memorize them by heart, so I won’t fall for the same mistakes again. I can still remember how I ended up choosing 成積 as the kanji equivalent of せいせき when it should’ve been 成績 (see that miniscule difference?!). It’s not like I’m dwelling in the past here, but it serves to fuel my drive to learn (though who am I kidding, I only have a few days to go before the exam x__X).

A Spark of Hope

Despite uncertainties regarding how I would fare in the coming exam, I feel rather optimistic about it (the ‘pessimistic-like remark’ above is nothing more than a fact), not in the “I’m sure I will pass!” sense (that would be blind optimism), but more of “For as long as the exam hasn’t ended yet, there’s still a chance that I’m gonna pass!” I know it’s gonna be a tough road, but as the great Toua-sama has said “A low possibility means it’s not zero”, so there’s still hope! There’s a big prize at stake if I succeed in this exam (I’ll get 2 or 3 times the allowance I get atm!), but that’s not something I deserve to have, not until I’ve proven myself worthy. At this point in time, I still don’t deem myself worthy (no I’m not being modest about this), so all that I can do is to my best in the upcoming exam, and see if I actually am.

More than being anxious and nervous, I’m excited — ready to take the plunge, ready to take the challenge! I’m not afraid of “failing” because there’s no such thing. The results can only be “Pass” or “Try again next year”, which means that things can only get better (there’s no way but up!) There’s no need to be intimidated about the exam, just take it one step at a time.

All the best to those who will be taking JLPT!!! Ganbareee! FAITO! 加油！ 一緒に頑張ろう！ ^-^

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Now, imagine you had a 魍魎の匣, a box of mouryou. Wouldn’t that be perfect for Halloween?

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