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Hey Joel, nice to see you’re still hanging around here :D
Do you know what the situation is with TextFugu members being able to access EtoEto? I remember logging in AGES ago but there wasn’t much content (yup, shocking). Now when I try again, it doesn’t seem to recognise my login details. It’s not sending any reset password link to my email either which makes me think I’m deleted from their system?
…OK, I feel stupid now. Just before I sent this, I noticed a “Join” link (I didn’t realise anyone could join now). There’s actually a reasonable amount of content in Kuma right now, I’m genuinely surprised! Obviously EtoEto will never be finished properly but it’ll at least give me some more study material.
OT: After a long, long hiatus of doing next to no proper studying, I’m finally getting back into it! Work is so boring so I decided to try reading some articles from the Hiragana Times sample issue when nobody was watching, just to kill time. That’s kinda got me back into the swing of things. Started reading (re-reading?) Shin Kanzen Master N3. I never really studied listening at all so I’m giving a book/CD called Nihongo So-matome a try as well. Also trying a game called something like Little Charo – it’s for learning English but has both languages for all text/some audio.
How’s your own studying going, Joel?
Welcome back!
Studying’s been… not as great as it ought to be. I really gotta get back into learning kanji and vocab. I’ve been working on a translation of a drama series for practice (and for the fun of it) and I realised recently that it’s been a whole year since I last finished an episode…
Actually, I’m going to Japan for two weeks starting Saturday week. =D
Yeah, I hear you on vocab. I’m constantly having to look up words but I’m just so sick of doing flash cards! They kinda took over my life for a bit and I don’t fancy using them again. Well, they didn’t take over my life as such, just that I was getting unnecessarily stressed about doing them (or not doing them) and not seeing much real benefit. Some words I just kept failing over and over and it was slowly crushing my spirit a little more each day.
And kanji… I think I spent more time arguing the merits of RtK than actually studying useful stuff! It’s so easy to fall into the trap of thinking “I should really do X, but first I’ll just do Y for a bit”, then you never get round to doing X. “I should really read more of this novel, but someone on the internet doesn’t understand why Heisig’s book is actually useful in certain cases, so…”
That’s awesome that you’re at the point where you’re even slightly capable of translating a drama, that takes some serious doing! The only drama I’ve tried watching was 電車男 but that was with Japanese subtitles, English translation, and lots of pausing and rewinding (plus not really listening to the audio properly). I really need more listening practice…
Have a good time in Japan, I’m sure it’ll be great :D
I haven’t posted on here for ages because I got tired of Koichi after he started launching other stuff instead of finishing what he started and realised TextFugu was pretty crap after all. The last few ‘seasons’ of TextFugu were obviously rushed out, I got a new Koichi email today which reminded me of this place. He can shove the wani up his kani.
Anyway since 2011 when I started learning Japanese, I’m now more or less fluent and live and work in Japan (no longer as an English teacher, thankfully) so this site helped, but also I’m not stepping near another Koichi project again lol.
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This reply was modified 6 years ago by
Luke.
Ooo, nice. Where are you living? What are you doing? =)
I’ve been using WaniKani, myself – registered four years ago today, actually, but didn’t start using it seriously until about this time last year. It’s helpful in that it feeds me the kanji I need to learn a few at a time, which helps me set a good pace. I’ve been to Japan twice since my last post in this thread – the aforementioned one in December 2017, and again in April 2018, and actually managed to hold several decent conversations, which was nice.
Fortunately, since EtoEto is coming “Soon” (TM), Koichi has switched off new subscriptions for TextFugu. I confess I was getting a mite tired of lying to people about how much they’ll love it here…
Hey Luke, nice to see you again :) And Joel, of course!
You started 2011 and you’re fluent now. I started in 2010 and… I’m nowhere even near :D When I started I thought “It’ll probably take about 4 years to get fluent, I reckon”, but now it’s been double that because I haven’t put the consistent work in (for various reasons including laziness, stress, uni work, depression). Good to hear it’s going well for you! What are you working as now?
I’ve been putting in more effort with Japanese in the past year or so, mostly due to boredom at work, as I mentioned before. I’ve gone back to flashcards, doing a deck called Anon 5k. I don’t care nearly as much about doing reps every day but I’m still benefiting. I gave up on Little Charo (a bit boring) and Nihongo Sou-Matome (also boring). I did work through Kanzen Master N3 and N2, plus I just finished reading the whole Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. I’ve watched a few series on Netflix as well – there are a handful of shows that have Japanese audio AND subtitles! I’ve also (re-)played through Final Fantasy X, Ocarina of Time and Skyrim, all Japanese versions.
My crowning achievement this year has been working through the 1st Harry Potter book. It took from February to October(?) because I was doing it in little chunks at work and at random times. I used a great site called japanese.io for mouseover vocab. I read a chapter in English then a chapter in Japanese, so it’s not like I read a full novel from scratch, but it’s been a huge accomplishment for me.
How is your Japanese coming along, Joel?
Oh, it’s coming along. I’ve joined a few book clubs over on the WaniKani forums, so I’m currently reading Aria, and a kid’s book called なぜ？なんで？せかいのふしぎ, and Yotsubato (though we’re between volumes right now), and I’m rapidly falling behind on 時をかける少女.
Have not practiced my speaking once since April, though…
Oh cool! What are the book clubs like? What do you discuss, just interesting vocab and grammar?
I haven’t practised speaking since… 2015, I think :D I was in a small, after-hours Japanese class while I was at uni, but since graduation, I’ve had no interaction with Japanese people at all. Speaking scares me so I’m fine just reading and (occasionally) listening ;)
It’s weird to think I started TextFugu as a teenager. Now I’m a full, proper adult and it’s still not been finished!
Mostly help each other with tricky bits. On the Aria thread, I like to research the real-world things that inspired the chapter as well. =)
Sorry for the slow reply, my definition of fluent is quite loose lol, I can get by doing everything by myself but I still lack the vocab to speak really intelligently and without needing to consult a dictionary for some things, but I don’t need to be startled by being spoken to in Japanese or find it tedious to speak to people in Japanese on LINE these days
I was living in Okayama until recently but moved to Tokyo for more job opportunities, got really lucky and have a nice job in IT and a good salary now with health insurance (most English teaching places use loopholes to avoid paying you shakai hoken), I rarely use Japanese at work so I try to use my commute, lunch breaks and an hour after I get home for studying, I do this every day so progress still gets made!
Honestly I wanted to move to Fukuoka City and could have got a much bigger apartment for cheaper than what I pay in Tokyo but you can’t beat Tokyo for jobs unfortunately, especially as a foreigner… I do like it here though, so I don’t want this to sound too negative :D
I was tempted by WaniKani but I’m already deep into the Core6k vocabulary with iKnow.jp so I’m not going to change to another service which is more or less the same thing but a different presentation
Hope all are well!
Hey! Look at all these zombies!
In a moment of procrastination, I just randomly popped over to this tread for the first time in probably a year, and what do I see? Relatively recent posts from some people not asking about the pronunciation of 一人!
Congrats on finishing a whole novel, Michael. I still struggle to make it through manga…reading about 5 pages at a time, about once every 2 weeks when I have more than 5 minutes to myself.
And Luke, way to go getting a real job in Japan and making it out of the ALT trap!
Time again for the annual event of “Remembering TextFugu Exists”!
If you any of you guys have email replies on still: Hello! :)
It’s sad to see there are still new people fooled into signing up for this site. Even EtoEto has had no announcements since 2017, I think.
Also, I just learned from Tofugu.com that Koichi’s full name is Jaered Koichi Croes. I think “Jaered” definitely sounds more “Seattle Hipster” to me.
I’ve been struggling to remember – what was the name of the first guy Koichi brought on to help with the site? I know Viet was second, but the first guy was great and I was sad when he left.
TextFugu? What’s that?
It’s sad to see there are still new people fooled into signing up for this site.
Oh, there are? I thought new subscriptions had been shut down ages ago.
Also, I just learned from Tofugu.com that Koichi’s full name is Jaered Koichi Croes. I think “Jaered” definitely sounds more “Seattle Hipster” to me.
Yeah, I try desperately to forget that name. =P
what was the name of the first guy Koichi brought on to help with the site?
Hashi?
Man, I was sort of passively waiting for EtoEto’s release for the last four years. Bummer to see the project’s been abandoned. :(
BUT hi guys! I haven’t done any studying in a while, and was sort of thinking of doing the new-years-resolution thing when I saw WaniKani’s lifetime 50% off sale, which reminded me of EtoEto and my alpha access I once had…
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This reply was modified 6 years ago by
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