I can’t decide whether I can read in Japanese or not. I’m now studying with Big Bang’s Japanese interviews and I was reading this yesterday. I am studying with it, so I’ll look up every word that I don’t know how to pronounce and writing them in my notebook. But even without doing so, I found that I can understand the article pretty well. Knowing Chinese helps me to guess the meaning of the kanji (which are very easy to guess 90% of the time) and I didn’t have huge problems with the grammar etc too.
And if I use a dictionary alongside, I can understand the article 100%. This is much faster progress compared to Korean. O.o So I feel really.. unsettled now? The article isn’t too difficult to begin with (an interview with Big Bang about their ALIVE album) but I wasn’t able to read a Korean article (even with a dictionary) until a year after I self studied (I think..).
All I can say is that perhaps knowing English, Chinese and Korean helps a lot? :/ English for all the katakana words (English loan words), Chinese for the kanji and Korean for the sentence structure, grammar patterns and way of expression?
Strange feelings.
8 Comments
passioninseoul
19 April, 2012 at 9:03 PMUnderstanding English, Korean, Japanese as you is my goal. Although my dad said that I can’t do both languages (Japanese and Korean) at the same time, from knowing you and reading your post, I believe that I can do it!!
Post more about your life, I am curios to know because you’re my language idol. lol
hangukdrama
20 April, 2012 at 9:52 AMYou can definitely do it ^^
Keax
19 April, 2012 at 10:05 PMI know it’s probably because I’m a beginner learner of Korean, but it takes me mad long to read anything in Korean including my textbook. Really painful. T_T I read Japanese a lot faster, even though I’m bad with katakana, and my kanji knowledge is limited (I usually guess the meaning from Chinese lol).
I’m forever impressed how you manage to self-study both languages! You talked about time in a previous blog entry. I attend class regularly partly to make sure I continue to progress and not be at a stalemate which is very likely should I be self-studying instead. But I can’t seem to have enough hours in a day to do it all anyway.
hangukdrama
20 April, 2012 at 9:52 AMTime is never enough. I like classes, but sometimes I find them too slow and draggy. how’s the SKS classes?
gamcho
19 April, 2012 at 11:14 PMThat is so awesome, Shanna! I think the reason you’re able to learn Japanese quickly is because… you are a GENIUS haha!!
hangukdrama
20 April, 2012 at 9:50 AMLOL!! no I’m not xD I’m just a beginner in Japanese!
blacktortoise2x
20 April, 2012 at 4:04 AMI’m not a Japanese jedi master yet, but I had a experience with Chinese like that. I looked through a few chapters of a Chinese grammar manual(traditional characters) and knew just enough about chinese grammar to make sense of basic sentences.
hangukdrama
20 April, 2012 at 9:51 AMhaha! Yeah I guess it will work the same way the other way round 😛