Category Archives: jlpt

Let’s Up Our Japanese Reading Comprehension

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So with the JLPT getting too close for comfort, I realized that I need to get used to reading huge blocks of Japanese text quickly. It’s something I was fairly decent at before, but lack of practice has hurt me. At the same time, I want to learn more about anime and manga.

Solution: Reading Japanese wikipedia entries and Japanese online newspaper entries about anime!

Already I’ve learned that Sakigake!! Otokojuku actually goes from a gag manga to actually being serious with tournaments and what-not, and that its popularity increased upon becoming serious.

Here comes old-fashioned Japanese test. All tests are stupid!

Took a Practice JLPT 2

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Even sitting by myself with no one around doing a practice version of the exam, the test is incredibly intense. I basically ran out of time and had to do a lot of things on the fly.

In the end I didn’t do very well, but what I learned is that I have to watch out for the reading comprehension sections because the bulk of the points are there. At the same time if I spend too much time on them I’ll lose points in the grammar section.

Is there a chance of me studying enough to pass when the test comes up in 3 weeks? Yes, but I have no idea what the percentage is.

One month to JLPT

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And I am totally not ready yet.

Grammar and kanji are not up to snuff, though I’ve definitely made progress. I still have a month to go, but Japanese of this level is not something you can cram for in such a short amount of time.

All that’s left is to bank on that 50% pass mark, or to truly believe that courage will turn 50% into 100%.

Kamikita Keigo

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There are a number of aspects of the Japanese language that you can use to supplement your Japanese studies, but one of the most difficult areas in my opinion is that of politeness. More often than not, anime characters care little for using the appropriate verb forms in specific situations. Probably the most you’ll ever see in terms of levels of politeness and familiarity is characters who originally called each other by their last names transitioning to a first-name-basis kind of relationship. And the most formal vocabulary is known as “keigo.”

Keigo is the kind of vocabulary you use when you want to be ultra formal, ultra polite, and probably talking to your boss. I can’t give any specific lessons as my keigo is shaky at this point in time, but to give you an idea of keigo and some of the difficulty that learning it entails, I’ll provide a few examples. The verb “suru,” to do, in keigo is “nasaru.” That “itadakimasu” you hear so often before meals is actually a keigo form of “moraimasu,” or to receive.

Again, this is not something you can develop or improve significantly while watching anime or reading manga, so in this case it is best to go through more orthodox channels.

また馬から落ちてしまった: Continuing Adventures in JLPT2 (Non-)Studying

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I’ve registered for the JLPT2, which happens December 7th, 2008. As a reminder, registration ends around September 20th, so get a move on it if you plan on seeing just how much Japanese you know while under the pressure of a test environment with a test purposely designed to fool you.

After Otakon, my studying had dropped significantly, and I found myself forgetting kanji i thought I knew. Alarmed, I became determined to study more with the help of a friend. I answered some sample questions from the JLPT2 and got most of them right. However, being correct doesn’t matter if you don’t actually answer all of the questions, and this is where I learned the harsh reality of the JLPT2: It is a LOT of questions in very little time. One section wants you to answer 100 questions in 40 minutes, leaving you actually less than 30 seconds per question. Granted, you only need to get 60% of the test correct in order to pass, but the pressure of that time limit is so harsh it’ll cause me to lose 2 PP every time I attack.

I also have been trying to improve my listening comprehension, and decided to be all hardcore about it and listen to the Nikkei News Podcast. What I learned is that I can understand Japanese commercials (or rather the between-news-segments promos) a hell of a lot better than I can understand news about business and economics. Maybe if I listen to it 10 more times I could actually understand 50% of it.

it’s only a few months away so I need to buck up and study more. You may or may not see a decrease in post that are actually about anime.

JLPTToo Much?

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The Japanese Language Proficiency Test, or JLPT, or 「日本語能力試験」 (I’m writing this down so I finally remember what the damn test is called in Japanese), is a test given once a year so that those who study Japanese may get proper certification to show that, yes, they know *this* much Japanese. 4 is the easiest, requiring only basic Japanese education, while level 1 is super crazy difficult and you really shouldn’t try it.

I have been aiming for the JLPT2, which is the “business” level, and described on the official site as…
Level 2: The examinee has mastered grammar to a relatively high level, knows around 1,000 kanji and 6,000 words, and has the ability to converse, read, and write about matters of a general nature. This level is normally reached after studying Japanese for around 600 hours, which is equivalent to completing an intermediate course.

Passing Score: 240/400
Writing-vocabulary: 35 min
Listening: 40min
Reading-grammar: 70min
Total: 145min

And looking at the material required, I can’t tell if I’m in over my head or not. I’m pretty confident I could pass the level 3 without too much trouble, but I might be in a situation where the level 3 is too simple and the level 2 is too difficult. Also, because I haven’t been regularly exposed to normal Japanese since leaving Japan three years ago, I fear my listening skills have deteriorated significantly.

That said, the weirdest thing is that upon checking out some sample tests, I found the reading comprehension to be easier than the isolated vocabulary section. This goes against everything I’ve ever experienced with foreign language exams.

In the meantime, I’ve been trying to master all ~1000 kanji required for the test, and the result is I’ve been making weirder and weirder tricks for remembering certain words.

極, or pole, I remember because it sort of looks like Souther, the Pole Star.

憎, or hatred, I remember because the right side looks kind of like Optimus Prime, and the left side looks sort of like a cannon (yes, I know it’s a version of the heart radical), so “Megatron hates Optimus Prime.”

Every time I do something like this, a baby probably dies.