I studied Japanese for 5 years. Originally I was going to double major in it and teach English in Japan if the game industry fell through. I think learning in an structured environment is key for starting out. After you know enough Japanese to hold a decent conversation, then you should find someone to practice with in…
most people you would meet here speak English anyway ;) As people suggest, start with grammar. Japanese is an insanely complex language, but the grammar is key. Once you have control of Japanese grammar, it acts as a base for learning all the other stuff. I personally practiced katakana and hiragana on Mixi - a Japanese…
I suggest learning grammar while learning hiragana/katakana/kanji. Simply put, start writing words then simple sentences with hiragana/katakana as you learn them. Then work your way up to more complex writing. Once you've mastered hiragana/katakana start introducing kanji into the mix. Speak the words out as you write them…
Blenderhead: I think it's impossible to work anywhere in Japan where the Japanese "work ethic" isn't present, but that doesn't mean you have to join in. I think as others have pointed out (and japanmanship.blogspot.com is really the source for this type of stuff) that as a foreigner you're not expected to be Japanese, and…
Theres a far better dictionary than kotoba called simply "japanese", it was on sale a while back on the appstore, not sure about now. There is some good advice in this thread. I think you are in the enviable position of having so many tools at your disposal that simply weren't around when I came here, most notably…
I'm currently studying Japanese in my spare time, haven't got far enough to be able to speak fluently yet - only learnt how to read katakana/hiragana, which isn't saying much because that's the easiest bit. I used http://smart.fm/home for learning kana and currently using to learn kanji, although there are literally 100's…
Hi there, I'm considering the massive undertaking of learning Japanese. I know learning any new language is a pretty mammoth task but from what I understand, Japanese is one of the more advanced to learn. I'm keen to learn for a number of reasons. Firstly, I've always considered Japan as somewhere I would like to live and…
"Japanese is easy" - yeah right. A lot of people do end up staying here due to the placid nature of society. The Japanese appear to have a great ability to direct their energy onto other tasks. I do see a fight here in Tokyo every now and then, but compared to Brighton or London, it's a very rare occurrence. Transversely…
people seem to have the misconception that anything over 99 cents on the app store is expensive ;) $13 is cheap for a dictionary like "Japanese" - any alternative would set you back hundreds of dollars.