Path: ccsf.homeunix.org!ccsf.homeunix.org!news1.wakwak.com!nf1.xephion.ne.jp!onion.ish.org!news.heimat.gr.jp!news.jone-system.com!mmcatv.co.jp!news.moat.net!news.glorb.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: ken_nicolson@hotmail.com (Ken Yasumoto-Nicolson) Newsgroups: fj.life.in-japan Subject: Re: YahooBB and usenet Date: 3 Mar 2004 19:31:50 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com Lines: 32 Message-ID: <6afefaef.0403031931.1a190445@posting.google.com> References: <4043120a@post.newsfeed.com> <2ue640tmt3edq4c0h50fi6bvd5gk6uq4g2@4ax.com> <6afefaef.0403021533.5ecf3bd3@posting.google.com> <6afefaef.0403022256.55b621e7@posting.google.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 202.228.229.71 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1078371111 8793 127.0.0.1 (4 Mar 2004 03:31:51 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2004 03:31:51 +0000 (UTC) Xref: ccsf.homeunix.org fj.life.in-japan:12408 "Ryan Ginstrom" wrote in message news:... > If it's any consolation that was probably the last of them. Now it's on to > the BBQ parties. Grrr!! This weekend's going to see 0 degree weather again around Osaka. > Nevertheless, it seems just a few short years ago that you were having > trouble with some fairly simple Japanese. To be able to gist-read a > newspaper is quite a step up from that. Have you been doing anything in > particular to study? Well, it's not like it's the Nikkei Keizai (or whatever it's called) I'm reading, it's a much simpler level. The typical 75% kanji serious articles (like our Union newsletters) still make my eyes glaze over. Depending on the exact article in the wife's paper (Seikyo Shinbun), it varies from 25% (say, Chinese philosophy) to 90% (nice weather for sakura) understanding, including kanji readings, aided by the generous helping of furigana used by the paper. I plodded along for two years at a JPT2.5 (~600 kanji) level after my free lessons ran out, just improving conversational skills with the BYJW (although we usually talk Japlish - "donna tea hoshii?", "Green ga ii, please"), then for the JPT2 test, I picked up KanjiLab round about last September and after mastering the first 1006, I just decided to go the whole hog and get them all done - currently at 2/3rds perfect getting readings from kanji+English gloss. Also, rather than sleeping or playing games on my handheld, now at meetings I bring my dictionary and try to read the slides, looking up words I don't recognise, etc, etc. Ken