これは 何？ （７）

知りたくない

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （７）

お寺のお手洗い

日本で何を食べましたか（６）

カリ

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （８）

節電  せつでん    conservation of electricity

Everywhere!

これは 何？ （6）

Yanaka Cemetery (谷中霊園)

From Wikipedia:

Takahashi Oden (高橋 お伝, 1848 – January 31, 1879) was a female Japanese murderer known for killing a man, and being the last woman in Japan to be put to death by beheading. She was also suspected of poisoning her husband.

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （５）

夜間は　ボットンを　おして　ください。。。

これは 何？ （5）

ねこだ。

日本で何を食べましたか（４）

たこやき！

美味しかった！

すみません、 写真を撮ってもいいですか（４）

パチンコの看板の女子。

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （4）

上野の動物園

これは 何？ （4）

でも　雨がふっていません

すみません、 写真を撮ってもいいですか（3）

歩いても

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （3）

自動のドア。　押して　ください。

Automatic door.　Please push to open.

これは 何？ （3）

This is an Automated Car Park that uses the Paternoster system.  As you can see, a total of 2000 cars can be stored vertically in a parking that uses little more space than a regular house.

Check this video to see what goes inside an Automated Car Park.




Parking space has been an increasing problem ever since the car became so popular.  And automated car parks have always been investigated, as shown in this clip from Geneva, Switzerland from the 1970's.

日本で何を食べましたか（2）

おいしかった！

すみません、 写真を撮ってもいいですか（2）

日本の夏はむしあついよ

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （2）

ちょっと　待って、ね

これは 何？ （2）

コイン　ロッカー　だ

日本で何を食べましたか（1）

シュークリーム！　初めてだった。

すみません、 写真を撮ってもいいですか（１）

東京には　たくさん　けいたい人がいますよ。

これは 何？ （1）

車を二つがありますが　ガレージを一つだけです。

どうしょう？

東京で何を見ましたか（１）

ハチ公

日本語の勉強のために 東京へ行った。 たくさん漢字を見た。 （1）

東京 羽田 に　つきました。

そして　エスカレーターで二回に　行きました。

そこで　お手洗いが　ありました。

出口はまっすぐです。

天気は どうでしたか

 東京はすごくあつかった

 夜もあったたかかった 

さいたまも、　千葉も　。。。


毎日晴れました。　ぜんぜん　雨がふりました。

日本旅行

夏休みに数日間日本へ行きました。　

東京の羽田国際空港につきました。羽田は 初めて でした。

短かったけど,すごく　楽しかったです。

たくさん　写真を撮りました。

たくさん　話がありますよ。

いっしょに　見てみましょう。

やった！

It's a real tiny step, but still I want to highlight it and give myself a tap on the shoulder over it, as a way to reward and motivate myself.
I use Anki for memorising Kanji, and it has a tool that shows how many and which Kanji you already know.
Today, it showed that I mastered all kanji from the first grade of Elementary school.  Yatta!

As you can see on the picture, I also already know a big part of the list for the second grade, so that will be my next aim.  Get to know them all by the end of the year? Where's my daruma?

By the way, the ultimate goal is 2000 kanji, right?　　がんばりますよ。

This is where I feel I am now: at the plateau...

or rather, the Valley...or Canyon...

I have the feeling that I'm not making progress in Japanese lately,

despites all my efforts to memorise tons of words, verbs, kanji, sentences ...

Is it normal?  It seems it's widely discussed on internet.

もういちどう

がんばってね

More dots ...

Another example of more dots to connect.

I watched this great drama about a teacher and her class of Japanese-studying foreigners: 日本人の知らない日本語 - Nihonjin no Shiranai Nihongo.
The series are very humorous and hilarious from time to time. Very often, misunderstandings and communication issues are leading to comical situations while at the same time revealing cultural insights from both Japanese and foreigners living in Japan.




I enjoyed the show very much, and I wanted to know more about this highly amusing teacher.
Her name is Riisa Naka (仲 里依紗 Naka Riisa) .

While browsing her filmography, I found she has played the lead in other famous movies, such as
Toki o Kakeru Shōjo/The Girl Who leapt Through Time (Live Action) (2010) [Actualy she also did the voice in the 2006 anime] and Zebraman 2: Attack on Zebra City (ゼブラーマン -ゼブラシティの逆襲) by Takashi Miike.

From this movie, 2 energetic videoclips have emerged: "NAMIDA～ココロアバイテ～" and "Zebra Queen Theme [ゼブラクイーンのテーマ]".






Riisa-san also performed in other drama (which I haven't seen yet), such as My Boss My Hero and Yankee-kun to Megane-chan.

Connecting the dots

As said before in one of my entries, immersion is crucial if you want to learn a language. Second to that, it's important to have fun while learning as a way to keep you motivated during the hard task.
So I try to get to get exposed to spoken Japanese as much as possible, mostly by watching movies and J-drama.
Now, a lot of drama is created for a high-school audience, but I still watch, notebook and pen at hand, ready to juggle down some new words I pick up.
What I find very interesting is that several actors play in several drama and movies, and as you follow them, you can find other movies in which they played and where other known actors are playing. So you discover many movies and drama, as well a new actors.
I like to google them, and connect the dots.

For example the movie that I posted about last time:
Linda Linda Linda (リンダ リンダ リンダ) is a movie about some highschool girls that form a band to do an act on their final schoolday. The movie starts really slow and gives the impression to be boring. But the final 10 minutes really moved me. See that clip in my previous post: they play a cool version of the song Linda Linda. After searching I found this is a song by Japanese punk band The Blue Hearts. The lyrics are in masculine form, so it's funny to hear the highschool girls sing them.



The singer of the band is played by Bae Doona . Her face looked familiar to me, and after research I found that she also played in Air Doll (空気人形 Kūki Ningyō) by director Koreeda. He is also known for directing Nobody Knows (誰も知らない Dare mo shiranai) , Still Walking (歩いても 歩いても Aruitemo aruitemo) After Life , known in Japan as Wonderful Life (ワンダフルライフ Wandafuru Raifu) and others.


Another bandmember is Yūko Odagiri (小田切　悠子 Odagiri Yūko) , who plays the guitar in the band. I had seen her before as well, and it was in the movie Lorelei: The Witch of the Pacific Ocean (ローレライ Rōrerai) about an experimental submarine during the war.


And in fact, the captain of the submarine is played by Kōji Yakusho (役所 広司 Yakusho Kōji) , who also plays in Tampopo, Shall we dansu, The Eel, Warm water under a Red bridge, Memoirs of a Geisha, and many others...


I find this such investigation very interesting, and it gives me joy and keeps me motivated.
Truly, I like to connect the dots and discover more interesting movies and actors ...