Learn to speak and write Japanese fluently

i’m used to reading in english, fast… slowing down for japanese is hard for me, but my kanji knowledge doesn’t allow me to skim. the best part about trying to read more is that japanese books are printed in a tiny format, so you can carry them with you easily. i read a few pages every day on the train. when the story’s good, it makes me wish my commute were longer than 15 minutes.

After studying almost 8 years I can’t say I’ve achieved this goal, even though I work at a Japanese newspaper doing research and translations… I’m hereby resolving to study up for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, level 1. Passed level 2 a couple years ago but haven’t studied since then. Need to learn, minimum, another thousand kanji.

怖い！