LLearn Japanese

Daily Thread: simple questions, comments that don’t need their own posts, and first time posters go here (May 04, 2025)

  • May 4, 2025

This thread is for all simple questions, beginner questions, and comments that don't need their own post.

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Seven Day Archive of previous threads. Consider browsing the previous day or two for unanswered questions.

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14 comments

  1. First time poster here:

    Just found out Duolingo says they are an ai first company. πŸ™

    Any good trusted alternatives?

  2. What’s a good way to say goodbye to the streamer in the middle of the stream (especially one with few viewers where you’re likely to be read)? At the end everybody says γŠη–²γ‚Œζ§˜, but I think this doesn’t apply if you’re leaving before they end the stream.

  4. Someone has started a Japanese Graduation course in a university with basic knowloge?

    I pass in a Graduation course and IDK how much Japanese i have to know beforehand. Im Studying hard in this 3 months but has someone has some experience in this?

  5. I would’ve like to make this a post, but can’t coz karma. But here goes, I would really appreciate suggestions from y’all for what to do in my situation rn. I’m really struggling with core style vocab decks. I’m just can’t remember the meaning or reading or both of the words, no matter how much I grind them. So I decided RRTK for a month, so I got to know the meanings/keyword for a lil over 300 kanji in that time, after which I dove back into vocab again (using the Kaishi 1.5k deck).

    Doing RRTK did make it easier, at least for words with kanji I’d seen before (for the most part, coz as I found out, kanji sometimes combine to form a word which means something unrelated to the meanings of the individual kanji…so that sucks). But I still struggle to get the reading (even at a slow pace of 5 new cards a day), and of course for words with kanji I don’t know, it’s even more hard as I have nothing to go on really (idk why it’s been so frigging hard for me). No matter how many times I review them in a day, no matter how much time I spend, I just keep forgetting them. I’ve never even particularly had a bad memory, so this is extremely demotivating.

    A solution I thought of was a core deck with mnemonics (either edit an existing one and add your own mnemonics or use an existing core deck with mnemonics; I found one like that on Ankiweb). These mnemonics would be stories connecting the meaning of the word/kanji and the reading of the word. However, mnemonics will only work if I know the meaning of the kanji first, to trigger the mnemonic in the first place. Or for some reason, even if I didn’t know the meaning, but the reading stuck when going through the cards, I could still use the mnemonic to back track to the meaning. But I will need to know at least one. So mostly I will need to know the meanings of the kanji first.

    So I’m back at square one and at a loss what to do, other than the obvious route of drilling all JoyΓ΅ Kanji RRTK style completely, and then do a vocab deck hoping for the best that knowing the meanings of the kanji will help make the task of remembering the meanings of the words and their reading easier. Or at least I’ll have meanings of the kanji using which I can make or find mnemonics to help recall the reading. But I really don’t wanna do that, and wanna do vocab directly.

    I also though of doing RRTK Kanji damage style using the Kanji Damage deck itself or using the Kanji damage mnemonics and editing it into my current RRTK deck. This way gives me both the meaning and one ON-reading for the Kanji, so I could get a head start on words that use ON readings, and tackle the KUN readings as they appear in words.

    Also I realize Wanikani pretty much does everything I want, but I can’t afford it. So that’s that.

    Any suggestions on what to do really? I feel very demotivated and lost.

  8. In an anime, a terrorist woman is giving a young not advice (maybe) and says the following:

    あγͺγŸγ‚’ζ―ε­γ¨εŒγ˜γ‚ˆγ†γ«γ―γ—γŸγγͺい

    The above was subtitled as: “I don’t want you to the up like my son.”

    I am wondering if that is an accurate translation. Am I correct in my understanding that in the Japanese, she’s saying specifically that she doesn’t want to do something. So a proper understanding would be something like “I don’t want to act on you in the same way that (someone unspecified) acted on my son.”

    Basically, the speaker is the subject of する right? So this sentence is actually kind of a threat and not the warning that the translation suggests? Or am I wrong?

    Thanks

  9. Is there an Anki plugin that show JLPT progress stats similar to bunpro ?
    I started mining cards and I’d like to see how much vocab I know for each JLPT level.

  10. I have been using a Samsung tablet with an S-pen over the past month to write my answers in a.o. Renshuu. This has worked fine and helps me get familiarized and learn the various characters more easily.

    But I am having some issues with writing some similar characters, and most notably the katakana γƒΌ (prolonged sound mark) and δΈ€ (kanji for one). They are VERY similar, and it often causes me to write one over the other.

    Reading is fine from context, my biggest issue is with writing it. I think what it boils down to: is there e.g. some special way to handwrite one of them differently which would distinguish it from the other?

  11. I have just learned hiragana and katakana, does anyone have some advice on what to do next? I wanted to do the core 2k deck next but i dont know if that is the right thing to do. Thanks in advance.

  12. This is perhaps only tangentially related to the Japanese language itself, but does anyone know of a workaround for downloading ebooks (as in the epub/pdf files themselves) from Japanese Kobo? This [help page](https://help.kobo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360019527954-Download-books-from-your-Kobo-account-to-export-to-another-device-or-app) states that Japan is the only region where they don’t actively offer this.

    Alternatively, does anyone know of a Japanese ebook seller that doesn’t actively try to lock you into their ecosystem the way that Amazon, Kobo, Book Walker, etc. seem to? Thanks!

  13. γ€Œγ¦γ„γ†γ‹γ€γ“γ‚Œγ€δΏΊγ‚‚γ γΎγ—γŸγ£γ¦γ“γ¨γ γ‚ˆγͺοΌŸγ€

    what’s this たって in this case?

  14. I’m learning voc through the core 6k deck (also Wanikani and Genki).
    I’d learned that to open was 開く／あく, but the deck also gives me 開く／ひらく.
    What is the difference between the two? And how important is it that I don’t mix them?

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