My Beginning of Japanese learning journey. (Motivation)
So as a post of 2025 new year resolution. I decided to learn Japanese I mean how hard can it be, (Spoiler alert, extremely difficult). So with a motivation to flex to my friend to say that I watch Anime in original audio without subs, so I signed up for a instructor based training center for learning Japanese. Now I will be honest, I work like 10-14 hours for IBM, also it happens that I am also developing this web application for writing this blog on the side as well, I paid for the course like my money was growing on trees, thinking that the classes will be conducted on the weekends, It turned out that classes were on every weekdays for 1 hour and it ends just before my work shift starts.
I will make myself clear, it was my stupid ass who made these assumptions and not the Institutes, they were rather helpful and understanding of my situation although I was the one lagging behind. You know I am more of a pro self-study and self-paced training kinda guy. So conforming to a regular classes was challenging.
Now that I am halfway with my training and is lagging so behind, I will start writing this blog series So that I will be able to revise my knowledge and do my own research on the language itself, this particular blog (also my first blog on the Prod env) will act as a blog index that I will be updating once I post a new blog. While a reader can also filter my blog posts by tags, I will always tag each my Japanese learning post by learn japanese, readers may use the advanced search to search by tags there
Japanese Language Proficiency Test
The Japanese Language Proficiency Test or JLPT in short is an examination held world wide for non-native Japanese speakers that certifies and evaluates the proficiency in Japanese. The exam is jointly conducted by The Japan Foundation with the local authorities.
The examination has 5 levels of difficulty JLPT N5 - JLPT N1, with JLPT N5 being the beginner's noob basic Japanese when spoken slowly while N1 is the Zen Guru of non-native Japanese speakers and is expected to deduct nuances of native Japanese speakers, form sentences quickly read more here.
My goal here is pass N3 or N4 by the next year. Why you ask? Well as I mentioned earlier, I wanna flex, but it has some advantages, If you pass JLPT N1 or N2 you get preferential treatment for Japanese Immigration for highly skilled professionals, Now I happen to have a degree of a profession which is considered Highly skilled. Usually Doctors and medical professionals with JLPT N1/N2 gets the best treatments and there are good reasons for that but a software dev really don't need to understand people that much that is what I think.
The exam is held twice by The Japan Foundation once in July and once in December. but some exam center only have either of the two. Check your exam date and nearest test centers here.
Index:
- Introduction to Japanese Language and Scripts → Read Here