Mail within Tokyo sometimes arrives the same day. Chew on that a minute. Not via Fedex, mind you.

Today I had to buy a new copy of a textbook, because the used copy which was shipped 3 weeks ago, from a state near me, has not arrived. The tracking number shows it has been hovering around Chicago for at least one week. If you google "worst post office america", the branch that delivers to me is NUMBER ONE. I know they have it. If you have been there, you can attest. It's a black hole.

Our building has stopped getting mail. The whole building. I get home from work and don't see the junk mail all over the floor and I know we are still being sanctioned for some reason. Why? We are a peaceful people? We love freedom!

Barack and Biden. So now you know what to do in November. In the meantime, why not learn about Japanese politics with some fine analysis here.

Better yet, if you want something really terrifying, here's a page of Japanese horror mp3's and videos. You can even choose the fear level!

The Just Bento site author/chef extraordinaire has another site that focuses on non-Bento Japanese and Japanese style food. I learned from her that butter and soy sauce make anything taste good.

Does 2channel make your head spin like me? This blog summarized posts into articles, sorting out the chaos of that strange land. It's not always pretty, but it's great reading practice.

And my recent favorite. Take a speech or anything you've written in Japanese, and run it through here to see what it would look like in Samaurai (武士語), Kansai Ben, Okinawa Ben, Business, Yankee, and others.

Back in school tomorrow. Have a great week!!

Ok, my challenge as a blogger is to make interesting posts that require little revision. I am becoming aware how little time I have to allocate to blogging. While it is enjoyable, is not particularly beneficial to my Japanese or my other endeavors. This is the main reason I stopped posting after February; I was in class, working, and going to Japanese lessons twice per week. In a week or so, I will be busier than I was this spring, with much more on my plate. So I am trying to revise as I write here.

What I wanted to cover today are the instructions to the JLPT. I want everyone who is taking the test to walk in the door to the exam room as prepared as possible. I don't want anyone to spend more than an instant trying to decipher the instructions to the various sections. Most are not difficult, but there are a few things that someone new to the test might get caught on.

An important note. This is based on my experience of the 2007 test and my copy of the 2006 test, which I bought in Japan. If the 2008 JLPT is rewritten and doesn't have these type of questions, my apologies. I don't think that will be the case, however. No lawsuits, please.

Listening

This is where I heard a few whimpers and some gnashing of teeth. When you hear the choices, you are required to mark a response to each. Your book will have 2 rows of 4 spaces for each question:

1
2
3
4

Y:
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]

N:
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]
[ ]

As you hear the answers, mark yes or no for each, as you hear it, like so:

1
2
3
4

Y:
[ ]
[ ■ ]
[ ]
[ ]

N:
[ ■ ]
[ ]
[ ■ ]
[ ■ ]

If you aren't sure, guess the "yes" answer and move on. You can fill in the 3 "no" answers at the end, but you will only have a few seconds to turn the test in, so don't do this for all the questions. If you aren't sure of the answer, you will not have time to review until the end of the section, and by then you will have forgotten the choices.

The reason for this method is simple; if test takers only have to mark the correct answer, those who didn't know the answer would merely wait to hear when everyone was writing.

Vocabulary

Many sections require only a cursory reading of the instructions. You will see and underlined word and you will select the proper reading. Here are a few example from the 2006 test:

一級：

再びふるさとに澄んだ川を取り戻すまで、どんな努力も惜しまない。

１：再び　1．さいび　２．ざいび　３.　ふたたび　４.　ふだたび

２：澄んだ　１．くんだ　２.　すんだ　３．　しずんだ　４．とんだ

二級：

今度引越しすマンションは、家賃が今の二倍だ。

１：家賃　１．いえだい　２．いえちん　３．やだい　４．やちん

２：二倍　１．にかい　２．にき　３．にばい　４.　にぶ

God, it wasn't easy when I took the 二級, but as I contrast the two levels, it's clear the difference is pretty big. But, I digress. Then you will have the opposite scenario, the sentence contains the reading, you select the kanji. Going forward, I will supply 二級 examples only.

鳥のむれが大きなわをえがいて北の空にとんでいった。

むれ：　１．群れ　２．組れ　３．族れ　４．団れ

and so forth. In another section, you will have to select the appropriate vocabulary, or as the directions say:

＿＿＿＿に入れるのに最もよいものを、１・２・３・４から一つ選びなさい。

So you may get hiragana or kanji. Read the sentence and pick the appropriate word.

わたしの会社は、倉庫を＿＿＿して、オフィスにしている。 So the sentence isn't too tricky. My company ___a warehouse, and made it an office.　So you know to look for "renovated, remodeled, rebuilt" その感じ。

1. 改正　２．　改造　３．　改善　４.　改定

Without using rikaichan/peraperakun, which are not allowed during testing(>.<); select the correct word.

I will go over more in other posts. All this switching between English and Japanese is making me impatient for my morning coffee. There are other types of questions-homonyms and usage-related, which I will cover. This may be a 4 or 5 post topic. Hope it helps.

So far I am doing laughably bad on the quizzes in my book. Many of the words that I know in a general sense are being presented as answers to fill-in-the-blank questions. So I need to know the proper usage of say, 「方面」and ｢方向」enough to choose the right sentence to insert them. The tricky part is if the example sentence has a word or two I don't know, it becomes more of a process of elimination.

But, for what it's worth, this is useful to me. People say, "The 1kyuu is full of words nobody uses." But, these are words I use in English and am glad I am studying them so I can use them in Japanese.

I woke up because there was a ladybug in my ear. Now I can't sleep and am checking my ear every 30 seconds. It's because a recent episode of "This American Life" had a story about people who get cockroaches in their ears. They have to go to the hospital, because the roaches can't turn around in the ear canal. Luckily, the ladybug wasn't in my ear canal; or if she was, she was small enough to exit, and I caught her on the way out.

I bet in some countries a ladybug in the ear is a good omen.

I'm not sure how well it's being reported, but there have been a few disqualifications for doping at the Olympics. The always above-board DPRK lost both a bronze and silver medal after testing positive:

BEIJING - Kim Jong-su of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) has tested positive for doping at the ongoing Beijing Olympic Games, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said here on Friday at a press conference.

What struck me as odd were the events he won medals in:

Kim took a bronze in men's 10-meter air pistol on August 9 and won a silver in the men's 50-meter pistol final on August 12.

So there are drugs which make you shoot better? Actually, there are. He tested positive for propranolol, a drug prescribed for hypertension and migraines in children. It helps reduce trembling.

I must be missing the reason athletes take these drugs, knowing they will be tested.

Source

I picked up all my study guides that came in yesterday at Sanseido in Mitsuwa, my little Japan away from Japan. I ditched the usual commute of 2 buses and 2 trains, instead riding my bike 11 miles to the Rosement CTA stop, and hopping the bus on the final leg to Mitsuwa. It was a great bike ride on a beautiful day, albeit slightly dangerous on long stretches on busy Devon Avenue. Since it was a day to do things differently, I bypassed my usual shio ramen and instead had kitsune soba. I picked up some rice, two cc lemons and my books. I also bought yet another Kanji dictionary, as if the more I own the more I will know. There are worse addictions.

On the way back, I stopped to watch a parade in the Indian/Pakistani section of Devon. I was enjoying the costumes and dancing (and girls, ahem) when a older Indian guy asked me where I was coming from. I told him I was returning from the Rosemont CTA station, whereupon he asked how far that was. I told him about 11 miles (according to Google maps). He proceeded to berate me for not riding longer, telling me I should be riding 20 miles at least 3 times a week. He then explained that exercise is based on 3 principles; strength, stamina, and flexibility. He then broke down each one for me and how to go about them. For example, do not go to yoga studios; get a book and do it at home. Instead, once a month, go to yoga open houses for free, but do not let the teachers adjust your asanas.

In the midst of this 45 minute long, unexpected health lesson, another man came up to us. The friendly fruitcake asked what he wanted, and the guy replied that he wanted to talk to me! Why did I become so popular in Little India today? The guy was with VOA Television in India, and wanted to interview and film me. So he asked me some questions about the parade and how I liked it. I told him it was fun and the costumes were really festive, etc. He asked if I knew why the parade was happening and I sheepishly told him I did not. He told me today was Indian Independence Day. I promised to remember it. August 15th, everybody.

So in summation:

Happy Independence Day, India. I love Indian people and culture. I find them to be warm and funny people, and someday hope to visit.

If you want Japanese books in Chicago, order them from Sanseido. They quote 3 weeks for special orders, but it has never taken that long.

The 1kyuu books are daunting. I may ditch my normal Kanji and vocabulary studies, and just focus on the books, as they seems to cover a lot of the same material. Like I mentioned, I may not pass the jlpt while taking 17 credits in school, but I will try my best. Either way, the challenge is exciting.

I have more JLPT related posts planned, as they seem to be more popular than my personal missives. I hope I can continue to post at least once a week. I think I can, as long as I manage my time.

I never had a problem with playing music in front of large crowds, being a self-centered bastard. But at times when I played shows in front of 10 people, or 2 label people; that's when I got self-conscious. The typical stage fright remedies I heard were to look slightly over the audiences heads, or (more commonly) drink varying amounts of Jaegermeister.

In Nodame Cantabile, unbearably cute Sakura and the S Orchestra get nervous before their first performance. Her mantra, at about :30, killed me. But it beats pretending the audience is naked.

The reading test is murder, that's what everyone says. There is never enough time to finish, etc.

It's really no more difficult than any adult level reading passage. What I mean is, the reading section is not 300 pages long. What makes it difficult is the vocabulary. So your strategy is to learn all the words. Native readers aren't faster, just familiar with the words. Don't try to practice speed reading at the expense of vocabulary.

There is a place for speed reading, however. We practiced 速読 in school. It was beneficial because it challenged me to try and read faster, even when I wanted to stop and pore over the text. I was surprised to find that if I knew most of the words, when I was done with the article, I had a good idea what the author stated. My brain even seemed to keep working after the reading to unconsciously put it all together. Don't have staring contests with the kanji you don't know, just move on. So, to summarize:

1. Focus on learning vocabulary.
2. When reading, try and challenge your natural pace.
3. Trust your brain while reading, wait until the end of the passage to see if you got the meaning.

Like I said, this is a pre-coffee, just woke up, not thought out post. So you should probably do the opposite.

皆さん、お疲れ様でした。

Smart, cute, Japanese girls who write blogs are A-OK with me.

Smart, white guys who practice writing Japanese every day are also number one in my book.

If I ever decide to use that room in my apartment that has the refrigerator and microwave in it, I will make these お弁当 every day.

Why watch TV in English? It's all election nonsense, and you already decided to vote for Obama months ago. Why not watch a Japanese Drama? I recommend のだめカンタービレ.

Economist and NY Times columnist Paul Krugman has the skills to pay the bills. This week he is on fire.