Being Fluent in Japanese....

It's not THAT hard to learn a language....

Well...depending on what you mean by learn a language.

There is a level where you are able to get around, asking for directions, ordering, making small talk. This is way easier than most people are willing to admit. You can learn it in a few weeks, just studying an hour or two a day.

There is learning to the point where you are able to have a conversation, not only about self introductions and small talk, but the ability to say most of what you want to say. This takes many people years but it really doesn't have to. If you take a first principles approach to the language, then it can be done in months, and if you have someone patient to talk to, you can begin practicing within a few weeks.

Then there is a level of deep understanding and nuance in another language. This can take years, or even a lifetime, even if you put lots of time and energy into it and even if you have a practical approach. You can begin this journey after a year or two if you are really proactive, but it takes much longer to get to a level where people can treat you the same as a native speaker.

Of course there are various levels of understanding within each of these levels, but the point of bringing them up is to say that people really really overestimate the first two, and really underestimate the third.

I find the first two incredibly easy if I have a few months to focus my free time on the language, even just an hour or two a day, or even better if I have more than that. I've become very good at hacking the basics.

Becoming able to converse at a near native level though, that's always evaded me. The primary reason for this is vocabulary. Languages are MASSIVE.

And so I was able to learn Japanese and Mandarin to a level where I can talk about most things and send and receive messages, and when I watch something with simple dialogue, I can understand...but when I hear something out of context I miss 40-60% of what is going on, and I read about 4-5x slower than native speakers.

I've tried countless things over the years to try and speed up the process...and I guess you could say I've done that...but it's still a VERY long process.

As an example, I tried using games to learn vocabulary, reviewing the dialogue on Youtube 3-4 times after playing. I got through the first half of a 40 hour RPG game and already had a list of about 2000 words. I imagined that after learning 2000 words, I'd start to find fewer and fewer new words because I would have already learned a bunch of them.

But the second game I played wasn't any easier, even though the dialogue was the same level of difficulty. For every 100 new words there were about 10 that I'd studied in the last game. If I do some rough math...that means I'd need to study 400 more hours of games. That's not 400 hours of study, but 400 hours of dialogue. Each hour of dialogue would be studied about 5 hours total.

That's 2000 hours of study before I'll be able to understand most of what's going on in these games or a TV show or novel without a dictionary. THAT'S INSANE! I'm already conversational.

I don't blame this on Japanese being difficult. I don't the vocabulary harder to learn than Spanish or French. The basics were rough but I've got those down. It's just that languages are HUGE.

If I study about an hour a day....2000 hours will take me about another 7 years.

WHAT!?!

Of course I don't really NEED to learn Japanese anymore to live here. But I want to be able to read a friends novel, and listen to a discussion or interview and know exactly what is going on. I want to be able to join group discussions and not speak with a handicap, but like a native.

No matter how much I look for hacks, there is no way around this...I've got to put the time in. And so I continue to spend about an hour a day on studying through games. I've started 3 games and I plan to spend the next 6 months learning all the vocabulary in them. Then hopefully, after learning around 6000-8000 words, I will begin to feel the amount of new words that show up in every new game is shrinking.

If you've read any posts about my studying before you know I previously used Tales of Vesperia and Persona 5. Persona 5 is a 100 hour game though, and I couldn't be THAT patient to finish it. I decided to stop using it to study and study through Persona 4 instead because it's about a third of the size. I'll also use Final Fantasy Crisis Core and potentially some Star Ocean game and Xenoblade 2.

Here are some of the words I'm studying. I don't think any of my friends here are studying Japanese, at least not at this level so it won't be of any use to anyone, but just for my own practice, I'll write them here.

(Vocabulary from Tales)

Kanji	English	Hiragana
長雨	long rain	ながあめ
氾濫	to flood	はんらん
水位	water level	すいい
たたり	curse	たたり
寝言	nonsense/sleep talk	ねごと
実体化	materialize	じったいか
実在	actually exist	じつざい
司祭	priest	しさい
不束	rude / incompetent	ふつつか
末永く	evermore	すえながく
不可欠	indispensable	ふかけつ
手間	time/labor	てま
微力	small power	びりょく
王宮	palace	おうきゅう
内務	internal affair	ないむ
辛苦	hardship	しんく
見張る	to stand watch	みはる
王位継承者	heir to the throne	おういけいしょうしゃ
親密	intimacy	しんみつ
さぞや	surely
勘ぐる	to doubt	かんぐる
しばし	a short while
客室	guest room	きゃくしつ
円卓	round table	えんたく
整う	to prepare	ととのう
内示	unofficial announcement	ないじ
別命	a separate order	べつめい
お近付き	make someone's acquaintance	おちかづき
司る	unification	つかさどる
聖職者	clergyman	せいしょくしゃ
司教	bishop	しきょう
輔弼	advising the emperor	ほひつ
腹を割って話す	speak frankly	はらをわってはなす
王族	royalty	おうぞく
人気取り	publicity stunt	にんきとり
致命的	fatal	ちめいてき
醜聞	scandal	しゅうぶん
救済	relief / aid	せいきゅう
求める	to ask/demand	もとめる
低俗	vulgar	ていぞく
有効	valid/effective	ゆうこう
単刀直入	straight to the point	たんとうちょくにゅう
配下	subordinate	はいか
士気	morale	しき
高揚	enhancement	こうよう
便宜を図る	to accommodate	べんぎをはかる
義理立て	doing one's duty	ぎりだて
左遷	demotion	させん
強情	obstinate	ごうじょう
身の程	(knowing) one's place	みのほど
思い知らす	to make someone understand	おもいしらす
風情	taste/charm	ふぜい
武装	arms	ぶそう
兵団	army corps	へいだん
いかさま	fraud
謀る	to scheme	たばかる
矜持	dignity	きょうじ
曲者	ruffian	くせもの
返礼	return present	へんさい

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