-= English Below – and as always, please correct my mistakes! =-

３月２4日２０１１年　　木曜日

輓近僕はゴールデンコンパスを読んでいた。あまり本を読まないけど僕の友達が僕に「この本は一押しの本だよ！読まなくちゃいけない！」と言った。僕の友達はこの本好きな予感がする。。。今までこの本が面白くて好きだと思う。。。

Lately, I’ve been reading “The Golden Compass”.  I don’t really read books, but a friend of mine told me “This is a must read book! You have to read it!”.  I have a feeling my friend likes the book… So far its been pretty good, I think…

３月３０日２０１１年　　水曜日

昨日の夜めっちゃ楽しかった。一晩中僕と四人友達は一緒にテレビを見たりピザを食べたりビデオゲームをしたりした。よかったよ！

Last night was super fun. 4 friends and I watched TV, ate pizza and played video games all night long. It was pretty good!

-= English Below =-

３月２１日２０１１年　　月曜日

昨日めっちゃ楽しかったよ！起きたの時、いとこからのSMSメッセージがあった。いとこの名前はイアンだ。それを読んだが「昼ご飯行き食べないか？でも、まず、僕はおじが手伝わなくちゃいけない」。楽しそうと思っていた。ぼくは「はい、いいよ！」を答えた。

１時にはいとこがいなかった。めっちゃはらへっただったよ！もうすぐ、いとこが来って一緒に昼ご飯に行った。車でレストランまで１時間かかった。すごい腹へっただった。

でも。。。そのレストランは全焼した！！！僕は泣きたい。。。イアンは僕に「あっちシズラーがある！行ってみたいか？」と言った。次にいっしょにシズラーに行った。シズラーの豚のリブズは僕の一番好きなシズラーの食べ物だけど豚のリブズが売り切れた！信じられなかったよ！

でも、やっとの思いで、ハンバーガーの店に食べに行った。やった！

後で、僕とイアンは一緒にアイスホッケーのゲームに行った。その前には僕がアイスホッケーのゲームに行ったことがなかったからすごい楽しかった！

僕の週末が面白くてよかったと思う。。。。

-= English Below =-

３月１２日２０１１年　　　土曜日

今日の夜、ホーボーのパーティーに行って楽しそうだよ。でも、パーティーの前には僕がおばあさんの家をそうじしててつだってあげる。それは大丈夫！おばあさんは昼ご飯がぼくにめっちゃおいしいモーリシャスの料理を作ってくれるから！この食べ物は「ファラタ」という。

今朝は朝ご飯を食べ忘れた。。。今、はらへったから食べるの時。

またね！

Yeah so about those daily Japanese journal entries.  Eeek.  I figure it’s quite apparent that they won’t be posted daily on this blog because I find I don’t have enough time at my own computer to write them.  Or should i say, enough “proper” time.  I hardly have enough time to squeeze in an English post.  So i’ve been writing some journal entries down in my notebook, but I’m never too happy with them.  I’ve been hanging out with friends and my cousin lately, as well as having some late nights at Uni and the very little time I’ve found myself in front of my own computer is at a moment where the last thing I want to do is think.

Even now, I’m at Uni, waiting for a class to start, and using the computers here in the lab to make this post.  Times are tough.

Not really.

But they are for some.  How are the crazy ass earthquakes in Japan! Terrible terrible stuff.  The photos and videos i’ve seen are just simply shocking, like stuff i’d expect to only appear in some Hollywood flick.  But I am super grateful that all my friends are still ok.  Osaka wasn’t really affected, it seems.  But I do feel for everyone who has been affected by the quake, and I wish peace to those affected and a speedy recovery for Japan.

What else happened this past week? I attended a hobo party.  That was fun.  I also hung out at my buddy Tim’s new place.  We worked on a small game for one of our classes (Mobile Devices) at Uni – it was a productive (and, of course, eventful.  Note: “Tim”) afternoon/night to say the least!

-= English Below =-

３月８日２０１１年　　火曜日

私の日本語のクラスでは先生が学生に日記を書かせる。 でも、二週間に四つだけが先生に提出する。私はこのブログがあるからこのブログで書いて私の４最高のエントリーを選択するのが先生に提出する。だから、間違えば修正するおねがいしゅます！

でも、今、ことを書くがなちゃった。今日は日本語を勉強したりしごとで働いたりビデオゲームをしたりした。ちょっと楽しくない。。。

またね！

So I’ve had my first week of university – and it’s good to be back.

First thing i’d like to mention is my Japanese classes.  I was awesome enough to miss my first class on Monday – i got my times mized up… *facepalm* However, I managed to turn up for the second class.  It was scheduled to be a 2 hour class, but when I turned up the teacher (who didn’t actually tell us her name) handed out a test and told us to complete the test, then have a 1-on-1 consult with her, where she would mark our tests and give comments, then we could leave.  I had no idea we had a test! ARGH! However, i’m sure its safe to assume that I would have known had I turned up to class on Monday…

Anyway, I looked at the test.  First page: Translations.  I looked at the 5 phrases I needed to translate and immediately felt like an idiot.  I translated a grand total of 1 out of 5 phrases.  Not at all off to a good start. It was quite simply due to the fact that there were kanji in these sentences that i’d never even seen before – Ever.

Second page was grammar. No problems with that.

Also on second page, a thank you letter to a friend in Japan who sent me a Christmas present. No problems again (apart from an embarassing katakana error… guh… so out of practice).

In my last post i mentioned that I was going for my “Japanese Placement Interview”.  The word “Interview” was the word used by Dr. Nagata and so i prepared myself for an interview.  I went through some listening excercises, went over some grammar and vocab…. I didn’t bother with too much kanji practice as I figured speaking would be the primary focus in this interview. I’m already pretty confident with my pronunciation.  And generally, with vocab and grammar fresh in my mind i’m generally pretty ok at speaking, i mean, i’m sure to the Japanese I probably speak like a 5 year old child – a 5 year old JAPANESE child! And so i’m happy enough with that for the time being.

I was set, I was pumped, I was only a wee bit nervous, and really, most importantly, I was open to whatever result I would receive.  So I turned up, there were a few people in the room and so I immediately thought that this must be like a group interview thing.  I didn’t know if I should wait before going in or what, and there were some people sitting down outside so I took a seat and waited for a bit.  I also had a bit of a chat with the people outside, they were also there for either the interview or just to gather some information.  One girl had already lived in Japan for a year, and one of the guys was fresh out of highschool and had never studied Japanese before.

I walked in and told one of the Japanese professors that I was there for the interview to which she replied (in her Obaachan-like Japanese accent): “Oh, you’re here for the test!” then she hands me 2 bits of paper and tells me to sit down and get started (politely of course).

This wednesday i’ll be journeying to the University of Queensland campus at St. Lucia to attend a Japanese placement interview.  I requested (and… actually I’ve been approved for) Japanese 3 – which is essentially the beginning of the 3rd year of Japanese language studies at UQ.  That’s all really meaningless to me and I suppose the studies I have taken part in are meaningless to the Japanese language faculty which is why I’m attending this interview to figure out if this really is the right level for me.

I haven’t really studied or prepared for it yet.  I did a bit of study over the December-January New Zealand trip but, oddly enough, I haven’t found time to study now – although, that has to be an excuse because I reckon there was time for it.

Whenever I do study Japanese I surprise myself with what I already know AND how quickly I relearn stuff that i’ve forgotten. I still kinda think Japanese 3 will be the right level though…  But i don’t really have my heart set on any particular level because essentially the numbers tacked on the end of the class are irrelevant – i’m more particular about being placed correctly in a way that I will be able to relearn and review a bunch of the stuff I’ve already covered as well as push on and learn more.