Hi guys. Call me Francis. I’m a software engineer working in Manila. Several years ago I worked for a Japanese company, and my boss encouraged me to study Japanese because it would help me get promoted. Back then I became aware of TextFugu pretty early on but hadn’t been interested because it’s a paid service (yeah, I’m a cheapskate). I liked Koichi’s writing style, though, so I became a subscriber of the Tofugu blog.

My learning plan back when I started was as follows:
1. Learn カタカナ first. My reason for this was that I figured カタカナ would be more useful to me as a beginner who was self-studying, first because there were plenty of カタカナ in Japanese-themed places where I live, and also because I knew that a lot of the time I wouldn’t even need a Japanese dictionary when reading something in カタカナ, because many of them are just words/names I already knew. This actually worked out really well, and it was fun writing friends’ names in カタカナ and doing silly stuff like that.

2. Learn ひらがな. This took way more time than I thought, but I managed to do it with the help of the free Obenkyo Android app, which also helped me master writing both カタカナ and ひらがな.

3. Finally, learn 漢字. Initially, Obenkyo was again my go-to tool for doing this, but knowing the sheer magnitude of the task (so many 漢字!) I decided that if I truly wanted to know Japanese, I ought to put my money where my mouth is. That was when I joined the WaniKani Alpha testing group. Using WaniKani was much more fun than just doing the multiple choice quizzes in Obenkyo over and over again without any logical spacing. After several months, my 漢字 knowledge soared, and it felt great.

At that point, my boss told me that the JLPT exam was fast approaching, and that I ought to try it out. So I registered for the test. That was when I realized I was missing something very important: grammar. I had this wealth of Japanese words in my head, but I barely knew how to string them together in order to actually communicate in Japanese. I mean, sure, I had been reading articles about the grammar side of things every now and then (I read Tofugu, after all)… I even listened to that “Easy Japanese” podcast from NHK, but I was barely getting any useful grammar practice.

So, I started cramming as much info about particles and conjugations as I could before the exam, but it just wasn’t enough. Needless to say, I failed JLPT N5, which was pretty embarrassing.

To be honest, I was hit pretty hard by that failure. Maybe because it coincided with a few other personal failures I experienced at the time. Anyway, soon after that I was already working for a different company, had cancelled my WaniKani subscription, and had all but given up on learning Japanese.

Until now.

The trigger was EtoEto. When I heard that EtoEto was finally going on alpha testing, I was already too late (the way I understood it, one had to avail of the TextFugu lifetime subscription before July to get invited into the alpha; I read about it a few days ago). I was so bummed out by that missed opportunity, but it did make me realize that I was still interested in learning Japanese, after all. The only difference is I no longer want to do it for career reasons, but only because I want to be able to do something I once really enjoyed, and I want to do it properly this time.

So here I am, now a lifetime member of TextFugu, reading up on Japanese grammar, and waiting for another chance to use EtoEto. I’ve also reactivated my WaniKani account and had my level reset to 1, because I forgot so many 漢字 by now that it’s pointless to pretend that I’m still at the same level as before.

As a sort of prodigal son of the Japanese learning community, I look forward to becoming part of it once more.

よろしくお願いします！

• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma.
• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma.
• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma.
• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma.
• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma. Reason: revised awkward wording
• This topic was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  Francis Thomas Ocoma.