#asterlearns

[the-nihongo-adventure]

はじめまして～ Hello! I'm Aster from @asterlearns, this is my main blog. I'm on Week 1, Day 7 of the Langblr Reactivation Challenge, so I'm sending out some asks.

How long have you been studying Japanese for? What is your favorite part about studying the language? Have you read or watched anything interesting in Japanese lately that you would recommend?

Is that too much?? Feel free to interrogate me back if you want!

はじめまして、アストルさん!　質問を送ってくれてありがとう!　(⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)

Thank you for your ask!!

I started learning Japanese back in May, 2020, when our country was in lockdown because of COVID. Back then, I had been desperately looking for something that would keep me engaged and busy since I was really overwhelmed by the overall situation of uncertainty caused by the pandemic. It was then that I chanced upon this video by JapanesePod101 on YouTube, teaching all hiragana characters in an hour. I challenged myself to learn all the hiragana characters from that video, and started by practising five hiragana characters daily. Before I knew it, I had already started enjoying learning Japanese, and so ended up continuing with the katakana video, followed by learning Kanji on WaniKani and learning the structure/grammar on Cure Dolly Sensei's YouTube channel. I joined college in November 2020, so while I could no longer devote as much time to learning Japanese, I still continued to study the language in my free time. So yes, to answer your question, I've been studying Japanese for around 2.5 years (my answer ended up being longer than I thought it would be😅).

Ah, this one is a really hard question! I'm tempted to say everything, but probably my favourite part about studying Japanese is actually getting to use the language in real life. Over time, I've slowly become able to enjoy certain media in Japanese - songs, interviews, podcasts, stories etc. - with a deeper level of understanding. This year, I've also had the opportunity to attend events where I got to interact with fellow learners and native speakers in Japanese, which was almost a dream come true moment for me. It's also one of my biggest sources of motivation at the moment, the hope that one day I'll finally be able to understand and use Japanese the way I use English - incorporating it in my daily life, making it an irreplaceable part of my identity, and being able to help others fall in love with the language as well.

Yes! I very recently discovered the podcast Let's Learn Japanese with Movies thanks to Tofugu, and I'm already loving the stories as well the format in which the host of the podcast, Aki-san, delivers them. My favourite episode/story so far is The Reader. You can also check out the official website of the podcast to read the transcriptions and watch the videos from which the stories are inspired. Highly recommend it!!

It's not too much at all! I had fun answering all of your questions - please feel free to send in more of them if you'd like - I might not be able to answer right away since I'm giving my exams, but I'd definitely try to get to them as soon as possible! Also I hope I didn't bore you with my long answers😅

Kudos on participating in the Langblr Reactivation Challenge - I'll be looking forward to your posts! And best of luck for your Japanese learning journey, 一緒に頑張りましょう!😃

これからもよろしくおねがいします!　(⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)❤️