Inhae's blog

This post will be short because I have done nothing interesting this week to study or get immersed in Japanese. I have only studied Anki and I have written a short text in Japanese every day (a little more than the half of an A6 page).

I would like to say that I have been busy, but I haven’t. I just didn’t want to study Japanese this week, I was more into journaling, writing and drawing. The good thing is that I listened to some Japanse music while doing these activities, and here are some songs that I particularly like:

First of all, my favourite singer on this list: Alfred Beach Sandal. I like his album Unknown Moments, but my favourite song is “Horizon” from the EP ABS+STUTS:

I find that this is a song perfect to listen to while drawing, I can’t stop hitting the “repeat” button 🙂 If you like this style, you can check STUTS too (who worked with Alfred Beach Sandal on this song), but his work will be either instrumental or a collaboration with other artists that won’t all sing in Japanese. I personally like his album Eutopia.

I have also discovered Paris Match that I like a lot. This is a song from 2005, it’s called “Desert Moon” and is from the album PM2:

https://youtu.be/BPw0E8KJwNk

In spite of the desert theme, I found this song perfect to listen to on a rainy day like we had yesterday.

Let’s move to some more recent productions with Asako TOKI (土岐 麻子). I don’t like all her songs, but I do like her interpretation of jazz classics and I particularly enjoyed “Black Savanna” from the album Safari (released this year):

If you want to chill out with some good Japanese background, you can check Ohashi Trio (大橋トリオ). I think that in spite of the name, Ohashi Trio is not a band but a guy alone, Yoshinori OHASHI (大橋 好規). He made some interesting interpretations of American pop/rock songs. This is “Honey”, which I think appears in several albums. I chose this one because I like the video clip, but if you like it, you will certainly like his other songs as well:

Last but not least, one of my best discoveries this week: VIDEOTAPEMUSIC (except for collaborations, his work will be mostly instrumental). This is the song “Hong Kong Night View” from the album Souvenir. I think that this album was released in 2015 in Japan under the title “世界各国の夜” and this year outside Japan under the title “Souvenir” (but I may be mistaken). This song is featuring Sansuke YAMADA (山田参助):

This song reminds me of the film In the Mood for Love, that’s why I like it so much I guess!

(all these songs are available on iTunes)

And that’s it for today’s post. I spent the whole week unwilling to study Japanese. I haven’t read the news, I haven’t continued the drama I started, and I have barely opened my books (I haven’t read a lot and I am far behind my schedule for my reading goals of November). I guess it happens sometimes, and there are always some ways to stay in touch with the language that won’t feel like studying, music is a great example! Let’s hope I will be back to study next week!

About

I’m learning Japanese, Korean and Chinese to read mystery novels and play video games in these languages.

Learning languages has always been one of my favourite hobbies, but I’m not a social person, I don’t like to meet new people and make friends, this is just not me. I keep hearing that languages are meant for communication, that we have to actively use them, talk to people, etc. and for a long time, I thought I was weird to learn languages just for me, just to enjoy media, culture and entertainment in a foreign language, with absolutely zero interest in communicating with natives.

Now I don’t really care what people think, and this blog helped me a lot to stop doubting myself and just do what I enjoy doing.