If you are learning a foreign language, you are certainly using a spaced repetition system (SRS) to memorise vocabulary. I personally use Anki and created my deck from scratch when I started learning Japanese. Today, it contains more than 7000 words and expressions and I can say that, contrary to any other material, this Anki..
Japanese News: South Korea and North Korea together in Pyeongchang
On Wednesday (January 17th), officials from South Korea and North Korea have met and discussed the Olympics for 11 hours. Two major decisions came out of this meeting, both turned towards friendship: first, South and Nord Korea will enter the opening ceremony together, under a "flag of the unification" (a white flag with a blue..
Currently reading: 噓を愛する女 by 岡部えつ
I started the first novel of my 2018 reading challenge list! I picked up what seemed to be the easiest novel on the list: 「噓を愛する女」by 岡部えつ（おかべえつ）. I didn't know this author before, I have checked her Wikipedia page and I saw that there was a drama adaptation of one of her previous novel. I first..
Book review: 『パラドックス13』 by Keigo Higashino
Review 「パラドックス13」(read: サーティーン) is a novel by famous crime author Higashino Keigo. Contrary to what we may expect, 「パラドックス13」does not deal with crime and investigation, but with science-fiction. At least, an SF element gives the context in which the characters will evolve but we won't know much about the scientifical phenomenon that stroke the Earth on..
Daily Study: working on input
The concept of "input" may be familiar to a lot of language learners, but I didn't know the word "input" until I discovered the website Antimoon. Antimoon gives advice to English learner, but of course, they can be applied to any other language. The authors of Antimoon stress the importance of input through several enlightening articles..
Japanese News: Moon Jae-in and the comfort women agreement.
Several articles on NHK News Web (main source) discuss South Korea President Moon Jae-in's press conference that took place on January 10th. 記者会見・きしゃかいけん: press conference Of course, Japan media were closely watching what Moon Jae-in would say about the Japan-Korea agreement on the comfort women issue that was signed in 2015 by the two governments...
Reading notes: 舟を編む, part 5 and Review
Finally, the last chapter of 舟を編む! As I haven't taken many notes for this chapter, I will also write my review of the novel in the same post. Reading Notes 血潮が凍る The missing word on the fourth galley proof is 血潮・ちしお which means both "spurting blood" and "hot blood" or "hot-bloodedness". Hence Majime's joke 「血潮が凍る事態です」..
Bullet Journal: daily log or how to spare willpower
Even if I have a lot of things I want to do, I often end up spending most of my time wondering what to do next, overwhelmed by the multitude of materials to study. Every time that I have time to study Japanese, I think that I should make the best of it but I..
Japanese News: Webで見る2017
I found this page on NHK about the news that received the most attention in Japan in 2017. I have decided to go through the 10 first results and see if I can understand what it is about. This implies to understand the titles in Japanese but also, to have followed the news in Japan..
Reading Notes: 舟を編む, part 4
Still reading 舟を編む! Part 4 is told from the point of view of a new character and we know that a lot of time has passed since the end of part 3. I don't really like when many years are skipped in a novel, I like to feel close to the characters, feeling that I..
Japanese news: trying to understand an article’s title…
Yesterday, I searched for an article to study today and I found this: 相撲協会 貴乃花親方の理事解任を評議員会に提案へ on NHK. This kind of article really makes me want to cry 😭! I don't understand the title, I don't understand at all what it is about, I recognize many kanji but I am too lazy to think about what they..