今日俺のMegami Magazineが届いてきた！今月と古いの発行ほしかったから、Amazon.co.jpで注文した。秋葉原のK-Booksで探したんけど、見付からなかった。（でもこれが手に入った！あぁ、関羽最高！）

Amazon.co.jpの届けサービスがいいものだよ。三冊注文しても一つの包装に（特の機械で見たい）入れた。驚いたよ。

まぁ、俺の部屋の壁に白い間隔がまだあるからそれを直す予定を実行する時間です！じゃ、また！

え？なにこれ、一日間でアップデートは２回？ええ、見たとおりだよ！先のサイトのテーマがいろいろに役立たなかったから変更した。　どう？似合う？嫌ったら、俺に気にしないから我慢して。

じゃ、遂によみがえった、このブログ！

「どうしてそんなに長い休みしたんだか？」って聞いてるんだろう？　まっ、実は一月ポスト書いたんだけど、ウップロード前にあのポストの適当の写真もウップロードしたかった。でも、やる気がなんかなくなったから。こんなものが俺に英語でちょっとつまらないだ。そうして二月から今までずっと日本語能力試験２級の文字と語意と文法を勉強していた。毎日一日数時で。週末も。漢字が分かるのは好きになったから、あんまり大変じゃなかった。けどさぁ、勉強してもあまり使っていないが意味ないだろう？　じゃ、使おうか？練習練習！

日本語能力試験２級の漢字リストを勉強したあとで日本語の文が前部読めることがだいたいできる。漢字が面白い文字じゃないか？俺がそう思うけど。じゃ、漢字のあとに勉強をしていたのは語意だった。それが一番時間がかかるものだった。２級の語意リストが５０００ぐらい！大変そうね？けど、俺が勉強したリストは２０００ぐらいだった。もっと短いがよくある言葉リストだった。残りの語意を勉強する予定が文法の後で。

ええ、今の勉強するものが文法だ！文法が少し抽象ものだろう？直接説明できにくいじゃない？でも、使えば正しい使い方現れる。現れなかったらだいたい誰かが何かを言える。たとえば[あっ、ちょっと違う]とか「え？意味分かんない」かな？

ああ、疲れた。実は日本語を使える体験があまりない。自分だけで勉強することにするとき、先生がいないし、ほかの生徒もいないし．．．あ、寂しくないけど日本語を作ると試す機会ほとんどないだけだ。　あの機会もっとほしいから．．．これが一歩だな？　このブログ毎日アップデートしたいけど．．．それがどうかな？同じ約束もうしたんだろう？このときたたえるかな？

それじゃ終わり！

p.s.　俺のへたくそ日本語を許してくれ！

I kind of wanted to make this update a video update, becuase text is so 1983 and people upload much worse stuff to Youtube. But it would just be me in my room and I think that’d be kind of somewhere. I know once I get over the initial inertia they’ll just roll out, but hey.

Since my last update, two of the people in my guest house have moved out. The Czech guy had a party here and quite a few people turned up. About ten, which is a lot for our small kitchen that gets cramped when it has three people. What was interesting was that there were people from all over the place. Korea, Germany, Denmark, China, and of course Japan. Despite this, everyone was speaking English, and I was the only native English speaker there. Made me glad that I’m technically bilingual now.

Then I played Left 4 Dead for about two weeks straight.

Work prospects look terrible. I don’t even get responses anymore. I don’t really expect to find work until Febuary, March or April anyway. For English teaching, I need a degree in anything, and for I.T. work I need JLPT Level 2. Thankfully, I have an optical internet connection to pass the time.

Being a white guy in Japan is funny. When being served by someone Japanese either when you’re shopping or getting food, you get no eye contact and they mumble everything they say, assuming you don’t understand anything. I got a lot of that early on when I wasn’t confident in my Japanese. Now however it generally starts off that way (or with them shoving an English menu in your face) but as soon as you start speaking the lingo they change back to normal customer service mode, but when they thank you at the end, there’s a smile that says “thank you for speaking Japanese” or “thank you for not making me use English”.

An American/Japanese guy I met over here has had a friend come over from the US, and we’ve been up to touristy for the past week. At least I’m getting out of my apartment. We play a Japanese card game called Lycee. I’m kind of new, he isn’t. But he can’t read Japanese where as I can. So he knows what most of the cards do based on what they look like. If we’re card hunting, I have to read the cards for him. He shows me how to play. It works out okay.

But yeah, that’s about it. We’ll see how keen I am on an update sometime soon. Have fun now.

I’ll get the negative things out of the way first. The Australian dollar continues to drop (it was at 55c to 100 yen a few days ago), making taking money out of the ATM a trauma. It also makes my rent twice as expensive, blowing me very far out of budget.

Not only that , but IT job interviews were following identical patterns. I’d go for the interview, they’d love my experience, technical ability and how I’d fit in with the team. But as soon as talks about my Working Holiday Visa came up, things would always get sour and I’d quickly be shown the door. Some were polite about it (“We’ll have a chat with our HR department and see how things go), some were blunt (“Sorry, we’re looking for somebody with a full visa.”) and others were just plain rude (“Uh, you know that’s not going to work, right?”). All would end with me not getting the job. At least I don’t hate instant ramen.

So I’ve taken two different stances. Firstly, I’ve moved apartment. From Fujimidai, about fifteen minutes west of Ikebukuro, to Kinshichou, which is about fifteen minutes from Akihabara. Yes, freakin’ sweet, but not so sweet given that I have no money to spend there at the moment.

This is where teaching English comes in. I’m not getting full time IT work, and I need to start earning yen ASAP. So come Monday (which is a public holiday here, only found that out today), I’m going to make an additional English Teaching resume and start spamming the interwebs.

I’ve moved into a gaijin house with a few other gaijin. There’s a Czech guy who’s studying Cybernetics, an American who’s looking to become a proper English teacher, and two Korean girls, who can’t speak English. Which is fine, because they speak better Japanese than me and we can communicate without a problem.

So that’s how things stand at the moment. I hope my job searching goes well… and that there are no English tests, because that would just be epic fail. Once I start earning money I should be able to do something that involves me being able to leave my room.

Oh wait, I forgot a gif.

The problem may be that I’ve already got several hundered kanji under my belt and having to learn them again under this new method isn’t particularly appealing. It may be that because I’m in Japan I don’t really need to take this method given that I’m surrounded by Kanji everywhere. Or it could be that he very often gives kanji keywords that have nothing to do with their real meanings (“but of course”? I’ll of course your butt in a minute, seriously).

Something that I’ve been doing parallel to Heisig is increasing my vocab spreadsheet everytime I come accross a word I don’t know that contains at least one kanji that I’m familiar with. I then grind them through Supermemo daily or whenever I get time. I’m finding this kanji grinding method much better than heisig.

I originally started Heisig becuse when I finished JLPT Level 3, when I looked at the Level 2 kanji list I nearly died. You need to know well over twice as many characters (300 for level 3, 1000 for level 2) so I figured I’d combine Heisig with the level 2 kanji list. So I started from the first character, “arm”. I looked up the Heisig story from Reviewing the Kanji and got “Write your address on the fleshy part of your arm”. Address? Flesh? Oh man, this wasn’t going to work. I was going to have to start Heisig from the beginning. So I did. And having looked at Heisig for the first 200 or so characters, versus reading and updating my wordlist… the wordlist has won out.

Firstly, reading Japanese is fun, compaired to reading Reviewing the Kanji. Secondly… once again, I’m not sure why, but I don’t need mnemonic stories to remember Kanji… I might do for some of the harder ones, maybe, but I’ve not hit that yet. Just grinding Kanji and getting them wrong, and letting Supermemo work out the best repetition for characters you’re bad at seems to work the best for me. So for now I’m just grinding my custom vocab list, as well as JLPT level 2 kanji manually.

I actually worked on some of my gifs today. I’m sure you’re proud.

The reason for this? The Australian Dollar. Here, let’s look at a graph.

That’s how much Yen you can buy with AUD$1. WHAT THE HELL? When I got here at the start of July things were sweet, I’m glad I bought my Xbox and 24″ LCD right there and then. Now the wealth that I amassed working in Australia is worth half as much. And it’s only going to get worse. I would be stupid to spend any of it now, leaving me with the yen I have in my wallet for a week. My only hope is to wait for the Yen to crash and I should be okay again… although I’m thinking that by that time, there’s going to be a serious economic crisis at hand.

Foreboding doom aside, thankfully I’ve been doing all that part time work… although I don’t have any yen in hand to show for it at the moment. I was in Citibank yesterday getting an account so I could get paid, and they had foreign currency listings on a TV screen while I was waiting. It kind of made me feel good, because the New Zealand Dollar is in WORSE shape. It was like “LOL! Oh wait, that’s really bad…”

Still, I’m going to put this weekend to use. I’ve not made any gifs in… years now? I still note down the timings so I can go back later, but I might dedicate this weekend to making gifs of all the Anime Openings and Endings I’ve collected over the years.

Also, I’m going to for Danny’s (Choo) featured feeds. There’s been a few things I’ve wanted to take photos of and blog, but given that my current readership is about five to ten people I’ve kind of not bothered. If I can increase my readership then I’ll probably be compelled to blog more and on more interesting things. So we’ll see how that goes. I know I’ll be able to turn this into something awesome, I’m just not sure what kind of awesome yet.

Well, I’m off to the 100 yen shop to buy some food. Have a gif.

After I started flicking out my resume, I got struck down with this really bad cough. I started getting these requests from Agencies for interviews, and I was hoping it would go before then. No such luck, I had to postpone one but the guy had a cold himself and he understood. The problem was, I couldn’t talk at all. I decided to go through with one last Monday regardless of how I felt. I was trying all different kinds of medicine, sprays, gargles, lozenges, but they had absolutely no effect. Yes, I knew what I was taking as I can read that much.

The interview on Monday went okay, but it was with an agency so from there they send me job offers… which tend to be offers from job sites I already belong to. Ehh.

Turns out I could talk okay, as long as I had some water, and I didn’t laugh or I would lose a lung (which happened a few times). They had a Japanese interview which was interesting. He asked me a few things but I was worried about the politeness of my Japanese so I didn’t come off too confident. I remember he asked me about why I picked Japanese and came to Japan, so I started talking about looking at different countries in the world, narrowing down the decision based on language interest. I kept pretty clear about my anime and figure obsession. After I told him that, he said “Oh, usually when I ask foreigners that they say games and anime. That’s not the same for you?” and I was all “Oh, I sometimes watch anime to practice my Japanese.”

Aside from that, the interview was really good, I was on my toes, asking a lot of questions, I know I left a good impression. However it was from there that we came across a problem. I can’t remember why at the moment, but it’s easier to get a Visa when you have a University Degree. I knew this, which is why I came here on a Working Holiday Visa. That’s a good one and a half years. I also know you can get a Visa if you have ten years work experience in a particular field. I only have seven in IT, so that wasn’t an option. I thought there was a Company Sponsored Visa where a company decides they want you to stay in the country, and they organise a Visa for you. Turns out this isn’t the case… so if I want to stay longer than one and a half years, I’ll need to try and go for an Engineering Visa with only eight and a half years in IT. So we’ll see how that goes at the time.

I had an agency interview on Tuesday as well, but this was mainly a technical interview. This was great, I know I impresssed the guy. They offered me a Windows Server position from a client paying more than I’ve been paid before so that was nice. We’ll see how that goes.

Wednesday I had part time work with the guy I mentioned before. That went even better. It was just placing and building machines for a new startup company. They had their own build, but the build script broke during the build process. I impressed both the client and my boss by troubleshooting it to the fact that the build script didn’t anticipate extra partitions on the hard drive, blew them away and kicked the script off again. This was important as the company was from the US and their own IT department were sleeping. He gave me work on Thursday as well. This was with a Japanese company and was the first time he saw me use my Japanese and deal with other technical issues. This went very well too, I tried to use really polite Japanese at the beginning, but moved into “Normal Polite” Japanese and a little Plain Japanese, no one really seemed to care and there were no misunderstandings on either side.

In my previous agency interviews I said to them that I would have no technical problems dealing with Windows machines or Servers, and that the only thing I was worried about was my Japanese. Both interviews said that IT systems are usually in English, and my Japanese was good enough to get a point across and to understand a problem, so the politeness was a non issue. It looks like this is the case, and getting a job was going to be easier than I thought.

I had work on Friday too, emergency part time work from the same place I was getting work from before. Sunday I was helping a friend at a doujinshi convention (dictionary translates doujinshi as “(1) magazine published by fans; fanzine; (2) publication aimed at a particular hobby group; (3) publication sold directly, and not via commercial publishers” which is a better translation than I can do) helping him sell a game he and a few guys made. I plan on writing a post about that tomorrow.

Tomorrow I have an actual interview with a University doing internal IT work there. I’m sure it’s going to go awesomely. I’m also going to try and update my blog more frequently. I think I may have said that before too?

Did a lot of hunting around and found the best places to spam my resume. I figured it would either be really easy, or really hard. When I first arrived, I spoke to a guy I made contacts with while still in Sydney. He didn’t seem all that keen until we met and started talking about Windows Mobile. He started as a tech without any Japanese, and was sick about I.T. Recruitment agencies screwing their clients, and started an I.T. company himself. He would have liked to take me on board but their business was quite small and couldn’t afford a new starter. I was quite surprised to be honest, as he asked me to speak a little Japanese and I said “今まで。。。自己紹介しかできない。”　(“Up to now… all I can do is introduce myself.”) Which isn’t really true, but interviews make me nervous and it’s all I could think of at the time. Even with that, he was still willing to let me do work for him part time. Maybe Japanese isn’t as required as I thought?

A few months after I passed my Japanese Language Proficiency Level 3, I realised that my Japanese had a huge problem. Most of my study was self study, reading and translating, listening, watching, flashcarding and the like. I’d never put the language to use. I’d been focusing on the JLPT Level 3 which is all multiple choice, reading and listening comprehension. There’s no speaking portion of the exam. So I’d been studying for… two and a half years without putting the language to use. I could understand a lot more than I could use. I think I may have assumed that one goes hand in hand… you understand it, so you can use it right?

No, it doesn’t work like that. I’ve been using it as much as possible here in Tokyo and it seems to be that when I use something twice (word or function/grammer) then I can use it without thinking about it. Otherwise I’m stuck there saying “ええっと．．．何と言う．．．”(“ehh… how you say…”) with a quizzical look.

Anyway, so after spamming my resume out to a few places, I’m getting some responses. Usually interviews are good signs but it was very difficult to find IT jobs that require Coversational Japanese. That I could easily do, but many of them require JLPT Level 2 or a “Business Level” of Japanese. The problem with Japanese is that as soon as you get into a Client-Service scenario the language completely changes in order to show respect to the client. That’s why foreigners over here teach English – you can’t work in a bar or cafe without knowing the proper language. I have no problems understanding it, it’s the usage that does my head in. I know if I get into a company where Keigo (uber polite Japanese language) isn’t all that necessary I can use it to practice and move up, but the trick, like all people starting in a new field, is convincing the employer to hire you despite not having prior official expeirence.

Hmm. Being new to this bloggeration thing is interesting, I always end up having more to say than I think. Either way, I’ll end this here. I have to reply to a mail from a recruitment agency where the agent has said he “will be assisting my career search from now on.” I sure hope he can!

Here, have a gif.

1. Go to http://maps.google.com
2. Copy and paste the following line into the search field:
日本東京都中野区上鷺宮３丁目１０−１３
Even if it looks like a bunch of squares it should still work.
3. Click on Street View.

The initial location is a bit off, so you have to go North once, then West once. Turn left until you’re looking at the buildings, and you’re right in front of my apartment. No, not the one with the two dudes, to the left of them. Yes, oh yes, what an amazing apartment. I’m on the third floor. I have three largish windows, however as you can see, less than a meter away is another building from all of them.

Let’s take a little trip, shall we? The station is pretty close, actually I was there about five minutes ago.

Go west 14 steps. Then go north. On step 3, look to your left. The vending machine on the far left sells 550ml coke cans for 120yen, and 550ml coke bottles for 150 yen. The cans are huge, I’m sure there’s a pornographic series that revolves soley around where those cans can fit.

Go North another 5 steps, and look to your right.
I go here pretty frequently. Food is pretty cheap in Japan, so I can get a decent meal for 500 yen, about five bucks. The name of the place is “Gyouza no Manshuu”. Gyouza is like dumplings… I had no idea what they were until I had some. Nice with Soy Sauce.

Go North until you hit a junction, and look North-West. That place with all the bikes in front of it is a pachinko parlour, “Lucky Seven”. Think slots, except you watch little ball bearings fall randomly though the machine, THEN the slots trigger. I don’t get why it’s so popular. There’s another two of these places around here. Apparently, each day, particular machines are rigged to give out huge winnings.

Go North West + West for another 5 steps. On your left is a construction yard… when I was going to my Japanese course last month, every day at 8 am you’d see all the workers doing exercises together to tapes. Kinda lol.

Go West another two steps, and look to your left (and a little behind you) to the store with the yellow sign with the name 松屋. I eat there often too. One of the fist times I was there I ordered a beef rice bowl, and got a raw, uncracked egg in a bowl with it. I was all “Um, sorry, but I’ve got no idea what I do with this!” and the store clerk had to explain that you crack the egg in the empty bowl, mix it up, and then pour it on the rice. I didn’t like it initially, but now I get it every time.

Go west once more, look to your right and you’re right in front of 富士見台駅南口, or Fujimidai Station South Entrance. It’s not on the famous JR line, but the… the… what was it? Oh yeah, the Seibu-Ikebukuro line. I think the rail system is privatised. You’ve got the main JR rail system, then all these other little off shoots you need to transfer to and from to get to some places. I catch this line to Ikebukuro, which is on the JR line, then go wherever I want to from there. There’s a subway system too, but it tends to be more expensive.

When I first arrived, I got a Suica card, which is basically a card with an RF chip than you can apply money too, and then swipe that card to spend said money. The main place it’s used on is the train system. I don’t buy tickets, I just swipe my wallet when I enter, and exit. Works for all rail and subway systems. They have vending machines in the stations that you can use these swipe cards on to get drinks too. Very handy.

Anyway, so there you go. I’ve got some study to do so it’s time to get back to the Japanese vocab flashcards. Try not to think about me naked, okay?