Day 3: Trying to Memorize all the Hiragana

こんばんは！はじめまして。ワンです。どうぞよろしく！

日本語 is really hard, especially since I'm also taking 5th year Chinese at the same time. A lot of people told me that it shouldn't be that confusing since 1) Chinese can help me learn Japanese and 2) 5th year must mean I know Chinese so that means it shouldn't be that hard!

BUT... everybody is wrong!

First of all, I'm getting a little bit confused BECAUSE I know Chinese. When I see 三, I want to say 三 with a Chinese accent. When I see せ、か、い, I want to write 世，功，以. Also, before I went to だいがく、I didn't even speak a word of Chinese, I only spoke Shanghainese. After two years of intensive Chinese learning and spending a summer in Beijing, I am proud to say I can fluently listen and understand Mandarin Chinese, but not fluently read, write, and speak. 所以，我的中文也不太好，结果五年级的中文课也很难！

But I love all the せんせい so far. しばたせんせい is my friend's mother!

Also, I'm so excited to take Japanese because I wanted to do ever since I was 13 years old. I went through a phase where I tried to learn by myself and even went as far as to take one semester at a community college. The class was only once a week and I barely remember anything. I only remember learning  ひらがな but we never even learned かんじ or カタカナ. But at one point in my life, I knew ひらがな! I'm just also excited to take Japanese because I've been interested in its culture. I am an East Asian Studies major, focusing on comparative politics and I think it's fascinating especially nowadays when the tension in East Asian countries are rising.

Well, I'm off to study!

Also one thing I am nervous about is learning かんじ, because when I see the characters, the Chinese pronunciation will always pop up in my head first!

じゃあ、また！