Ani, she/her. Side-blog. Spanish speaker (Questions are welcome). Currently learning French, German, Russian & Japanese. I can and I will use the TL that I am capable of using.
chase your interest the way you would have if you were 5-15. If you like a show, a song, a movie, you replay it over and over, you put it on in the background because you want to, you replay a short chunk over and over, you make that MV you want to, you memorize the lines that are your favorite. You get obsessed with a novel or show? You find the chapters/scenes/lines that aren't translated yet and try to translate them yourself. Or you get so obsessed you start translating yourself because you want to compare your own translation to ones you've found. You start grinding social media in the language you're learning, for even MORE posts about the thing you are obsessed with.
If you get obsessed with something, if something captures your interest strongly? RIDE ON THE WAVES OF THAT INTEREST AS LONG AS IT LASTS.
抱き締める だきしめる to hug someone close
舞い上がる まいあが to soar; to fly high
すり抜ける すりぬける to slip through
曖昧 あいまい vague; ambiguous (N2)
形ばかり かたちばかり token gesture
報う むくう to reward
誓う ちかう to swear; to vow (N2)
君を抱き締めたい
消えてしまう前に
もう一度
Ah どこまでも
舞い上がる Crystal
ねぇ何もいらないから
もう少しだけ
感じてたい
Can I touch your heart?
触れたくても
すり抜けていく
Oh someday?
Someday
小さな笑顔が
なぜか苦しい
How can I be closer uh?
この想いは何故
答えが出ない
How I am gonna find it?
どうやって？
Oh, let me know
曖昧な形ばかり Crystal Snow
報われない Story
なんてもうムリ
Eh この手で変えてみせるのに
Eh Surely
誓えるのに
君を守りたくて
涙に変わる前に
もう一度
願う程に
届かない Crystal
100年先になっても
次の一歩は君とがいい
Can I be your one
星ひとつない
雪の夜空
Oh someday?
Someday
Pine's Ridiculously Long List of (Mostly) Free Japanese Study Materials
2026 Restart Edition
All my current study materials, because sharing found resources is caring. You may have seen the first version of this in the past, and I had a study lull due to circumstances since I last posted that. Taking everything into consideration, I made a few changes and updates to my list of resources.
Again, these are not JLPT-specific and are for beginners like me. Comparison is truly the thief of joy. I still hate my handwriting, and I still block every YouTube Channel I find that says learn X language in X short time period. I am not its target audience. I am still a slow learner, and that's okay.
As I said in the previous post, find a community because it truly does make a difference. Shoutout to Seitokai's Nihongo Discord!
This list contains the following: my textbook (paid), anki decks, dictionaries (paid and free), a game (paid), grammar and kanji guides, writing practice, watching (not YouTube) and reading resources.
Textbook: Tobira: Beginning Japanese I. This is one of the three resources that are paid. I really like this text book because it's colorful (which, it did matter for me) and physical (which, I did Marugoto, but I prefer turning the pages myself, if that makes sense). You could probably borrow this from z the library.
Genki and Minna no Nihongo are definitely more popular and would have more third-party supplementary material (like on YouTube), but I found they're catered more to university students or classroom learning which does not fit me.
Tobira has a self-study guide containing how they'd suggest you use their textbook to study on your own, and links to videos and audio materials which help you review vocabulary and explain grammar points found in the book. Disregard how their vocabulary videos has beginning spelled as begging. IDK how that got past quality control, but I mean everything else was sound.
Anki decks: And while I understand that Anki is not for everyone (and I suspect I am not too, but I am still in my trying-to-embrace-Anki-phase). Making a deck is a productive form of procrastination, but I digress.
Tatsumoto's Kana (Writing Sub-deck)
Tatsumoto's AnkiDrone Sentence Pack V7
Custom Tobira: Beginning Japanese I Vocab Deck
Dictionaries and similar:
A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. The second paid resource in this list, sorry! The e-book sold on Amazon does not have good reviews as it's a scanned copy of the book, rather than a properly formatted e-book. I have the physical book copy.
Rikaitan browser extension I use on Firefox with installed JMDict English V4, JMExtra, 日本語文法辞典(全集), and Kanjium
Takoboto site (online) and app (with offline access) dictionary
Youglish site for pronunciation examples.
Stardew Valley Japanese Wiki because no one can stop me from playing this in Japanese even if my pronunciation will likely suffer but I don't care I will complete a playthrough in Japanese! The wiki is free, but the game isn't. I had been playing Stardew Valley years prior to my Japanese learning journey and I love it. Update 1.7 can't come fast enough, but in ConcernedApe and his team I trust.
Ultra Handy Japanese Verb Conjugator because help!
Immersion Kit provides audio and picture examples for Japanese words and phrases. It helps you look up things when you're immersing.
Game:
Wagotabi. This is the third and last paid resource in this list. It's a role-playing game which starts off in English, then gradually changes to Japanese as you play through and learn kana, kanji, vocabulary, and grammar points. It's fun and I have yet to beat my in-game rival because I don't know left from right yet. I am stuck LMAO. I barely know my directions in my native language of Filipino, you can't expect me to know this immediately in Japanese PLEASE.
Grammar: Because if you can't get your hands on a textbook or prefer to just read through the grammar points, there are available free alternatives online which I do refer to from time to time as well.
Cure Dolly Script. This is a transcript based on the YouTube series by Cure Dolly. Whether you're put off by the robotic voice the original creator used or you just want something to read along or refer to, this one is for you.
Sakubi: Yesterday's Grammar Guide
Kanji:
The Kanji Map is where you can search for kanji, their radical, and what other kanji can be related to them.
Handwritten Kanji Search as it says on the tin.
Writing:
Kakikata Generator for Japanese writing sheets. I like how customizable it is, which is very useful for me since there are certain kana characters I would really like to be legible.
Watching:
Famelack. I like the shop channel especially because all I can understand from it so far are the numbers. LOL
Slow Japanese with Yuki. If you're familiar with Comprehensive Input in Japanese on YouTube or in their website, you've likely seen her before. She's the same creator, but this is her post-CIJ venture.
Japanese Media Recommendations that I have yet to go through, but I have it in my bookmarks.
Reading:
Reader Ttsu for reading Japanese materials on a browser, used in conjunction with Rikaitan, since I couldn’t find an e-book reader that I can install a Japanese dictionary in.
Todaii Japanese site and app for easy news reading. Has a one-time lifetime paid option to unlock all the features. It has audio that plays along as you read.
Mangaz for manga if you're into that. Features independent and/or older, more niche work. Also has adult content if you're into that. This site disappeared for a bit because of that whole payment processor issue which like, plagued half the internet last year, but they came back! Not completely beginner friendly, but it's fun to look at!
Tadoku for easy reading materials which really is for beginners.
Open Access Readers is a list of reading resources gathered by the University of British Columbia.
Watanoc is a free web magazine written in simple Japanese.
for any Japanese learners who like creative writing in any capacity, my new study trick is this:
I combine the grammar and kanji I'm learning to write short stories. Like this:
Let's say I've got 5 kanji I'm learning, and 3 grammar points.
I look up vocab words for those 5 kanji and choose one word I especially want to learn for each. I make a lil' list of the new-to-me words.
Btw: You don't choose the words based on a predetermined story. You pick the words you want to learn and then decide how to make a story out of them.
Using the vocab and grammar points as creative restraints, I make myself (hand)write a 5-sentence short story, each sentence containing one of the vocab words. Occasionally I'll write a few more sentences to ensure the story has a beginning, middle, and end.
I'm not gonna share my stories because I'm sure they suck, but it's honestly been a lot of fun. I've written about pirates and witches, gods and a lawyer who got turned into a rabbit.
It feels very efficient because I'm reinforcing my kanji and my grammar at the same time that I'm practicing my writing skills. Plus, I entertain myself and actually look forward to doing it.
梅雨 (tsu-yu) "the rainy season" (literally "plum rain")
The Japanese rainy season usually lasts from early June to mid-July, just before it starts to become unbearably hot and humid in summer.
It often rains non-stop all day.
When I lived in Japan, outside my balcony often looked like a rainforest during this season:
The kanji in this word are:
梅 = plum
雨 = rain
According to Wikipedia, this name comes from China. When plums begin to fall during this period, the moisture evaporating from these plants was believed to transform into rain.
Like many countries, Japan uses a 12-month calendar. The names are very simple. January is 一月 (ichi-gatsu, literally "Month one"), February is 二月 (ni-gatsu, "Month two"), etc.
However, before the Meiji Restoration (mid-1800s) it was common to use an older 12-month system. These months’ names referenced the weather and the seasons (similar to the French Revolutionary calendar).
June is “Minatsuki” in this old Japanese calendar.
水 = water
無 = none / not any
月 = month
無 means "not any", not "of".
So why doesn't this mean "the month with no water"?
According to wikipedia, this 無 is used purely as an ateji, which is a kanji used for its pronunciation rather than its meaning. 無 is pronounced "na", which sometimes has the same meaning as the possessive particle の ("no"), thus rendering the meaning something like "water's month".
Which makes sense, given that June is usually the time of the Japanese rainy season!
In Japan, 春分 (shun-bun) spring equinox is a national holiday. The week which contains spring equinox is called “o-higan”. This has connections with Buddhism, and on this day many people visit spend time with their families and visit their family grave.
“Bota-mochi” (rice cake covered in sweet bean paste) is traditionally eaten on this day.
Fukuōji Kazuhiko aka 福王寺一彦 aka Kazuhiko Fukuōji (Japanese, b. 1955, Mitaka City, Tokyo, Japan) - Blue Bird of Moonlight from The Light of the Sun and the Moon, Japanese Paintings: Mineral Pigments
This month we’re reading Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao! Join us for this read in Seitokai’s Discord!
On a backstreet in Tokyo lies a pawnshop, but not everyone can find it. Most will see only a cosy ramen restaurant. And just the chosen ones – those who are lost – will find a place to pawn their life choices and deepest regrets.
Hana Ishikawa wakes on her first morning as its new owner to find the pawnshop ransacked, the shop’s most precious acquisition stolen and her father missing. And then into the shop stumbles a charming stranger, quite unlike other customers. For he offers help, instead of seeking it.
Together, they must journey through a mystical world to find Hana’s father and the stolen choice – through rain puddles, hitching rides on paper cranes, across the bridge between midnight and morning and through a night market in the clouds.
But as they get closer to the truth, Hana must reveal a secret of her own – and risk making a choice she will never be able to take back.
The usual kanji for horse is 馬, so does this mean there are two ways of writing "horse"?
Kind of! Japan uses the Chinese Zodiac system in which each year is assigned one of 12 animals. When referring to these animals in the context of the Chinese Zodiac (and not as just regular animals), a different kanji is used.
If you're talking about a regular, ordinary, horse the kanji is 馬.
On the other hand, if you're talking about the Year of the Horse, the kanji is 午.
Japanese language learners will recognise this 午 as the kanji for "noon", and there seems to be something of a connection between "noon" and the Horse in the Chinese zodiac. According to Chinese astrology the Horse sign is associated with the direction of "north" (12 is in this position on a clock face), and with the hours 11am - 1pm.
書初め (kakizomé) The First Calligraphy of the New Year
New Year's is the biggest festival in Japan. As a time for new beginnings, it is often observed by doing activities "for the first time in the new year".
The first calligraphy of the new year is called 書初め (kakizomé).
The kanji:
書 = writing (as in 書道 - Japanese calligraphy, or "the way of writing")
初 = first time
The above image is a 書初め (kakizomé) work that I did a while back when I was living in Japan.
Like most 書初め (kakizomé) works, it contains a reference to nature and a hope for the coming year.
The kanji are:
春 = spring
日 = day (or sun)
鳥 = bird
還 = return
飛 = fly
So a loose translation is "In spring days, birds fly back." The birds can refer to hope and good feeling, as well as a sign of spring.
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