The end of the Japanese class

Assalamualaikum and ohaiyo!

It has been a very good day. So, it’s a bit late of updating but I have an exam yesterday and it was sure a tough one. No, not anything related to Japanese but huhuhu just an emotional expression. But, Alhamdulillah it passed. And it’s better for not thinking about that.

So, it has come to an end. The Japanese class. We had a great fun which I don’t know how to describe it literally. But, yes, we did have fun.

So, our last class was last week in Friday. It’s presentation time. Based on my personal view, the presentations that were presented before us were tremendous. They’re full with knowledge and there were some things that I’ve never expected to be really exist (I’m not the type that will look into something thoroughly, I just love some things only on its surface that’s why I don’t know these things) such as yakuza and its types. I don’t know Yakuza are vary. And about the internet’s big difference between Japan and Malaysia. And also, the vocaloid and Hatsune Miku. I guess I spelled the name correctly. I don’t really understand why would they have Hatsune Miku when they can make lots and lots of anime at first but finally I got a grip on it. It was related with people’s voice that was used on a character of Hatsune Miku and even ‘she’ has her own concert. I’m really surprised to know that though. And the technology of japan on absorbing the vibration of earthquake that are being applied in building in Japan which is a very good evolution for them. I’ve never knew that. Luckily, I joined this class >-<

My group were presenting about the Hanami. So, what is Hanami? Hana means flower and Mi means view. So, generally it is an occasion where people are appreciating the view of the cherry blossoms or sakura in Japan. I have an opinion that is we are not quite interested to know if other places have the existence of the same kind of view. Because we want that place to maintain its specialty and the world love to accept just that. But, of course it is nice to see the same stunning view nearby. There are loads to tell when it comes to this occasion as it doesn’t really happen every day.

So, here I attached few photos of us together in our last class with sensei. It is a memorable class ever. And yes, it’s time to get hustle and bustle now. There will be law classes in a row in another semester. Also, next week we are starting the final examination for this semester. Let’s get ready to strive for triumph!

See you again! Especially you, sensei

Last Quiz-Last lesson

Assalamualaikum and Konnichiwa!

So, last Monday was our last lesson and last quiz with Sensei Zoraida. I'm grateful that I actually joined this Japanese language class. All things that I learnt in this class are intrigue and amusing. Nevertheless, it has come to an end. But, I still have the resolution to learn this language deeper. Although, sometimes I mixed Japanese and Arabic unintended. Whatever it is, languages for me are interesting.

So, I got our classwork assignments back then in the class.

My Haiku!

The essay pertaining kazoku!

And there were loads, but I might not be able to post all of it here :)

Further, we still have our final project and video to be sent to sensei. I'll try to post it here before the dateline of submission.

In regard to the essay, I got a friend studying in Korea. I've used to read her Korean essay (even though i can't read the essay). I got jealous of her. Finally I can brag to her that I can write and speak more or less in Japan. Hahaha. No, I just kidding.

Okay. See ya in the next entry!

Kimono Demonstration

Assalamualaikum and konnichiwa minna-san.

In this weekend, I spent some time watching an anime, Code Geass Akito The Exiled and a japan movie, Neko Nanka Yondemo Konai. From these stories, I detected a few phrases that we learnt in class. Sometimes I get too excited to understand a few of it. And also, I learnt new vocabularies. And there is a quite recent movie that had gone viral through the anime lovers which is Koe No Katachi or The Silent Voice. I watched this movie last night with my roommate and we found ourselves to be very emotional towards the movie. It is a sad movie. But, don’t worry. It has a happy ending.

I only reminisced that I went to a Kimono demonstration a few days ago, which then I decided to insert the moments here. The speaker or the demonstrator is a Kimono Stylist from Japan. He is a popular stylist and lots of actor and vip used to wear his Kimono. From the demonstration, I learnt on how the kimono is being worn. And also, there were few audience that can have the opportunity to wear the kimono. And the most interesting kimono among the one that was brought was the chocolate kimono. The idea of having chocolate as a material on the kimono is unique and original idea. I gained loads of new knowledge about kimono which all of them are interesting. The intrinsic facts about kimono are it is handmade and the way kimono is worn can be different for a different status of people for instance the empress.

All the volunteers with the Kimono!

Nobuoki Tomita with his design!

That are all for this entry. Till then.

A new perspective of Japan Language

Assalamualaikum and ohaiyo minna-san!

How’s life? Hope everything is fine and you are doing good, ok? Let us proceed to another entry. Last week we did some casting of a conversation in Japan between the host and the guest. It was a great experience. We could not speak japan language or even try to do so outside of the class because it’s a foreign language in USIM and not everyone learnt it. Whatever it is, be diligent and don’t feel shy when we are learning new things. Apply and get a grip on it. I recorded a few videos, to be precise only two of my classmates group acting. I forgot to record mine. But, yeah. You can see the gist of it.

My classmates were acting the host-guest conversation!

I hope the video can be watched clearly >-<

So, how was it? Interesting, isn’t it?

And also, we learnt loads of new kanji. It’s a bit tricky to memorize them, yet, they are fun. Yesterday, my friends and I went to Watson to by some toiletries. We found a facial cleanser with a big few kanji on it with hiragana descriptions. We read a tamago kanji and pronounce the hiragana stated on the product even though we did not know the meaning of it. It’s a good practice, I assure you.

Once, sensei used to tell us about sumo. Because there was an exercise in the textbook in regard to a sumo wrestler. So, sumo wrestlers have a strict or discipline kind of life as they should devote themselves to the game. The game used to be regarded as a sanctity game. And the sumo wrestlers were to be ought as a god. But, today the believe has been modernized. I’ll check it again sometimes. It’s a good knowledge and it is interesting to learn other people cultures and traditions.

That’s all. Till then.

いえ

Assalamualaikum and こんにちは！

In this update, I will talk more about いえ. So, いえ is what we called house in English. There is a lot type of house ever existed in this world. Type of house that we learnt in our last week class are 一戸建て、マンション、アパ後. Well, these are the houses that usually be seen in Japan. So, what are the houses that we usually see in Malaysia? They are フラット、コンドミニアム、リンクハウス、ｾﾐｲﾁﾞｲ､バンガロオ.

What can I say about my own place?

わたしは　Puchong に　すんでいます。

わたしの　いえは　リンクハウスです。

かぞくと   すんでいます。

わたしは　いえは　ひらいです。     

Besides that, we know some of room vocabularies. I mean the basic furniture placed in a room such as いす、テレビ、エアコン、たな、たたみ　and others.

Further, we also learnt prepositions used among the Japanese. They include なか(inside)、よこ(outside)、うえ(on)、した(under). We actually did an interesting class activity using this preposition. We need to listen to the audio on where to place a few pieces of small paper to its place in accordance to the audio. There was time when I can’t get it right. Hahaha. I think I need to practice more.

Till we meet again.

はいく

Assalamualaikum and こんにちは！

Recently, we had a test. Well, to be honest, I studied earnestly because I’m afraid that I can’t answer them all. To be compared with my classmates, I might be a little slow to catchup things. But, don’t worry. I’ll try as hard as I could to study this language. I hope, I won’t stop. The test was easy and there were clues everywhere. But, me being me, did not aware of those clues. Huhuhu. Let’s move on to our main topic.

Okay, this post will be in regard to Haiku. We learnt this only recently. So, what is Haiku? Haiku is a short poem comprises 3 lines with 5,7,5 syllables. It can be about anything. You can use Haiku to describe seasons such as Haru, Natsu, Aki or Fuyu. It can also be about animals, insects, foods, family, people or even sceneries. I’m not really sure if the syllables need to be in the same vocal or consonant as we only do the basic of 5,7,5 syllables. I’ll try to check it out later. I’ve tried a Malay version of Haiku during class, it sounds like this;

Perbaringanku,

Diatas bunga tulip,

Oh, bahagia.

And it’s a homework for us to do it in Japan language. We’ve submitted last week. And the way it was written is from right to left, from top to bottom. I forgot to take a picture of it. So, I’ll just type it here.

あいしてる、　　　　　　         　Aishiteru,

わたしのかぞく、                      Watashi no Kazoku,

あ、こいしい。                           Ah, koishii.

So, mine is about family. It really difficult to think about anything else cause I don’t really have some vast vocabularies. Google don’t really help us to get what we precisely need sometimes. There is various thing that was being used by my classmates in their Haiku. Some was mentioning about sora, about chocoretto, sukina hito and others. It was amazing!

That’s all for now. Let’s meet again in another update.

Ja, mata!

たべものと のみもの。

Assalamualaikum and おはいよ　みんなさん！

おげんきですか? Cheer up, be happy! あの、みんなさん、なにが　すきな 　食べますか？

So, this post will be going to be about たべものとのみもの。Nyum nyum! Tabemono or food is our main source of energy. I love food very much that sometimes I can’t stop! And nomimono is beverages. Recently, we learnt a few Japanese vocabularies on certain foods with its classification such as たべものと　くだものと　やさい  です。

Credit: Bing

Credit: Bing

There are also a few sample questions that we can now ask our friends if they like something to eat or drink.

なにをよくたべますか？- What are the food that you usually eat?

Or if you want to change it with drinks

なにをよくのみますか？-What drinks that you usually drink?

That's all. Sayonara!

私のかぞく。

Assalamualaikum minna san, こんにちは！

How’s your day? Hope everyone is doing fine. Today, I’ll be updating on what I’ve been up to in my Japanese class. We’ve been practicing hiragana and katakana handwriting. For me, hiragana is far way easier than katakana for its round shapes and I actually can remember it by the picture illustrated in japan foundation’s apps. And of course, as well as by tracing it down to the worksheets that is one of our homework. Let me show you a picture of it.

seriously, I really need to learn to edit for this picture to be normal. huhu

Recently, we learnt about かぞく. What is かぞく? Kazoku is where we call ohana in Hawaii. It is family! We did an activity with our partner for having questions and answers in regard with our family members and placed it in the family tree.

What is mine?

So, here is my family, 私のかぞく。How about yours? Based on the family tree, we also made a brief presentation about each of our family. It is interesting to know about others’ on how their parents have different job than mine or their sibling members consists of 9 people and more. Despite of that, we also wrote a para of essay about our family on しごと、age, and what are their position in the family.

This post will be a short one. Nevertheless, thank you for reading!

さよなら！

Let's do this!

Assalamualaikum and こんいちは!

This entry is my third attempt in writing this journal. Our third class was replaced with talks. Unfortunately, I’ve got classes on core subject, law of contract and Islamic constitution and administration, which of I can’t attend the talks. A friend was kind enough to give me a gist of the talks, where the talks gave us an idea on some of the Japanese cultures. Some might resemble with ours but in a different way and some might not. I hope I can have the chance to attend this kind of talk in the future.

Further, I’ve finished the hiragana course, an online task in the ‘minato’ website. I did attach the website’s link in my first entry. It’s fun. Frankly speaking, I felt like going back to my kindergarten days while completing the course. But, no worries cause they are really helpful. I got my report card for this course as well!

Sorry, i dont know how to crop it in blog

                                                                            

I finally memorised all the hiragana characters. But, I still confuse with some of the characters. Whatever it is, they can slowly be improvised. Right? We are now doing the katakana course. The characters are edgy and more difficult to remember. Yet, if we try harder, there are no obstacles that we can’t go through. :*

Despite of that, I also did some research on how to learn Japanese faster. Especially for beginner like me. One of it is through read easy comic or manga. There’s one titled Shirokuma Café. I downloaded its pdf, it will be quite difficult to find it in the bookstores, I guess. It contains four part if I’m not mistaken. Oh ya! Shirokuma means polar bear. This comic is a children comic but somehow it’s useful. This shirokuma café was also adapted into cartoon. Huhuhu. I’m not sure to call it cartoon or anime. For those who are interested to watch, you can search it in youtube. I got some of them from my friend. Don’t worry if you can’t understand them because they have subtitles.

 Aren’t they cute!

This is the anime version. They used simple words that we could understand some of it immediately without reading the subtitles!                                      

That’s should be all. Let’s meet again in another entry! Have a nice day!

さよなら！

わたしわ ハフィザ です

Assalamualaikum and おはいよう!

This is my second attempt on writing the portfolio. Recently, I’ve been searching for lots of Japanese Dictionary that will suit me, the beginner. And, I’ve found one. It is one good dictionary apps and it also provides phrases for particular word that we search. My first impression was ‘wow, this is good!’ It is Takoboto. If you mind to have a look on it, it’s in the play store.

Despite of dictionary, as most of our Japanese class are using online task for our assignments, which is based on the Japan Foundation, there are some other apps that is quite helpful to memorise the hiragana, katakana and kanji characters built by the Japan Foundation developer. They are interesting. My free time finally preoccupied with beneficial things. Hahaha. So, here are they. The name with memory hint are the apps that will boost your memory on the Japanese characters. You can just search japan foundation on the play store, they will eventually pop out.

 You guys can see the takoboto dictionary is having the red short octopus-like picture

                       

Next, okay okay. For me, this is the best part. Where we learnt new way to greet people, which is out of our usual manner. They are the same, but the things different are on the language and culture. For example:

はじめまして -  hajimemashite

Hajimemashite can only be used once for self-introduction. When you want to introduce yourself to other people, you can start with this expression. (Please correct me if I’m wrong) Then,

いただきます -  itadakimasu

This expression used by the Japanese before they start to eat their meal. It’s resemble to ‘let’s eat’ in English or ‘jemput makan’ in Malay. (Again, please correct me if I’m wrong)

We also have learn to write our name in katakana characters. Why katakana? Because our names, who live outside Japan considered to be foreign. Katakana characters usually for foreign words. Katakana was created by the foreigners when they first came to Japan.

わたしわ　ハフィザ　です- My name is Hafizah

Hahaha. So, that’s my name.

I guess, that is all for now. Have a nice day!

さよなら！

Prefatory Japan Class With せんせい Zoraida

Assalamualaikum and おはいようございます

Last week was our first Japanese class. This is my first time engaging myself in foreign language class. Well, yeah except for english and arabic class.

As it was introductory class, we learned quite a lot about our classmates. The best part was when sensei asked us what made us interested to join the Japanese class. The answers were vary and we're amazed with most of them. But, most importantly is that we would find it is memorable to be part of the class.

Further, we're given links to help with our Japanese self studies. I've gone through some of them and it is easy to use.

Here are they,

http://marugotonihongo.jp/en/library/

https://minato-jf.jp/

That's all, I guess.

Till then.