My Failed Attempts #1

    This.  This is how I started many years ago....  That dictionary is 20 years old now...  You can't learn a language through a dictionary.... Then I bought that handy dandy study sheet...  Can't learn a language from that either.


    This was my first failed attempt to learn Japanese.  I purchased the dictionary from a used book store and the sheet from Fry's Electronics.....  Not bad purchases per-se but they weren't the right purchases to get me where I wanted.

    So many times I tried to study the hiragana and katakana charts in the front of that dictionary, and so many times I failed.  All the mysterious moon runes always had me perplexed.  One of my first mistakes was trying to learn the katakana first.  With what I know now, learning hiragana first is the best way to start.

    Trying to learn from the study sheet didn't work at all back then either.  My eyes fumbled around through all the text , and not once did I ever remember anything that was on it.  I couldn't understand the categories.  I couldn't cement the words in my head.  I couldn't learn Japanese.

    I thought I was dumb and never meant to be bilingual.  Only talented smart people can be bilingual.  Only smart people can do it.... because they can just instantly know it....

    Back then I didn't realize I was wrong.  I was always getting bad grades in school and failed a couple years of math.  I wasn't fortunate enough to have art classes or creative writing or.... anything I would have been good at.  I just thought everyone else around me understood everything without effort while I was just stupid.  It was natural for me to think like that then.

    But now I know better.  I can learn.  I have learned.  I am learning.  I will learn more.  I just learn differently.  It took me a long time to realize that.

Sometimes the hardest thing in the world is believing in yourself...

学ぶ  (まなぶ) (manabu) = to study, to learn