I have been to almost all of my classes thus far. Today I attended Japanese again in the morning, then The Tale of Genji and Japanese Popular Music in the afternoon. In the morning class everyone brought in a show and tell item. Mine was the chopsticks that my last host family gave me. I did not really prepare at all, but think I did a pretty good job explaining my item. Some other people had real trouble, and still others simply read from a speech they wrote the previous night. Now that in cheating in my opinion. The thing that makes Japanese class fun is the fact that you get to use your knowledge to make new sentences. That is also the best way to learn.
The Tale of Genji class looks really interesting. The teacher even remembered Brenden when I said that my majors were computer science and Japanese studies. I want to get my hands on a book pronto. The music class looks like it will be more of a "translating and understanding lyrics" type of course. We started the day with the Japan national anthem called Kimi ga yo. We went through the lyrics explaining what all the kanji was, then compared it to 3 different translations of the song. It is amazing how different the translations were. Thursday I have a class about the theory of translation. I am hoping that these two courses will go hand in hand together.
Tomorrow I want to check out the Ceatec which is somewhere in Tokyo. It is this big electronics expo which shows off the latest and greatest. Admission is free so there really is no reason not to go.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Study Time!
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2 comments:
Cool, I'm glad to hear that you're enjoying your classes so far. Nice to hear that Prof. Rowley still remembers me. :)
Sounds like you'll be all set for Karaoke by the end of the music class . :) I actually don't have any idea what Kimi ga yo is about... I'll have to go look up the lyrics some time.
Looking forward to hearing about Ceatec. :)
There's a paperback edition of the complete Tyler translation now that you should be able to find at either of the Kinokuniya's in Shinjuku ($28 retail price, but they'll mark it up a bit). When I read it, only the 2-volume hardcover was available, so it cost me about 一万円. Actually, ordering it on Amazon.co.jp might be a pretty good option as well.
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