“Boku wa Orestes desu.” Yesterday was my first proper Nihongo lesson. I had good knowledge of most of the material taught on the first day, so I am looking forward to the more complex things. The class will be focusing on spoken Japanese, so romaji will be used mostly. Many of the students (myself included) expressed interrest in learning hiragana and katakana, so some time will be devoted on our kana needs every week. I bought both the romaji and kana versions of the coursebook, Japanese for Busy People.

Michelle alerted me to the existence of All Look Same?, a test of your skill in telling apart people of Chinese, Japanese, or Korean origin. I wouldn’t be mentioning this here, if it were not for the fact that the site is beautifully designed, and if I did not take (excessive) pride in my CJK recognition abilities. My score was a pitiful 7 out of 18. I think my biggest problem was the Koreans, as I haven’t had contact with many so far. Indeed, this page comforts me, as it shows that Koreans are the best at this test. New Yorkers are in third place, tied with the Taiwanese, and better than mainland Chinese, Hong Kong Chinese, and Japanese. Remarkable that the Singaporeans only managed 18th place.