Seito and Kyooshi

The other day, I had my first Japanese lesson. Before you start thinking poorly of me for the fact that we have lived here for over three months and have not yet learned Japanese, consider the fact that first, while still in Canada, I checked books out from the library in an effort to teach myself. After that didn’t happen as well as hoped, we looked into actual lessons when we first came here: unfortunately the beginner lessons were only offered at a time when we both worked. So, having heard that there were volunteers who taught Japanese, we left our information, but were warned that our chances weren’t good, as volunteers like the students to have at least some language experience. So, back to the drawing board, and on to the internet, where I tried to teach myself Katakana: only to get part way through memorizing the alphabet before the site crashed and I was no longer allowed on.
With that as an introduction to learning Japanese, I was pretty excited to have an actual lesson. I have no expectations of being fluent in the short time that we will be here; however, it would be quite advantageous to know at least a few basics of communication. I’m sure I’ll be able to say much more intellectual and accurate things in a while, but for now, I have learned that in terms of learning this particular language, there is good news and bad news. The good news is that the tenses are quite simple: it’s either past or present/future. None of this had gone; was going; had been; was going to go; went; etc, etc. It just doesn’t exist! The bad news is that in terms of writing it, there are 3 alphabets used, and then mixed all together. Any regular sentence may use a mixture of Katakana, Hiragana, and Kanji. To add to the fun, there aren’t only 26 letters in each: it’s about twice that in the first two, and thousands more in Kanji (Chinese characters)!
And so, a little bit nervous and a little bit excited, I went to see what I could learn. It was great fun, and the lady was more nervous than I was (it was her first time teaching). I came away with the feeling that there was a strange mixture of things going on. In many ways, it is like returning to kindergarten, to the very basics, and learning to read for the first time (“What letter is this? What sound does it make?”). In other ways, the task itself is so totally overwhelming: the necessity of learning and recognizing and memorizing and writing characters, learning words, learning grammatical rules, counting, (there are different ways to count for different objects: people, long thin objects, thin flat objects, levels of an apartment, houses, small animals and insects, etc, etc)! Where do you start?? In other ways, it’s a bit like playing mad gab: Ra – do –ne –e (My own dear “Rodney”)! Or this one: Ra –su – to sa –mu- ra-i?