"All three had been taught French at school. How deeply they now wished that they had learned it!"
E. Nesbit. The Railway Children
Another year and again the resolution: I will study my Japanese. Perhaps this year (and hope springs eternal among us students of Japanese) I will even learn it. Today I've discovered another handy tutor, the Daily Yomiuri's Pera Pera Penguin, a series of "5-minute Japanese" by Hitomi Hirayama, founder Tokyo's Japanese language school Japanese Lunch.
This is another one of those resources I wish had been available when I lived in Japan. The one-page format explains a concept and has examples in kanji and romaji. Too many beginning Japanese books don't include kanji, rendering them useless for practicing with Japanese coworkers who find it as difficult to read romanized Japanese as it is for me to read phonetically spelled English. I can only imagine what wonderful conversations might have ensued with Akamine-sensei and Washizuka-sensei if only we had had "Pera Pera Penguin" as a springboard.
Posted by M Sinclair Stevens
January 04, 2002
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