銀魂(ぎんたま）

Hi guys!

It's really been a busy week this week! (and last week...and the week before...) It's my final semester as a master student (and very likely the final semester of my student life), so I kind of decided (unconsciously) to make good use of it  by registering a lot of courses in and outside of my department. The result is that I'm running around so much, having classes, studying at libraries...I feel like I can almost make this sentence come true:わたしは にじゅうよじかんにべんきょうします。lol

Well well, let's complain no more and light  up the mood :-)

So I've been watching this Japanese animation , 銀魂(ぎんたま）, since this summer. My boyfriend is a huge Japanese animation fan and this is his favorite. I didn't really get the enthusiasm because I don't like the way characters 'shout' at each other in Japanese animation, but then a very good friend of mine recommended it to me, too. Then I decided to try it out - it's always good to expose oneself in the language environment to get the feeling of it.

Anyway, ぎんたま is about a  guy nicknamed ぎんちゃんwho used to be a samurai(侍、さむらい) but not any more, because his city has been occupied by aliens. However he still has the 'samurai's soul'（魂、たま） and secretively helps other people in need. Sounds inspiring, isn't it? It is, but with all the inspiring stories we hear every day, doesn't that make you bored? Well, let me tell you some other things about this guy: he has silver-colored, curly hair (actually ぎん means silver); he never pays his rent nor pays any salary to his two teenager employees; he loves desserts, never eats anything else and has this big, wooden tablet hung on his wall with the kanji 糖分(sugar) on it... He's not a 'hero' in the conventional sense, instead he's just someone like us, with a 'samurai's soul' inside.

I've written a lot about this show, but it feels like only a fraction of the whole story. You'll get it when you watch it. Do I love it? Well honestly,not a huge fan yet. I only really love it when the episode I'm watching really funny. My point is that watching it is relaxing and it helps me learn Japanese. There are other TV series that I love, like 'Love Sory in Tokyo', that I'd definitely watch from the beginning to the end and (hold a roll of paper tissue in my hand and cry to the sad ending, yeah I'm soooo that kinda girl), I guess I'm just not that much of a animation fan after all.

But I think I'll stick to 銀魂 for the time being, because my schedule only allows me to watch one peisode a day at most (only 20 minutes). Maybe, I'm just saying maybe, I'll love it one day and finish all 220 episodes...hahaha

Good night!

Excited to be on the First Year Japanese class!

Hi everyone, I'm Qian Xu and I'm Chinese.

I've always been very interested in the Japanese Language. I like Japanese animation, drama series, and I want to understand the text on the package of Japanese cosmetics! :p In fact, I tried to pick up some during college, but unfortunately I was so self-disciplinary as I thought I could be :(

This time, by joining your guys in the first year Japanese course, I can stick to the learning pattern and hopefully make some real progress.

Actually I find myself somewhat frustrated about memorizing characters in the Hiragana. This is not the first time I carefully studied them, but they are like new to me again! Why do they all look like the same >.< I think I'll have to spend more time, practice more, and catch up with the rest of the class.

很高兴加入一年级日语！希望和大家共同努力，天天进步！也谢谢老师的耐心教学！
(Simplified Chinese: Glad to be in the First Year Japanese class! Hopefully we can try hard together and make progress every day! Thank you sensei for your kindness and patience in your teaching!)

(Well well, do Chinese characters and Kanji look alike? They do, but they also have significant differences. Kanji is more similar to traditional Chinese, but what we use is simplified Chinese. (Well the Taiwanese and Hong Kong people use the traditional ones) And the pronunciations are totally different! So I have an advantage at wring kanji but the downside is that every time I see kanji I read them as Chinese characters in my mind, which is very bad for memorizing their sounds! T.T)

Self-introduction

おはようございます。
はじめまして。
わたしはシュウ（Xu）です。

にじゅうさんさいです。
Shanghai からきました。
Columbia だいがくのがくせいです。

どうぞよろしく。