Read_Me_First.txt

Dear anon learner,
   So you want to learn Jipangu?
This will guide you from knowing nothing to an intermediate grasp of Japanese without any real need for you, lazy but willing learner, to do anything other than what is instructed. It could not be any easier than this.

1. double click on anki-2.0.33.exe to install Anki. This is the tool that will keep Japanese
from falling out of your ears and being swept into obscurity
2. open the newly installed Anki program
3. click on "File" and select "Import..."
4. locate the following:
~kanji.apkg
~vocab.apkg
~kana.apkg
~grammar.apkg
~Visualizing Japanese Grammar.apkg
5. select one of them, click "Okay". It will install and give a yellow prompt "[x amount of] cards imported"
6. repeat this process for each .apkg file

Congratulations! You've just installed your Japanese Learner Anki Package.

Now, to start learning.
-1: go to http://realkana.com/ and play around with the program till you get a feel for these shapes. This is the phonetic representation of the Japanese language. Don't stress too much about it; just become familiar with them.

-2: with this new knowledge, open up Anki and click on the kana deck and select "Study now". This is a flash card program; the front of the card which you are shown will be a prompt which will generally provide something to recall. With this kana deck you are going to be getting an ear for the sounds which make up Japanese. This will go from audio on the front and you will write out what you hear. Be honest with your answers and let the system do what the system does best.

-3: now that you have been introduced to how Japanese both sounds and how these sounds are expressed with shapes, it is time to start learning about the language itself. Open up Japanese the Manga Way.pdf. You will be reading through this slowly and carefully, taking it all in, over the course of the next X amount of days. Don't rush it but don't take too long. This is only the start. Keep in mind that your reviewing in Anki is a daily event so click on the deck you have been instructed to use (kana) and do the cards it shows you each day and by the time you have read through Japanese the Manga Way, you will be able to write out Japanese sounds by ear and read kana. The book itself will gear you up for the next step.

-4: using this grammar knowledge, without wanting it to slip by, the next time you go and do your Anki reviews, before closing the program there are two new decks you are going to start studying from. 1st, vocab. This is a recognition deck and your aim will be to see the prompt on the front of the card and recall the pronunciation for the word and what it means. 2nd, kanji. Yes, kanji. You are going to need to become familiar with these. This deck is a production deck, which means like the kana deck you will be writing out your answers. Keep up the daily reviews with these two decks just as you are with the kana deck. This will ensure that without really thinking too much about it, you will be able to write Japanese, recognise the individual sounds which make up the language AND what these sound like in words and spoken in sentences (in your vocab deck).

-5: the day after you finish digesting Japanese the Manga Way you are going to open up a new pdf, this one called "Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese.pdf". This is another grammar guide however it covers a wider range of elements than Japanese the Manga Way, but has inferior explanations. The benefit is that it will provide a slightly different perspective and approach, but will help keep the grammar fresh in your mind. Combined with reading the sentences in the vocab deck, by the time you have digested this guide, you will have a decent grasp of the fundamentals are will be ready for the next phase. I suggest reading through each Japanese the Manga Way and Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese in no less than a week and no greater than two weeks.

-6: in Anki, it's time to start a new deck. Click on Visualizing Japanese Grammar. These are a video series from the Washington University in Clapistan and it will take you 22 days to cover all of them. The reviews for this one are rather spread out as there are only 66 cards/clips but you don't need to see them all that often. Keep your reviews with these the same as the other decks. The key difference is that each card with launch a clip for you to watch. All you have to do is take it in. The clips are great and you will learn things which are not explained in the previous two guides, plus it provides full audio and handy animations. By the time you have seen them all, under the assumption that it took you 28 days from day one to cover both grammar guides, it is now the 51st day in your studies. These are your "stats":
#かな ＝ you can write, read, pronounce and listen to them inside out and upside down.
#漢字 ＝ you haven't strayed from your studies and now you can accurately write for the most part 500 different kanji from keywords and are already likely familiar with different readings.
#語彙(words, nigga) ＝ you've studied through and have maintained reviews for the first 1000 words in the vocab deck and have picked up a small collection of other words gleamed from the kanji deck and from your grammar guides. This is a nice base to work with for the next step.
#文法(grammar- come on you know this) ＝ the example sentences in the vocab deck make sense and you can feel Japanese starting to make sense. Looking back to 50 days prior your gains are hard to comprehend but you know deep down that you've made a lot of ground. English-only anons likely repulse you a little. That's okay, let the hatred flow through you. You are destined for greater things.

-7: this is where is starts to get real. You are going to add a new Anki deck to your daily study/review schedule. Click grammar and "Study now". This deck will overwhelm you at first as it is entirely different from what you are used to. The point of this deck is to use it as you would a grammar guide, each page as a separate lesson, if you will. Your goal here is to carefully read over everything, take it in and watch your comprehension sky-rocket over time. Upon seeing each new card for the first time at least make sure to careful read through the notes at the bottom of the page. These are the meat and potatoes of it all. By the end of the first two weeks reviewing with this deck, you will have gone over much of what you have before but in detail you likely were not aware existed. This is good. This is your knowledge being refined. Keep working through this in the described manner, along with your other decks, till you have reviewed the first 202 concepts. This will have systematically covered every single entry in the Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. Your last card will be "㊦ ずつ" and the first card of the next section will be "㊥ あまり". You are not starting this yet.

-8a: the rest of the grammar deck has been suspended. You are to keep reviewing everything as per normal with each deck, but do not remove the next volume of the grammar deck from suspension just yet. You are going to take the next 7 to 14 days to let that grammar sink in a little more and are going to take a look at fun Japanese.

-8b: In the learning pack folder there is a file titled "Resource Catalogue"- a spreadsheet in either excel of open office format. Select whichever you want, they are both the same. The spreadsheet is an offline copy of what has come to being called the Cornucopia of Resources. This contains details of manga, light novels, textbooks, etc. In the first sheet you are going to pick a manga series to test your comprehension of Japanese. I suggest either of the following:
よつばと！
mega:///#F!jB0h3BKA!36ITFudC9P25d8tmiGYvvw
スケッチブック
mega:///#F!35sFiB4I!zR2AeJsPWuJteYDbfbWYvQ
あういら
https://mega.nz/#F!ro8U0apD!ne4trowThvlaOx6qW7JMjw

Over the next 7~14 days I want you do to nothing but review in Anki and learning more and more kanji and vocab while reviewing the other decks. Your kana deck should pretty much be all mature by this point and you should be getting fuck all reviews from it. Your Visualizing Japanese Grammar deck is starting to get rather sparse in the reviews -but damn it's helped, hasn't it?- and your grammar reviews are slowing down a little without adding new cards. During this lull period of not adding any new grammar cards you are to take one of these manga series and READ THE FUCK OUT OF IT, as much as you can over this period. The reason why is that you will be introduced to Japanese which bends, breaks and plays with all of what you have been up till now taught. It is going to be HARD at first but after a week or two of reading between a hour and a few hours a day you should be starting to get a feeling of comfort reading these works. If you manage to finish a series off, which would be extremely impressive, grab another one.

-9: It's time to unsuspend all of the cards from the Intermediate volume (and the rest). These cards have a grammatical concept prefixed with ㊥ , starting from "㊥ あまり" and concluding at the very last card. By now you should know the drill, because you'll be doing exactly what you've been doing up till now till you reach the end of the deck. You are going to be facing example sentences which range in difficulty but many of which are likely more complex than you have experienced.

-10~: from this point on you will be continuing to review daily and work through the grammar deck. In a few weeks reviews for the VJG and kana decks will rarely pop up. The cloze cards in the grammar deck were suspended by default but I urge you to unsuspend them as the corresponding recognition card matures. If you stick to this pace after the week or two (let's pretend it was 14 days, for argument sake) in another 43 days you will have reviewed the final recognition card for the grammar deck and for the most part have covered everything to the intermediate state of Japanese grammar.
Congratulations cunt, you went from being a pig disgusting EOP to having an intermediate grasp of Japanese in around 130 days. These are your minimum "stats":
#かな ＝ you can write, read, pronounce and listen to them inside out and upside down.
#漢字 ＝ you haven't strayed from your studies and now you can accurately write for the most part 1270 different kanji from keywords and are already likely familiar with different readings.
#語彙 ＝ you've studied through and have maintained reviews for the first 2540 words in the vocab deck and have picked up a small collection of other words gleamed from the kanji deck, manga and from your grammar guides.
#文法 ＝ you are ready to devour manga, start reading light novels and visual novels. A texthooker and frequent dictionary look-ups are required but that's the way language works.

Your main goal now is to containing maintaining reviews on those finished decks while keeping up with the vocab words and kanji from their respective decks.
The biggest issue now is WORDS, SO MANY FUCKING WORDS, every time you try to read something. Don't worry, if you keep up your reviews and find an hour a day to read real Japanese outside of Anki, in another 130 days you will have picked up words in the thousands from reading alone. By the time you have been at this for a full year you will have covered more reading, ability to write, and grammar than most learners do over the course of five years. That's just how fucking good you are: with almost no effort you've become able to read Japanese.

I have no advice or guidance from this point on. If you don't know what to do next, I have failed you; your parents of failed you; society has failed you and more importantly you have failed you. Goodspeed anon, 幻想郷 awaits.