It could be called fatigue. Mental exhaustion. The downward tug of existing at all. Without getting too lost in the melancholic, I will simply say that the past week was a tough one. Every day in Japan is a special experience, but a simultaneously tiring one that asks a lot from a student of language; attention is raised on all fronts, to not only meet challeges of communication but also lifestyle. Couple the “always on” mindset with daily, formal classes and it is easy to become mired in a state of mind that is unproductive, not only to learn but to treat relationships with the focus they deserve.

Thus, I was challenged last week–personally challenged–and while I have come out on the other end with a level of positivity for the final week ahead of me, it was not without some contemplation. And a long weekend.
Necessarily, my language competence took a hit. Reading comprehension was consistent during my slump, but as I found myself talking less, when I got involved in conversations, I was less than eloquent. I like to think of the language-speaking mind as a machine, with many shifting parts and connecting wires. When one talks less, the parts of the machine are still present, still functional, but they have been powered off. They are cool to the touch and and need quite a bit of work to get back to their peak output.
So several times in the past week, I was not operating at “peak output.” My linguistic mind was cool to the touch. As I took notice of this challenge, I also noticed how easily crippling it could become–the longer the machine rests, the more it will need to be functional again.

No matter how intimidating, conversations are essential to sustain speaking ability. It sounds obvious, and it is, but it is an easily forgettable fact when you feel burdened. Several times this week, I was intimidated, and honestly failed to meet my challenges. But, as the trite saying goes, one may lose the battle but win the war. I am going to stop mixing metaphors now.
As I mentioned, this weekend was a long one, thanks to Ocean Day (海の日、うみのひ, umee no hii). I used the time to focus and reflect on where I had been–mentally–and what I could do from there. And I had just the experience to facilitate this reflection.

On Sunday, I went with a friend and this friend’s hostfather to a place called Shirayama in Toyama Prefecture. Shirayama is a mountain village that has been preserved in a very traditional state. For example, all the houses bear straw roofs that are actually cycled to maintain the tradition. Various agricultural tools and methods, silkworm production, and rice fields (tanbo) can be seen. The village is fun (though, and I say this ironically, filled with tourists).

Surrounded by the immensity of Toyama’s mountains, so shrouded by clouds that you believe they could stretch upward forever, spending time examining a slice of Japanese history, and speaking exclusively Japanese while doing so, was the exact kind of recentering I needed.

I am going forward now not only with more confidence for the final week, but with the reminder that learning a language is going to be exhaustive, and sometimes you might wonder if you can truly improve. The answer to such inner strife is to live. Language is so many things, composed of a people’s lifestyles and customs and thought. The will to expose yourself, and to be involved with the people around you, is both simple and essential.

Joshua Kuiper

カイパーヨシュア

Time wears on at a breakneck pace–as is always the case when dealing with workloads, social relationships, and daily adventures but nonetheless surprising for this.
I have just under a month left in Japan and the conflicted feelings are coming on strong. On one hand, I love this country and its people and its language and do not want to halt my immersion. However, I also will be happy when I finally get some time with my family back home in the U.S., country with a significant amount of issues but also that is my undeniable home.

At this point in my summer immersion experience, I find myself thinking a lot about values: what have I anticipated, what have I mistaken, what have I overlooked. Learning Japanese at an accelerated pace while also having daily interactions with native speakers and the Japanese lifestyle has been a constant process of learning things that are new while also striving to maintain the old. Perhaps one of the most difficult aspects of language immersion is that one cannot only focus on the “next chapter.” Every day may demand a varied amount of vocabulary and grammar (some learned, some not), a challenge that, slowly but surely, encourages those mental connections that turn conjugation tables and kanji lists into Japanese.

Certainly, such a challenging task of retaining the old while developing the new is most emphasized by kanji. For me, personally, kanji are a stumbling block on the path to fluency. I love kanji; I love studying such an extensive collection of symbols, each one representing not just different sounds, but concepts. For example, 花, one reading of which is はな, or hana, meaning “flower.” Sometimes, kanji form a set of sounds in a larger word, but they still retain some integral symbolism, such as 国, or くに, or kuni, “country,” which can be used in 国際的, or こくさいてき, or kokusaiteki, “international.”
So kanji are interesting and deserve my time. But they are also incredibly challenging to memorize, especially as I must constantly study new collections of them.
But while I have been struggling, I have come to find out that even native Japanese speakers can have kanji trouble.
It is a rather unique social issue: as more and more people (especially young people) are using technology for communication, kanji skills are weakening. Though I should clarify that reading kanji is not the issue, it s writing. Over the past weeks I have talked my host family, with students from the local Kanazawa Daigaku (University), and even with the summer program instructors, and all report that at one time or another they forget how to write kanji. As technology develops more and more, and tools like autofill become more fine-tuned, the need to follow stroke-orders (the, ah, “right” way to write kanji), or even to ever write by hand at all, disappears. By typing in the base syllabic components of a word (i.e. hana for 花) the kanji pops up and the brain can move on.

In the U.S., for example, it is an issue that is difficult to relate to. Once the alphabet is learned, it’s learned. People may forget words throughout their life, but not the means to express those words in writing. But in Japan, that is gradually becoming problem to investigate. As said, reading recognition is not the problem–it is writing. An issue akin to losing one’s tongue when one tries to speak, perhaps.
What learning about this issue has done is emphasize in my own mind the extreme importance of kanji acquirement and practice, especially at this early stage in my language-learning process. Kanji, was they would appear, are always going to be difficult and will always require upkeep, especially as a foreigner. Writing the same symbol several times over is nonetheless exhaustive, but maybe now I can appreciate the importance of the exercise.

Outside of kanji, a lot of my focus recently has been placed in conversation skills and vocabulary (as I have already written about, where creativity meets the need for new material). The days that I have an opportunity to speak with students from the local university are usually the accent marks to my weeks. Last weekend, I joined in with an event hosted by a university club that facilitates international interaction. We all made bread dough together and bake said dough over a fire. The experience was fun, but was made special because of one student I met in particular: he is a mechanical engineering student but, as he told me, he has a passion for English. We talked in English and Japanese together for an afternoon, each encouraging the other. Experiences like the one we shared are a demonstration of the beauty of language. We are both people who want to navigate in foreign spheres, discovering the undeniably human beneath layers of unique culture, systems, beliefs, ways of life.

Until next time.
Joshua Kuiper
カイパーヨシュア

With more time in Japan, confidence has grown. While it has taken time, I feel as though my ability to express ideas is not as limited as when I began. While this sounds like a natural consequence of prolonged language immersion in a foreign country, it is nevertheless something for me to personally reflect on. In my first entry, I discussed the need for creativity in conversation; expedient ways of conveying meaning are important at a lower level of language proficiency. As I have spent more time with native speakers, I find this creativity is very much tested. I have engaged (or been engaged by) teachers, host families, neighbors, local students, and so on. In each encounter, the desire to approach complex topics has proven to be attainable but occasionally slow and awkward.

For example, discussing the U.S. and its politics is a challenging activity no matter how “creative” I am with noun modifiers or liberal interpretation of verbs usage. At some point, complicated vocabulary becomes essential (grammer is more or less a non-issue). In Japanese, senkyou is now a fixed entry in my mental dictionary. Senkyou translates as “election.” Talking politics in Japan right now necessitates this word; of course, the U.S. presidential election is in November, but Japanese national elections are in July.
When talking with my hostfamily about the upcoming U.S. election, I mentioned that I would be able to vote in November. Then when prompted on who I supported, I said that I lean toward Sanders. Of course, by this time it’s known that Trump and Clinton are the respective nominees. It’s a difficult election, I tell him.
Both my hostparents were more or less unspoken on who they supported for the U.S. But, there was one topic of which they were certainly vocal, and that is Trump’s statements regarding foreign policy. Part of Trump’s policy involves a withdrawal of U.S. military presence from Japan, a move that might be viewed as more supportable if Japan’s self-defense was not restricted–by the constitution established with U.S. oversight after WWII. As my hostparents relate, the policy presented by Trump is a difficult one for Japan, should it ever be realized. However, currently the Japanese government is considering changes to the constitution, so that such a decision from the U.S. would be less of an impact on state security.

The nature of the U.S. electoral system also came up for discussion. Since I support Sanders, my hosfather assumed I had voted for him in the primaries. When I said I had not, he was initially (understandably) perplexed. It was problematic to explain 1) that I’m Independent and 2) that being Independent means (in most states) no vote until November. The idea that an individual cannot take part in decisive elections because of party lines was apparently very foreign. Thus, I was educated in Japanese senkyou. In Japan, anyone of voting age (18, as in the States) can take part in all elections; there are no party divisions, and no systems like those in the U.S. (such as caucuses, primaries, delegates, superdelegates). Of note is that Japan has a number of political parties, similar to systems as in the U.K.

What discussions like that described above have revealed to me is that vocabulary is becoming more and more important in the immersion process. While initially, a limited vocabulary can suffice for introductions, directions, and general living, real important interactions necessitate an ever expanding vocabulary. And thus, when creativity meets the end of its sphere. Vocabulary acquisition is definitely a challenge, especially given all the words that are a part of everyday life but not in a textbook. Add in slang and regional dialects, and speaking the language becomes quite easy compared to listening to native speakers. As the weeks continue, in order to get the most out this immersive opportunity, I will need to focus on out-of-class encounters.

“Challenge” is a word my hostfather says often (in English), and I find myself echoing the sentiment. My weaknesses are known; now I must target them. If, in the future, I want to talk about Japanese security, or climate change, or food imports, then I must continue to push my boundaries. This weekend I will be discussing the Shinto religion with the head priest of a jinja (Shinto shrine), an opportunity that I am very excited for but also anxious. It will be a test of my listening, without a doubt. However, the chance to delve further into something that has been a part of Japanese culture for centuries is invaluable. I cannot wait to report the conversation.

Alright, until next time.
Joshua Kuiper
カイパー

It might be called “cultural conditioning.” The trip to Japan was long, and exhausting, and I barely slept from a combination of stress and excitement and the ever-pressing need to study, study, study. Yet, taking my first few days together, I might say that the plane flight (and second flight, and bus trip) was the most arduous part of my transition. As the days following my arrival in Japan proceeded, I found myself able to connect with the new environment with relative ease.
In the past few years, I’ve spent my time learning about Japan and getting exposure to Japanese culture. And I am not talking about anime. Books like Natsume Soseki’s Botchan, or Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles; an education in literature and social currents during the past two-hundred years or an investigation of Japan’s miasmic ancient history through Notre Dame classes; of course, activities with the Notre Dame Japan Club, experiencing such traditions as kendo; and, maintaining an active apetite for Japanese cuisine; in such ways have I found exposure to Japan while not being in Japan. Certainly, nothing approximates to the material reality, but my surprises have been minimized, to say the least.
Which is to say that I have been able to put the majority of my efforts into dealing with the real transition of this summer experience: that of speaking Japanese extensively, everyday. At the beginning of this trip, I was a first-year student of Japanese. My challenges have been many in only a week’s time. I have found that communicating with a fundamentally sound but limited linguistic knowledge demands creativity and fast-thinking in everyday settings. When I am talking with my host-mother, for instance, and come upon a vocabulary gap in the conversation (I want to say “musician,” and I have no clue how to do), I must consider what I have at my disposal to approximate “musician,” no matter how goofy my expression sounds. Being understood is important; eloquence can come with time, but being able to speak at intervals and maintain a discussion is more foundational to the experience.

In many ways, I have felt myself to be a child since I have arrived. The common college refrain is “I’m not a kid anymore”–maybe that’s high school, but nevermind. Point being that learning a language through cultural immersion is a humbling experience that demands one’s ability to learn from others, from all kinds of backgrounds and persuasions. Given my skill level, I know there are Japanese children who can speak Japanese better than I can. And that’s good; I would hope so. Recognizing this, my next conversation with a 6 year old can be as educational as a conversation with the 40 year old neighbor, or the elderly woman in the convenience store, or that grumpy teen on the bus.
Already, I have been able to learn words outside the classroom setting through simple environmental exposure. The Shinto protective charms, o-mamori (お守り), are now a part of my internal lexicon. As with hatake (はたけ/畑), or agricultural field, and “owari sheetei kudasai” (おわりして下さい)(“Please take seconds.”) These are words and phrases with varied contexts, but life is composed of varied contexts, and immersing onself–linguistically, culturally–in another place is about living the life of another people, in all respects.
That said, I have so much longer to go on the road of language learning and living. Time with my host-family is a time for discussion, good food, and Japanese game-shows (which are great, by the way). But I must strive for more chances to connect out in the city and community. While I have been to a few cultural sites thus far, such as Kenroku-en Gardens (兼六園)(nationally recognized for its beauty), there are more sites to visit, and people to engage while doing so.

The students of the local university likewise present a great chance for conversation. Language tables are sure to be my next step in navigating the language-learning process, alongside others who are in the same pursuit. Univerity students have their share of thoughts to give on all manner of topic, within Japan and without. The language table I have been to thus far was a initially daunting but actually fun once started. To bridge a gap like that made by language is a rewarding experience, especially when doing so reveals how truly connected people are by just being human. Topics from international study to rough class schedules to famous composers and photography found their way into the language table discussion, and I look forward to he next time when I can not only learn more about Japanese language, and not only learn more about Japanese life, but to connect with others.

Well, that’s me for now. A fledgling in the ever-increasing expanse of Japanese language, or so it seems. But everyday brings more experience, more encounters, and more understanding of those tiny details that make up a thing called life in Japan.
Thanks for reading!

Joshua Kuiper　（カイパー）