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JLPT Sunday, Version 3.1415926
So last night after posting to LJ, I did some more studying. I took the reading test. I did okay but not great.
This morning I woke up at 9am or so... the exam started at 12:30 in Nishi-Eifuku, the doors open at noon, so I figured I'd be on the 11:07 train out of Akabane to get to the university just as doors were opening.
I did the N3 practice book listening test after showering and changing and all. And... it was easy. Too easy in a way. The only part that was hard was the last part, which isn't worth a lot of points -- they say a sentence and you have to choose what makes a logical next sentence, out of 3 choices you hear... those are a bitch because you have to quickly catch the first thing AND the choices.
So I got on the train and found my way out to Nishi-Eifuku. The test site was actually Takachiho University, which I had never heard of before, probably because their baseball team is in the same league with Soka, and Soka wins it every semester.
Really, the routine was exactly the same as it was for me every other JLPT: get off train, giggle at the number of white people in the station, stop off at convenience store, buy some snacks, walk to test site, grumble at the gaggles of Asians who are in groups talking loudly in their native language and smoking; get into test room; take test, eat snacks between test segments, go to bathroom between segments, drink water between segments, check dictionary on cellphone between segments and slap forehead, leave, go splurge on something foodwise that I wouldn't do otherwise, come home and grumble about how retarded I am.
Actually, what was impressive in this test was that there was a girl sitting in front of me who couldn't have possibly been taking the test seriously. She kept breaking all the rules like looking at the test book before you're allowed to, and during the second segment, reading/grammar, she literally just filled in the blocks randomly and went to sleep on her table. I have no clue why she wasted the 6000 yen to do that, she clearly had no idea what she was doing, and it was almost like she was just there to keep one of her friends company. She didn't take the book out of the room either, so it's not like she was just there to get the test questions. WTF?
As for the test itself, I took N3, which is a step down from N2, because I was sick of failing N2. To be fair, I probably failed this N3. Unlike the practice questions for vocab, which were dead easy, they put some stuff on this which was really tricky. And of course there were words that I KNOW, but when I get the word "seiseki", meaning the person's result, and am presented with 性積 性績 成積 成績 and have to choose one... I know damned well it's one of the latter two, but I stared at it for a full minute before realizing that despite that being the kanji they use for "box score" in baseball, I seriously had no fucking clue which of the latter two right kanji it was. How stupid is that? I see that word a bazillion times per year and just take it for granted.
I also got confused between 制服 and 製服. God help me. I work in a fucking junior high school.
On the other hand, I pulled some words out of my ass that I've never been sure of but made some very lucky guesses. So we'll see.
Reading and grammar was odd. I actually felt like I was doing really well at the READING, which is always my weakest part. But I could actually understand the passages and the questions. They were even somewhat interesting (like, one was about a woman who was discussing the benefits of those 10-minute 1000-yen haircut places, and another was talking about the shopping habits of people who frequent 100-yen shops). What was dumb is that then I had trouble with the GRAMMAR. And also, they didn't call a 5-minute warning on any parts of the test so I found myself quickly filling in stuff at the last minute rather than having time to check back on some questions. Dammit.
Listening wasn't so bad. There were a few times where I think I got some wrong answers simply because focusing on a listening test for 40 minutes straight is GRUELING, and so my attention would wander for like 5 seconds and that'd be enough to miss a key word or sentence, since you only hear each thing one time. Shrug.
I dunno.
What's silly is, I think that if I had taken the N3 test in July, back when I was actually studying actively, I would have done very well on it and been a lot more confident. Instead, I was goaded into taking the N2 then by my classmates, and I knew it was over my head, and of course I failed. That was stupid. Of course, I could have also actually STUDIED this time for the N3, but eh.
Anyway, so the test was in Nishi-Eifuku, which is on the Keio Inokashira line... so I had this idea that I should go get dinner at Mayatoku afterwards since I hadn't been there in over a year. It's the little Hiroshima-yaki place in Sengawa, near where Pau used to live. The guy who runs the shop loves college baseball and so the place is filled with photos and signatures from former Meiji and Komazawa players (Komazawa's field is literally less than a mile away from the restaurant. Meiji's is further but maybe it used to be closer, I dunno... and the university is not so far away anyway, I had to transfer at Meidaimae anyway). By which I mean, he has signed boards from players like Shinji Iwata (Meiji->Chunichi), Ryota Arai (Komazawa->Chunichi), Yasutaka Hattori (Komazawa->Lotte), Yuki Kume (Meiji->Softbank), Takahiro Imanami (Meiji->Fighters). And he has a big photoboard of an intimidating-looking Meiji pitcher staring down from the mound... who happens to be Kenshin Kawakami. I was last there in August of 2009, for Pau's going-away party. Meiji won the Big 6 championship in Fall 2009, so naturally there is also a big Meiji championship framed photo as well as a shikishi signed by the entire team.
But when I came into the shop, only his wife was there, and she didn't seem to recognize me. There were two old guys in counter seats, one who was clearly a baseball manager for something, still dressed in stirrups and all. And there was a younger couple at a table, and the guy looked kinda familiar but I'm not sure if that means he's a Meiji baseball player or what. But yeah, I got the そば入 okonomiyaki and it was, as I remembered it, fantastic. In the meantime the place actually ended up filling up by the time I was done eating -- guess it's a good thing I got there around 5:30 -- BUT, Mayatoku-san (I'm not sure his real name, it's Toku-something) had returned by then and as I paid, he's like "You've been here before, right? You're a Carp fan?" and I'm like "nono, not a Carp fan, a Fighters fan... Do you remember me, then? I haven't been here in over a year at least." "I think so. You're from America and love pro baseball here more though?" "Yeah, that's me. I used to come here with Pau. And I love college ball too! Last time I was here was before Meiji's championship."
Shrug.
It would have been nice to actually look through the photos more and to see if I could find the scrapbook that they put Polaroids of our group in, but the place was awfully busy AND they'd had several phone-in orders while I was there as well. Dunno if I'll ever make it back. It's actually kind of a miracle that I could find the place at all, to be honest.
And yeah, then I came home, via Ito Yokado.
I'm going to hold this entry open until the morning and post it then, just in case I get accused of giving away JLPT answers before the test is over in the US as well.
This morning I woke up at 9am or so... the exam started at 12:30 in Nishi-Eifuku, the doors open at noon, so I figured I'd be on the 11:07 train out of Akabane to get to the university just as doors were opening.
I did the N3 practice book listening test after showering and changing and all. And... it was easy. Too easy in a way. The only part that was hard was the last part, which isn't worth a lot of points -- they say a sentence and you have to choose what makes a logical next sentence, out of 3 choices you hear... those are a bitch because you have to quickly catch the first thing AND the choices.
So I got on the train and found my way out to Nishi-Eifuku. The test site was actually Takachiho University, which I had never heard of before, probably because their baseball team is in the same league with Soka, and Soka wins it every semester.
Really, the routine was exactly the same as it was for me every other JLPT: get off train, giggle at the number of white people in the station, stop off at convenience store, buy some snacks, walk to test site, grumble at the gaggles of Asians who are in groups talking loudly in their native language and smoking; get into test room; take test, eat snacks between test segments, go to bathroom between segments, drink water between segments, check dictionary on cellphone between segments and slap forehead, leave, go splurge on something foodwise that I wouldn't do otherwise, come home and grumble about how retarded I am.
Actually, what was impressive in this test was that there was a girl sitting in front of me who couldn't have possibly been taking the test seriously. She kept breaking all the rules like looking at the test book before you're allowed to, and during the second segment, reading/grammar, she literally just filled in the blocks randomly and went to sleep on her table. I have no clue why she wasted the 6000 yen to do that, she clearly had no idea what she was doing, and it was almost like she was just there to keep one of her friends company. She didn't take the book out of the room either, so it's not like she was just there to get the test questions. WTF?
As for the test itself, I took N3, which is a step down from N2, because I was sick of failing N2. To be fair, I probably failed this N3. Unlike the practice questions for vocab, which were dead easy, they put some stuff on this which was really tricky. And of course there were words that I KNOW, but when I get the word "seiseki", meaning the person's result, and am presented with 性積 性績 成積 成績 and have to choose one... I know damned well it's one of the latter two, but I stared at it for a full minute before realizing that despite that being the kanji they use for "box score" in baseball, I seriously had no fucking clue which of the latter two right kanji it was. How stupid is that? I see that word a bazillion times per year and just take it for granted.
I also got confused between 制服 and 製服. God help me. I work in a fucking junior high school.
On the other hand, I pulled some words out of my ass that I've never been sure of but made some very lucky guesses. So we'll see.
Reading and grammar was odd. I actually felt like I was doing really well at the READING, which is always my weakest part. But I could actually understand the passages and the questions. They were even somewhat interesting (like, one was about a woman who was discussing the benefits of those 10-minute 1000-yen haircut places, and another was talking about the shopping habits of people who frequent 100-yen shops). What was dumb is that then I had trouble with the GRAMMAR. And also, they didn't call a 5-minute warning on any parts of the test so I found myself quickly filling in stuff at the last minute rather than having time to check back on some questions. Dammit.
Listening wasn't so bad. There were a few times where I think I got some wrong answers simply because focusing on a listening test for 40 minutes straight is GRUELING, and so my attention would wander for like 5 seconds and that'd be enough to miss a key word or sentence, since you only hear each thing one time. Shrug.
I dunno.
What's silly is, I think that if I had taken the N3 test in July, back when I was actually studying actively, I would have done very well on it and been a lot more confident. Instead, I was goaded into taking the N2 then by my classmates, and I knew it was over my head, and of course I failed. That was stupid. Of course, I could have also actually STUDIED this time for the N3, but eh.
Anyway, so the test was in Nishi-Eifuku, which is on the Keio Inokashira line... so I had this idea that I should go get dinner at Mayatoku afterwards since I hadn't been there in over a year. It's the little Hiroshima-yaki place in Sengawa, near where Pau used to live. The guy who runs the shop loves college baseball and so the place is filled with photos and signatures from former Meiji and Komazawa players (Komazawa's field is literally less than a mile away from the restaurant. Meiji's is further but maybe it used to be closer, I dunno... and the university is not so far away anyway, I had to transfer at Meidaimae anyway). By which I mean, he has signed boards from players like Shinji Iwata (Meiji->Chunichi), Ryota Arai (Komazawa->Chunichi), Yasutaka Hattori (Komazawa->Lotte), Yuki Kume (Meiji->Softbank), Takahiro Imanami (Meiji->Fighters). And he has a big photoboard of an intimidating-looking Meiji pitcher staring down from the mound... who happens to be Kenshin Kawakami. I was last there in August of 2009, for Pau's going-away party. Meiji won the Big 6 championship in Fall 2009, so naturally there is also a big Meiji championship framed photo as well as a shikishi signed by the entire team.
But when I came into the shop, only his wife was there, and she didn't seem to recognize me. There were two old guys in counter seats, one who was clearly a baseball manager for something, still dressed in stirrups and all. And there was a younger couple at a table, and the guy looked kinda familiar but I'm not sure if that means he's a Meiji baseball player or what. But yeah, I got the そば入 okonomiyaki and it was, as I remembered it, fantastic. In the meantime the place actually ended up filling up by the time I was done eating -- guess it's a good thing I got there around 5:30 -- BUT, Mayatoku-san (I'm not sure his real name, it's Toku-something) had returned by then and as I paid, he's like "You've been here before, right? You're a Carp fan?" and I'm like "nono, not a Carp fan, a Fighters fan... Do you remember me, then? I haven't been here in over a year at least." "I think so. You're from America and love pro baseball here more though?" "Yeah, that's me. I used to come here with Pau. And I love college ball too! Last time I was here was before Meiji's championship."
Shrug.
It would have been nice to actually look through the photos more and to see if I could find the scrapbook that they put Polaroids of our group in, but the place was awfully busy AND they'd had several phone-in orders while I was there as well. Dunno if I'll ever make it back. It's actually kind of a miracle that I could find the place at all, to be honest.
And yeah, then I came home, via Ito Yokado.
I'm going to hold this entry open until the morning and post it then, just in case I get accused of giving away JLPT answers before the test is over in the US as well.
no subject
Don't the proctors yell at people when they break rules? How did this girl not get tossed out?
no subject
The proctors are supposed to yell at people. But in this case, since she opened her book and was in the front row, a few people followed her example, and so the proctors just told them all to close their books. That was in the first section. In the second section she did it again, the girl next to her said "だめ！" and she just kind of laughed like "whatever" and closed it... then proceeded to fill in bubbles randomly and go to sleep. I'm astounded by her behaviour, honestly.
no subject
What you propose as a replacement is actually testing a totally different skill IMO, that of whether you know meanings properly. At least on the 1kyuu there were questions like that, where they had you choose among several different but similar-meaning words to fill in a blank.
I'm curious about this, though:
This kind of question seems silly to me to give to a non-native Japanese speaker
What makes it not silly for a native?
no subject
I'm going to disagree here. At N3, being able to tell the right words is actually important. To give a parallel, it's the equivalent of testing "they're", "their", and "there", or being able to tell "stationary" from "stationery".
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no subject
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I mean, spelling sucks and it's a giant memorization game regardless of what language you're learning, but it seems like it's still a relevant language skill to anybody who wants to communicate in writing.
no subject
Anyway, this kind of question is just a pain in the ass (and actually is the kind of shit my kids study for their kanji kentei, which is why I made the comment about it being for a native speaker). I wouldn't be this angry about it (keep in mind, I am mostly angry with myself here) if it wasn't a word that I literally see every single day.
And for the record, my kids don't mispell things like that. They spell everything in katakana, that's their big mistake. They like "ranchi" instead of lunch, "salada" instead of "salad", "basuke" instead of "basketball".
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My previous comments about 積もる were intended to try to say that you don't need to be that angry any more than you would about something you missed because you just hadn't studied it. Even if you see 成績 every day, you have no reason to pay attention to small details (like the radical) unless you _also_ regularly need to distinguish it from ones that are slightly different.
no subject
_______ do you live now?
a. werhr b. where c. waire d. wehre
To me, it'd make sense more to have the choices be:
a. where b. when c. wear d. ware
It's like, in this case, they really could just give me the kana and ask "which of these is a valid word?"
no subject