49 lines
1.8 KiB
Markdown
49 lines
1.8 KiB
Markdown
---
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title: "I'm a Student Again"
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description: I started taking Japanese classes at CCSF.
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slug: student-again
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date: 2025-09-02
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resources:
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- name: textbooks
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src: textbooks.jpg
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title: My textbooks
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params:
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alt: >
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Three textbooks fanned out on a dark wood desktop. From left to
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right: Japanese for Busy People Book 1, Genki Book 1 Workbook, and
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Genki Book 1 Textbook.
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tags:
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- Life
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- School
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- japanese
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- CCSF
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---
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{{< figures/image name=textbooks >}}
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I've been fortunate to take two trips to Japan over the last couple years.
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Leading up to those trips, I picked up learning Japanese, attempting to build
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some basic language skills for getting around. At first, I used [Duolingo][dja]
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but recently switched to [Migaku][mja].
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When I returned from our most recent trip, I decided to find a class so I can
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practice speaking skills. [Community College of San Francisco][ccsf] has an
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excellent program called "[Free City][fc]" that grants free tuition to residents
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of the city. It also has [Japanese program][ccsfja]. So I enrolled in their
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online Japanese 1A (Intro to Japanese) and in-person Japanese 10A (Beginning
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Conversational Japanese) courses.
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The scheduling constraints are more complex this time around. Juggling the
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responsibilities of work, childcare, volunteer work, and other hobbies is a
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challenge. It makes me appreciate the freedom I had in my late teens and
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early-twenties.
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Nevertheless, I'm looking forward to learning in a more structured way again,
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and also getting a chance to practice speaking with real people rather than
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talking to the AI bots in my phone.
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[dja]: https://www.duolingo.com/course/ja/en/Learn-Japanese
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[mja]: https://migaku.com/learn-japanese
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[ccsf]: https://www.ccsf.edu
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[ccsfja]: https://www.ccsf.edu/degrees-certificates/japanese
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[fc]: https://www.ccsf.edu/free-city
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