I passed N3 a while ago, but could actually speak at that level when I did, not just pass a test. My understanding is probably slightly better than that. However i stopped studying. While my understanding hasnt dropped at all, my speaking stagnated.
I can do anything i need. Sometimes its really easy to communicate, sometimes(especially over the phone) it can be harder when they say something i don’t understand. It makes me feel really self conscious and embarrassed about it. When i meet wifes family it’s embarrassing too cause i get self conscious about speaking like an idiot with broken Japanese, and dont want to make them feel awkward.
Its like im at this point where because i can do anything i need even if sometimes i have to brute force it(but get it done anyway) and half the time i communicate easily there is no real motivation to improve but i also feel really bad about those moments which are strained(almost exclusively on the phone).
Anyone else in this limbo?
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Yeah, stopped studying during COVID for a few reasons and got, to be honest, lazy about it because I was getting by alright.
Now there’s a baby here and my wife’s family and friends are coming back round more often, so it’s been a shock to realise that actually everything has got stagnant and shitty, except maybe my listening because Ive been sitting on my ass watching TV for the last few years.
N3 isn’t that high really so I don’t think you shouldve stopped studying. That’s probably about where I am and I realise that most of how I was getting by was enthusiasm and as you say brute force.
Get back onto what you were doing before. That is what I’ve been doing. Takes a few weeks to build the habits back up again.
Try not to be embarrassed and keep going. The more times you are in situations where you have to use Japanese and are challenged by it, the better you will get. Despite studying Japanese in university before moving here it took me a bit over three years before I passed 3kyu (N3 now I suppose). As you progress passed N3 notice what people around you are saying and how they are saying it. More than studying, I found that listening to how people actually talk, and copying them, helped break through that limbo you mentioned.
Sounds like you’re on a plateau. Sometimes those can drag on a bit. Just keep plugging and you’ll be back on your way up… to the next one.
> It makes me feel really self conscious and embarrassed about it.
I can relate. I’m already normally a shy person, but being shy in a country whose language I don’t master makes it 100% harder not to mentally crash when the other party doesn’t understand what I’m saying, which is bound to happen and does often. Keeps me up at night a lot!
It sucks because even if you have theoretical knowledge, practical knowledge only comes through practice… which means going through these awkward moments. Don’t let it scare you because this is the only way to improve and the alternative is plateauing which is not desirable.
I was in this for a while, but just had to push through. More study, more practical practice (reading, watching, shadowing), more convo. It takes quite a lot of effort for things to start to click.
N3 is like “basic daily life” level. So yeah, convo can be hard because it’s not ‘basic daily life’ but more fluid, reaction-based stuff. But the more you talk, with more people, the easier it becomes. It takes years of hard practice to follow and carry proper conversations IMHO.
You’re at the level where you’re starting to get good enough to be confident with some regular interactions, but you know that for other regular interactions you’re so far away. And it takes a long time and a lot of practice to improve. For good or bad, you have your wife who can translate or handle a lot of the technical stuff.
If you think that you can get by with N3, then obviously you’re right, because you are, but you’re also unconsciously or consciously avoiding a lot of things because there’s no way you could understand them or do them. Are those things important to you? I don’t know, but probably some of them are or will be at some point in the future.
Haven’t had stagnation, but rather peaking without study. If I studied I could go further but the motivation isn’t there. I’m already doing translation work for events and announcing in both languages.
It came down to keeping up social activities during COVID. The regular ski group was still skiing while other places were on lock-down. Continued playing golf because it’s outside. Golf is largely a sport where it’s 5% actually playing and 95% talking. Those social muscles were kept in place.
With my in-laws though, they know there are some days where nothing comes out smooth in Japanese. Almost like a stammer. They know to leave the talking light that day and it really helps. With family, talk it out and let them know your anxieties or insecurities. It feels horrible but it’s helped around the house 500%.
N3 is like a 4 year olds babble. You need to study. I think your only limbo is not studying
You gotta get a grip and just plow through the embarrassment. You’ll never get better if you don’t. There’s no magic shortcut.
Don’t be so conscious about it. Just do your best.
It’s a problem many foreigners face when learning Japanese.
If your level of spoken Japanese is slightly less than perfect the other party automatically reverts to katakana and broken English and therefore practicing becomes a challenge because people want to “make it easy” for you where in fact they don’t realize they’re actually hampering your ability to practice and learn.
The only way that works for me is, full confidence, even when you make mistakes, because the other party will be less inclined to dumb down his/her language.
If you don’t understand a word over the phone, just say you don’t understand it and ask to rephrase it.
Once you can get your reading speed up watch all Netflix with Japanese subtitles. Even try playing some games like Pokemon. As long as you find it enjoyable and feel like you are learning something I think this is a good way to study without feeling like study
Just so you’re under no illusions, I have N1, and I still can’t understand 50% of what any Japanese man says to me. A little higher with women, since they tend to speak more clearly.
The lovely, clear, proper Japanese on the N1 CDs? No problems!
I have basically given up improving my Japanese; I just don’t have the brain for it.
I don’t give a toss what my in-laws think about my Japanese level. Even if I was pera pera there wouldn’t be a great deal of kotastu chatter regardless.
It’s a hard language and N3 isn’t much. I’ve nearly passed N1 and I still struggle with convo and partially because they don’t test speaking skills
Oh, I can relate! My speaking is actually fairly decent, but my listening comprehension is relatively abysmal. So when people hear me speak, they think I’m more fluent than I am and point the hayaguchi firehose at me.
If you’re not doing so already, take iTalki lessons. There are conversation tutors on there that are shockingly cheap. I’ve gotten to where I am because of that, in addition to structured study and reading, watching TV, Anki, etc.
Also, seemingly endless drunken nights out with people who don’t speak English will supercharge your casual conversational ability. That is, if you remember anything the next day.
I’m N2 and have never really been at what I would consider a true conversational level in Japanese. All my real communication abilities have been problem solving or information sharing, not the typical conversational stuff like describing foods and whatever Taro did while he was shitfaced at the last nomikai. To be fair I don’t particularly care about those things so I’ve accepted it as it is.
Sento! You need to spend time with old dudes at the sento. Go once a week on the same day at about the same time. Hang out naked with the jijīs and talk story. You’ll get good fast.
I spent a lot of my effort in the books and not so much on speaking during my two years of language school. I would go to cafes after classes nearly every day and grind kanji or read novels and stop at every word I didn’t know and reread the page once I was done with all the words. This ended up working well for the JLPT test, I passed N1 after 1 and a half years.
Speaking, on the other hand, I would consider myself pretty weak. Turns out that studying in the books – even being able to understand a lot of words – does not necessarily translate to bring able to utilize them freely in speech.
Im very hard on myself when I make a mistake during a conversation, so I think I was trying to do everything I could to get good at Japanese without having to speak (more than I had to at language school). Now I’m in my late 20s, where it is scientifically proven that language acquisition begins to dull pretty hard, and regretting that I didn’t get out there and talk more.
If I have any advice to give, get out there and speak with people – preferably people who will kindly point out your mistakes instead of laugh at you.
What I did was to pay someone to listen to me speak for an hour a week and correct my mistakes. I’d choose a topic, prepare in advance by pre-studying vocab, and make an outline of points I wanted to touch on. I started the first few weeks with my hobbies, then branched out to talk about general subjects like science, technology, politics. One week I’d talk about the plot of a movie I saw and it’s good and bad points. Another I’d talk about the road trip I took when I was in university. It was good because I was able to slowly weed out awkward phrasings and word choices I had adopted, and by preparing in advance I maximized my talk time per session.
Sometimes I talk to little kids so I can get experience on my level. Then they use vocab I don’t know.
The turks at the kebab stand don’t give a shit, they just speak loudly and broken. be like them
Just accept that sometimes you will make embarrassing mistakes and don’t linger on them.
Those tests are over rated.
You need to read and watch a lot of stuff in Japanese and get materials to get to N2 then N1. And that’s just the start. You can’t stop trying but something tells me you haven’t started trying based on other responses in this thread
Sounds like you stopped at the point where you convinced yourself you can speak and listen but in reality, you have the same daily conversations repeatedly on the same level as a toddler. Talking to people in an izakaya when everyone’s drunk and ‘interested’ in humouring the foreigner doesn’t count.
If you are genuinely happy to rely on other peoples English to get by for the basics in life, go for it. Just be prepared to be lonely when you are old and grey and nobody thinks it is cute anymore. Sounds sad to me!
It takes 2. The native Japanese speaker has to talk clearly for you to understand, and you have to work your hardest to make yourself understandable.
If you get the feeling that the Japanese person is just blasting native level talk at you, it’s not worth having a conversation with them.
I say this because JLPT N3 level might be seen as a child’s level of speech, but that doesn’t mean they can’t make you understand them by speaking clearly and slowly to help you.
On the flip side, work your hardest and you’ll get there. If you don’t then nothing will improve which I’m sure you already know and understand without me saying this.
Same here, I have N1 with 60/60 in the listening section.
But I still can’t understand 40% of what the native speaker is saying. Usually, it’s the kanji we rarely hear about. I usually catch the nuance when they speak so I can grasp the context. The problem is when I’m being asked something I have no confidence in how to answer the question. It sometimes leads to misunderstanding and miscommunication.
I should have asked about the word I don’t understand instead of trying to guess the meaning. My communication skill and anxiety really make communication in Japanese harder.
*Usus est magister optimus.*
Find a customer facing role in Japanese language, with your existing subject-matter expertise (alternatively, something you could learn on the fly, and not hate). Working in a company role, where you could shadow others would be the best option, as you could pester them for all the expressions they use at work, and mimick them yourself (instead of inventing your own sentence structures ).
You will be shitting bricks at first, sweating through the sentences.
*Start gradually*. I worked in local bars during my students year – the daily conversation about all range of (mundane) topics helped me with the sentence flow, some vocabulary.
*Upgrade your vocabulary*. Next, I pivoted into tech-sales, customer facing role. That was my existing expertise, that I had to translate into Japanese language, and solve customer problems. Had a lot of coworkers to learn from, and customer feedback helped identify gaps in my communication.
There’s a bunch of other alternatives, that don’t require you to change your vocation – any group activities with locals, relationships etc, but I felt my language improved most when money and my face was at stake 🙂
We all hit it at some point. Just gotta throw yourself at it and do your best. You’ll pick up on things naturally as long as you don’t shy away from talking.
The phone sucks because the person you speak to is almost exclusively talking with their politeness on 1000% and phone audio quality sucks most of the time.
just keep studying and keep practicing I promise this gets easier
I’m currently “N3” level as well but my comprehension is better. I had reached a plateau of some sorts around 2019. Then when the pandemic happened and we had to move away to the countryside it kinda forced me to pick up my listening skills. I think you need like some kind of boost too you know? Like something that has you in a situation like I was in that had me like “shit I’m screwed” so to say lmao. I signed back up for school now and I’m studying for N2 and one thing I will say that I’ve noticed my teachers mention a lot is that a lot of people who can speak Japanese can’t pass the JLPT but the people WHO can pass the JLPT can’t speak Japanese. Which is really funny, but sad cause it shows how they don’t give us enough actual language practice. I think you should join those weekend classes they have at the 文化 or friendship centers? On weekends (at least where I am) where you can participate in speeches, or practice speaking Japanese with older people. That’s what I did and it really helped a lot.
I had a similarish experience, (though more around the n2-n1 gap) and there’s one insight you might appreciate. When you spend 2 or more hours a day studying your ass off, and then have chitchat with your wife and a friend when you go out for drinks, it feels like the amount you’re gaining from the fun non-stressful chitchat far outweighs what you’re getting toiling away by yourself.
And that is in some ways true. In usual conversation you might only use 20% of your vocabulary (probably much less), so mastering that through chitchat will make you feel progress much more quickly. But that 80% you don’t use all the time, that only one word comes up in 30 minutes of talking, is what can really derail a conversation and make you feel like an asshole. And it’s also a huge barrier to deeper conversations about hobbies, or talking with your doctor, or conveying nuanced feelings to your partner. It’s just as important as the stuff you use all the time, and you have to maintain it pretty vigorously. Once you get to a certain point, books/wikipedia/newspapers can make supplementing and maintaining that vocabulary feel like much less of a slog.
So, I get it. Lots of people are being pretty harsh, but a committed relationship and a fulltime job is a lot to have on your plate among god knows what other responsibilities. But you just gotta think of studying as part of your hygiene. Maybe you can’t do 2 hours every day, but do it some days, and commit to doing at least 15 minutes every single day. And like others have said, you gotta make the jump to living in Japanese. Switch your OS languages, watch Japanese TV, etc. Spending all your free time watching American shows on Netflix or whatever just leads to brain rot.
the biggest barrier in learning is the fear of making mistakes.
This is ingrained so deep in me because of the way I learned language as subject in school.
It is ok to make mistakes and there is no scoring or grading. Having people who can correct you is beneficial.
I found a website – japatalk where we can get a teacher to practice with.
My coworker is also struggling with english and I dont judge them. And I learned not to think they are judging me for my broken japanese.
How it works in your native language, you start reading and experiencing new words through situations in literature.
If you depend on conversation to get better at language, you’ll only ever have conversational skills about things you’ve spoken about in the past yea? Start reading a news paper, reading books, playing games, all in Japanese. Take notes when you see a new conjugation or grammatical pattern, write down new vocabulary or words that you had to double check the readings for.
I’m in the exact same boat as you and what is really doing it for me now is… playing LN in Japanese that have voice over. As I play, I repeat outloud and read the kanji, if I don’t know a kanji, I will look it up on my phone 🙂
If you’re not, incorporate shadowing into your study routine. Read out loud, speak along with podcasts, stuff like that will keep those skills fresher than they’d otherwise be and build muscle memory.
If you want to learn without studying you have to remove English from your life. Only communicate in Japanese and ask the people you are communicating with to correct your mistakes.
Personally I don’t wanna do that so I’m gonna remain shit at Japanese.
Read more, speak more, listen more. N3 is on par with a 5 or 6 year old at best, and the kid will have better grammar than you. You need to put in the work to get results
You just gotta keep speaking. I mean this is why most Japanese can’t speak English. They are too scared to make mistakes and embarrassed/self-conscious so then they end up never speaking which results in the overall lack of fluency in this country. No one honestly cares if you make mistakes. Like, if someone speaks to me in broken English, I am never thinking they are dumb or anything. I am amazed at their effort! I am sure Japanese people are extremely happy you are making an effort. Just keep at it!! You got this.
I and other Japanese people are tolerant of foreigners who are not fluent in Japanese. Japanese is not used as an official language all over the world as compared to English.
It gets better the more you try.
But I’m damn grateful for having someone I can commiserate with whenever I do a terrible presentation or when my boss outright says to my face that he doesn’t get what I’m trying to say. There’s been many days where I’m just so frustrated and it feels like I’ve made no improvement that I want to give up and live in a gaijin bubble. It’s not true! But maybe you just need that stress-relief to give you enough energy to keep going.
I hope the dog-piling doesn’t get you down.
Are you in an environment where you don’t need to speak Japanese that much on a daily basis? Either way, I would switch to only using Japanese whenever possible. I recommend trying to learn proper business Japanese as well, Keigo and whatnot. The mistake I made, is that I got used to Tameguchi, and found myself sounding awkard during conversations that would have required Keigo.
When you aren’t able to communicate, you also place the burden on the other person you’re trying to communicate with too. If you’re married to a Japanese person, you’ll be stuck with this problem for along time, so better take care of it sooner than later. Brute forcing your way through conversations will bite you in the ass in the long run.
Working up the motivation can be a bitch tho. Even if you study, you’ll probably still struggle with the nuances of the spoken language and culture in general at times, and that can make it even harder to find the motivation. Just starting with increasing the amount of Japanese you speak and use on a daily basis can work as a start. Still, you got to study with intention as well, good luck.
Probably going to get downvotes to hell but this is an absolutely asinine position. “Oh I am knowledgeable at a very basic level in {insert literally anything here}, but learning any more than this seems like it’s not as helpful in daily life.” Well yea? That’s literally how it works for almost anything assuming it isn’t your profession.
No one needs to learn words like pontificate or cacophony. No one needs to learn number theory. No one needs to learn the difference between a C#m9 in root or second inversion.
These are things literally no one needs in their day to day unless it is something they either care a lot about (dear hobby) or their occupation. It’s only a diminishing return if you don’t get something of equal value out of it. If you don’t value conversations at a higher level or with people without that fear of awkwardness, then don’t do it. If you do and maybe even like the language, just study.
I don’t even know why you’re posting this here, you either will or will not do it. Nothing we say will push you one way or the other except maybe to leave the subreddit. Are you just looking for people in a similar situation to complain about your shared complacency?
What is OP looking for? Not willing to study, but still embarrassed and have no confidence in speaking.
Looking for others with similar cases to justify not studying..?