warmly,
Bill

I’m curious, have you found any really good online Chinese monolingual dictionaries?

Of course, when I lived in Taiwan I had a lot of time to watch Chinese TV. All their programming is with subtitles. So I was getting input with written confirmation constantly — even the dreaded news broadcasts. I used to watch Taiwanese shows just to get the reading practice — since I couldn’t understand a word of Taiwanese but the written language is all the same. It was like free but merciless flash cards.

Even after all these years of getting input (now mostly from my wife or her TV shows) I still believe the methods being discussed here could help me improve. I’m probably not as good as I could be after all this time. But I want to focus as much time on Japanese right now, especially since I’m on the cusp of actually understanding a complete sentence or two when I’m watching Japanese shows!

Look forward to hearing more as I want to learn Chinese after Japanese!

@Luke: I’m not sure why people have ingrained in their brains that the only way to learn a language is through blood, tears, sweat and lots of rote memorization. I guess that it’s because that self teaching methods require a lot of personal effort and willpower and most people are not willing to do what’s necessary to achieve results. They use slower and more comforting methods. People who don’t follow them are seen as geniuses or as people who have an ‘unfair’ advantage over them, like photographic memory. Actually, the only advantage we have over them is that we dared to try something different and we stuck with it.

I have only really been learning Japanese for about two months. Using this method, I’m astounded at what I can actually understand at this point. Sure, it’s miles away from being anything meaningful…. yet. Still, I think it’s a lot more than what I could’ve achieved in another method.

I did have a leg up on the kanji, though, since I learned Chinese many years ago and have kept it up. (Probably because my wife is from Taiwan!) Now, having said that, I’m amazed that you are going monolingual in Chinese so soon. That’s just a a testament to your hard work and the effectiveness of this method. Way to go!

Anyway, I’ve been working with some Japanese soap operas with Chinese subtitles. It’s a great way to practice both languages. But my sentence mining at this point is pitifully small. Well, I mention this to you since you are undertaking Chinese study. These types of soap operas would probably help you. Their like Chinese flashcards with Japanese pronunciations.

Good luck and keep up the great work!

TONS! Lots of criticism. The main excuses I heard were:
(1) “it’s just your personality/it takes a specific (detail-oriented) personality to learn Japanese”. Appeal to personality. This is complete BS, if the typos on this blog are anything to go by, I can’t be that detail-oriented.
(2) Maybe it works for you, but “that’s just YOUR way of learning things”. Funny, especially coming from teachers and TAs, who are trying to force THEIR way of learning things onto everyone else.
(3) Whether it works or not is not the point. The point is to obey class policies. This is my least favorite one.

In the end, for my own confidence and sanity, I had to seal myself away from those people in my own little world. Ultimately, the only thing that was worth it, the only thing that could possibly prove them wrong was to get fluent and Japanese…As it turns out, I don’t care what they think any more; it doesn’t matter; I can use Japanese quite freely, end of story. Results are what count, not the discussion.

A lot of the crap you are hearing sounds like what they told Heisig back in the day. It reminds of something Einstein (I think it was him?) said about scientific truth. First they deny as bollocks, then they say it might be true in some cases, and then it itself becomes “the new inviolable truth”.

Anyway, I’m really glad to hear you are progressing well. All the best to you in the future. Keep on keeping on :D.

でもそれにしても凄いな〜。もう中国語を中国語で学んでるってことはね。脱帽！そして（言うまでもないでしょうが）まだまだ頑張ってくださいね！それとも、「加油」と言った方がいいでしょうか！^^