Writing assignment

Letter to my Japanese friend - Hikaru.

私の新しいスタジオリコーディング

こんばんは　みなさん、

これは　私の新しいスタジオリコーディング　です。　うたのなまえは　「さよならのじゅんびは　もうできていた」　です。　うたは　「カノジョは嘘を愛しすぎてる」の　OST　です。オリジナルは　ここに　あります。そして、　わたしのリコーディングは　ここで　きってくれませんか：

https://soundcloud.com/vu-chau-2/acoustic-cover-sayonara-no-junbi-wa-moudekiteita

カラオケがないので、わたしは　ことごと（ギター　と　ベースギター）を　しました。Acoustic　です！（＾＿＾）

Basically, I watched this movie named "The Liar and His Lover" on the plane, and fell in love with a song in it. The title of the song is "Sayonara no Junbi wa Moudekiteita" (I'm Ready to Say Goodbye). The soundcloud clink above is my acoustic cover of the song. This is my first ever attempt to sing in Japanese :) As usual, comments are much welcomed!

あたらしい リコーディング (New recordings)

みなさん、　こんにちは！

今週の火曜日に　わたしたちは　PE5 (recording exercise)　が　ありました。わたしは　たくさん　アニメの　shadowing　を　しましたから、こんど　わたしは　うたを　うたいたいです。うたのなまえは　”さよならのじゅんびは”　（I'm ready to say goodbye)。このうたは　わたしが　ひこうきのえいがから　ききました。みなさんは　ここで　うたを　きいてくれませんか。

https://soundcloud.com/vu-chau-2/ek6qahzc7nim

それから、　こんしゅう　わたしは　あたらしい　うたを　かきました。なまえは　「Would You」です。このうたは　わたし　と　ともだちが　ホールドホール（Holder Hall)で　うたいます。リコーディングは　ここに　あります：

みなさんは　Comments　を　かいてくれませんか！ありがとうございます！

しゅうまつ

らいしゅうまつ、わたし　は　たくさんじかん　が　あります。　来週の金曜日に　私　の　けいざいがく　の　レポート　が　ありました。　でも、　はやく　レポート　を　おえました。　それから、　土曜日　と　日曜日　に　たくさんじかん　が　あります。　そして、　ゆっくり　を　しました。わたし　わ　キャンパスで　チョギングも　しました。プリンストン　の　あき　は　とても　きれいです　から、たくさん　しゃしんを　とりました。これ　は 　とったが　とった　しゃしん　です。

とても　きれいなですね！

PE reflections

おはようみなさん、

先月 PE の goals おかきました。Today I will review what goals I have and have not accomplished:

一。毎日　にほんごのテブル　に　いきました。
二。よく　柴田先生　の　office hours に　いきます。Sensei helped me on my intonation a lot, and I think it is getting better.
三。Do at least one shadowing a week: I watch a lot of anime, and often tried to imitate the speech of the character. However, I haven't done formal shadowing (careful, with scripts) yet.

For the remaining of the semester, I intend to continue going to Japanese table and 柴田先生の　office hours. I will try to fulfill the one shadowing per week goal that I haven't accomplished last time. Besides, I will try singing a Japanese song for my next free PE statement. :)

アニメレヴュー: FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST.

みなさん、

きょう、Fullmetal Alchemist　の　レビューおかきます。

I finished this series (63 episodes) in a few days, simply because it is so good that I cannot stop watching until the end.

What it's about: The plot is built on the journey of two brothers who have lost part or whole of their bodies when they attempted to bring their deceased mother back to life using alchemy, or れんきんじゅつ　(i.e. the technique that convert materials from one form to another, providing its composition/content is not altered). Along the way, they get more and more heavily involved in investigating the true truths about the Philosophy Stone, one that is said to be able to revive the dead. (Interestingly, in Harry Potter book I, Voldermort was also looking for this stone so that he could return to his original life form). They also learn many lessons from those around them, and realize that their aim is no longer just to regain their bodies, but to help prevent a huge conspiracy against the nation as well. おもしろいですね。

Why I like this series:

1) I am very fascinated by how the main character, Edward Eric (エドワードエルリック), was constructed. Unlike the practice of many currently famous manga, e.g. なると or Bleach, in which the main character somehow always obtains the supreme power as the show progresses and seems to have no weakness at all time. In fact, throughout the series, the Fullmetal Alchemist many times lose his battle, and he does not seem to improve much technically as time goes on. However, his real strength is his naive, yet unable to be altered, ideals that originally seem impractical, but always lead him to better outcome. For example, there are several occasions in which he had the chance to help his brother get back his body, but after considering the immoral means to which the chance was given to him, he refuses that scarce chance. Just as someone said at some point in the show, "by living those naive ideals, the kid chose the harder path for his life. Not everyone has the courage to do that." 

2) The series did make me think a lot about many real-world problems, e.g. why we have wars, why national borders exist, should all humans on earth exist as a unifying whole, or should we separate ourselves by artificially created objects such as nations or religions. Moral dilemmas are frequently put into the show. The episode that struck me the most was one in which a State Alchemist (someone who is good at alchemy enough to earn the national title) was under pressure from the Central government to produce a Chimera that could talk. Being afraid of losing his State Alchemist title, he figured an easy way out: instead of producing a talking chimera, it's easier to turn a talking human into a chimera instead; and he did exactly so, turning his own daughter into a speaking chimera. While this whole story seems crazy and very unrealistic, it made me think a lot about science ethics. How can we be sure that we in this real world are not doing the some thing similarly cruel?

3) The music: Like しんげきのきょじん, this show has kick-ass opening themes and ending themes.

4) The European setting: The country in the series resembles Germany in many ways (and perhaps the militaristic government itself is an analogy to the Nazi). I just in generally like Japanese series that have setting in Europe (e.g. くろしつじ, or "Black Butler"), often for reasons I can't explain.

It has been a while since I last saw an anime series that is so beautiful and thought-provoking. 私はこのえいがはとてもすきです。This series probably will stay as my favorite for a long time :)

ありがとう。

私のあたらしいうた

こんばんは　みなさん。

せんしゅうまつ、じかんがありました。そして、スタジオであたらしいうた（ソング、or "song"）おしました。

どうぞ。:)

https://soundcloud.com/vu-chau-2/danh-thuc-giac-mo-wake-me-up

ありがとうございます。

Goals Statement for PE

みなさん、こんばんは。

As I'm trying to improve my Japanese speaking, I'm writing here the goals that I want to accomplish and how I'll achieve them. By the end of my 日本語の一年生, I want to improve the following:

- Intonation: Try not to get too pitchy/tonal (I have a very strong southern Vietnamese accent) when speaking Japanese. Become natural in word pitch and sentence intonation!

- Speed: Speak a little bit faster and pace the sentences more naturally.

- Special mora: Try to get my "ん” to sound more natural! 

- Consonants: Become less nasal in my speech. 

To achieve the above, I plan on doing the following:

- Go to Japanese table every week! (With possibly ONLY the exceptions of: (1) before a thesis assignment deadline, (2) 1 week before grad school application deadline, and (3) the week I take GRE exams!)

- Go to 柴田先生's office hour often (ideally once a week) to get my wrong pronunciation corrected.

- Do at least ONE anime shadowing exercise per week.

- Watch (or REwatch) one episode of しんげきのきょじん per week and try to speak along with a character in it (エレン？).

That's it for now <(^_^)> じゃあ、また。

Self-Introduction

はじめまして！

みなさん、 こんばんわ!

はじめまして！ Vu です。 ベトナム の Ninh Thuan から きました。どうぞ よろしく.

わたし は プリンストン  だいがく の よねんせい です。わたし の せんこう は けいざいがく です。せんこう は とてもすきです。わたし も にほん が とてもすきです。

も いちど、 はじめまして おねがいします！

じゃ ね ！

My new song! ぼく の ソング!

みなさん!

If you have a moment, please check out my new song (sadly my にほんご is still not good enough, so it's gonna be in えいご :P) - Loving You:

I'm sorry the quality isn't great, but I did everything (from beginning to compose to record my singing, playing and editing) in 7 hours, so it was a bit rushing :) I wanted to complete this song early to dedicate it to a special someone back in Vietnam as an official good bye and thank you for all the things that person has done.

いま、わたし は とても かなしい.

Anyways, mina-san, please enjoy it! どうぞ.

The Start of Japanese 101 Adventure

おはよう, みな さん!

First off, let's listen to some background music while reading this entry, shall we?

The song above is "The sixth station," soundtrack of the movie "Spirited Away" by はやお みやざき (Hayao Miyazaki), the creator of Studio Ghibli (read: The Japanese Disney; I personally much strongly prefer Studio Ghibli, but let's postpone this till another post).

I've liked Japan since I was young. My childhood imagination was built on Pokémon, Sailor Moon, the Super Sentai series (which in my opinions is often way better the American counterpart, the Power Ranger); then I was attracted to the detective mangas - Detective Conan, Detective Kindaichi, Detective Academy Q (たんてい がくえん Q), and many more - as I grew up. Somehow I got used to the anime drawing style with big-headed, big-eyed characters (see Conan as an example) very naturally.

Because of the heavy influence, I always dreamed of going to Japan one day when I was young, and I did just that with the Princeton Global Seminar program in 2012. Spending 5 weeks in Tokyo and 1 week in Tohoku, I just grew to love this country more and more. I was impressed by a very dynamic society (definitely one of a kind in Asia, since nowhere else sells porn in a regular book store #cultureShock), delicious food, beautiful temples, awesome onsens, and more than anything, the people's politeness and hospitality.

Learning Japanese has been a dream that I've put off for way too long. Somehow I always got convinced that there are many more practical things to learn in life for my career and my future, so learning Japanese always comes second in my priority despite all the interests. This semester is my last semester at Princeton, and since I'm applying to a PhD program, I should be drowning myself in taking Math and Economics grad courses at Princeton for a stronger application. Then a thought struck me: "If I don't take Japanese now, then when?" Perhaps never. I was scared of the answer, so I signed up for JPN 101. Let's hope that this is a great crazy choice! がんばってね!

My first impressions of the class was that the professors are very friendly (and maybe speaking the stereotypical Japanese's "Engrish" accent on purpose :)? ), and that everyone else in the class is very comfortable practicing our broken Japanese together (which is absent in many language classes). So far so good, I've had no concern nor worry YET (I may change my mind once the semester kicks in - just wait for my complaint in later posts).

Let the adventure begin! はじめましょ!

P.S.: In case you wonder what my blog's name means, Chikara-meshi is a very wonderful (cheap) fast food chain in Japan that serves delicious beef bowl. Don't be put off by the term fast-food, since this is no McDonald. Give it a try when you go to Japan!