Hello everyone.
Thank you Nicolas san for creating a wonderful website for all learners of Japanese language. This website has the most comprehensive list of Kanji that you can use to prepare for Japanese language proficiency exam.
Since this is my first time posting here, I would like to briefly summarize my background. I am originally from Japan, and initially moved to Southern California to go to college after finishing high school. I have lived here for over 10 years (long time, I know!), have been tutoring Japanese on a part-time basis for eight years.
I’ve met many people who are truly fascinated by Japanese language, history and culture here in Southern California. Japanese is definitely one of the most popular languages as you can also find countless Japanese language websites. People in America learn Japanese for both personal enrichment and career advancement. There are two reasons my student almost always give me when I ask them why they are learning Japanese.
Japan is one of the most advanced countries in the world. Companies such as Panasonics, Honda, Toyota, Toshiba are all from Japan, and their products are used by millions of people around the world. There are many other Japanese companies successfully exporting their products to the international market. As Japanese companies continue to grow in global market, you are more likely to work with Japanese people. Naturally fluency in Japanese language makes you more competitive in the job market. The US economy has been stagnant, so some of my students are looking into applying for English teacher positions in Japan.
There is another obvious reason, which makes Japanese a popular foreign language. Japanese has a long history and its fantastically rich culture has been admired worldwide. Sushi is actually very popular in where I live. I was shocked to see people eating raw fish when I first moved here. There are many Japanese restaurants and grocery stores here, so people are introduced to fascinatingly unique Japanese culture in our daily lives in Southern California.
I can come up with many other reasons that make Japanese language and culture special, but I am going to end here. I am looking forward to posting more articles about Japanese language and culture! Thanks for reading.:>
Please share with us why you are learning Japanese in the comment section below!
About the Author
Hi My name is Yumi! I am originally from Japan and have lived in Southern California for many years. I have been tutoring my native language on a part-time basis. I look forward to contributing articles about Japanese language and culture. If you have any questions, please feel free to write me. 🙂
Yumi is the owner of the Yumi to Lesson website which helps students to learn Japanese (http://www.yumitolesson.com/)
NIHONGO ICHIBAN 
Nicholas san,
I am appreciate that you share your knowledge free for us, I have joined to the Japan company in my country Indonesia for wood working products for 11 years till present. Because I am as a representative, so Japan people just come and go for several days each four months. Used to, when the timber still booming; mostly Japan people come and go till half of every month. Due to now shortage of timber they come to Indonesia 4 months each. During 11 years I am joining, my Japanese like no improvement, because most of Japan people that has duty to Indonesia; they can speak English. However some people still poor in English. On this occasion I try to speak Japanese. As you know that Internet in Indonesia just about 4 or 5 years ago introduced to the society and the speed was very slow (perhaps download video I have to shopping first). In the last 2 years a little bit better; however, if I sing the same song from youtube; I can faster 15 to 20 seconds. Nihongo Ichiban, I just found about April this years. Not so terrible, I think it is never to late to mend. By founding the Nihongo Ichiban, it is very helpful to improve my Japanese. However sometime I still confuse. Here I can learn how to write kanji but if kanji combined with hiragana it will different. For example: 素晴らしい also speaking Japanese is very fast for pronunciation.
I suggest, when Nihongo Ichiban posting on Facebook always ask to the audience to make sample sentences. However this has happened, but very seldom. Sorry if my writing make you inconvenience.
Thank you Nicholas for sharing your knowledge, and you will be get bigger return from God. Amen.
Hello,
Thank you very much for your encouraging comment. I am sure that your Japanese business partners will appreciate your effort in communicating in their native language.
I have many ideas on how to make it easier to learn Japanese including information on pronunciation, lessons and test, etc. It just takes a lot of time to create all this contents. At this moment I first want to make sure all kanji and as many vocabulary as possible are uploaded, so that I can easily refer to them when I start writing lessons.
But your comment is very encouraging and motivates me to try harder.
Thank you for this.
Nicolas
Nicholas San:
My name is Jesus from Caracas-Venezuela.
I was in the same situation of Retyawanto San.
I worked for Toyota branch here in Venezuela in a franchise company, where supervisor from Japan used to come from time to time. All of them talked in English and it was easy for me to let them understand me in a easy way. But everything is not glory since there are very few Venezuelans (inside the company) who spoke Japanese or even English. One day a co-worker inspired me to learn Japanese saying that it would be very interesting for the supervisors to listen instructions, greetings and conversation into their own language. So I decided to start searching the way to learn Japanese. Although I am not working anymore in this company I got attached to Japanese culture and philosophies, so I kept my desire to learn this awesome language.
In this quest I started to follow (In Twitter) any Japanese people, organization, website or blog in order to meet people… Then I saw your twit where I found this awesome site. So I hope I can keep returning frequently to learn more.
Congratulation for this fantastic site.
Ganbatte
hi! I wanted to know if you would know of any Japanese students that would want to go to school in Santa Barbara (living with us, and working as an nanny)? Please let me know if you know of anyone. Thank you!