That ten-week Japanese class I mentioned has finished. Next up is level 2 which starts in a couple weeks. Reflecting on what I’ve learned has been really interesting. The books this class go over are written to be simple and have common words repeated often. Those words I think I’ve learned pretty well just by reading and rereading the short stories. It feels great to read a story in a foreign language and have that feeling that you aren’t translating in your head but just imagining the scene from the story. However, when watching something on Viki without subtitles I still miss a lot and have to rely on guessing from context. I think this story method of language learning is really great for me but it’s a journey.