Japan is hot and humid! Aizu's really not so bad since we're up north and get some mountain weather, but I bet most places south of here are blazing. Speaking of which, I'm going to Tokyo tomorrow! Yeah, I didn't know until yesterday either! Jamie's cousin is flying into Narita tomorrow afternoon, so we're catching a bus at 6 am and meetin' up with Jamie's friend Nobu. Even though we're only gonna be there for about 3 days, it'll be a good time.

Things have been goin' slow in between and somedays I feel like I've accomplished nothing, but I suppose that's something I've got to take into my own hands. I've been given an amazing opportunity to get research done in Dr. Wilson's lab, and I just keep putting it off.

Despite that, at least my Japanese is getting a little bit better day by day. I study in some way or another each day, whether by spending time with Japanese people, reading textbooks, or trying to translate manga, which are Japanese comic books. I've been reading a specific manga a bunch lately, but the going is real slow when you've got to look up every other word. It turns out to be great practice for reading and kanji recognition, but the characters tend to talk in very casual slang which isn't always the real way things are said.

See, Japanese has varying levels of politeness in speech depending on several things: the speaker, the receiver, familiarity between them, social status, position rank at work, school, etc, and sometimes gender. Overall, these levels of speech are called keigo, but they divide like so:

• Teineigo (polite speech) is the standard form of speech that is first taught to those learning Japanese, and is almost always safe to use with anyone. (Times in which you could get yourself in trouble using it are with someone conducting an job/entrance interview or working as a store clerk. Both are situations in which a higher level of formality is required.)
• Sonkeigo (honorific speech) is used to praise another and his actions. This is nearly always used by store clerks to show respect for their customer, and can never be used to refer to one's self.
• Kenjougo (humble speech) is used to lower one's self and actions. The idea is to express that your actions are being done in order to assist the other party.
• Bikago (word beautification) is used to honor a word and essentially refine one's speech. As a consequence, it's often used to praise deeds or gifts received by an individual.
  

Then there's the plain ol' informal speech with is used between friends and those who know each other very well. If used improperly though, it can get you into trouble. You might end up really insulting someone or appearing extremely full of yourself. I accidentally offended a friend once by being too harsh with my words. Luckily, a lot of Japanese people will just chalk those sorts of mistakes up to being a foreigner and not fully understanding the language.

Anyway, these differing levels of speech make it really tough for non-natives to learn the language. It's one of the biggest make-or-break differences that determines whether or not someone will ever be fluent, and consequently one of the biggest reasons why people give up.

Ganbarimasu!