Comments on: Boiling Water

By: All Japanese All The Time Dot Com: How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency. » Surely One Could Learn Multiple Languages At Once?

Sun, 20 Dec 2009 10:04:09 +0000

[...] timescale, because it’s going to take as long as it’s freaking going to take, and if you stop, you lose. And once you’ve built your beautiful linguistic house, you don’t just let out a [...]

By: All Japanese All The Time Dot Com: How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency. » Comfort Zone, Growth Zone, Panic Zone

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:20:04 +0000

[...] reboiling and three-day monking. They do eventually put in enough time, but it’s dissipated over far [...]

By: RainbowPinku

RainbowPinku — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 07:46:59 +0000

Great website, I love to read your posts. I had Japanese private teacher for over 2 years, did selfstudy in Japanese for 1.5 years and then had to stop taking lessons when I moved abroad. (could not afford it) Now I want to continue my studies, and really I forgot a lot since the 1 year break, even tho I watch Japanese TV shows or anime daily, or listen to J-pop I try to stop taking beraks, and finding excuses. Everyone has at least 10-20 minutes a day before you go to sleep the read thrugh your kanji’s or to learn a few new ones. I have a fulltime job and a part time job (7 days a week) so I can not study 18-24 hours a day like you do. I will still try, I started labeling all items in my room with their Japanese names, and I bought myself the laminated Kanjiposter advertised on your site, I will read your site daily yo get fresh motivation, and to feed the fire I need for boiling my water.

By: Elvagejo

Elvagejo — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 20:51:40 +0000

Heating water takes less energy than a phase change ( boiling ).

A beter analogy ( sorry Lane, you went a little too far ) is pushing a car. Hard at first, but once it’s moving you don’t have to push very hard at all (ignore the having to run along side it). Stop long enough and friction drives it to a halt and you start all over again.

You are free to use this for AJATT the book, movie, musical etc.

By: All Japanese All The Time Dot Com: How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency. » Little and Often

Tue, 10 Mar 2009 20:03:01 +0000

[...] we want to be learning. That’s fine. The key is to get back on the horse as soon as possible. Don’t let the water go cold, get the fire back burning hot and bright again the moment the wind dies down. We may not be able [...]

By: All Japanese All The Time Dot Com: How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency. » Other People’s Perceptiveness (OPP): What It Takes To Be Great

Sun, 05 Oct 2008 04:11:27 +0000

[...] links that comes up every once in a while, and just so resonates with the kind of things you read here, that it simply has to be brought to everyone’s attention. The deal is, CNN Money/Fortune [...]

By: jpavlakovich

jpavlakovich — Tue, 20 May 2008 02:08:02 +0000

Careful, he never said his water was actually “boiling”

By: Lane

Lane — Mon, 19 May 2008 04:01:47 +0000

Okay. I forgot to mention… The reason stellar bodies might be a better comparison is that Wan mentioned that khatzumoto’s “water” was boiling at a higher temperature. At STP and with regular water, that’s not possible. You can, however, have variously massive black holes with respectively varying Schwarzschild Radii or domains of knowledge and experience…

Just thought I’d not forget to mention my point… ; )

By the way, great site. I’m working on Heisig as we speak.

By: Lane

Lane — Mon, 19 May 2008 03:56:58 +0000

I think stellar bodies would be a better comparison. Or think Katamary Damacy if you like. Add mass. You eventually create a star and fusion begins (understanding?). But it becomes a self-sustaining process… uh… I didn’t really think this through so bear with me. If your star is massive enough… then you’ll fuse to iron or lead or something, blow off your lighter elements and implode into a black hole. This is where I was trying to start my analogy because as you add matter, your Schwarzschild Radius (domain of your knowledge?) grows. But, as information leaks out in the form of Hawking Radiation, your black hole is literally evaporating. The SRS will help you sort of ‘recapture’ that Hawking Radiation as it were… To the extent that letting your language black hole atrophy for too long will cause it to literally evaporate and disappear. On the other hand, continuously adding mass will expand your domain indefinitely.

Hmm… How about it?

By: Hakushon Daimao

Hakushon Daimao — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 02:50:36 +0000

I just wanted to leave a comment and say how inspiring I’ve found your site to be. After almost 5 years in Japan I am still in the intermediate stage and that’s been getting me down. I’ve started using your Khatzumemo everyday to help me remember how to *write* kanji not just read them. Plus, putting in all new vocab I come across. I’m at day 5 now and I’m detirmined to keep going. I’m sure that by my 5th anniversary next year I’ll be at a much better place with my Japanese.
Thank you （＾－＾）

By: ruisu

ruisu — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 11:48:25 +0000

It’s so true…I think a lot of great advice can be learned from those who were on the bad side of a situation. Coming from that side :p, I can assure you that you really do have to tend to the fire. Picture yourself on a desert island, with no matches…if the fire goes out, you’ll have to spend all day rubber sticks together to get it going again. Or you can be vigilant and tend to it.

I say this as someone who often winds up rubbing sticks all day. Trust me, you don’t want be that person!

By: Lionelltd

Lionelltd — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 04:53:21 +0000

Great stuff. Thanks for the inspiration.

By: What A Forest Monk Can Teach You About Language Learning | babelhut.com

What A Forest Monk Can Teach You About Language Learning | babelhut.com — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 16:05:25 +0000

[...] Khatzumoto over at All Japanese All The Time wrote a great article comparing language learning to boiling water. Khatzumoto’s metaphor reminded me a lot of one used by my favorite Thai forest monk Ajahn [...]

By: quendidil

quendidil — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 13:31:50 +0000

Khatzumoto, it’s me again, sorry in advance if I’m bugging you again
but, could you tell me of how you managed your time in school?
Do you find Steve Pavlina’s “Do It Now” article similar to your own experience? (you
seem to have read him)

Thanks

By: khatzumoto

khatzumoto — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 23:27:08 +0000

LoL

By: Wan Zafran

Wan Zafran — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 17:36:40 +0000

This is the part where I mention the concept of thermal equilibrium. Since your Japanese ‘temperature’ is higher than mine, I would most definitely appreciate a bit of ‘heat transfer’ as such. (Haha.)

By: ジェームス

ジェームス — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 12:50:07 +0000

沸いてるよ

By: James

James — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 05:54:35 +0000

damn.. this makes me even more depressed about cheaping out on my chinese study to cram for midterms today

By: Stephen

Stephen — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 05:28:45 +0000

This is a great metaphor as it instantly captures my previous failures at learning languages. Thanks for your inspiring words, they’re a big help, and keep up the intensity!