Hi all.

I was listening to the pronunciation thread and heard a lot of really impressive Japanese from a lot of people! I was shocked to hear such excellent pronounciation. I think maybe the fact that a lot of people have studied on their own have made them really go that extra mile.

I was wondering if anyone would be interested in doing the occasional skype chat to have a go at non scripted Japanese with other people speaking Japanese? For those in Japan or with Japanese speaking friends it might not be a big deal, but I imagine it can be hard to actually converse with someone for those living in the sticks.

It's just an idea. Anyone interested?

Off the topic, but 陰鬱！
I just learnt and made a story for 鬱 yesterday, so yeah, just a coincidence.
I made up the primitive 'Treasure map' for the map looking part.

Don't. Speaking Japanese with foreigners is a great way to start speaking unnatural Japanese. Mimic natives, not other foreigners. Find Japanese people to speak with over Skype instead.

I agree with Tobberoth. The last person I want to speak Japanese with is another Japanese learner. What might seem like simple fun could create a whole host of bad habits.

I second that - we may sound great but there's plenty of opportunity to talk with native Japanese speakers on Skype.

This site is free to post and hope someone contacts you. (I was actually contacted by several people over time, so if you're not in a hurry you can save two Frappucinos worth of cash.) For $6 you can get a one-month "gold" membership that allows you to contact anyone who has posted (of which there are hundreds to choose from because unless you pay, you just wait for someone to contact you). Everyone I contacted was really enthusiastic, and I've been chatting almost every week with someone from Tokyo for more than six months.

http://www.mylanguageexchange.com/Default.asp

The only downside to native Japanese speakers is that most of them are in Japan, so the time difference could be difficult, but it's worked out for us so far.

Here is another link :
http://www.language-exchanges.org/

http://www.sharedtalk.com/

Best place I've ever used for voice conversations with natives online. There's a ”文章チャット”and "音声チャット”

This is where I found one of my conversation partners when I went home for the summer:
http://www.conversationexchange.com/