ghinzdra Wrote:And I don t see why you wouldn t be able to pass level 1 next year .

I guess you're right. I here it only takes about 3 months to prepare for anyway.

Quote:Oh dear god, the Evangelion one found it's way to youtube... with background music!

Interesting. This is a test question?

koyota Wrote:Considering all the Chinese sites seem to have うっとうしい　as an answer for the 蒸し暑いvocab question, but they are certainly wrong I believe?

koyata, I'm afraid they're right. I confirmed it with a coworker. Sadly, I missed this question as well because I learned うっとうしい as "crappy or sh**ty mood" but having investigated further it seems it is also used to refer to bad weather (蒸し暑い is considered bad, gloomy weather).

You can see from this site 蒸し暑い fits うっとうしい:
http://thesaurus.weblio.jp/content/%E3%8...7%E3%81%84

Jarvik7 Wrote:Kanzen Masten master is not a good book to use for grammar I think. A number of the points towards the back of the book are infact the same point in a very slightly different form, and some other ones actually belong to much easier kyuu (like 〜まみれ). I haven't looked at the Sou Matome books for 1kyuu, but I loved their 2kyuu stuff. In retrospect I never would have bought any of the kanzen master books except for reading. The vocab KM book went totally unused.

Two questions

Out of interest, why did you need/want to take the JLPT? Ok, that's a bit personal, but I guess we all think you're beyond what the JLPT tests for.

Second: About the grammar book, would that be your recommendation for other people, whether they are test takers or not? Myself, I'm not planning on taking the test, but I was planning on slowly doing the KM grammar sentences.

I, too, took 1級 and got tripped up over the picture of the kids watering the flowers. Unfortunately, it threw me off, so I totally missed the flower description and had to make a wild guess. I was staring at the triangles and circles, wondering if I had just suffered a massive testing anxiety attack that made me forget every Japanese word I knew... @_@

Other than that, though, my overall thoughts were:
Kanji/Vocab: better than I had expected (this is always my worst section)
Listening 1: a few toughies, but fair overall
Listening 2: easy breezy
Reading: easy passages, but a few of the questions were tricky
Grammar: again, better than I had expected

I found the test and answers online and went over them with my Japanese husband, and I'm pretty sure I passed ギリギリ, but I couldn't remember how I had responded to some of the questions. We'll see!!

And my husband vehemently disagrees with the supposedly correct answer for the first reading's last question (#8 - 前者と後者)...anyone else have thoughts on that?

basugasu Wrote:koyata, I'm afraid they're right. I confirmed it with a coworker. Sadly, I missed this question as well because I learned うっとうしい as "crappy or sh**ty mood" but having investigated further it seems it is also used to refer to bad weather (蒸し暑い is considered bad, gloomy weather).

I'm not completely sure, but from my understanding, uttoushii can also simply mean anything unpleasant. It does not necessarily have to mean "dark"

Evil_Dragon Wrote:

basugasu Wrote:koyata, I'm afraid they're right. I confirmed it with a coworker. Sadly, I missed this question as well because I learned うっとうしい as "crappy or sh**ty mood" but having investigated further it seems it is also used to refer to bad weather (蒸し暑い is considered bad, gloomy weather).

I'm not completely sure, but from my understanding, uttoushii can also simply mean anything unpleasant. It does not necessarily have to mean "dark"

うっとうしい means two things.

1. Gloomy. Refers to BOTH gloomy weather and feeling gloomy.
2. Annoying. Refers to pretty much anything which makes you irritated.

Tobberoth Wrote:1. Gloomy. Refers to BOTH gloomy weather and feeling gloomy.
2. Annoying. Refers to pretty much anything which makes you irritated.

That's probably why hair can be "uttoushii". I kind of figured they did not mean gloomy.
Edit: Thanks to China I'm pretty sure I passed.

Can someone please post the link to the 2級 solutions from yesterday? I can't find the "chinese forum" using google...

Evil_Dragon Wrote:By the way, as I understand it, reading questions are worth more than the rest, but how about the rest? Are listening, grammar and Kanji/Vocab worth exactly the same?

They're not all the same, they have different values, and they are scaled up by different amounts to add up to 400 total. Looking at one past paper its like this:

Kanji 1 point, 1.1 points scaled (10% of total points)
Vocab 2 points, 2.2 points scaled (15% of total points)
Grammar 2 points, 2.2 points scaled (20% of total points)
Listening 1 point, 3.7 points scaled (25% of total points)
Reading 5 points, 5.7 points scaled (30% of total points)

vosmiura Wrote:They're not all the same.

Thanks. Seems like it was the right decision to spend some extra time on those reading and vocabulary questions.

By the way, how did you feel about the time limit? I read quite a few times how there's way not enough time. However I felt there was enough time to thoroughly check everything. How did it go for you guys?

Congratulations everyone! Great to see how far so many people have progressed over the past couple years.

Jarvik7 Wrote:Grammar: barf ...

kazelee Wrote:I thought you were already Level 1 and Above :O.
Guess, my dream of passing level 1 next year is a bit unrealistic, huh?

I've also heard it's difficult for people with high level Japanese to pass JLPT1 without some exam specific review. Wrightak passed it after reading a lot (ie no special listening, kanji or vocab review), but I recall he spent some time on grammar points. So if you want to focus on exam preparation, Kazalee, you should be in good shape.

I was also a bit confused about Jarvik's situation though. At first I understood he was a translator. Then I read that he's an academic. So I was surprised to learn that he has only studied Japanese for 3 years (1 yr in Japan?). That's good progress.

Evil_Dragon Wrote:

vosmiura Wrote:They're not all the same.

Thanks. Seems like it was the right decision to spend some extra time on those reading and vocabulary questions.

By the way, how did you feel about the time limit? I read quite a few times how there's way not enough time. However I felt there was enough time to thoroughly check everything. How did it go for you guys?

I had about 10 minutes spare on the kanji & vocab section. For readings I finished all the questions just in time, but some of them were just from skimming the passages for key points. I wouldn't have had time to thoroughly read the whole passages.

So this was the 'old' JLPT, right? Next year is supposed to be harder or something?

Ok I m going to check this out with japanese friends tonight but right now I think I failed
I ll probably score 65 percent more or less (don t even want to think about a 68-69 score)
reading is not bad but as high as I hoped . I needed 76 pourcents of good answers and after having compared 3 sets of chinese answers I have only 13 anwers/54 pourcents of very likely good answers and 18answers/75 pourcents that have a chance to be right . Sure all of those are only applicants answer but there are 3 set of them and in most case I agree with their answer after pondering a little while. With the reading alone I would have had a chance but I needed some extra point to make up hearing.

Hearing part killed me .I officially ***** hate question 4 which totally threw me off . A full page for a question is extremely confusing:JPLT makers obviously never heard about tunnel vision .Very bad idea also to give letters to BOTH the answer and the character .As everybody by the time I catch up with that the flower question was already over.Needless to say it does wonders for confidence....Makes me wonder if there wasn t some mean intention here . Up that all my answers were good.

Anyway ....I ll publish a japanese correction by tomorrow on this forum

ghinzdra Wrote:everything below level 2 is simply useless in your interactions (job, reading ,etc...). It won t mean shit for companies (who aren t ashamed to ask for native like abilities even when they recruit foreigners.

I appreciate your perspective, but there are other perspectives, too. Level 3 is not useless to the guy on here who said he studied for level 3 entriely on his own, and it isn't useless to the 6th grader at my testing site who has been studying Chinese in an emmersion school since kindergarten, and it is not useless to me if I can use what I learned to talk with the in-laws. I hear what you are saying about job prospects, but still level 3 is not entirely useless. If it helps motivate you to study then it isn't useless.

As a holder of lvl 3, the only real reason to take it IS the motivation. That's it, and that's why I took it. Beyond that it's useless, and that's exactly what ghinzdra said.

I've never studied for anything more than I did the week before 3級。If you need the motivation, take it, but don't expect it to help you in any other fashion.

Could help me skip levels of Japanese class in college. Not that I would even if I did pass, but yeah. I took Level 3 for the motivation and I don't regret it. It was a pleasant experience.