It's been a long time since I conquered the 常用漢字. What I like to continue to do is find new Kanji, especially rare ones. So, what new Kanji have you just recently encountered? Kanji that I've recently encountered include

蓑、猯、緜、侫、崗、忝、罧、躡、慵

I try to learn or study at least 30 Kanji everyday. I really want to become a Kanji guru. The Kanken 1 has been a goal for some time now, but I'm lacking around 2000 characters.

Anyways, it doesn't matter what level you're at, what Kanji have you recently learned?

I'm currently reinforcing JLPT2 w/ KanjiBox while also filling up on JLPT1, but I've encountered a few non-常用 along the way.

My most recent JLPT1 fave is 騎, from 騎士団 (as in ハリーポッターと不死鳥の騎士団）.

Most recent non-常用: 揃、which I stumbled across in this Lifehacker translation on doing laundry: http://www.lifehacker.jp/2012/03/120326laundryhack.html

Yeah, I'm reading an article about doing laundry efficiently. I went out looking for laundry content when I was trying to talk to myself about doing the laundry this week. I swear, I read things in 日本語 that I would never consciously seek out in English.

I like 忝; I didn't recognize it by itself, but recognized it as a component of 添　(e.g.　添削).

Ya, that character is in words like 忝涙。

揃う
不揃い

Are words I can think of with 揃.

I might need to read that laundry article for myself. My parents claim I can't do it very well. ワロタｗ

imabi Wrote:Ya, that character is in words like 忝涙。

揃う
不揃い

Are words I can think of with 揃.

I might need to read that laundry article for myself. My parents claim I can't do it very well. ワロタｗ

Yeah, 揃う is what the article uses.

忝涙 is a great word. I love this language.

After all, it is the best language in the world.

Well, maybe these examples of 揃う will help you remember the character.

みんな揃ったかな？
歯並びが揃っている。　← Everyone is envious of these people.
靴下はさまざまな色が揃っている。

I read the article. There are smart ideas, but I'll probably never do them.

imabi Wrote:So, what new Kanji have you just recently encountered?

疇 which is #30087 on this site, one of those non-Heisig kanji. Encountered in the word 範疇 (category) in episode 4 of "Tokkan" dorama.

The highest kanji number on this site that I've encountered is #40288 - 鵠.

Also in the word 疇昔（ちゅうせき）

So, I've been studying all day. There's plenty more days like this to come in order to pass the stupid Kanken 1, 前途洋洋の逆, I've come across some odd words. Either the word or the Kanji that is used is weird, or both.

逆睹. At first, I mistook it as 逆賭. The word is basically a synonym for 予測. It can be pronounced as ぎゃくと or げきと.
玩愒　がんかい　　もてあそびむさぼること。The definition isn't the problem, remembering the second character is.
鞅掌　（おうしょう）　　First off, when I hear おうしょう, I think 王將. The word means 忙しく立ち働いて暇はない。I used that phrase earlier in a response. This is so much more complex than SAT words. Thankfully, the word isn't hard to read.
刀槍（とうそう） かたなとやりのことだとわかるけど、「とうそう」を見ると、「闘争」とか「逃走」とかのことを思い浮かべる。
朽木糞牆： 「朽木は雕(え)るべからず、糞土の牆(しょう)は杇(ぬ)るべからず」から。　First off, I've never seen 杇 before in my life and probably won't ever again.

This is just barely scratching the surface, but I find the entire process of studying for the Kanken 1 so intriguing.

Most of the kanji I've learned lately come from here:

I'm not sure how well I'm actually retaining them, though. A lot of them are just Chinese place names or historical figures.

The other main thing I'm reading is not so great for learning new kanji:

I still suck majorly at cursive script. I see some obsolete Kana that I don't remember in that one picture. Do you have any online resources for how to read documents like those? I'm unable to actually obtain stuff like that at the moment, but it is very intriguing.

I don't know of any online resources, no. I have books.

Well, maybe I'll get lucky and find them one day. Would you mind giving them the names?

Like you imabi I've also had my eyes pinned on Kanken 1 for some time, though I imagine I'm still leagues away at the moment, as I'm studying for 4級 at this time. Admittedly I'm only at 4級　because of vocabulary issues since I know about 3000 characters now.

Since I'm still catching up on the vocab side, I don't try to make learning Kanji a too big part of my studying, so I'm learning about 10 a day. I also mostly try to add only characters that I've encountered in the wild as it's much easier to remember, rather than just looking through a list.

The next characters to put into Anki from my notepad (where I put all the Kanji to learn next) are as following: 彰迄遼訣縊伽溜晰嗜饒鍬舒緻巷厨吶喊

imabi Wrote:Well, maybe I'll get lucky and find them one day. Would you mind giving them the names?

The two main ones I use are 辞典かなー出典明記, a small book that only covers the kana, and then くずし字用例辞典 for kanji. There are some introductory textbooks for くずじ字 also but I just started with an actual text -- I was able to do this because I could use a text that had an exact 翻刻 on the Internet, so I could check my work (and it's mostly kana; the few kanji it has are easy to read).

Ya, I can read about 20% of it, which I guess that's better than 0. The more I stare at it, the more I recognize. I have a list of 変体仮名 that I found. I should really invest time into remembering them. I also have this dictionary with cursive script for around 3000 characters. It's really good that I at least have that. It's just a matter of finding time to do the research. Right now I'm trying to get my Kanji skills up another 3000 just to feel comfortable taking something like the Kanken 1.

Taishi Wrote:Like you imabi I've also had my eyes pinned on Kanken 1 for some time, though I imagine I'm still leagues away at the moment, as I'm studying for 4級 at this time. Admittedly I'm only at 4級　because of vocabulary issues since I know about 3000 characters now.

Since I'm still catching up on the vocab side, I don't try to make learning Kanji a too big part of my studying, so I'm learning about 10 a day. I also mostly try to add only characters that I've encountered in the wild as it's much easier to remember, rather than just looking through a list.

The next characters to put into Anki from my notepad (where I put all the Kanji to learn next) are as following: 彰迄遼訣縊伽溜晰嗜饒鍬舒緻巷厨吶喊

I don't know if you've already done this, but some words that I can think of with those Kanji in it include

表彰
顕彰
遼遠
秘訣
永訣
訣別
縊死
溜める
明晰
嗜好
饒舌
巻舒
解舒
伽羅
伽
夜伽　←　酒色にふけったｗ
緻密
縹緻（きりょう）
巷
厨子
吶喊
鍬入れ
馬鍬
鍬

If vocab is your problem, then this is definitely going to be helpful.

imabi Wrote:I don't know if you've already done this, but some words that I can think of with those Kanji in it include

Are you honestly trying to tell me you can "think of" those words out the top of your head simply by looking at an obscure out-of-context kanji?

I mean, who remembers 伽羅 as "aloes wood" (except a forester or something)?

Not to mention you supposedly have knowledge of around 4,000 kanji (since you said you lack around 2,000 for the Kanken 1), and you have just only finished high school, if I'm not mistaken.

If so, I question your existence as a human being, and take it you're an android released from the future to destroy mankind. Did Dr. Gero send you? Unless, you are Dr. Gero?

Or you're just a prodigy of some sort?

伽羅　Is merely phonetic. I've seen it before too.

縹緻　I learned yesterday.

明晰 I've known this one for a long time

I've already gone over these Kanji before, so I better retain them. It doesn't take much effort for me to study and learn more Japanese. After all, it is my major now. And, I plan to go all-out in my Japanese studies. Prodigy, perhaps. I still have a long ways to go before even I am satisfied about my knowledge.

Some of these words are common too. They just might not be normally written in Kanji.

Another word for 伽羅 is 沈香（じんこう）. I believe I used a similar word to this on my word of the day, which I've not been able to do because I've been too busy. Grr...time is sometimes our greatest enemy. You can also read 饒舌 as such:
饒舌（しゃべ）る
I saw it yesterday in late 1880s short story I found online.

imabi Wrote:Another word for 伽羅 is 沈香（じんこう）. I believe I used a similar word to this on my word of the day, which I've not been able to do because I've been too busy. Grr...time is sometimes our greatest enemy.

Wow. I totally squandered my youth. :-p

I didn't have much social life in high school, but I was liked and known more than most people at the high school, odd but at least pleasing to know that people think well of you. I normally spend around 5~7 hours a day studying Japanese and have been doing so for about 4 years. Given also that I'm not the average person in intellect, but fully knowing my own limitations--math being one--I feel that I'm at a respectable point in my journey with Japanese.

In the coming years I want to really know a lot more Kanji, perhaps three times more than I do now. I'd like my vocabulary to finally overcome my English vocabulary. I would really like to know at least 10,000 more words within the next two years. I can recognize many more words than I can actually think of spontaneously, but I think that's for just about everyone.

I want to really start diving into more about dialects and classical Japanese. Although I would only rate myself as intermediate in Classical Japanese and somewhat knowledgeable about most of the main dialects, I still have a ways before I could ever be viewed as an expert in them. But, that's why I have my site where I can essentially dumb all my works and findings, reviewing them and editing them primarily for myself.

I just would really like it if someone could lock me in a room with food, water, bed, computer, my books, bathroom, clothes, air conditioning, etc. for a year and see what all I could do. I guess I'm crazy for that being one of my fantasies.

imabi Wrote:I just would really like it if someone could lock me in a room with food, water, bed, computer, my books, bathroom, clothes, air conditioning, etc. for a year and see what all I could do. I guess I'm crazy for that being one of my fantasies.

No, I share the same fantasy. I often think that I'm being held back by responsibilities, monetary needs, and various other hindrances.

I suppose I could reject my responsibilities but, alas, that would contradict my ethics. It would be quite selfish to sever my connections to my significant other, family, and friends for a year simply because I can't be bothered with them.

Of course, I could reject my ethics. However, rejecting one's own ethics whenever it's convenient is equivalent to committing oneself to moral relativism, i.e. having no ethics at all (because nothing is binding).

It's amusing and oddly intriguing how wanting to study in solitude for a year leads to such a dramatic dilemma. Sometimes I wonder if my ethical quandaries are the marks of a philosopher or symptoms of a psychological disorder. However, I admit both may be true simultaneously.

Anyway, you should consider a job in academia. I think it would suit you.

Responsibilities...yes, I agree with you that that is the one thing that holds us back from doing certain things.

I'm about to go off to college, so I'm going to be spending some of my remaining days with family. I also have to deal with appointments while I can I still use my parent's money for things.

I really do want to get into academia. I don't know what exactly I would want to specialize in Japanese though. I know that my college is just now starting to make courses specifically for Kanji, but I can't take it with what I know. They only allow people with little to know experience with Kanji take the class.

I think that the more I help people with Japanese via my work, the more qualified and experienced I'll become. I still learn a lot of things all the time about grammar related things.

The biggest problem I have for some reason is a lack of energy. I sleep about 10 hours a day. That's too much for someone my age in my opinion, and I don't really know what the problem is. I've been thinking that it is a health problem for some time, but I can't think of what it could be. I should probably be checked for high blood pressure. I know that things like that are hereditary in my family.

Money, it's evil yet so awesome at the same time. Sadly, I don't have much. I only get minimum wage and only a few days out of the week.

Some new words that I've recently come across.

嫋嫋（じょうじょう）、誹毀、身じろぎ、拘攣（こうれん）、抹額（まっこう）、末梢神経、草履虫、水爬虫（たがめ）、謙称、丕基（ひき）

That's 10. Maybe I can study some more. These are pretty easy. 乞丐…this word has so many possible readings. かたい、かったい、きっかい、こうがい
I'd rather use the word 乞食

imabi Wrote:...
If vocab is your problem, then this is definitely going to be helpful.

That's what I'm doing on the front of my cards in anki. I write the reading of the kanji I'm trying to learn as such: 御とぎ噺 and が藍 for 伽 etc. It really has helped me learn kanji as I do not rely on keywords and I also learn/retain vocab.