Determination

In nostalgic memory of my trip to Japan last autumn and in preparation of a future one (hopefully next spring), I registered for a beginner's Japanese language course. The first class took place last night, in a smelly school classroom in the third district and with a surprisingly high number of attendees. I was 99% sure I would know the teacher from sight due to my "Japanese past" and she duly came over to me after class, telling me she knew she had seen me before, but wasn't quite sure where to place me. It's a small world. Well, it's a small Japanese expat community in Vienna anyway.

I'm not deluding myself that I'll be able to speak (or even read or write) proper Japanese after this course, but it might be useful to stock up on some useful phrases. Having worked with Japanese colleages and bosses for 9 years, I've absorbed a teeny bit of basic knowledge of Japanese - I guess you could call it some rudimentary passive language skills. These came in handy when we did a listening exercise and I seemed to be the only person able to hear where one word started and the other began.

I wasn't overly impressed by our sensei's didactic skills, but we'll see...