Japan : Trip to Kansai, 京都, 西京区

En français
We finally went back and took the right train for 西京区 to go to 嵐山. We went to see 渡月橋 first, the romantic "Moon Crossing Bridge". It's been said that when you across this particular bridge, you must not look behind, otherwise your relationship will break up and that if you go there with someone you like you will stay together.We then went to the Monkey Park. Once we reached the top of the mountain, we could feed the monkeys. We also observed there diner time before going back down. We tried to go to the bamboo road but it was already night when we got there so we didn't see much. We then went back to 京都 for diner. It had been raining all afternoon and we were all wet and tired but that was still a lot of fun.
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Japan : Trip to Kansai, 京都, little incident

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The next morning we were planing to go to ,西京区 to visit the area, old Japanese house, temple, monkey park, bamboo road. But when we arrived at the train station things got a little complicated and we got into the wrong train and ended up in 敦賀 instead. That was kind of a epic mistake as we stayed in the train for more than one hours then had to get back. But that was still fun. The train controller didn't made us pay the extra ticket and even wrote a letter to make sure that we would be able to use our tickets to go to our original destination. The landscape was really beautiful and we could see the sea from the train. That made the trip turn into a little adventure. It's good to have a bit of excitement.
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Japan : Trip to Kansai, 奈良市 : 大仏殿

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In the afternoon we went to visit 大仏殿 the largest wooden building in the world, with inside the world's largest bronze statue of Buddha 大仏. The great Buddha is part of the "Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara", an UNESCO World Heritage Site, together with other temple in Nara. It is 14.98 m high and really impressive. We entered the temple and turned around the statue. There are also other smaller statue in the great hall.

We then continue our walk around in the temple complex before going back to the station for a well deserved dinner before taking the next train to 京都.

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About learning : Screw the method

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I guess the title says it all, I got a little tired about learning languages. Not that I don't want to learn, just that I want to learn so bad that I just don't. I think I lost myself trying to apply other people's methods that seemed to work for them and possibly other people around but kind of flop for me. Not because they are bad methods, I think more because I was just doing things wrong because that didn't really match with my personality.
I think instead of trying so hard to get something their ways without actually getting the full grasp of it because I'm obviously just myself and not them, I should have got back a little bit and reread (my own crap) the first few posts of the "About learning" section of this blog.
I did learn 3 languages to fluency without having to read about any method before starting-even though two of them are probably starting to fail me due to lack of use but let's overestimate myself like every one else seem to do- so what the hell is wrong with me right now and why the hell don't I speak Japanese after almost one year here.
I can already here people saying that it's ok and that I'm just being too hard on myself. Sorry but screw that too.

I think I just want to speak so perfectly that I got scared and don't speak at all. Fact number 1.
I'm just too much thinking about how people are looking at me. That's a hard one to admit but Fact number 2.
I'm underestimated myself quite a bit, and it's hard to stop. Fact number 3.
But let's face it no matter how bad things turns out for some reasons I don't understand I still have some people calling me a genius at least once a week, no matter how wrong it sounds to me.

Now let's be back to my own shoes or should I say use my super powers and see how it goes.
There is no right method to learn a language because the method should be adapted to the language itself and to the culture behind it and to the person learning it. That's how I learned English mostly reading and watching Hollyoaks. I learned German taking classes in the morning and watching anime in the afternoon with the kids. I learned Italian just for the love of art as my teacher said.



So I just have to figure out what fits with Japanese and Chinese and I think that's not going to be too difficult. I just have to stop trying and let it flow. Let's get to work!