頑張ってね

6 of sophomore students at my university passed Monbukagakusho written examination and today all of them are going for interviews.

I'm not one of them.

The fact that I didn't pass written exam did NOT upset me a tiny bit. How could I expect I would pass when I barely understood the Japanese readings in the exam? I knew I wasn't gonna make it the moment I walked out of the exam room.

17 students out of 70 something are qualified to the interview round with 6 of them being my friends. 4 of us weren't qualified, and I was one of them.

The minority. Yes, I am the minority. I wasn't qualified.

Right.

I was thinking how a Japanese dummy like me got to study at the same place with the Goddesses like them.

I've been struggling with Japanese ever since the start of my sophomore year. It's getting difficult more and more each day and it seems many of my friends get the hang of it while I DO NOT.

In January, I had nervous breakdown after all the mid-terms were announced. I was going through denial that I did not suck at Japanese, I wasn't stupid, and I could improve.

Well, the denial phrase had stopped because I finally admitted that I suck and sort of stop setting my hopes high with all my Japanese subjects. I kept telling myself I wouldn't be sad and upset about it anymore since I probably didn't have enough potential. If my Japanese sucks, then BE IT. Who cares?

Right, who am I trying to fool here?

As usual, I talk about shitty things I'm facing in life with mom (Poor her, I think it sucks having to listen to me ranting)

She said I wasn't stupid. It's just I've never really tried to improve my Japanese from the very beginning.

"Look at what you've done in the past week. You watched Oscars, bought the book Revolutionary road, went out to see American movies, grabbed some free English magazines back home to read, listened to American music etc. All things related to your English skills. What about Japanese? Have you ever considered about reading Japanese books or listening to their music or doing anything to improve your Japanese besides studying?" she said.

Well, she's right.

I've never really done anything in Japanese. As you can see, I'm still writing this entry in English!

I know I'm just lazy. It's so easy to access information in English that I don't try to find it in any other ways. English is a part of my life. Why can't Japanese be one too?

My confession: deep down I have no passion in Japanese. I like traveling in Japan cuz it's cool. Their food is great. Their culture is interesting. But that's pretty much it; my interest remains on the surface.

The reason I started studying Japanese in my school was because I didn't wanna learn French. Plus Japanese seems to be a better choice when it comes to finding jobs here.

But this is, after all, what I've chosen. I really should "try" to put more effort.

I did. I just started my lang-8 page. Found out about lang-8 via twitter and I think this is a very cool social networking site which native speakers can correct my writing.

I started writing 2 entries in Japanese this week. It was VERY hard trying to put my thoughts and write down in the language I'm not really familiar with. It took me forever to write some certain sentence, and I had to go back, pause, think, and rewrite a lot.

I've had some responses from Japanese by correcting my grammar, vocab, etc. Some of them were really nice putting comments to encourage me to keep trying. Guess I've never realized the TRUE meaning of 頑張ってください before.

頑張ってください (Gambattekudasai) or　頑張ってね (Gambattene) is my favorite Japanese word. Japanese don't say "good luck", they say "gambattekudasai", which I guess it can be translated as "keep trying", and they say it ALL THE TIME.

I agree with Japanese on that one. Effort is, in most cases, more important than luck.

When I read all of those comments after I found out I didn't pass the Monbukagakusho written exam, I felt tears stinging in my eyes.

I've forgotten how it feels to receive some little encouragement and how it can affect people. All I've heard from my Japanese teachers at my university would be something more like "You don't know about this in Japanese? How could you NOT know about this? You're a Japanese major, you MUST know it!"

And they'd go on about how desperate they feel toward us and so on. They'd say we could be better, this is NOT the best of us yet.

Yeah, the world I live in is strongly determined to crush my self-esteem to the ground.

I thought I'd be strong enough to not give a shit about them and would never let them get me, but now, they did.

And I'm trying to restore my self-esteem back which is NOT easy with my present surroundings. I'm trying to regain my confidence and tell myself it's ok to make mistakes.

Oh well, I still have another plan next year, and this should be my last opportunity.

I'll really, really try this time. I'll have to figure it out what I wanna study in Japan (To be honest, I still have zero idea on that one), will do my research, will write a good study plan, and will totally put my heart in it.

I will TRY TRY TRY TRY TRY and TRY, and if I fail again, BE IT.

At least I can tell everyone I DID try. At least I myself know I DID try.

Simply because I just can't stand myself being a real loser.