In a December post about the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, I may have given the impression that a Japanese student’s emotional distress is limited to that particular ritual of degradation. In fact, to undertake the study of Japanese is to undergo a thorough examination of one’s inadequacy in the eyes of a skeptical culture. My chosen envoy of that culture is an Osaka-born Japanese tutor in Queens. She’s friendly and encouraging, but she still manages to send subtle reminders that despite my efforts, I know nothing.

Now, you probably think that your reporter is projecting his own insecurity onto the Japanese as some sort of misplaced Orientalism, but take a look at my recent “required reading” list and judge for yourself. Let’s start with Second-Grade Kanji Drills. Despite the ordeal of the JLPT, I was confident that I’d passed, so at the beginning of the year I felt like cock of the proverbial walk. Seeing this confidence, “Keiko-sensei” ordered me to buy Second-Grade Kanji Drills from the Kinokuniya on 6th Ave., across from Bryant Park. (It’s a new location, and a beautiful store.) “Look in the section for kids,” she said, “Not teenagers, little kids.” She stretched out her hand and lowered it toward the floor for emphasis. Little kids.

So after putting on my best really-not-a-child-molester face and descending into the Kinokuniya kiddies’ section, I came out with the bright yellow book you see to the right, depicting a group of animals who are all laughing at me, except the billy goat, who feels nothing but pity and shame.

My tutor said that Second-Grade Kanji Drills would broaden my vocabulary by teaching new words made from characters (kanji) I already know. The book teaches vocabulary by way of example sentences, and I’ve found these examples tend to fall into one of two categories. One type of sentence will employ cultural references—folk tales, nursery rhymes, etc.—that make perfect sense to a seven-year-old Japanese kid but leave me wondering what tulip monsters have to do with the kanji for “intersection.”

The second type of sentence is maddeningly nondescript, offering little to no context. Imagine trying to learn new English words from sentences like this:

atavism, noun.
Ex: That thing is an atavism.

brobdingnagian, adjective.
Ex: “Brobdingnagian” is a word that can describe certain items.

I am stupider than most seven-year-old Japanese kids, and Second-Grade Kanji Drills has no intention of changing that.

Then there was Arsène Lupin vs. Sherlock Holmes, which was an unpleasant experience mostly because I had to acquire it from BOOKOFF, a Japanese chain that shares the used-book market with the equally popular GOBOOKYOURSELF stores. New York’s BOOKOFF is located on the other side of Bryant Park from Kinokuniya (in what is rapidly becoming the city’s Japanese bookstore district), and it has all the joy of a funeral parlor that just lost its lease. Silent Japanese expats shuffle through the aisles while staffers operate a smelly shrink-wrap machine, sealing tome after tome into literary purgatory. I had to wait three minutes for somebody to abandon their shrink-wrap duties and ring me up, but the prices are cheap, so if you don’t like the service, BOOKOFF.

As for Lupin vs. Holmes, I was enthused about it because it’s written for something approximating an adult reading level, and the cover depicts a tense standoff instead of a squeezebox-playing rabbit. I gave up after a while, though, because the action in the first few pages—I’d estimate the first 200 or so—were filled with descriptions of a desk in a furniture shop. Once you learn the Japanese word for “desk” (also “bureau”) a couple dozen times, you might be ready to move on, but Arsène Lupin vs. Sherlock Holmes was not.

Finally, there’s my current textbook, acquired from Amazon Japan. Amazon.co.jp is a good option if you can’t find something at the other two stores (or if, by some accident of fate, you don’t live in the New York metropolitan area).

Integrated Approach is a fine textbook, yet it, too, has some example-sentence weirdness. Don’t get me wrong, the examples are helpful and all, but they’re laced with subtext. Here’s a few from my recent studies—these are honest-to-God English translations taken verbatim from the book:

“How is your Japanese class? Difficult?”
“It is not necessarily the case that one’s Japanese improves once one goes to Japan.”
“The Japanese people are famous for working hard.”
“Wisconsin is a great place, but winter is too long.”
“Mr. Tanaka looks like a woman.”

The passive aggression is hard to miss, but take note: If I’m going down, I’m taking Mr. Tanaka and the residents of Wisconsin with me. We all are doomed to fail it.¹