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The morning of the test, I had to head out and be on a train by 8AM. I got to Nishi-Funabashi to transfer to the Toyo-Kosoku line. As soon as I walked down the stairs to the platform, it was one of the weirdest sights I’ve ever seen. It’s hard to explain, but even though almost everyone was Asian, you could tell immediately that it wasn’t a usual crowd of Japanese people. Almost every single person waiting on that train platform was a foreigner, and everyone was going to the same place as me to take the JLPT. Tons of people were holding up JLPT preparation books in various languages, checking notes and talking to their friends about the test. It was unreasonably loud with chatter too. It was so strange. The best way I can describe it is like the Harry Potter movies. You know, when they go to the train station and you see all these magic people, wizards, etc running around with shopping carts? Only instead of magical school kids and giants, it was nerdy looking white guys and Korean girls in emo glasses and trucker hats.

And that brings me to my next point. While you’d expect “group of foreigners in Japan” to mean a bunch of predominantly white people, you’d be pretty wrong. Actual Asians make up the biggest percentage of foreigners here. And that never applied more heavily than to the people taking the JLPT. Of course I only experienced one test site at Funabashi, but I’m willing to bet everyone else had similar experiences.
Does this match everyone else’s examinee groups fairly well?

In an attempt to make my page more intelligent-looking, I have constructed a pie chart showing the groups of people who were taking the JLPT this year. This has been scientifically validated and checked a few times by my imagination.

Let us examine each of these groups individually.

• Asian chicks – as I said, most of the foreigners taking the test seemed to be Asian, but then it also seemed that most of them were female. However, I had to add an extra subgroup (see next) to help classify further. This is the “without glasses” group.
• Asian chicks with emo glasses – It’s almost ridiculous how many of these girls were wearing emo glasses. It’s even more common now than the stupid trucker hats and furry collared-coats. But there are some girls who rock all 3, and I’m pretty sure they’re always the Korean ones. By the way, if you do a Google Image Search for “emo glasses,” most of the pictures that show up are of Asian chicks.
• Other Asians – guys, really really ugly females, and TheLeong.
• Middle Eastern guys – Although I don’t tend to see a lot of Middle Eastern-looking guys around Chiba or even when I go to Tokyo, there seemed to be quite a few taking the JLPT. And they also always seemed to be in groups, even more than the other groups present. Seriously, I never saw a lone Middle Eastern guy at the test. I didn’t seem to see any Middle Eastern girls though.
• Other – Mainly this is white people. Also the one black guy I saw. There are of course many sub-classifications for the white people I saw at the test, such as “confused looking old guy” and “huge nerd wearing way too much winter gear.”

Well that’s enough statistics and data for one night.

On Sunday I finished the JLPT, the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, called the 日本語能力試験 in Japanese. This is kind of like the TOEIC test, but to measure Japanese ability for foreigners. Unfortunately, unlike TOEIC it’s only available once a year, meaning if you mess up and fail the level you take, you have to wait an entire year to re-take the test. There are 4 levels (級), with 4 being very basic (I passed this back in high school), and 1 being the most difficult. I took 2級 since I looked at last year’s 1級 exam and it would require a lot more studying than I wanted to do. Level 2 was pretty do-able I think. According to the official site, the requirements to pass level 2 are as follows:
The examinee has mastered grammar to a relatively high level, knows around 1,000 Kanji and 6,000 words, and has the ability to converse, read, and write about matters of a general nature. This level is normally reached after studying Japanese for around 600 hours and after completion of an intermediate course.

While I certainly don’t consider myself anywhere near fluent in Japanese, I’d like to think that my abilities are at least better than just being able to communicate about “matters of a general nature.” The official description for Level 1 says to pass you need to have “an integrated command of the language sufficient for life in Japanese society.” I’m pretty sure that I have been living a pretty sufficient life for the past 15 months, but oh well. I think the descriptions are just off, because like I said, that test looked ridiculous, with kanji and vocabulary that even Japanese people don’t use realistically.

I registered for the test back in September, and even bought some books to help prepare for the test. As should have been expected, I didn’t really do any prep for the test until mid November when I did last year’s exam as a practice test, then some actual studying the week leading up to the actual exam. Oh well. The test went pretty well overall, though more difficult than I was expecting. I think last year’s test seemed easier to me, but I could be wrong. As you only need a 60% (yes, that’s right) to pass levels 2-4, I’m fairly confident I’ll have a certificate being sent to me in February. I’m not going to count my chickens too early though. And yes, we have to wait that long for the results of a scantron test.

No real stories to tell about the test, although during the second section, Listening, some girl in the back of the room’s cell phone went off. At first it was a short alarm, maybe an e-mail, but then it started going off even more. While she may have been able to get by if she’d have shut it off really quickly and acted like it wasn’t her, the proctor finally got up and red carded her, ejecting her from the room and disqualifying her completely. Girl even tried to argue a little bit. Ha, ha. Yes, I have the right to laugh at this girl since the distraction probably cost me a question. Also a Thai girl sitting next to me didn’t even show up until the second test, meaning she already lost 100 of 400 points. On top of that, she didn’t understand the instructions in Japanese that one of the assistant proctors was saying, so I’m under the impression that 2級 was hopeless for her anyway. Overall, the people taking the test were more interesting than the test itself, so that leads me to the next post…

So the Japanese Proficiency Exam (日本語能力試験) is in about 4 days. Sunday morning. Let’s look at all the studying I’ve done in the past few months. I did a full practice test (last year’s actual exam). Passed that. Not an amazing score, but not too shabby I guess. And….

OK, so all I’ve done is a practice exam. Aside from that I haven’t truly studied Japanese in about 3 years. This could be bad. I think I’m going to start cramming for the next few days just to try and remember some more kanji and grammar.

I was thinking about taking the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (日本語能力試験) this year, but I think I’m boned. I should have applied or at least tried to start applying a while back. This doesn’t make sense, but to apply you actually have to buy this application booklet from a Japanese bookstore and apply that way. This is just if you’re taking the test in Japan, which I would be, since I’ll be there in December. I’m pretty sure that if you’re taking the test in the US, you can apply online or using some kind of modern technology. There are 4 levels to the test, with 4 being super easy and 1 being super hard. For a while I was thinking of taking level 2, but then I realized I haven’t studied in years and I can only read like 20 kanji, so 3 is looking like a better idea. I can study and stuff to take Level 2 next year maybe.

I actually took level 4 back when I was maybe a sophomore in high school, and passed it. I tried level 3 the following year, but didn’t really study much (I never did that in college, let alone high school) and ended up failing it. I’m pretty sure I’d be able to pass level 3 no problem now. If it weren’t for kanji, I could possibly even do level 2.

But back to the application process. To take the test in Japan, I would need the stupid application booklet, which costs 500 yen. Then on top of that, you have to pay an application and test taking fee, which is another 5500 yen. Since it’s the afternoon of the September 5th application due date in Japan right now, and I don’t even have the booklet, I am pretty much S.O.L. on this. There is actually an extended application due date into October, but then you have to pay an extra 3000 yen handling fee for being a late jerk. 90 bucks to take a test? Ehh….I suppose I could take it when I get to Japan, but I am thinking it will be best just to study this year and take Level 2 in December 2007.

Speaking of deadlines, if anyone wants to attend the Tokyo Game Show at the end of September and wants me to register them with my group as Press/Media, let me know ASAP, like in the next few hours. I’m faxing in the form pretty soon.