http://www.japanese-language.aiyori.org/beginner1.html ,the cartoon is just the nice way to begin and the flash is so easy to use! =)
To those who aren't well acquainted with the Mandarin language and Japanese language, but wish to learn both, so you might be as well wondering 'should I learn Mandarin first or Japanese'? In my case, since I already know how to speak and write Mandarin, I might be wondering whether I could get confused with the Mandarin words with that of Kanji.
I found the comment by mumeichan to be a useful one, and indeed it could clear your doubts too =)
Doesn't really matter. The are two differences.
Japanese uses the traditional form of all characters while the Chinese use the simplified form. Chinese in Taiwan still use the traditional characters though. And anyone who has at least been to a primary SJK will know quite alot traditional characters. The character for car in Japanese is 車, while in Chinese is 车
Secondly, when a few base words are used to make another work, it will have different meanings in both languages. For example, bicycle in Japanese is
自転車 which is literally self transfer vehicle
In Chinese however it is
自行车 which is self go vehicle
But actually, when you're reading, you immediately recognize a set of characters as one word. You won't read it as self transfer vehicle, the whole set of three characters will instantly appear as bicycle to you. So even if you learned Chinese first, you will simple be memorizing sets of characters. And if you learned Japanese later, you need to memorize an alternative set for the same word. Even though English and Malay use the same roman script, you're not confused are you? When you read "air" in Malay, you don't ever think it means air in English right. You know right away it's water.
Another example I can give to convince you is that when people who already know how to speak English learn French, it's not going to be a big problem if some words sound the same but have different meaning.
"Vous souhaitez assister à une classe de langue?" The sentence means "You want to attend a language class?"
The bolded word certainly sounds like the English word assist, and assister without the à also means assist in French. But anyone learning French will someday learn that "assister à" means "to attend" and will recognize it from then on.
Personally I love to learn French too, planning to take up French courses soon with the hope that i could manage to distribute my time well. I believe with any language, reading is the key. The more you read, the more sentences you'll be familiar with.
Next semester gonna start and well, I must come out with a new aspiration indeed. =)
