Since the JLPT is not offered in the US this July, I will not take it. I may take it in December. To compensate, I will show some progress here.
Language learning is a bit unique type of learning, especially 2nd language learning. Most学习方式要求你多用脑子。学第二语言的时候，有时最好少用脑子。 In other words, it is I/O-heavy, not CPU-heavy.
I will demonstrate my progress in 日本 and tiếng Việt in this post. I have not spent any time writing in Japanese or Vietnamese, so how will I do so?
I will do so by showing a couple news articles from today (5/15) and then translating it.
Vietnamese
”翁 Vladimir Medinsky, 长团 ?? of 俄, day 15/5 notified (通报) 派团 Russia that they will wait for the Ukraine đàm phán group to start talks starting at 10:00AM 5/16/2025 (local/地方 time) in Instabul, 土耳其🇹🇷。"
“We had a very reliable agreement with various 领导 of 世界。They had 解释立场 of us. Ahead, we will wait for Ukraine, they should arrive and meet”, Mr. Medinsky said.
Mr Medinsky, 助理总统 of 俄, with 总统 Vladimir Putin had 提出再启动 đàm phán 直接 with Ukraine 在 Instanbul “but no have 条件坚（？）决。“
“We already đàm phán”, 翁 Medinsky added.
Errors
- It turns out that I could not recognize that đàm phán meant 谈判. I guess I have not seen these two characters often enough.
- I did not notice any other noticeable errors, but obviously I can’t detect many types of errors as a learner.
Japanese
In Tachikawa(?), …., manual and “not-allowed-person attack training”
Tokyo Tachikawa city 3rd elementary school, 2 males pressed, where 5 school workers were attecked, 15-th day (yesterday) happened for 1 week. School workers good judgement and brave conduct, 儿童 safety was protected, opened school protect against violence ?????. Each place’s strategy strengtened and broadened.
Errors
- 押し入り: Doesn’t mean 押 (press), it means 押入 （force-enter).
- 浮き彫りになった: “highlighted, became clear”
- “開かれた学校での防犯の難し” grammar error. did not correctly guess the meaning of the sentence.
Summary
I show the level of my reading skills so far. Both Japanese and Vietnamese are mostly readable to me, because I have an understanding of Chinese characters, English, and the common non-Chinese words.
However, I am still facing errors on passages and my reading speed is not close to 200 WPM yet.
My listening, writing, and speaking skills are worse, mainly because I do not practice them at all. I do practice Japanese listening, but after ~100 hours cannot understand without subtitles yet. I can only map sounds to text, and then understand.
Even though I have spent hundreds of hours, I am satisfied with my progress. There is a limit to how much one can memorize in 1 hour or 1 day. As a result, there is a limit to how much one can accomplish in 1 lifetime.
I expect my skills to continue to improve as I allocate ~1 hour/day to language learning. There will be a limit, but I expect to it to pay off.