Five passages of real-length Japanese with furigana but no word-by-word help: a diary, an essay, a news report, a conversation and a literary scene. Read first, then check yourself against the translation and the questions.
About 4 minutes to read
The earlier lessons glossed every piece. Here the glosses are gone. You have furigana and the method from the previous lesson, nothing else. The aim is to experience what reading real Japanese is like and to find the grammar you can already handle.
How to use each passage
Read it once straight through, without stopping.
Find the last word of each sentence. Then find the clauses that describe nouns.
Only then look at the translation, and the questions.
If a passage is too hard, that is useful information: note which lesson's grammar it uses and go back.
Passage 1 · A diary
先週の土曜日、友達と一緒に新しくできた水族館へ行きました。
朝早く出発したのに、道がとても込んでいて、着いたのは昼過ぎでした。
でも、大きな水槽の中を泳ぐ魚を見て、疲れも忘れてしまいました。
Last Saturday I went with a friend to the newly opened aquarium.
Although we set out early in the morning, the roads were very crowded, and we didn't arrive until after noon.
But when I saw the fish swimming in the big tank, I forgot all about being tired.
What matters most in learning a foreign language is not mastering perfect grammar but the attitude of trying to speak even if you make mistakes.
This is because language is something that sticks only once it has been used, and knowledge you don't use is soon forgotten.
Passage 3 · A news report
昨日午後三時ごろ、東京都内の駅で停電が発生し、約二時間にわたって電車が止まった。
この影響で、約三万人の利用客が足止めされたが、けが人は出ていないという。
鉄道会社は原因を調べるとともに、再発を防ぐ対策を検討していると発表した。
Yesterday at about 3 p.m. a power outage occurred at a station in central Tokyo, and trains stopped for about two hours.
As a result, around 30,000 passengers were stranded, but no injuries have reportedly occurred.
The railway company announced that it is investigating the cause and considering measures to prevent a recurrence.
Passage 4 · A conversation
「ねえこの前話した映画、もう見た？」
「ううんまだ見てないんだ。見たいとは思ってるけど、時間がなくて
「じゃあ今度の週末一緒に行かない？実は私ももう一回見たいなと思ってたの」
「いいねそうしよう
"Hey, have you seen that movie we talked about the other day yet?"
"No, not yet. I do want to see it, but I haven't had time."
"Then how about going together this weekend? Actually, I was thinking I'd like to see it once more."
"Sounds good. Let's do that."
That day, the old man standing on the station platform slowly closed his eyes, as if trying to remember something, as he listened to the sound of a train approaching from far away.
However many long years had passed, the one thing he could never forget was the promise of that summer day.
What to do if it felt hard
Make a list of the grammar you could not name. Look each up in the lesson on that subject.
Read the same passage again tomorrow. The second reading is nearly always much easier.
Then read something you actually want to read, and use this course the way you would use a dictionary: only when you are stuck.