China - the next Japan?

Seems an unlikely comparison to make, but there are similarities - fast growing economy, export focus, in the Far East, er, black hair and foxy chicks? Hmm, Still, the Economist wonder if the rapid growth of China might follow a similarly spectacular path as Japan. I doubt it.

(Click on the picture to see how it pans out)

Far more likely is the stagnation of the UK economy in a Japanese fashion. Fashionable zombieism infects the UK banking sector. Hmmm.

日記帳１番

今日、昼ごはん時に急がしすぎましたが日記帳を書きませんでした。　今から１２月６日まで、毎日日本語を勉強したい。

Hmm, it's kinda a late and I want to go to sleep, so that will have to do.

One new word mind you, or at least one new version of a word I thought I knew. 日記帳（にっきちょう） means 'diary'. No new grammar point as I have not had a chance to look at one today.

Does anyone know anything about オードリー?

I mean, what are these guys about? What is their humour based on? Weird.

Here's a typically inane clip.

オードリー 春日の嫁オーディション
Uploaded by angelbabycupid - Sitcom, sketch, and standup comedy videos.

Anki updates

Exciting news from Anki, the excellent Leitner-derived spaced repetition system.

It creeps ever closer to the magic v1.0, now at v0.9.9.6, but along the way it has been seeing ports across to an ever increasing number of platforms, beyond the usual desktop varieties of Windows, Mac, Ubuntu and Fedora. You can now run Anki on:

• vanilla iPod/iPhone
• hacked Maemo iPhone
• Maemo N770
• Windows Mobile

and for me, most excitingly, in the pipeline there is

• Android

This will be the shift that really makes SRS the ultra-powerful tool that evidence suggests it can be.

DS Language learning

Not sure there's anyone out there any more, but worth mentioning this to see the response...

Just seen that there are two Japanese learning games on the DS here in the UK

• My Japanese Coach
• Mind Your Language: Learn Japanese

Not sure how good these are, but one reviewer rated the first of these (MYL isn't out until next month)...

If you already have a DS and are serious about learning Japanese, you should get this game to help along your study, particularly if you are not fortunate enough to have a Japanese speaker giving you regular lessons.

So this may not be much use for me and the boy, but I'm interested as it would help my visual learning bias. There is one pretty major grip about kanji stroke order, which could be really annoying, but as a tool for learning - imagine having a DS version of fb's KanjiBox app (v2 in beta now!). How cool would that be?

The same reviewer also mentions a couple of Japanese titles:

I've purchased some Japanese games for the DS recently, which have been useful for Kanji and Kana learning (Kanji Sonomama DS Rakubikjiten and Tadashii Kanji Kakitori kun - both available from Amazon Japan).

Anyone used any of these? Let me know and I may try getting hold of them.