Why I'm studying Japanese

I decided to study Japanese for a few reasons. My first reason is due to a trip to Spain a few summers ago. I previously learned Spanish in high school, but my lack of practice since then resulted in me forgetting most of it. Therefore, while in some rural areas of Spain, I found it a bit difficult to communicate as few people spoke well in English. Thus, I thought it would have been more of an experience if I was able to communicate with people in their native tongue. This reflection caused me to pursue learning new languages, I first started by learning German for a year so that I would be able to speak with my family that lives in Germany the next time I visit them. I'm by no means fluent, but this past summer when I visited Germany, I found it to be far more insightful and fun to speak to people in German. This now leads to Japan. I plan on going to Tokyo next summer for the Summer Olympics and a good friend of mine with be competing. Also, I plan to explore other parts of Japan and think it would be valuable to have some knowledge of the language before visiting.

Also, my grandfather speaks English, German, and Japanese, so I thought it would be a fun trio of languages to take on myself.

The most challenging part, but also the most fun, of learning Japanese thus far has been learning Hirigana. When learning German and Spanish, learning a new writing system was unnecessary, so I only had to focus on vocabulary and grammar. I'm excited to perfect my writing in Hirigana and Katakana as it's a beautiful script to master.