Japanese is generally placed at the top of the list of the most difficult languages to learn. English speakers in particular find this conversational system to be tricky due to the fact that it is characterized by some peculiarities. These peculiarities are what make people wonder how native speakers manage to communicate with each other in the first place. But is Japanese as difficult to learn as people claim it is? There are countless online articles that support the idea that this communication system is not nearly as difficult as people perceive it to be, but on the other hand there is also scholarly research that attest the exact opposite. So, what is the truth? Well, even though the language has some challenges, like getting used to the writing system, it is fairly easy to learn if you study with a Japanese language teacher .

In terms of grammar structure, Japanese is like Korean and Chinese, not to mention that it adopts the Chinese kanji characters into the writing system. Besides these similarities, it has nothing in common with other languages. So what actually makes it difficult? What is in fact difficult is that it will take you some time to master the language. This means that you will not become an expert after only a few Japanese language lessons. It will take you the same amount of time it would a French speaker to be able to perfectly converse in Spanish. Even if the two languages have a common Latin root, there is still a certain degree of difficulty.

To succeed in mastering the language, you have to be able to ignore the cynics and the defeats. Japanese is a colorful and means of communication, being spoken by 140 million people around the globe. The task of mastering this conversational system is made even simpler owing the fact that there are quite a few English loan words in Japanese. These loan words will give you the head start that you need in order to understand and to make yourself understood. Examples include “Internet”(pron. intaanetto) and romantic”( pron. romanchikku). Basically, you can say that you have won the linguistic lottery.

While pronunciation may be fairly easy, grammar will take you some time to understand how it works. But the good news is that you have simplified tenses. More precisely, there is no future tense, which means that “I clean” or “I am going to clean” are said in the exact same way. This may sound confusing, but the context will tell you what the speaker means. Moreover, reading and writing are not impossible to learn since there are so many apps designed to help you in the process, not to mention that there are countless textbooks you can use to upgrade your skills.

To conclude, without some guidance everything will appear difficult in the beginning. This is why you should find a tutor to help you. If there are no schools nearby, you can go online on websites like Nihongo teachers.com which are especially created to bring together foreign learners and teachers. Once you find a teacher, you can arrange an online meeting and of course start learning.