Practice listening to Japanese, part 3: podcasts redux

Lately, since I began my preparations for the N2/JLPT2 certification test coming later this year, I decided to really focus more on listening comprehension. Although I passed the listening section of the N4/JLPT3 test in 2009 with a reasonable score, the N2 requires an almost fluent ability to listen to dialogue and conversation, and I know from experience that I am far from this level when I listen to my wife and her friends chat. My wife, who came to the US 10-11 years ago, told me how when she first came, she often listened to American radio, and American music.¹

As I live in the US, Japanese radio shows are hard to come by, and I don’t own a lot of music CDs. So, a while back, I decided to make good use of the Internet, and found plenty of online content: news shows and podcasts. At the time, I listened only to Japan Broadcasting station (nippon hōsō, ニッポン放送) which is easily available on iTunes in podcast form. Of those shows, the two I still like consistently the best are 谷村新司 – まあるい日曜日 and YAGアニメラボ零〜ゼロ〜 for their straightforward content and easy listening. Other shows, which focus on comedy only, are definitely for advanced listeners and often utilize Kansai dialect which is harder for Japanese-language students to understand (since we haven’t even mastered standard Japanese yet), so I don’t listen to other shows on Nippon Hoso much anymore.

Lately though, I found another podcast station in Japan called RKB Mainichi Broadcasting company which I initially found on iTunes, though it’s easier to subscribe to individual shows from the website instead, rather than one big feed through iTunes like Nippon Hoso. The shows here vary in content more, with less comedy, and more topical shows including food, advice, and general news or talk shows. I like the show はっちゃけ the best so far, as it’s a 90-minute talk show which posts every Sunday and features two hosts: a guy named Eitaro and a gal named Mami-go. What you get is a good, basic dialogue between the hosts with some comedy, some advice, and so on. A very well-rounded show, and you can listen to both feminine and masculine Japanese, so it’s perfect for Japanese language students. I often spend the whole week going through one show as it’s too long to listen all at once, and I like pace myself. Also, I think the hosts have great chemistry and the Japanese is funny but not too difficult to follow like some comedy Japanese shows.

You can’t get much better than this.

I do like other shows too, including the daily スタミナラジオ news show. This appears on weekdays and usually features three guest speakers who talk about news subjects like the economy, travel, and sports, but sometimes the topics are too difficult to follow and I space out, while other topics are pretty engaging like one show about food-carts in India. Try it out, and see what works for you.

As stated in previous posts, the best way to improve listening in a foreign language, I believe is both consistency and variety, so having a live radio show that is both interesting and something you can reasonably follow is a guaranteed way to improve, even if the process is slow and almost imperceptible.²

Good luck!

¹ Her taste in music differs from my quite a bit, but I still love her. Just kidding.

² No joke, when I go back and watch my daughter’s little cartoon programs or even listen to JLPT listening sections, sometimes they seem kind of slow now. Frequent listening to normal speed conversation, even in small doses on a consistent basis, really does tune the ear. I can’t wait to go to Japan this spring and try things out.