tadoku reading challenge round 5 – week 3

Week 1: 157.45
Week 2: 266
Week 3: 403.15!
Total: 826.6

I had an amazing week for reading! It helped that it was also minimmersion weekend and I dedicated Sunday mostly for reading. I finished 逆転裁判 and started three more books as they’re of varying difficulty and I worried that if I only read a difficult book I’d get demotivated. I also started my goal of reading 君に届け from the beginning, and I’m now on volume 4. I can read a volume a day if I don’t stop to look up unknown words – I’m trying to rely on the context, but if I’m really stuck I’ll look it up. Honestly I haven’t read this much in Japanese in a week, month or even a year. This challenge has shown me that I can make reading in Japanese a habit, and when the challenge ends I will continue to read as much as I have been.

So, what are the plans for the final week (plus two days)? I’m going to see if I can read a volume of 君に届け every two days (as I have a few days out for work – but I could read on the train – and social stuff so reading time is more limited), continue reading my other books, and try to have breaks with podcasts and reading scripts, and also drama since it’s been a while. I’ll most likely break 1k points (!!!) and once this is over I definitely won’t miss tracking my reading all of the time. Instead I’ll continue to update my Bookmeter account with completed books, since seeing the graph go up is a great feeling! I still don’t understand some words and sentences but that hasn’t stopped me from enjoying my reading. Not understanding everything is what put me off reading lots in the first place, and whilst I have gaps I’m learning new words every day. The more you read, the more you learn!