Why Japanese?

Hi! My name is Elaine and I am a student at Barnard College of Columbia University. I am currently taking a First-Year Japanese course here. Since I was little, I loved Japanese culture. I grew up watching Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z with my siblings. I enjoyed spending hours reading manga. Lately,  I started listening to Japanese music. I always wanted to learn Japanese so that I can experience the culture firsthand. I want to be able to read Japanese manga, to watch anime without subtitles and to understand lyrics to Japanese songs. I am planning on studying abroad in Japan during Spring semester of my junior year. I am excited to learn more vocabulary and to be able to converse in Japanese with other people. I hope that my year abroad will be full of adventure and excitement~! :] I can't wait to visit~~

During the first two weeks of class, I found memorizing and writing Hiragana to be the most difficult task. I think that my Japanese writing is heavily influenced by the Chinese background. I hope that throughout the semester, I can improve the handwriting and be somewhat fluent in Japanese.