My eyes are burning, as is my throat, as is my face, and is the skies of Sheffield. Hayfever is killing me, just as these poxy exams are. Glorious weather this weekend but sadly I can't enjoy it thanks to the constraints of my final exam of second year. On Thursday, I woke up at 7am and travelled up to Hillsborough for a 9am, 3 hour exam on Contemporary Japanese Society. Sounds interesting doesn't it?

Not really. I ended up finishing it in time and got all my questions answered, but still felt as if it was a little too much of a sociological analysis than outright debate. Tbf, I followed my lecturers advice of stating my own opinion and expressing a unique view of Japan. I didn't just glance over the lecture notes and rehash everything, I did express my own ideas on these concepts - which, in the words of my lecturer is the 'A Grade'.

I completely ran out of steam towards the end, and what started off as a nice little essays about the Japanese Constitution and the social effects of the rapid economic growth was a tainted somewhat by the final question about homogeneity - which I sorted of answered very loosely and didn't really plan out. Either it will be a work of genius or a simple crazy guy rant.

Still... I did it. And that's the most important thing. I couldn't give two shits about grades this year - there is so much I've learnt that doesn't need to be given some grade. Who cares about a 2:2 or 2:1 - its about getting the job done.

Onwards to my second and final exam - which is the big one. Japanese Language IV. How I have thought about this as being a complete useless thing. I've now reached a point where I am merely cramming vocab and grammar structures for this. I know roughly what will be on the exam (unlike Semester 1 where I rushed into it and didn't revise the topics adequately.) However, I still feel as if, something bad is lurking on that page when I open it up on Thursday. I just know - something will be there that I can't answer. The Japanese to English translation is going to be proably the hardest, as its the only one I'm not sure on how I will tackle it. I reckon no-one will get a first on this section. Our marker is a grammar pedant! Probably only professional translators could succed. The second bit, the reading comprehension is probably my worse - but again, I'm a victim more to not understanding the context, rushing through it and/or not getting the kanji/grammar etc. The final bit is a mini-sakubun on statistics, which I can sorta do, but am not 100% confident. At most it will be a very bad literal English to Japanese translation with some of my own work thrown in for good measure.

But still, the point is to do my best. I'm certainly not attempting to learn extra vocab, grammar and kanji over the summer for merely 'passing an exam' - I'm doing it for the Japanese. At most the exam seems like a huge side distraction for that and more of a pithy little bit of paper to satisfy my teachers. I really prefer doing more 'practical' Japanese - which is why next year is essential and this year is pretty naff. I guess learning statistics in Japanese is supposed to prepare us for the dissertation in year IV.

Anyways, taking last semester as a prime example - I hardly failed (it was just the one rushed section that screwed my grade up. But as I sit here looking at all this crazy grammatical nonsense, I do question my own sanity about studying Japanese.

Oh well. Its just vocab that is letting me down. I kinda know the grammar and can translate okay. As long I don't panic like last time - I'll be okay.

This summer is going to be one of study sadly. I need to do the joyo kanji and head up all the grammar I've done. I might head up to Durham during my time back home to try and meet some Japanese people who want some language exchanges or whatever. My speaking has gotten so bad - I've forgotten so many basic words in Japanese! >_<

Anyways, as the longest day comes about soon - so does the longest exam in the world. But I'll be finished next Thursday afternoon. And that is what is driving me on for these final few days.