Begin Japanese Language Study Part 1

This is an article that I wrote for the website keikokun that appears to be down. I didn't want my article to be lost so I have reprinted it here.

Introduction

I often get asked why do I study Japanese and after much thought here is my response. First, a little bit of annoying background info.

I grew up in South Tampa in a small city called Port Tampa that is near MacDill Air Force Base. Early in the morning I watched an amazing Tokusatsu show called Ultraman (1966-1967) that was about a giant alien from outer space that protects the earth from giant monster invasions. Ultraman was airing on TV in syndication during the 70’s. Following Ultraman, my life changed forever back in 1977 when Star Wars debuted. My two sisters took me to see it and I have been a fanatical science fiction fan ever since. Shortly after Star Wars, I was looking for something to feed my addiction and that lead me to Sandy Frank’s Battle of the Planets, a US localization of Gatchaman (1972-1974,) featuring the added in R2D2 clone, 7 Zark 7 and his robotic dog, 1 Rover 1. Battle of the Planets was about 4 teenagers and 1 young boy known as G Force who battle the evil planet Spectra. Battle of the Planets was a logical transition from Ultraman because G Force often battle giant robots that resembled monsters.

It is only natural that in junior high I would meet Pat Conroy, who was born at one of the military bases in Yokohama, Japan. He was a mega Robotech fan and we got together because we were the only two fans of anime in the junior high school back in 1986. He had a collection of videotapes that were recorded from Japanese TV anime of the 70’s and 80’s. So we would get together to watch anime with no subtitles. This was frustrating for me because I had to make up my own storylines.

Also I would buy Japanese toy robots and model kits from specialty comic book stores that used to exist in Tampa and are now gone. Anyway, I would get frustrated trying to assemble a model robot and not being able to read the Japanese instructions or buying Newtype or one of the Tokusatsu magazines and not being able to read the article. So after graduating from high school in 1990, I spent some time at Hillsborough Community College, without any real purpose, until Pat told me he was going to start studying Japanese at St Pete Junior College in Clearwater.

I officially began Japanese language study in 1995 with Keiko Witsil. So that is my answer. It was mainly to relieve my fandom frustrations and to be able to rent video tapes from Kotobuki Japanese Market without having to rely on English dubs or subtitles.