If you’re interested in learning the language, but don’t have 3 years to prepare:

Jisho.org is an online English-Japanese dictionary that helps you find words by selecting radicals from a chart. You can learn to break down 99% of common kanji into their radicals within a week and then it’s a matter of selecting 2 or 3 radicals in the chart and matching the picture. Finding all the kanji in a sentence (or more likely, the three kanji on a menu item) should give you a decent idea of the full meaning. Now you point at the menu, say the standard question from your phrase book, give a polite nod, hold out your money at the appropriate time, and you’re nihongo jouzu.

Edit: I would only recommend this method if we’re not using Google Lens. Lens is way faster and you can still decipher the menu with your dictionary after your food arrived.

Hiragana is a kind of alphabet imo. It maps a single character to a single sound.

Inb4 we argue about what counts as a “single sound”.

I agree that not everything is related to Donald Trump and America’s system of government.

I wish some subjects could be apolitical: there’s no reason for trans healthcare to be politicized while other healthcare is seen as a basic need. But as we know, even “healthcare is a basic need” is a topic of political discussion in some countries (cough). The choice to make it “apolitical” is itself a political act. So yes, everything is political. From the food you eat to the music you listen to.

Beer is beeru, hotel is hoteru, taxi is taxi. The only real difficulty I encountered is when the waitress asks you what she should write on your omurice and you can’t think of any animal names.

You have to think as an American and see that it’s about cars, drive-throughs and lane merges.

True, I switched to IEMs with replacable cables, so at least I can spend a little more on the headphones without fearing that a tiny crack will make them worthless. The cables I bought are pretty durable though, seems like the right twisted copper can survive going in a pocket after all.

I am running CrDroid on a €150 Redmi shitbox and I don’t have any trouble opening websites. I don’t even look at processing power when picking a phone, all I need is headphone jack, fingerprint unlock, e-sim: whoop, filtered 1000 phones down to 2.

But using a phone for 10 years? You’ve used yours since 2016? Or do you mean that no phone ever lasted for 10 years, but this next one surely will?

Instead of the zapper, use the dropper and make it a permanent rule in your ublock