Tainted Report

One thing I've always been fascinated by is Japanese culture. I love the technology, I love the bullet trains, I love the atmosphere of Tokyo (or what I can infer from the videos and photos of it), I love Japan. It is incredibly interesting to me, for whatever reason.

It's even gotten to the point where I have started to learn Japanese. My friend gave me a copy of Rosetta Stone with the Japanese pack on it, and I bought My Japanese Coach to see if that was helpful. And while that hobby has taken a little break as I've become more busy with school and diving, it's still something that I would love to pursue.

But Japanese... well, it isn't really a very useful language to know if you are a citizen of the United States. There aren't very many Japanese speakers in the US, so it's not like Japanese translators are in high demand. So it seems that pursuing Japanese would be more of a hobby than something I could pursue as a career.

But then I had an epiphany: I also have a pretty large interest in the gaming industry. And where do many premiere gaming industries have their headquarters? Why Japan, of course! I guess I probably should have made that connection sooner, since my borderline obsession with Japan almost completely stems from my love of gaming. It makes perfect sense that both should go together.

If I were to minor in Japanese (which is my plan regardless of what my major ends up being) I would have a huge upper hand in the gaming journalism field. I'm sure many top companies are in need of Japanese correspondents, and it would be awesome to live in Japan, reporting about all the latest news and whatnot. And maybe it would only help on a smaller scale; if I am able to land just one interview with a Japanese developer because I can converse with him, then it was all worth it.

Again, I know that it's a pretty easy connection to see, but I didn't think about it until just know. While I have not been able to make up my mind on whether or not I want to pursue journalism full time, or head down a different career path, it's cool when things fall into place like that. And until I do make that decision, I'll just have to sit back and repeat the phrase "Otokonoko tashi wa juicu onondeimas" into my crappy computer microphone, and continue writing up lackluster blog entries and amateurish video game reviews.