Customer Reviews

In-Flight Japanese: Learn Before You Land

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The blurb on the back of the package claims that if you work on this programme during your flight, you will learn enough of the language to get by. Unless your flight will be equal in length to a flight to Mars, you will certainly not be able to absorb enough of this 60-minute course to even nearly get by. This is a CD "update" to Fast & Easy Japanese (also by Living Language). In-Flight Japanese boasts over 400 essential words & phrases (a 100 word increase from Fast & Easy). Less is sometimes better. Each phrase on In-Flight is only spoken once (rather than twice as on the Fast & Easy series), not enough if you want to gauge your progress. The native speakers are for the most part speaking clearly, but WAY too fast. It comes with a "boarding pass"(booklet with the entire script, but no Japanese script, very bad when you end up needing help from a native speaker). If you are already familiar with the language, the In-Flight series might actually get you up to speed in between the in-flight movie & the meal (soda pop & peanuts). If you are trying to learn Japanese, try Pimsleur's Japanese I thru III (expensive but effective). Pimsleur Japanese has 30 lessons in each unit, and will get you SPEAKING (the course is audio only) straight away. Pimsleur is by far the best course available. If you are short on time and need a "survival" course, get Language/30 Japanese (by Educational Services Corp). Language/30 comes with 2 tapes and a booklet (has Romanised script as well as Japanese characters, in case you need help from a native speaker). The truly serious language learner will be wise to go through all 3 Pimsleur courses and finish up with Living Language Ultimate Japanese Level I & II.

I have taken beginning Japanese and was familiar wit the language before purchasing this CD. The lessons are fast and useful as a reference or to catch up on some phrases I do not reccomend this for beginners trying to learn Japanese. Other products like Japnese for dummies and Instant Immersion do a better job of introducing you to the language. In flight Japanes had better examples than the Korean version. A very patient person can learn some basics from this CD in about a month but If you are looking to learn faster this is not the CD for you.

I have several in-flight language CDs. This one blows my mind because Japanese is hard. Be ready for a difficult language. I think it's way tougher than Chinese. Every sentence seems to have 4x the words and syllables as one in English, Spanish, or French.

So the idea of the product is still a good one, but it's a tough way to learn this particular language. Wow, get started early.

I've used several titles in this series - Czech, Japanese, Italian, Greek, Turkish, and Korean. I find that having some consistency in learning the same phrases from language to language really makes it easier, because I know what phrases I should be able to recall every time, if I can just search my mind (or the pocket size-booklet that comes with the CD) for it.

These CDs are not intended to teach you any complete language! These are handy phrases that smooth things over during your trip. Knowing how to say "thank you," "please," and the most crucial phrase of all, "excuse me," makes my trips much more pleasant. If you want to actually learn Japanese, you will need something more intensive, but if you just want to be able to ask where the train station is, this will do the trick.

No, you probably can't learn all the phrases on your flight to Japan or anywhere else. I put the CD in my car's CD player about a month before I leave on a trip and listen to it driving back and forth to work. Some minor flaws in the series are that some of the native speakers speak more clearly with others and there is little attempt to customize the phrases to each culture (do I really need to know how to say chopsticks in Czech?). But overall, I've been very happy with the series and knowing these phrases usually gets me out of one or two tight spots per trip.

One example is when I was getting bothered by a vendor in the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, who kept following me and asking me in English why I didn't say hello to him. I turned and with exaggerated politeness gave him a dramatic "merhaba," and he laughed and left me alone. A few local words can turn you from an lost American tourist to someone of at least vague sophistication who no longer looks like an easy mark. Or at least you can be someone who can get a friendly laugh from a Japanese restaurant owner when trying to compliment her on the meal. So if your goal is to actually learn the language, look elsewhere, but this series is great if you just want to be confident and polite.