Just yesterday I wrote about learning Hiragana.

What I didn’t mention is that I had already learned to recognize and read most Katakana characters through Duolingo.

At least, that’s what I thought.

Only after opening a Japanese workbook did I realize something.

Recognizing a character isn’t the same as being able to write it.

Writing each character by hand with a pen forces me to remember it in a completely different way.

Call me old-fashioned, but pen and paper simply seem to work better for me.

Even after repeatedly writing Hiragana and Katakana, I still confuse some characters.

To my untrained eye, a few Hiragana and Katakana characters look surprisingly similar, yet they are read completely differently.

Then another question naturally appeared.

When do I use Hiragana?

And when do I use Katakana?

I don’t know the answer yet.

I’ll keep writing.

One character at a time.