Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World

Japanese
Japanese is another language that intimidates many would-be learners, but
don’t let the naysayers fool you! Like all languages, it has many aspects to it
that actually make it easier than others. Many Westerners have successfully
learned the language, so you can too, if you are dedicated.
Learning kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese) is likely the most
intimidating part of learning the language. But there’s good news: what I said
about learning characters in Chinese applies equally to Japanese. A small
number of frequent kanji accounts for the vast majority of the language you
are likely to encounter day to day. For example, just fewer than two hundred
characters account for 50 percent of all kanji used on Japanese Wikipedia,
while just fewer than five hundred characters account for 75 percent.
Japanese has three phonetic alphabets (Hiragana, Katakana, and Romaji),
which will allow you to start reading Japanese before you know even a single
kanji. Many Japanese learner materials are written in Romaji, which can be
learned almost instantly (it’s how Japanese words are rendered in the Latin
alphabet), while most Japanese children’s books are written completely in
Hiragana, and there are lots of very familiar borrowed words written in
Katakana, both of which can be learned in a weekend. And if learner texts and
children’s books aren’t your thing, many manga (Japanese comic books) and
news sites like NHK News Web Easy add little Hiragana reading guides next
to kanji so you can start reading real Japanese no matter your level of kanji
knowledge.

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Pronunciation in Japanese is among its easiest aspects. The language has
an extremely small number of sounds, almost all of which are found in
Romance languages. And you will be happy to know that Japanese sounds are
one-to-one, meaning each Hiragana, Katakana, or Romaji sound can be
pronounced only one way! For example, the Japanese sound e (written in
Hiragana and 
in Katakana) is always pronounced the exact same way no
matter what word it appears in, unlike the English letter e, which has numerous
different pronunciations, as shown in the words “bet,” “beer,” “alert,” “here,”
“there,” etc.).
Even better, Japanese is not a tonal language, so you don’t have to produce
the proper tone for each syllable (like you do in Mandarin) to be understood.
Japanese does have some high–low distinctions (e.g., hashi pronounced high–
low means “chopsticks” while it means “bridge” when pronounced low–high),
but these distinctions are fairly small in number and the context will almost
always make it clear which word is being referred to. Regardless, learning
kanji eliminates any potential ambiguity.
Another major advantage Japanese offers native speakers of English is the
large number of borrowed English words used. When in doubt, you can try to
say an English word using Japanese pronunciation and you may be completely
understood!
Granted, there are indeed some challenging aspects to the language, but
like everything, you get used to them if you get exposure, use the language,
stay motivated, and keep pushing yourself to learn all the time.
For much more information to help you on your Japanese mission, see
fi3m.com/japanese.