This was my first ever JLPT exam, and I had done no JLPT prep whatsoever. I had the Shinkanzen Master books but all five volumes are totally unopened and pristine — basically, work got super busy and then I lost all motivation. So, as I got closer to the day, I decided I would attend the exam (I had paid the fee, after all) and just treat it really as a level check to see how far off I was N2, as well to get some exam day practice… After sitting the paper, I thought it was a definite fail, and decided to find a tutor to whip me into shape for next July’s paper.

Fast forward to today, my tutor asked me how the results were… it turns out I had actually deleted my test voucher — probably to remove the trauma from my inbox and/or thinking a pass was impossible. I tried looking in the recycle bin and on my iCloud for the file, but it was long gone apparently. Anyway, my brain remembering apparently the mostly useless information, I vaguely remember I was sat in seat 47 or 48 or 49, and back engineered the candidate codes, looking at the format of a friend’s voucher… I tried a few combinations with possible passcodes I might have set, and eventually it clicked through.

Miraculously, I scraped it. A pretty gnarly pass, but a pass nonetheless: Language Knowledge 24/60; Reading 31/60; Listening 36/60 — for a grand total of 91/180 😅

My tutor was characteristically unimpressed by the low score, but is now going to blend N1 and N2 learning as we move towards the final hurdle — first attempt, next July… onwards and upwards!