Best Program to Learn Japanese

If you are moving to Japan, or plan to be, you must learn the local language at least enough to get by.  One of the only phrases I knew upon landing in Japan was "tamonegi nashi" to be said at the counter of McDonalds (Makkudonarudo, Makku) to remove the onions!

That being said, I've tried out tons of language software since my arrival.  One of the best but most difficult to use has been Rosetta Stone.  The premise of the program is simple, click the picture or sentence that corresponds to the speaker.  The hard part honestly is sticking with it, Rosetta Stone is heavily vocabulary based, and you will learn a lot of less useful words in the beginning.  It teaches in a totally different way, similar to how children learn by context.  I liked this approach because I am not much for reading a language book.

I highly recommend that you get started months before you come to Japan, because Moving to Tokyo is not an easy thing to do.