i want to learn japenese?

Trust me: you'll never get very far with it.

You can do it, because I did. Don't listen to the nay sayers up there. First understand that it will be work, lots, even if you just want to watch anime it'll take you years.

Set a schedule, make a curriculum and stick with it. Expect slow progress but progress none the less. Understand you will be learning things like "which way is the bus stop" before "moon prism power."

I would recommend, if you take this solo route, to go onto demonoid.com or piratesbay.org and download "Japanese for Busy People 1,2,3" or "Japanese for Young People" if you're young. I also heard that "Genki" is a good book, but I didn't use it so I can't say.

Go through the books lesson by lesson and each lesson repeatedly until you can understand. But your pronounciation will be horrible so check out something like www.livemocha.com which seems promising and there are people who can help you with your pronunciation.

The main ingredient is perseverance, don't kid yourself about fast progress and keep with it, at least 4 nights a week.

For me, I learned to speak decently, read well, understand much more than I can speak, moved to Japan and lived for a year and a half and my wife is Japanese and I can chat with my in-laws.

Yeah its difficult but it's possible.

.... a college major in retrospect would have been a lot less time consuming though.

I suggest the same thing too. You should find a class to learn Japanese. The sites I'm about to give you won't teach you Japanese but it will supplement it.

http://www.lang-8.com/

It's a social network site kinda like livejournal. You can blog here in Japanese about what you learn and etc on here. Native speakers will correct your Japanese in exchange if you help correct their English.

http://www.smart.fm/

This is another social network site like live journal. It has list of words created by users on there. You can test yourself with a flash program they have there call I know! It will give you 10 words on that list created by a user. It will ask you 3 words at a time. I'll ask you if you know the word. Assuming you do you'll click on yes and will give you a multiple choice of that word. Get it right it'll go to the next word then the next. After the 3rd word it gives you a new one from the list. Everytime you get it correct it'll be harder on you.

I suggest if you're going to use smart.fm you should find a list for Japanese also you have to learn Hiragana, then Katakana, and kanji. I believe they have a Japanese course on there.

Get used to studying the Hiragana and Katakana rapidly. After you get that down, hinder Roomanji just like the plague. Review the grammar and vocabulary very in general or your are going to get misplaced. Practice talking it at all times. Do tons of study on it. Also, I reccomend discovering a organization or supply that may support you with the pronunciations, tradition, and tone.

http://www.infocobuild.com/language/japanese/japan...

This site can help you learn Japanese. This contains many online resources containing Japanese Kanji, grammar lessons, vocabulary and useful expressions. And you can find helpful study materials for Hiragana and Katakana.

Take classes in school. Seriously, Japanese is one of the worst things to attemt to teach yourself.