My grandmother was Japanese, and I was stationed in Okinawa. I've been taking Japanese language classes for about two years. I've studied Japanese off and on for at least 10 years; up until recently it's all been self-study.
My personal observation is that when you begin learning Romanji, you may learn faster initially, but it handicaps you later. Romanji is not standardized. So, if you pick up any 'handy guidebook of phrases' and try to use it, pronouncing unfamiliar words from Romanji can be difficult. In addition, certain subtleties cannot be accurately depicted using romanji. (ha vs wa comes to mind)
If your intent is to learn some Japanese words and phrases, feel free to skip the kana. But, if you plan to truly learn the language, learn hirigana first. This saves you from a lot of 'unlearning' later when you need to start using kana. Lastly, if you start with romanji, and then later switch to kana, it's a struggle to slowly labor through reading the kana. Start with kana, and you develop your reading skills in tandem with vocabulary and sentence structure.
My grandmother was Japanese,
My grandmother was Japanese, and I was stationed in Okinawa. I've been taking Japanese language classes for about two years. I've studied Japanese off and on for at least 10 years; up until recently it's all been self-study.
My personal observation is that when you begin learning Romanji, you may learn faster initially, but it handicaps you later. Romanji is not standardized. So, if you pick up any 'handy guidebook of phrases' and try to use it, pronouncing unfamiliar words from Romanji can be difficult. In addition, certain subtleties cannot be accurately depicted using romanji. (ha vs wa comes to mind)
If your intent is to learn some Japanese words and phrases, feel free to skip the kana. But, if you plan to truly learn the language, learn hirigana first. This saves you from a lot of 'unlearning' later when you need to start using kana. Lastly, if you start with romanji, and then later switch to kana, it's a struggle to slowly labor through reading the kana. Start with kana, and you develop your reading skills in tandem with vocabulary and sentence structure.