The door of summer
Seiko Mazda was a one of the most famous Japanese idol singer.
I like this song especially lyrics.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
Monday, July 2, 2007
Harry Potter
Finally! It's been less than three weeks to go till the release of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows". What will happen to Harry in the end of the story? Will he die or not? And what about Snape??? I am so excited! Personally I am expecting that there will be lines about Norbert the dragon (appeared in the 1st book's) in the 7th book, I am a big dragon lover like Hagrid.
Harry Potter series have a lot to do with my English study. When I was a child I loved science fictions and fantasies so much, I read Dr. Dolittle, Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea and hundreds of Japanese SF novels. I think learning language is similar to making myself again in another way of logic because when I think about something I use to use only Japanese language but recently I think in both English and Japanese. If a languages consists our thought, the language(words choice and way of speaking) will be our character. So when I started studying English, I wanted to produce myself in English same as I grew up in Japanese. Harry Potter series were ideal books to fill my fundamental part of English. I read all Harry Potter series(so far released) 3 times and I have been
reading aloud Harry Potter and philosopher's stone(1st book) over 30 times after Stephen Fry's audio book. I think it worked well for my English so far, but there is a problem. I am not good at TOEIC or EIKEN examinations. It's obvious, these examinations have nothing to do with hocus-pocus. I'd better try O.W.L. or N.E.W.T. lol
reading aloud Harry Potter and philosopher's stone(1st book) over 30 times after Stephen Fry's audio book. I think it worked well for my English so far, but there is a problem. I am not good at TOEIC or EIKEN examinations. It's obvious, these examinations have nothing to do with hocus-pocus. I'd better try O.W.L. or N.E.W.T. lol
Friday, May 25, 2007
I am sorry, Max!
Ikebukuro is my ex-working place. It`s located northern part of Tokyo and is so called "entrance of Saitama prefecture" because a lot of rail roads are running from Ikebukuro to Saitama prefecture. Last weekend, I had a meeting with my bad friend and went to a Chinese restaurant which is near by north exit of Ikebukuro station. Recently Ikebukuro is famous for the Chinese community that includes Chinese grocery stores and restaurants. When we were hanging around in Ikebukuro my bad friend said to me "I read an article that there is a restaurant which serves dog meat around here, so what do you say?", The restaurant`s entrance was on a tiny alleyway and we went down a staircase to the basement. I asked to a restaurant staff "Do you serve dog meat?" and he said "Yes, sir". The dog meat we ordered was a spicy soup with chopped dog meat. At first the dog meat had the flavour I`ve never experienced but after a couple of scoops I began to get use to it. This time I can`t rate this restaurant properly so no rate. If you were interested in dog meat, why don`t you go to Ikebukuro?
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Mini Bruce Willis
His first appearance was a Japanese TV show. When I saw him for the first time, I couldn`t breath at all. Look at his "masculine" shoulders! Recently he maid his short movies and showing them on his Myspace blog... enjoy! :-)
Mini Die Hard : The battle with Hans
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
The beginning
Sometimes I am asked why I started English study. Actually I don`t have a particular reason for that so I always said it was my new year resolution.
My English-study life has started since Jan 2002. Before the time, I was a normal Japanese guy who thought I could manage the conversation in English if it was necessary. It`s a typical misconception for a Japanese guy who works for a software company because programmers can program in English code therefore I can speak English.
Whereas it was a terrible mistake. On the first day at Nova I got a level check exam and an Australian girl was in charge. We were packed in an enclosure and she showed me a couple of pictures which I was instructed to explain the situation in English. I got extremely nervous... and in the end she said "YOU ARE SEVEN BE desu!" Oh my gosh!! (T_T) I had thought I could have been Lv6 at least, I was devastated. But of course I could not complain about it in English, I was a 7B.
Why Japanese people get so nervous when they have a situation speaking English? This is only from my experience but... Our Japanese start studying English at junior high school first year(12 years old). The first-ever English sentence we learnt was "This is a pen" and the teacher snap the pencil in two and said "This was a pen". Then we applied the sentence to "I am not a pen", "We are not pen" etc etc... Thus we learnt English sentences like mathematical formulas like "One plus one equal two". At the end of junior high school our English lessons got more and more complicated. We had to use past perfect sentence, past perfect progressive sentence and future perfect. "The more grammatically difficult sentence is the cooler" that was typical our perspective. That meant English was not a language but a logic and that image made English highly academic. Therefore when I heard the English sentences which were pronounced by native English speaker, it sounded like bellow.
I learnt difficult words and sentences picked up from News Week or New York Times by Japanese English-teachers but I was not use to hearing casual conversations and slang. So they sound like academical spell. That`s why I got extremely nervous when I joined Nova.
(To be continued...)
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
I made my food blog
Because of too much inappropriate posts, my food contents had to migrate to another place. Plz visit my foodie blog below.
http://foodiekawasaki.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Sunday, March 25, 2007
What would you do, If you got BSE infection?
Five high school students were arrested for skipping out on a YAKINIKU restaurant bill in Osaka Japan on 15th March. When the students had to pay the bill, they invented a pretext that "We got BSE infection because we ate your beef!".
The restaurant manager fought back saying "You can`t become sick so quickly!". But the high school students marched in the restaurant mimicking cow, and bellowed "Moo-Moo!".
The manager telephoned the police immediately and the students were all arrested. At the police office they said "We thought we wouldn`t have to pay the bill, if we said we were infected by BSE. But we don`t know what sort of disease the BSE is".
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
My favorite noba CM
I love noba`s CM and this is my favorite one came out about 10years ago. I put subtitles on it so enjoy.
Friday, March 16, 2007
My mum`s story
My mum is a person who sometimes acts strangely mysteriously.
I moved out from my parent`s house when I entered the University.
And every summer and winter holidays I visited my parents.
First sign of my mum`s enigmatic act I realized was...
When I visited mum on my first year`s summer holiday,
mum was wearing a wristband with spheres carved out from wood and it looked quite nice.
I said,
"Hey mum, that bracelet is cool. Where did you buy it?"
She said,
"I found this from my old stuff box and if you asked me why I am wearing this, the day before yesterday I set fire to my oven and I forgot it. It was really dangerous, daddy told me off strictly, so I decided to put this bracelet on my hand while I use my oven so that I never forget the fire."
"... Cool mum."
Things couldn`t have been worse...
Next winter holiday, there was a walnut crusher doll on the living room table.
The doll was a souvenir when my dad went to Germany on business trip.
And a walnut was crammed in the doll`s opening mouth. It was bit odd.
I asked mum,
"Hey mum, what on earth is that dolls on the table? Isn`t it messy eh?"
Mum said,
"Takeshi, I told you last time I forgot the fire of my oven, and I forgot it again. I needed to improve my reminder. If you found the doll with a walnut, would you remind me that I am using the fire on my oven?"
"... Okay mum."
Had I thought the things couldn`t have been worse? I was wrong.
Next summer holiday, there was no sign of the walnut crusher on the table.
Instead of it, my mum appeared wearing a flying helmet which I bought when I was in the high school.
This time I could guess why mum wore the helmet but I asked mum unwillingly.
"Hey mum... why?"
"Takeshi, you know me forget things. I forgot the fire again. I`ve improved my reminder. The most annoying thing is the best I thought. If you found me wearing this helmet, would you think me using the fire?"
"... That`s really smart mum."
Next winter I visited my parent`s house. My mum wasn`t at home.
My dad said,
"I think mum went to the next door house to give them some fruit."
And when mum got back home...,
She was wearing the helmet.
She had completely got use to it.
library picture
Monday, March 12, 2007
The Ultimate Comfort
For your information,
Japanese toilets are the most "advanced" in the world.
Im really proud of them.
When I was sitting on my "Washlet",
I thought
"Hmm Comfortable... warm and really hygienic... but I can`t be satisfied yet.
Somewhere, there would be the ultimate comfortable toilet.
I have to go on a research."
Ta-dah! I found this the most "advanced" toilet, The SATIS 
Here, SATIS`s wonderful functions.
*Full automatic toilet seat and lid
SATIS has a human sensor so that we don`t have to bend our body any more to open the lid. really hygienic and comfortable.
*Modest light
Even if nature called you at the darkest night, you would be happy because the Modest light will illuminate softly around your foot and the target so that we can go on our dream after the mission.
*Turbo odor killer(TOK) plus Doubled Power Odor Killer(DPOK)
During the mission TOK works automatically. And there is a DPOK button on the RC. Just in case. 
*Full automatic flushing system
We don`t have to flush ourselves. The motion of flushing might harm your back or spine. SATIS will flush instead of you, and he can detect number 1 or 2 from the duration of the mission.
*"Relax Music" (MP3 player with SD card and Stereo speakers)
Absolutory! Music is necessary whenever in our life, I almost forgot that.
These are options we can choose for the BGM.
1.Liebestraum No.3 in A flat major S.541-3 (F.Liszt)
2.AIR ON G-STRING (Johann Sebastian Bach)
3.NOCTURNE No.2 in E flat major Op.9-2 (F.Chopin)
4.Fruhlingslied (F. Mendelssohn)
5.Chirping of birds
6.Koto(a Japanese instrument) and Shishiodoshi(kind of zen)
7.Chirping of insects (my recommendation)
8.Bubbling stream sounds
If you want to hear the musics check this link out!
http://www.satis.jp/prdcts/htm/fnctn_01.html
This is a summary of the functions.
And this is the original page(Japanese).
http://www.inax.co.jp/products/toiletroom/toilet/satis_asteo/point/index04.html
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Invitation to the KANAMARA festa 2007
Kanamara Festa will be taken place on 1st April 2007.
I translated the official site so if you are interested in click here!
(But the link might contain content considered objectionable by someone. you have been warned.)
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Australia trip
I went to Australia(Melbourne and Sydney). I saw my friend in Melbourne and he took me around. We drove to the Great Ocean Road, it was amazing!
16th Jan there was a big blackout in Melbourne. I booked a restaurant the day before and tried to get there by a taxi. (It was near by the west gate bridge, taxi was the only way to get there) I realized all traffic lights were gone out and police officers were directing traffic. When we managed to get the restaurant (but it took a long time) there were very few people and all looked sad. And the restaurant manager said "Im really sorry because of blackout we can`t make your meal so you have two options that you give up your meal tonight or I will book our other restaurant located another coast of Yara river so that you can have your diner there". I said "How can we get there?" He said "Im gonna call you a taxi, it will be a 15min ride". I asked him to book that restaurant which was in NewQuay and drove there. When I got the restaurant I realized that it was definitely the same restaurant which I booked, I should have booked this one in the first place! Inside the restaurant was very hot due to blackout, I ordered fried calamari and T-bone stake but my wife ordered raw oysters in spite of blackout and 40C temperature. I felt her "SAMURAI SPIRITS".
In Sydney we visited Sydney Aquarium and Taronga Zoo. Both of them were spectacular but Taronga zoo was a place that I really wanted to visit. We bought zoo pass tickets which is a set ticket of ferry fare and zoo admission fee. 36$ is not expensive for an animal lover I really think.
On the last day we just walked around in Sydney. We bought bread, salad and roasted chicken at a supermarket and went for a picnic in Royal Botanic Garden. A funny thing happened, when I was reading my book on the law a man who laid my next door talked to me that we were reading same book! (Michael Crichton`s "Sphere") He recommended me other Crichton`s book "Congo" so I will try it later.
The best thing of Australian trip is that there is very little time difference (only 2h) so easy to go and come. But temperature is so different. The hottest day in Melbourne is 40C and when I got to Japan it was -2C! (It was snowing actually)
These are summaries what I found out in my Australian trip.
1. Australian cuisines are all delicious.
Before I visited Australia I thought Japanese are the craziest nationality about food but Australians are too. All foods were sophisticated and delicious. And Australians seemed to like eating out. I found more Japanese restaurants than I expected. But Sushi's ingredients were all salmon.
2. Australians are crazy about exercise.
When I visited Royal botanic garden hundreds of people were running along sea coast, and some were doing dumbbell exercising and the other were boxing exercise on a hill. As if they can`t live without exercise like a tuna (they can`t breathe when they stop swimming).
3. A vortex`s spinning direction is clockwise.
I heard that in south hemisphere the spinning direction of a vortex is clockwise. It was true. I tried several times but the directions were all clockwise. When I got home I did a same experiment but direction was also clockwise. Is it world wide thing? But I can feel south hemisphere in my house that would be great.
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