FInal Project; International Marriage By Makiko and Sayuri

Hello, everyone! We are Sayuri and Makiko, researching about International Marriage.

The reason why we choose this topic

We thought that there are more international couples recently than the past. And we found the statistics that shows the increase of the number of international marriages.

But still, that wasn’t THAT big number compare to our expectation. (http://www2.ttcn.ne.jp/honkawa/1190.html) It was also much less than Korea. (http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%9B%BD%E9%9A%9B%E7%B5%90%E5%A9%9)

Why?

To find out the reason why the Japanese people don’t really get international marriage that often, we decided to make a survey.

Thanks for the today’s technology, we made a survey on the internet and spread it on Facebook and Twitter. And thanks for our sweet friends, we got 126 answers! 

The questions on the survey were:

1.    Do you want to get married?

2.    Do you want to get International Marriage?

3.    What is the obstacle to International Marriage?

4.    What is your expectation for International Marriage?

Q1



 Obviously a lot of people want to get married.

Q2

“No” is more than “Yes.”
Why do Japanese don't want to get an international marriage?
So we made next question.

Q3

Most people chose "difference of habit" as a obstacle. Tha's ture, we can expect easily.

But there are a lots of internatinal coulples now and there must be the positive side!

Let’s go to the next question.

Q4

The answers varied widely. But that means that there are more reasons than the choices that we’ve make, doesn’t it?

The interesting thing that we focused on was the comparison with the choice “language barrier” in Q3 and the choice “language skill” in Q4. This seems like a inconsistency but we don’t think so. We can learn a very important thing from this. All things have both the bad side and the good side…, AN OBSTACLE COULD BE THE EXPECTATION!

Conclusion

The percentage of International Marriage is still very low like, around 5%.

And according to our survey, not many people want to get International Marriage.

HOWEVER,

We still think that the percentage of International Marriage will increase.

The reason why we expect so is;

-There are more foreign people living in Japan, recently.

-Increasing number of studying abroad and overseas travels creates more opportunity for Japanese people to meet and fall in love with foreigner.

-Comics, Movies and TV programs about International Marriage, like "ダーリンは外国人" help creating the atmosphere of accepting International Marriages.

-To solve the problem of depopulation, what about asking foreign people’s help?

Blog #6: childish, but adult clothes

Hi, everyone! I'm Yu! I'm sorry to be toooooooo late for the deadline.

Today, I'd like to introduce you my favorite brand, FRAPBOIS(フラボア). I think that most of you have never heard this brand's name! But, have you ever seen a pink polka-dot windbreaker which I often wear? I believe that you all understand what I said!lol So, I bought it at FRABOIS.

This brand's concept is as I wrote on the subject, "Childish, but adult clothes." and there are many genderless clothes in this brand. Although girls and women are allowed to wear boyish clothes and look cute in these clothes, there are few men's clothing stores which keep feminine cloths and it is a little difficult for most of boys to enter girl's clothing stores and buy clothes . (I think Keiichi can do them!lol) However, we all men can buy such genderless clothes in this brand! Of cource, they are very cute!!!

In addition, this brand has many unique clothes. Look at this picture.

At first glance, this shirt seem to be normal, but when we see the enlarged one...

 

 

You noticed the little angel! Like this, this brand is thoroughly particular about the detail. That's why I'm really attracted by this brand!

Blog #9: Slang

Hey everyone, it’s Makiko. Sorry for the late post.

Summary of the lecture

Language is a living thing so that it is changing all the time. Slang, an informal language used by people in a particular group, is one form created through the changing. People use slang to share the emotions in an easy, funny and creative way. And people also use it to feel the sense of belonging to the group and identify themselves. 

 

Japanese Slangs

I’d like to give you 3 examples of Japanese slangs, ファボる, 女子会 and ぼっち飯.

ファボる

This is a term for Twitter. There is a system called “favorite” in Twitter. If you find your favorite tweet and want to see it even after it has lost in the long fast timeline, you can keep it in the box of “favorite” so that you can find the tweet easily from the “favorite” whenever you want to see it. ファボる(Fav-る) means to make a tweet “favorite.”

女子会 (Joshi-kai)

It is a women-only lunch/dinner/drink. In Joshi-kai, girls don’t have to care about guys and talk about everything that they actually feel and get free from stresses. Most Joshi-kais are held in some pretty fashionable restaurants or bars, not just normal Izakaya (居酒屋), to enjoy the woman-fullness! (<--- I've just made this word "woman-fullness! Could it be a slang?? Haha)

ぼっち飯（botchi-meshi）

It means having meal alone. This is a negative expression for those people who have meal alone and it implies that they are doing so because they don’t have any friends to have together.
It surely seems like having lunch alone is just a normal thing and it doesn’t worth to make special slang for it. But this slang has made. Why? I think because recent young Japanese people cannot act alone so that just “having meal alone” has become a special thing that worth to make a word for it.


My opinion of slang

I think there are two big reasons why people use slangs.

1.    There’s no particular word for it.
If you have to explain the situation without the slang, it’ll take a long time (just like I did upward.) ファボる is a very good example for this reason. Twitter is a new culture and there’s no particular word for it so we had to create it.
Slangs are made to fit the new culture or lifestyle.

2.    To identify ourselves.
This is also mentioned in the lecture, and I strongly think so, too. People want to feel the sense of belonging to the group (and sometimes to feel that they are different from others) and feel relieved that they are not alone. ぼっち飯 is a good example.

 

Too much use of slang sounds foolish so I don’t like it. But it is true that slang is very useful in many ways. I think people (especially, young people like us) should care about when and for whom to use.

Blog #9: Slang

This is Keiichi. I know the deadline was still over, but I'll do.

1. Summary of the Unit 1

 Slang is an informal language associated with particular group. Everyone use slang mainly because they want to share their emotions in hidden way, without understanding of people outside. The professor thinks it has both positive and negative dimensions because of its changeability, undesirability and so on.

2. Three Japanese slang words

・Pakuru (パクる)

"Pakuru" means to imitate some design, ideas or whatever other people created, or to stole something. From teenage people to around 40-year-old people at most use it. There are some reason of its origin, however a lot of people said that it came from a Germany word "packen" which means to grasp. 

・Kari-paku (借りパク)

As you can guess "Kari-paku" is the word mixed with "Pakuru" and "Kariru(借りる)". "Kariru" means to borrow. So "Kari-paku" means to stole something borrowed from someone. Like "Pakuru", people at most 40 year-old use it. 

・Moru (盛る)

"Moru" means that girls take a photogenic pic in printclub or by oneself, by putting on heavy make up or by taking it at an angle with a lot of light. Now this word is used for exaggerating something. Every teenage people and around 30 year-old people use it because it has been in fashion in about last 3 years.

3. The biggest reason these 3 words started to be used is their pronounceable. They all have just 2 to 4 sounds and this is good for young people to tell their feeling in shorten way. The 3 words are also in fashion because they sound fun and funny. I know this reason reason can be understood only by Japanese people, but certainly, they sound funny. 

Slang is so fun and so easy to use. However, I feel the more I use them, the more stupid I'll become. A lot of foreign people say Japanese has a lot of beautiful sounds but Japanese "slang" has nothing without funny. We should use our mother tongue correctly and should look at beautiful proper Japanese words again. 

See you in Friday! I miss our class!!!!!

Blog #9: Slang and Language Change

 Hi, I'm Yu! How was your life during school festival? Did you enjoy it?
Today, as I said in the title, I'll talk about Slang.
Firstly, I'll summarize the lecture.

 Language is living thing and we can't stop language from changing. Slang gives users a sense of belonging to the group. Slang is used by everyone now. When we use slang, we can shows we are part of culture, share social and emotional experiences, and it's fun, humorous and creative.

 Next, I'll list up three example of Japanese slang.

1. KY

 This is a little old word. It came into fashon in 2007 and was awarded 'word of the year', so it was prevailed by such a media as TV. This is an abbreviation of 'Kuuki ga Yomenai', in English 'he or she isn't sensitive to situations'.

2. gugu-ru(ググる)

 This means searching for something by using google. 'Gugu' is abbreviation of 'google' and 'ru' is a part of verb, so it is used for verb. For example, when someone asks a question on a BBS without searching it by himself, others say to him, "gugure."

3. oshi-men(推しメン)

 This means a menber who someone likes or supports  in a girl's idol group such as AKB48. It is the abbreviation of 'oshiteru member(推してるメンバー). 'Oshiteru' means 'support or like'.'For example, his oshi-men is Oshima Yuko. It is often used by people who like AKB48.

 I think slangs are often abbreviation of words. Therefore they have nice rings of them and it is fun for us to use them. That's why we are curious to use slangs.

Blog #9; Slang

Hi, I'm Sayuri. Today, I should do homework on this blog.......:(((((((


1. Summarizeation

  Language is living things. Slang is one of the examples and is usd in a particular group to identify them as one of the member of it. There are four benefit to use it; to become desirable, to show you are an expart in a certain situation, to share emosional experiences and just to enjoy. Some people don't like it but languages are always changing and fascineting people.

2. Japanese slangs
   ・Doyagao(どや顔)
　・Riaju(リア充)
　・Dhis-ru(ディスる)

 2-1Doyagao（どや顔）
　　　This means the face. You show the face when you success something. For example, it is said  that Mr. Kawashima, a goal keeper of Japanese football team show the face, when he stop a goal. And it is said that some comedians used this word in a TV program and it was spread widly then it got "an award of the word in fasion in 2011 ". So now it is used in a broad generation.

 

 

  2-2. Riaju(リア充)

　　　　This means a person who has good relationship in a real world, not online. At first, people who use 2channel(one of internet services) and are always use this site and they can't do well in a real life, made this word to because they envied a good relationship in a real world. Now it is used in a young generation mybe.

 

 2-3.  Dis-ru

         This means "insult" or "disrrispect". Japanese made this word English's "dis" and Jpanese "ru" which means verb. It was from Hip-Hop. It is used among young.

 

 

I think most of slangs in Japan is shorten words so the big reason  why  we use it is just to make easy to say.  If you envy someone who has cool boy friend and you say "I envy you. Why you have such a cool guy and why can't I get it!". It is normal. But "f**k riaju!" is easy to say, sorry the expression is terrible..... So we use shorten words, slangs in Jpan!

 

 

See you soon;)

 

Sayuri

　　　　

　　

Blog #7: UK

Hey, guys! I'm Yu! How was your summer vacation? As you know, I went to UK to study English for a month during my summer vacation. I had many great experiences which we couldn't have in Japan!

I watched the Japan vs U.S.A women's football game finals in the Olympics at Wembley Stadium. Although I had'not got the ticket till that day, I believed that I got the ticket and I went to that stadium. Fortunately, some tickets were left in the ticket counter. After I bought the ticket, I took a stroll around the stadium and I saw Mirei Kiritani on the way to the stadium! This is the picture I took then! She was very cute!

By the way, do you know what the Wembley Stadium is called? Yes,  the Empire Stadium. In Japanese, "サッカーの聖地". The reason why this stadium is called the Empire Stadium is football was originated in England and this is the most famous stadium in the world! I was really happy to enter in such a stadium!This is the picture of the stadium.

In the end, Japan was beaten by U.S.A, but I was proud of Japanese players who played football majestically in the final!

Yu

Blog #7; My new favorite movie

Hello, everyone. I'm Makiko. Today I want to strongly recommend my new favorite movie.

That is…

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Intouchables.” The Japanese name of it is “最強のふたり Saikyo no futari.”

It is a very beautiful French movie about a friendship between a very rich cultured old disabled guy, Philippe, and a young poor uneducated guy, Driss.

I’d LOVE to explain the detail of the story more, but for someone who haven’t seen it yet and fancy to watch this movie after reading my post, I won’t tell you the detailed story ;)

Instead of telling you the story of it, I’m going to tell you my favorite points of this movie.

1. It is a FRENCH movie.

It is just my taste, but I love the sound of French. Only hearing the beautiful pronunciation of French makes me feel happy enough.

 

2. No sympathies or pities.

One of the main characters, Philippe, is a disabled guy. His brain is fine so he speaks normally (,he often makes cool jokes,) and he sees normally (he’s an art collector.) But his body is paralyzed due to an accident so he can’t move any parts of his body except his head. Most movies whose main character is someone disabled include scenes in a hospital and make people feel pities and sympathies. But this movie is not. It’s just so funny and happy. You can even laugh out loud at jokes about the disability! The secret of it is I think because Driss, the young guy, doesn’t have any pities. He’s really fair. He won’t compromise with Philippe’s disability.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. This story is based on a real story.

At the credits roll of the movie, you can see lasting story of the real version of Philippe and Driss.

 

I’m not the person who say “this is the best movie I’ve ever seen!!!” or something easily, but I can say that this film has written on my list of most favorite top 5 movies. I’m going to see it again.

If you have seen this movie, tell me. Let’s share the feeling and talk about it!

Blog #8: Yomiuri Land

Hi I'm Keiichi. Finally October came !!
These days it has been colder than September and is also good climate for us!!
But the only worst thing is the big temperate gap between the noon and the night or morning. In fact I caught a cold because of this. So you should keep warm if it will be warmer than you expected when you leave home.

By the way, during this summer, I went to Yomiuri land for the first time after I graduated from my elementary school. Actually I had never been to amusement parks after graduating from it so I really looked forward to go at that time. It was much exiting place than I expected before, so today I'm gonna introduce the attraction in the Yomiuri land.

Yomiuri land has two area, one is an amusement area, and another is a swimming pool area. The pool area is limited for summer (maybe until the end of September), so many consumers in summer seem to go there for swimming. There are four types of pool, such as diving pool, water sliding, whirlpool and a big wave pool. The diving pool was exciting than I expected because it was very scare to dive into it but once I overcame it, it gave me a certain great feeling!

Yomiuri land also has a lot of amusement machines, mainly roller coasters. In Japan it is known that the real thrills of an amusement park are roller coasters and ghost houses but I didn't like it at that time. So I was so nervous when got in a long line of a jet coaster and rode it to tie seat belt. But after riding it, it also gave me a lot of certain feelings!! Finally I overcame my fear on roller coasters!!!


Next time, I would like to try a famous amusement park "Fujikyu highland", which has the most thrilling roller coaster and ghost house in Japan.

See you.

Blog #8; My favorite TV drama in summer

Hi, I'm Sayuri, enjoying listening to your presentations!!


Every summer, I feel like to watch tv drama "socrates in love", we call it "seka-chu"!

The supervisor was Yukihiko Tsutsumi, who made TRICK(movie and tv drama), 20th Century Boy(movie ), H2(tv drama). He is one of the famous survivors in Japan.

And the story is that;
In 1980s, one normal high school boy, Saku, and one high school girl who can study well and are pretty, Aki, fell in love. Their love was pure and sweet. But suddenly she had a cancer(leukemia).........

Anyway, why I like sekachu? I have 3 reasons!!



One; beautiful background(pictures)
Main characters lives in a countryside. So there are beautiful nature. My favorite scene is this;










Two; music
I got soundtrack and hear when I sturdy.  This is one of musics, "Saku and Aki". I can relax with this song.

Tree; casts

Of course, main characters, Takayuki Yamada and Haruka Ayase, are really nice! But other sub characters are more attractive!!! Especially, I love a teacher of Saku(the woman who is behind Aki wearing wedding dress), Yuki Matsushita, and his best friend Suke-chan (the man who are bihind Saku and we can't see all of his face), Kotaro Tanaka. Their action were not special but natural, and we can sympathize them.



If you have time, if you want to recall your high school, I recommend you watch it!! I think drama of seka-chu is better than movies one!!!

Bye

Sayuri

Blog #7: JLH international church

Hi everyone. This is Keiichi. During this summer I did almost nothing special as far as I remember, but on almost every Sunday I had gone to an international church. So this time I'll tell you a bit about the church.

The international church "Jesus life house" is in Roppongi. It has other 4 branches in Japan: Yokohama, Osaka, Sendai and Sapporo. And also it has some branches in overseas like Australia...etc. Sorry I forgot all. Anyway, I think this is quite big christian group in Japan.

It was mid of July when I knew this church. My friend, who is christian and used to work at my English conversation school, invited me to free English conversation service at the church, and I tried going to there for free English lesson. When I got into there for the first time, Everything was different from all the church I knew, except learning Christian religion.

At the church, there are many people from various countries. A few foreign people can use Japanese, therefore I had to use English to make a conversation with them. This was good experience to get to know foreign young people and I could improve my English.

The English lesson is free for 2 months and after that, I cannot join it unless I invite new friend to the lesson. So I've gone to there for about a half and 2 months, and then I realzed I had no interest in Christian religion though my kindergarden is christian school! Therefore I stoped to join it.

Anyway, this will be good oppotunity to learn and use English in Japan and you can make a lot of good foreign friends. If you're strongly interested in it, or you really want help, let's google! I know this church is secure, and not CULT.

See you guys.

Blog #7: Firework Festival

Hi, guys! Long time no see and I miss you so much. I love this class so I can't wait to see you at next class. But I don't hope the summer vacation would be over.....

In August 25, I off to Firework festival at Nagareyama city which Makiko lives at. Most Japanese believe that fireworks are symbol of summer, and I think so.

The firework festival was held with Misato city. So I could see two fireworks festivals at the same time. the number of fireworks were more than 10,000!!!! It was so much fun!!!!

This is one of the best picture that I took!!!

It's really lovely, right? There were smile, dog, cat, and fish wireworks!!!!

Did you guys goes to firework festivals? If you did, please let me know!

Bye

Sayuri

Blog #6: Japanese Cars

Hi, everyone! I'm Takuya. I'm gonna write about Nissan(日産） which is one of the famous Japanese car companies. I love cars, especially sports cars and Nissan has many sports cars and they look very cool so I want to introduce them to you.

Nissan's cars which I specially like are GT-R, SKYLINE series, and FAIRLADY Z. These cars not only cool, but also have high-performance engines so they are also driven as machines for races. They sometimes win the championship so it becomes a good advertisement of Nissan and Nissan is still continuing to be famous in the world.

In addition,there are not only sports cars, also low displacement cars(kei-cars), compact cars, and electric vehicles(EV). The most famous one is LEAF. This car do not emit carbon dioxide because the energy is 100% electricity and it was awarded by World Car of the Year 2011. A lot of car companies have produced ecocars such as hybrid cars but they could not produce EV such as LEAF because of lack of the technique. Thus, I think Nissan has supreme technology.

However, the price is more expensive than other companies' cars a little, so Nissan's share in the car market is not so wide. Japanese company which has the biggest share is TOYOTA but TOYOTA has only family cars and compact cars so I like Nissan rather than TOYOTA. I wish Nissan will have No1 share in the market.

If you are interested in Nissan, please check the link and enjoy!
http://www.nissan.co.jp/

Blog #6: My favorite brand

Hi. I'm Keiichi. As you know I'm the heaviest shopaholic in Gakushuin uni, so today I introduce one of famous fashion brand .

One of my favorite fashion brand is "H&M". It sells fashion products, including cloths, accessories, jewels, cosmetics, and whatever associated with fashion. In 1947 its first outlet was opened in Västerås, Sweden, with its origin name "Hennes"as cloths for women, and 20 years after, it started to sell men's and children's clothing and changed its name to " Hennes & Mauritz". Now its name was changed to "H&M", which is expanding all over the world, and has about 2600 stores.

There are two reasons why I like H&M.

Firstly its price. Its products are always so cheap compared with other fashion brands, but not be seen so cheap. This brand always knows what is trendy, what people need, how to sell its products for more consumers, and appropriate price for them, so it can be attracting so many people in the world.

Actually I bought them only about 1000yen!!! (but left below is not H&M's product. I bought that necklace at Forever21, which is also fast-fashion brand.)
How amazing they are :p

Secondary its policy. Its policy is "interpret the latest fashion trends and create collections that are accessible to all." That is, H&M does not target particular people like fashion lovers or teenage girls. It opens its door for everyone, regardless of their age, their country, or whether they like fashion or not. Nowadays, not to target age-group is most important thing to succeed in business.

(I really miss these shoes...I wanted to buy it when it was announced, but it was sold out when I went to outlet.)


Before I researched about H&M, I didn't know its policy or marketing strategy at all although I go its outlets once two weeks. But after writing this blog, I could know a lot about H&M and I came to have more interests in it. Besides, my heart is extremely exhausted because of exam, so this blog really became breath-fresher for me!!!!
Good luck everyone for your exam! And hopefully, see you in summer!!

Blog #6: Japanese amazing company

Hi, I'm Sayuri. Today I would like to talk about one of famouse Japanese brand, CASIO . It was founded in 1957 so they've been for 55 years. At biggining, they delveloped electronic calculater. This is a photo.

After that, they developed  many kind of electronic devices. Maybe, when you hear the name of CASIO, you guess their watches. But today, I forcuse on their electronic dictionary "EX-word".

Look! It's so cool! It's like a small computer! This is CASIO's electric dictionary. Of couse, I have it. And I see many colleage students have CASIO's, and you?

This is reaally useful. There are so manny functions, here.

・many kinds of dictionaries in it (about 35 dictionaries)

・pronounciation (English and other languages)

・touch panel (we can write someting to serch)

・a collection of words for TOIEC

・SD card (to add a new dictionary)

etc......

Thanks to these function, it has No.1 share of the market. And I love it because it's light to carry, cool design. And moreover it is smart!!! I think Japanese company always think about small things. And as a result, they could make super useful dictionary!

Sayuri

Blog #5: Rethink about jobs

Hello everyone! I’m Makiko. I know this is sudden, but I’ll ask you 2 questions;

1.   Can you draw figures of a nurse, a flight attendant, a teacher of a kinder garden and a florist in your mind with your imagination?

2.   Then, can you draw an astronaut, a mechanic, a scientist, a pilot, a policeman and a surgeon, next?

Done?
Okay, then I’ll guess your imaginations. The people for the question No.1 are women and people for No.2 are men, aren’t they?
Correct?
This is exactly what I want you to think about through reading my post. People tend to think that jobs which require kindness and communication skills are for women and the ones which require the scientific knowledge and physical power are for men.

But can’t girls have a dream to be an astronaut to change the human’s history? Can’t boys long to the florist to make people happy? Of course they can! But as you’ve EXPERIENCED just now, people still have a prejudice for women’s jobs and men’s jobs. So we have to throw them away.

Now I want to introduce some interesting programs to solve these problems.

First of all, watch this video below.

This is made by EU. What did you think? Wasn’t it awkward? Well,it was failed. There was a big argument all over the world soon after it had made. And because of a lot of criticism, EU stopped using it.

Next thing is a “Girls’ Day.”
On this day, girls go to the scientific companies or laboratories and experience “men’s jobs.” This is carried out in many countries. It would be a good opportunity for girls to think about their futures in those kinds of jobs.

At last, let me introduce my favorite video about this topic.

Isn’t it awesome? I like it very much!

People’s lifestyles are changing and the differences between men and women are getting less. The era of quiet modest girls is over now. We can do whatever we want. The only thing we have to do now is to put off our stupid suits of prejudice!

GIRLS, BE ANBICIOUS.

Blog #5: Electric Competence

 Hi, guys!! I'm Takuya! I'm gonna write about 鴻海精密(Hong-Hai), a Taiwanese company.

 Have you heard this company's name? It ranks third in electric world and increases its share of the market. No1 and 2 in this world are SAMSUNG and LG which are Korean companies. A lot of Japanese know these two companies' name, however, Hong-Hai is not so famous in Japan compared to them. I think the reason is that it does not have own brands. For example, SAMSUNG has Galaxy, a smart phone, and it is very popular in Japan. But Hong-Hai does not have. 

 Then, why it can increases its share and grows recently? The reason is many companies orders to manufacture their products to Hong-Hai so its profit is increasing. Very famous companies such as SONY, Panasonic, and Apple also do that and this is the reason why I am interested in this company. 

 Why they do that? Why don't they manufacture their products by themselves? Because Hong-Hai has very skillful technique and ordering to it is cheaper than manufacturing by themselves. Thus, a lot of famous and popular products, for example, liquid crystal TV, PS3, and iphone are produced by Hong-Hai!! Doesn't it sound interesting? They are made in Taiwan! Do you have an iphone? Probably, it is also made in Taiwan, not in U.S.! 

 Hong-Hai will be continuing to grow so you should remember it because it is more famous than Japanese electric companies. In the past their products had good quality so they became popular in the world but their shares are decreasing recently. One day, I think Hong-Hai would have No1 share in electric world.

 Here is the rink. Please check it out if you are interested in it.

http://www.foxconn.com.tw/

Blog #5: Our future

Hi, I'm Sayuri. Today, I would like to talk about "our future". There is a big probrem in Japan, that is "nuclear power plants".

The nuclear power plant in Ooi re-worked from July 1st. It was the first case after the accident in Fukushima.

Why Japanese government dicided to re-work? Kansai Electric Power Co.,Inc.(Kan-Den) has 11 nuclear power plants. This is percentage of electric power in Kan-Den. Surprisingly the nuclear power is the highest percentag. Since the government dicided to stop the all nuclear power plants, it couldn't supply enough electricity.

If it doesn't rework the nuclear power plants, the poeple who live in the Kansai area have to save 15% of using electricity in this summer(By 節電.go.jp ). By the way, Tokyo Electric Power CO.,Inc.(To-Den) could save 18&% of it(by YOMIURI ONLINE). And it was hard, wasn't it? But we realized that we had used much more electlicity than we need.

So the Japanese government dicided to rework one of nuclear plants in Ooi to keep supply of electricity. But more than 20,000 people gathered in front of the official residence to protest aginst the re-woking.



But they are poeple who live in Kansai?  They think about Kansai poeple? The nuclear power plants have danger. It is true, we felt it by 3.11. In the other hand, there are many people who have got much benefit from them. People who work there, people who live in Ooi; they recieve money from government and Kan-Den, and so on. We have to think about them because they are not bad people and they just make a living.

Just saying "Stop Nuclear Electrisity!" is nonsense. Because we already  know about it and it can't move the government. So we have to think about human life(include people who live in Ooi) and offer new type of generation. It's not easy way. But now we have to dicide our future.

Sayuri 

Blog #4: Swilling Soda

 Hi! I'm Yu! Today, I'll introduce you the news article which I'm interested in.

 On May 30th, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that he planed to introduce the prohibition of swilling soda to deal with a fatness problem in NY. This prohibition will restrict the sales of drinks which contain sugar such as soda, ice tea, sportsdrink in restaurants to 16 ounces.

 However, beverage industry started a campaign against it on the street and the media. The American Beverage Association(ABA) takes the initiative in this campaign. This industry made New York Stake withdraw the introduction of soda tax in 2010. They insist on the freedom of choice of drinks. In addition, they think that drinks contain sugar are aimed at and  low-income consumers will suffer heavy losses directly for this prohibition.

 To be sure, fatness causes many diseases. It will increase the amount of medical bill and the expense will fall on the country and autonomies. However I doubt whether this goverment intervention has a effect on fatness problem. Although they people can't drink soda too much at restaurants but they can buy soda at supermarkets and drink at home. I think that his prohibition can't keep the number of overweight people.

Anyway, it is getting hotter and hotter and you will get to want to drink soda. But, be careful not to drink soda too much to keep weight!

See you next time!

Yu

Blog #4: Raw liver

Hello everyone! Today, let me introduce a sad news.
On July 1, Japanese government officially forbid any restaurants to sell the "raw liver" and a lot of people went to Yakiniku-shop to eat it the day before. 

It all started with the food poisoning-case happened at the Yakiniku restaurant "Yakiniku Shuka Ebisu" last April. Some boys eating these were dead of O-111 virus contained in them. After this harsh case, since last October, every restaurants which treated raw meat dishes had to boil  meats used for such dishes in the water more than 60 degree Celsius at least 1 minute, if they are ordered. Also they had to cut and boil such meats by using cleaned equipment. However since yesterday, Health, Labour and Welfare Ministry forbade to sell raw livers because they can contain some viruses like O-157 virus which can make people die at the worst, and especially in summer such viruses can be expected to increase.

But this decision can give some restaurant bad incentives. Some analysts, in this case, some restaurants will provide a raw liver by changing its name from "Liver sasimi" to just "Liver" because consumers will want raw liver more by forbidding.. Especially the restaurant which has big connection with local consumers will not be able to ignore their wants for providing a raw liver so  it can provide a raw liver as a liver for boiled, in order to keep its customer.

I agree with its decision but I think Japanse government should have decide a certain rimit for forbidding a raw liver. If it decided to forbid to provide them "FOR 3 MONTHS", consumer wouldn't likely to eat them. One reason many Japanese people disagree with this order is that the goverment has not decided to forbid it whether forever or not.

Anyway, I rearly eat raw meats in a Yakiniku restaurant so it doesn't matter for me!
Please be carefull if you eat something raw in summer.
See you!

Keiichi.

Blog #3: Saori Yuki

Hi everybody! This is Makiko and I’m going to introduce my favorite singer today. She made a great hit recently so I’m sure some of you probably know her already…,

Saori Yuki.

She’s a 63-year-old Japanese singer.

Her career is so long but she has been acclaimed again recently. Not only in Japan, but also in Europe and U.S., because of the collaboration with a famous American jazz band “Pink Martini.”
This collaboration album, “1969,” was in the top jazz charts in the U.S.. She and Pink Martini held a lot of concerts all over the world after the worldwide hit of their album.

In this album, she sings traditional Japanese songs to standard jazz or bossa nova songs both arranged with a beautiful jazz rhythm. Remarkable and interesting thing is that she sings in Japanese! I think that is one of the reasons why it has made a huge hit. The sound of Japanese could be very new and surprising for foreign people. Of course, her voice is really amazing. I think it is mature, feminine and independent.

This is my most favorite song. I like the video as well. Check it out!

I have recommended this song to one of my German friend who is learning Japanese!

I was not a big jazz fan, but I liked it so much. So even if you were not interested in jazz music at all, please, just listen to it first. If you liked it and needed more information, check Saori Yuki's Official Blog!

I hope you'll like it.

Blog #3: My Birthday!

Hey guys, I'm Sayuri.

It was my birthday today so i went to Tokyo Disney Land with my boy friend. Though the forecast said it would be rainy, it was a perfect day to go out! You can find it by this photo which I took.

I've been fan of Disney since I was child. When I was a little girl, my parents took me there many times. I can't count how many times I've visited there!! As you know, Tokyo Disney Land always makes us happy and gives us dreams. Why?

In my opinion, the key word is "thoroughgoing" which means it does anythinng completely. And more, there are 3 factors which support their "thoroughgoing".

First; "attractions". There are many attractions and every thing is really real compared with other theme parks. So we feel like we are in a Disney story.

Second; "shows". There are a lot of shows in Tokyo Disney Land and it attract all of us from children to senior peoples. The shows change every season. Today, the theme was "easter". 

And last one; "casts". The casts are really trained so they are cheerful and kind. And they always smille. Recently we learned UNIQULO's employees. Disney's policy is similar with it. We need the human service. And both almost achieve it and success in their buissiness world.

Anyway, I felt really happy in Tokyo Disney Land and really want to go threre again! Why don't we go there?

Sayuri :)

Blog #3: My Spring Vacation in HI

Hi! I'm Takuya. I'm gonna write about my spring vacation in Hawaii!

Last March, I stayed in Hawaii for a month to go to a language school. I joined in the English lesson of ELS Language Center in Hawaii Pacific University which is one of Hawaiian private universities. There were so many foreign students,  especially Asian at there but Japanese were fewer than I expected, so it was a really good situation for me to study English and I could make a lot of friends. Plus, I stayed in a residence that is a type of dorms and some of my friends also stayed in there, so we spent a month together not only in classes, but also in free times. Every weekends, we always went to a beach for surfing, BBQ, or other activities so we had a really enjoyable time.

My class was also enjoyable. I had a lot of homeworks in the school almost everyday. Besides, sometimes I had to prepare for a presentation in my class so I had to study hard but I could enjoy my class because of my classmates. They are foreigners so they have various types of cultures, ideas, and religeons. When we had a discussion in our class, I knew about them and they were quite interesting for me because most of them were informations witch I've never heard. Thus, I could study with curiousness and pleasure to know my classmates' ideas or cultures.

I could have a really nice experience in Hawaii, and I could make many friends. I'm still keeping touch with them on Facebook or Line but I miss them. I hope my friends and I will be able to meet again in someday!

Blog#2: My favorite book

Hi everyone. I'm Keiichi.

Today, let me intorduce my favorite book.
A week ago, I found the book "Aiteni [Tsutawaru] Hanasikata" at BOOKOFF. This book is written by Ikegami Akira, who is an famouse and popular journarist in Japan. He also has his own TV shows. In this book he mentioned how to tell someone what you think exactlly, mainly based on his experience in NHK. I'll pick up his two ideas in the book.

Firstly, I caught such a phrase: "You put the most important thing on the first line or say it at first." This words come from his experience of the newscaster at NHK. When TV stations make a news, they try to make "the read", which is the sentence mentioned at the beginnig of the news and has the most influence and important information. In order to bring people in the news, they put the most important thing at the biginning. On the other hand, not so important information, for example references and previous cases, are put at the bottom of the news because news are always a live program, and TV producers reduce the news from underneath if the time ticks down. Thus he said such a thing.

Next, I also found "use no conjunction as much as possible". He said most unconfident people tend to use much conjunction like "because", "so", "thus". He also said they don't marshal or brush up their idea so force to connect different ideas by using such conjunctions. In his view, I am probably such a person. The person who has clear opinions or ideas can make anyone understand because they set a certain sentence in a certain place.

My post is not enough to tell his book, but it is easy to read and understand, and the contents are all usuful in university lecture. If you want to read it, go to BOOKOFF or a bookstore! You can lend it at our university libraly but I still have the book so you will be able to lend it in next week.
See you guys!

Blog #2: Trip to Thailand

Hi! I'm Yu.
Today, I'm going to talk about my trip. I took a trip to Thailand with my friends in last March. There are many temples which differ from Japanese temples in shape in Thailand. Here are some pictures of these temples.



I had some Thai baht when I came back to Japan, so I went to exchenger in Japan. However, there was scribble which was written by ball-point pen  in a 1000 baht bill which is worth more than 2000 yen, and shopper declined to exchange it! So if you exchange foreign currency for Japanese yen, you should check that there is no scribble in both sides of bills!
Like this, we can get various experiences when we go abroad.

I want you to tell me about foreign country you recommend!

See you next time!