http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/rss popo's latest journal entries Lang-8 Inc. Mon May 28 13:00:03 UTC 2012 Mon May 28 13:00:03 UTC 2012 Lang-8 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Lang-8 By the time we arrived the shrine,We took the wrong train, missed our stop, and were out of breath from climbing the steep and narrow stone steps.
“What if... I fall off..the steps ? “I talked to my friend in the middle of the steps.
“ Well....I ..don’t have... the physical strength... to hold up you...so maybe... we would...tumble down...together..”
She replied from behind breathlessly.

It was a sunny day. We finally arrived at the shrine.
We joined our hands in prayer,sounded a bell and burned a stick of incense.
My friend bought a small charm to put in her purse.
There was a sitting area where we can drank “yuzuyu”( 柚子湯 hot water with Japanese citron flavor) for free. We had rice ball lunch I made there.It was fun but my legs ached following days……..

By the way,my friend is in “厄年”( "ｙakudoshi"　means　climacteric year) so she wanted to expel evil by visiting the shrine.
“ｙakudoshi” is considered the specific age of a person who experiences many bad lack in japan.
I think most of japanese take it so seriously but if they have time, they will visit shrines.

Looking back my yakudoshi,I didn’t care at all and didn’ visit a shrine too.There seemed not to be so many bad things in the year, or maybe I forgot them.

Posted at Fri Sep 25 01:39:46 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/243923 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/243923 popo Fri Sep 25 01:39:46 UTC 2009
Since I was accustomed to seeing Japanese emoticons, other emoticons didn’t look like a face mark at first. To be honest, until very recently.

But a very simple explanation I happened to find solved my problem.
Left is the upper part of the face and right is the bottom part of the face, right?
Now, I recognize a face mark!
But why are they rotated 90 degrees?

By the way, I read a study about emoticons.
Japanese emoticons show its expression by eyes.On the other hand English emoticons show it by mouth. Because Japanese read others expression by eyes and English speakers read it by mouth.
I don't know whether this opinion makes sense, but it seem to be interesting.

ヽ(o＾-＾o)ノ smile
(ﾉ>_<)ﾉ ~~~~~~~~~~~~ ┻━┻　　　pull over the table
ヾ(ﾟдﾟ)ﾉ゛　　　wave 　　　　 ヾ（ﾟ-＾*）♪ wink
(　>д<)、;’.・　sneeze　　　(￣(エ)￣)　a bear

Do you recognize these emoticons?

Posted at Wed Sep 16 10:57:23 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/237857 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/237857 popo Wed Sep 16 10:57:23 UTC 2009 It includes some stories written in the primary school textbook.
These stories made me feel nostalgic.

One of my favorite stories is “きつねのひろった定期券” .
A little fax found a train pass on the street. He was happy and imagined. He was going to the town and stuff his face with freshly-fried croquettes…
This “freshly-fried croquettes” remains fresh in my mind.
Eventually he gave it back to the girl who lost the pass.But the girl promised to buy freshly-fried croquettes for the little fox.

Come to think of it, the stories associated with food seem to be more memorable.I remember ice cream or pancakes with honey and freshly baked breads in the stories vividly.
I suppose that I like cooking or baking sweets because of these memories of the books.

Posted at Wed Sep 09 04:04:21 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/232447 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/232447 popo Wed Sep 09 04:04:21 UTC 2009 My grandmother died from breast cancer.I know I should be examined.
But the mammography test seems to be very painful.I have never met a woman who had it and said “It didn’t hurt.” On the contorary, everyone said it really really hurt.

“My eyes were blurred with tears.”
“I couldn’t help but say “stop, stop” “
“I expexted it because my freind told me but it was far beyond my expectation!”
…Their narratives cause me to shudder in fear.

Breast cancer screening is conducted like this.
Your breast is caught between plastic sheets and pressed as flat as possible! Then you have an X-ray taken each breast two times.
Doesn't it sound painful?

I’m going to get monmography and write how it goes.
But still I hope someone invents a less painful test.　(>_<)

Posted at Mon Aug 31 04:15:32 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/225514 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/225514 popo Mon Aug 31 04:15:32 UTC 2009
I often go to a store in my neighborhood which has a small foreign books corner.
I have bought paper backs in English several times there and sometimes the books made me wonder what kind of person who sold those books was.

The book I bought the other day was a chinese novel translated into English but I’ve never heard of the author’s name or the book title.
When I got home I checked the book on the internet.All books by the author haven’t translated into Japanese.

I guessed the person who had had this book might have been a Chinese, but if she ( or he) was chinese it wouldn’t need to buy an English version of the book…or just a Japanese who can read English and like books ?

Posted at Mon Aug 24 10:41:30 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/220108 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/220108 popo Mon Aug 24 10:41:30 UTC 2009
At the time I was being on the train for Ancona in Italy. The compartment was full of Italian. ( Maybe. I counldn’t tell where they were from.)
When I pulled out a basic conversation book written in both japanese and italian from my bag, someone said.

“日本の方ですか？” (Are you Japanese?) Nihon no kata desuka?

I was astonished to hear Japanese.
A young woman sitting next to me smiled.
“Yes, do you speak Japanese?” I replied in Japanese.
She said she had learned Japanese at Venice university.
I hadn’t known that there was the Japanese language department at Venice university until then.

And what I was surprised most of all was her Japanese. She spoke very fluent Japanese, had no accent,and understood almost of what I said in Japanese.
(Despite studying English, I can’t see what native speakers say when they speak at natural speed and my speaking is worse than listening.)

That made me think how high-level the Japananese language department was.
We had a fun time talking in Japanese until the train arrived her destination.

I haven't met someone who speaks Japanese better than her until now.

Posted at Wed Aug 19 01:29:22 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/216205 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/216205 popo Wed Aug 19 01:29:22 UTC 2009
I usually wear sneakers.
But it’s hot in summer so I bought a pair of sandals with low heels after trying on lots of them.

It was no ploblem when I take a short walk.But yeasterday….. I couldn’t stand the pain.In the end that forced me to buy a new shoes there and then. My sandals became rubbish.
Every time I see someone who strides waring high-heeled shoes,I admire her.
Is it a difference of endurance, or of feet ?


Posted at Thu Aug 06 05:16:50 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/207769 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/207769 popo Thu Aug 06 05:16:50 UTC 2009 I can’t remember most of what I learned.

At the beginning, I forgot to attach articles to nouns all of my writing.
(I learned later that there were articles first,then nouns that follows them.But the way of thinking “attach articles to nouns” can't be easily changed.)
Articles is still hard for me to use correctly even after I was explainded and read some English grammer books.
Propositions is difficult, too. And tenses!

When I studied about present perfect (現在完了) for the first time in school, I couldn’t understand it.
I could understand present, past, future tenses.But present perfect? Past perfect?
I wondered why there're such tenses.

A friend of mine who l took a private lesson of English conversation from a native speaker once said,
“My teacher often use present perfect continuous.”
“Present,perfect,continuous? What is that ? Have we ever studied that?”
“I don’t remember.”

I think Japanese isn't strict about tenses compared to English.
Therefore, there is sometimes no difference between past tenses and present perfects tenses (or present perfect continuous) after translating English into Japanese.
But when it comes to write in English, its vagueness is my headache.

Posted at Wed Jul 29 10:52:30 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/202503 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/202503 popo Wed Jul 29 10:52:30 UTC 2009 Sometimes I hear mice racing around in the attic.

One day, I was taking a bath. Getting in the bathtub made me feel relax.
After a few moments, something fell into the hot water from the ceiling.

I’m nearsighted person and can’t see anything clearly without my glasses.
Of couse I take off them when taking a bath so at the time I was the naked eyes.
Though my view blurred I could recognize the thing floating in front of me.
It was a cockroach!
I uttered a strange sound and got out of the bathtub.

“Roaches! ”I cried out.
“So what? “
My mother said watching TV.
“Throw hot water against it.”
“It fell into hot water!”
“Then it died”

One of my friends who heard this story was scared and said “If I were you, I’d never use the bathtub again.”
I use the bathtub even now.

Posted at Thu Jul 23 04:27:20 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/198378 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/198378 popo Thu Jul 23 04:27:20 UTC 2009 One day he called mother, after a few minutes conversation she said.
“I want to thank your host family. Can I speak to them?”

I was beside her and really surprised. Could she speak English…?Then she began to speak.
“ Hello, musuko ga osewa ni natteimasu.” (息子がお世話になっています)
It was completely Japanese with English-like accent.( It sounded weird). I dropped my head.
But she looked satisfied.
”I didn’t understand what she said but I think I could express my feeling.”
……Really?

My mother worked at a tea room on the middle of the mountain where has a famous shrine every Sunday,
Many foreign tourists visit there and sometimes she has chances to talk with them.
“Today, I talked with a foreign woman who travel alone in Japan. She came from England. So I said, “BBC!” she smiled!”.
Maybe she had to smile.

Posted at Wed Jul 15 04:51:56 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/192588 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/192588 popo Wed Jul 15 04:51:56 UTC 2009 But it was wrong　and I felt intersting.
"red lies" in Japanese means “complete lies”,” out-and-out lies” .

Is there any other colors that attach to the word “lie”?

The　word "ladybird" also made me surprised.
I imagined a beautiful bird because of the name but it was translated into “てんとう虫”　 in Japanese. 　
“虫“　means　“bug”.
I like "てんとう虫" and they are pretty but it’s difficult for me to associated with “ladybirds”.

Posted at Mon Jul 06 02:38:17 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/186512 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/186512 popo Mon Jul 06 02:38:17 UTC 2009 The one I used every year broke last summer so I have spent this season without any air conditioning facility till now.

My room has an old air conditoning but it has not been used for a long time…maybe at least 20 years...
I’m too scared to turn it on because I think something bad might blew out with cold air.

Besides, I like electric fans better than air conditions.It doen’t freez me.
I’m really relieved to get rid of unpleasant nights.

By the way, I wonder why recent electric fans have remote controls.Does everyone live in so large room?
I don’t mind to stand up to change the wind from weak to strong.

Posted at Thu Jun 25 04:04:12 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/179185 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/179185 popo Thu Jun 25 04:04:12 UTC 2009 “水無月”（minaduki）is the name in the luner calender.

At first I though why June was “minaduki” because June was rainy reason in Japan and the kanji of “水無月” meant “no water month”.
It turned out that “無” didn’t mean “no” but “of” later.

Besides, I found an alias name of June I had not known.(There are many alias names each month.)
It's “風待月”（kazemachiduki）that mean…the month of waiting for wind?
I think it is a very beautiful name.
Incidentally,there's the Japanese confectionery named "minaduki" which is made from azuki.

The other month having “無” in the name is October.
October is “神無月”（ kannaduki）. It means “no god month” because all gods assemble at Izumo Shrine in shimane province to discuss things of the year.

As a result, there is no god everywhere in Japan other than Izumo and Octorber is called “神在月”(the month of being gods….? I cant’ translate well.）only in Izumo.

Posted at Tue Jun 16 04:47:19 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/172940 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/172940 popo Tue Jun 16 04:47:19 UTC 2009 A coworker of mine who was in his early fifties used to talk with me when I worked together.
“I didn’t remember at all what I tried to do. It surprised me.Maybe I’m getting old.”
At times like this, I said.
“It was not a important thing so you forgot it. ”

Now, I realize what he said though I ‘m not in my fifties yet.
I forget things a lot.
When I was a child, I remember all the authers and the titles of the book I read.
Lately I couldn’t remenber not only the titles of the book but the contents of the book.( I remenber that I read it...)

Besides, I’m getting not be able to write kanji with my own hand since I began to use word processors. Word processors convert hiragana into kanji so there is no need for writing.
Being　accustomed to convinient tools cause me not to work my brain in a way.
For the moment, I’m goin to study a drill book of kanji to memorize like when I was at elementary school.

Posted at Tue Jun 09 04:23:38 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/167993 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/167993 popo Tue Jun 09 04:23:38 UTC 2009 The recipe I refer to says. “ add equal amount of sugar to strawberries”.
I measured sugar, then a large amount of sugar daunted me.
(If all the sugar were added,how many calories would be…..)
I dared to cut the sugar up to 15% of strawberries.

The kitchen was full of sweet smell while I was stewing strawberries.
It mede me feel happy. After all, five small bottles of jam were made.
I eat a toast spreading this jam on it every morning. It’s so tasty.

Now is the season of making ” umeshu”(梅酒).
Umeshu is a liqueur made by soaking plums and sugar with Shochu.
It can drink after about three mounths. I don’t like any alcohol because it don’t taste good to me except for umeshu. I’m looking forward to drink umeshu.

There are many delicious food around this season so I’ll try not to overeat.

Posted at Mon Jun 01 05:47:52 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/161624 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/161624 popo Mon Jun 01 05:47:52 UTC 2009 It's　"Learning Joy from Dogs Without Collars" by Lauralee Summer,which translated into japanese and I read that.
The Japanese title is "わたしには家がない　ハーバード大に行ったホームレス少女"　（"I had no home. A girl who was homeless attended Harvard University." ←　Is thid translation oorrect?)

The writer's family environment made me surprise.
She grew up in a single-mother family and lived on welfare drifting from town to town.
In a way, she might have been a poor girl but she didn't think so at all.
She had a strong spirit and never felt sorry for herself.

I though the similer impression when I read another book that was "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walls. Her parents were　characters, kind of childish and irresponsible but somehow couldn’t hate them, too.
The mother who ate a chocolate hiding in a bet when her children were hungry because there was no food to eat would be accused by peole at large in Japan.

However, both Summer and Walls love their paretnts despite feeling mixed feelings.
I thought of my parents whom I didn’t get along. with.

By the way, Summer’s university life surprised me a little.
Are many of the students in Harvard University elites who come from good familes?

Posted at Mon May 25 02:46:01 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/156007 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/156007 popo Mon May 25 02:46:01 UTC 2009 On hot days, I'm absent,feel slack,get sleepy and more useless than in the cool season.
I wish I could find a way to clear my head.

As I recall, there seem to not have been good things in this weather like this.
The personal computer that was my first home-built PC broke down last summer.
I didn't see what was wrong. In this kind of situation,I seemed to have to replace each part in the PC with new one to identify the broken part.

However, I didn't have any backup parts so I bought a power supply expecting that was broken. My guesswork was wrong.
In the end, I brough the part of the mother boad to the shop I bought it. A clerk immediately checked it out and said "This is broken." My heart sank.

The clerk refunded me in full since it was still under warranty.
I had to buy a new part and assemble the PC again despite forgetting the detail of building it before. It wasn’t so difficult thing to do, but my carelessness made me nervous.I was really tired.
Anyway, I use my PC now and I hope it never break down particularly in summer.

Posted at Mon May 18 10:28:59 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/150839 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/150839 popo Mon May 18 10:28:59 UTC 2009 It divide people by their blood types and shows that each blood type has a certain type of personality.
For example, someone who is blood type B is said to do things at their own pace,soon hot soon cold,hate to take orders from someone, etc.

In the same way, blood type A is well-organized, blood type O is easygoing,blood type AB is smart and so on.

I don't believe the opinion too much but sometimes it is useful of a conversation topic.
I think Japanese like fortune-telling in a variety of ways.
My aunt went to see a fortune-teller to consult whether they would get along wiht each other when her daughter had a marriage meeting.

"doubutsu uranai"(animal fotune-telling?)「動物占い」was also popular in Japan before.
It classify you into one animal group by birth date and each animal group has each character.
Incidentally, I was a elephant and someone who is a elephant is written not to listen to others in spite of having large eares....

Posted at Tue May 12 04:28:23 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/145766 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/145766 popo Tue May 12 04:28:23 UTC 2009 When reading a manga traslated into English,I noticed all of the first person in Japanese,such as "わたし(私）" "おれ（俺）" "ぼく（僕）""あたし" tranlated into "I".

Each first person in Japanese gave me a different impression.
When translated into English,the expressions seems to be disappear.
In a reverse case it could have some problem.

I read a series of tranrated mystery before.
The story was written in the first person.
The leading character was a private detective who called himself "ぼく" in the first book but in the next book,he said " おれ".

It sounded as if he was a different character to me.
This impression was ambiguous and it depends on a person.
"おれ" sounds like active and casual to me.On the other hand, "ぼく" sounds like well-bred and gentle.

Come to think of it,English also don't have any variations of desinence like Japanese.

For　example, "I like apples."
「私は林檎が好きです」「あたしはりんごが好きなの」
「僕はリンゴが好きだな」「俺はりんごが好き」

All in all, English could be easy to learn but it always difficult for me.

Posted at Wed May 06 05:10:27 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/140569 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/140569 popo Wed May 06 05:10:27 UTC 2009 It's hard for me to tell which English it is by only listening.
Maybe I don't have good ears.

One of my friends who spent a year in Australia as a working holiday maker told me that at first she couldn't understand some word which her host family repeated.
It sounded to her "saifu". saifu? さいふ？財布？（a purse in Japanese)
She recognized it was "safe" later.

I had a similer experience, too.
In my case, the word was "bo-shi".
I came across that word while listening to some English dialoges on my MP3 player.
bo-shi? ぼうし？帽子？（a hat in Japanese)

When I read the script ,I was stunned.
I knew the word but the pronounciation far from what I imagined.
It was "bullshit".

When native speakers listen to other contry's English, what does it sounds like?
I wonder if it's like "standard language"(標準語）and "kansai Japanese( western japanese?)"( 関西弁） in japanese.

Posted at Sat Apr 25 03:32:38 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/132143 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/132143 popo Sat Apr 25 03:32:38 UTC 2009 I'm in good health and not anemic,so I could donate my blood to 400cc.
However, I'm terribly scared to get an injection.

It would relate to my memory of kindergarten days.
One day I hid in a toilet to escape from an vaccination.
A kindergarden teacher easily found me and dragged me out of the toilet.She had me immunized while I was crying.
How painful it was!.
Writing his episode make me gloomy...

Anyway, I've avoided injections as much as possible but I feel myself a little selfish not to donate blood for such a childish reason.
If only I could belive it had no pain or little pain.....

Posted at Mon Apr 20 01:12:21 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/128255 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/128255 popo Mon Apr 20 01:12:21 UTC 2009 Maybe it's because of getting warm day by day.
I think I could sleep for 24 hours straight.

Speaking of sleep, I heard of the person who had been keeping awake for 11 days.
It's unbelievable for someone can't keep awake only for 36 hours like me.
I once stayed up all night studying for a test when I was a junior high school student.
I was too drowsy next day,so that I bumped my head on the desk during class.

Since then, I make it a rule to sleep in the night.Otherwise I tend to make many mistakes at work and can't consentrate on my study.

How many hours sleep do you need a night?
How many hours can you stay awake?

Posted at Sat Apr 11 12:05:58 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/121939 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/121939 popo Sat Apr 11 12:05:58 UTC 2009 It is 「日本人の英語」(”Japanese English”）by Mark Petersen.
He pointed out common mistakes made by Japanese in the book.
These examples applied to me, such as articles, tenses,prepositions,etc.
In particular I'm terrible at articles because Japanese has no counterparts.

I learned that articles attached in front of nouns and the similar explanation is written in English grammar books in Japanese.
I think of a noun and add a article. At the time I hesitate whitch is correct. "a" or "the" or "zero article" or "bare plural" ?

He wrote it was wrong in the first place.
Native speakers think of an article first, then a noun follows it.
Considering the word order in English,it is certainly natural.
But I felt stuck since it seems even harder for me.....
Probably English is more definitely about the number of nouns than Japanese.
I wish I could use articles without hesitation.

Posted at Sat Apr 04 00:28:54 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/117242 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/117242 popo Sat Apr 04 00:28:54 UTC 2009 The writer is a Japanese female living in New York. One day she visited her firiend who was down with a cold.
She gave the friend some water,food,and medicine.
As she left, she said " Take care of yourself." and "I just came to see your face."
The friend looked bemused.Then she noticed she coudn't get her point across to the friend.

"I just came to see your face."
(あなたの）顔を見に来ただけだから

We sometimes use this phrase.
This mean....I came to see if you are all right.I don't intend to disturb you.I'll go back soon.So don't mind me.
”your face” implies not only a literal "face" but also "your condition" or "your situation".

Now that I think about it, Japanese phrases tend to have many unexpessed meanings.That's why sometimes Japanese seems to be a ambiguous language.

Posted at Fri Mar 27 23:10:43 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/113111 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/113111 popo Fri Mar 27 23:10:43 UTC 2009 Such as "桜吹雪"　"木漏れ日" etc..
I like these words and I can visualize the scenes to see the words.

桜吹雪(sakura fubuki) means "petals of cherry blossoms fall like a snowflake" or "a flurry of falling cherry blossoms".

木漏れ日（komorebi)　means　"sunshine filtering through foliages" or "sunbeams streaming through leaves".

I searched these translations from the internet because I couldn't find both words in my dictionary.
But they just explain the meaning of the words.
Of couse it would be difficult to translate every word in one language into another language accurately.
Even so,I wonder if there are simpler words matching for the explanations.

Likewise, I think there must be some English words which can't translate well into Japanese.

Could you tell me an example if you think of?

Posted at Fri Mar 20 11:48:29 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/108540 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/108540 popo Fri Mar 20 11:48:29 UTC 2009 (沈丁花 in Japanese)
I can smell this flower in my neighborhood at the beginning of spring in Japan.
The language of flowers is glory ;immortality;eternity.

Orange osmanthus(金木犀） is also famous for the sweet fragrance.
But its scent is a little too strong for me. Besides it remind me of a toilet. Because the scent is often used as a air freshener in toilets.
Actually, winter daphnes is used,too.

So a lot of people feel the fragrance as "the smell of toilet" despite their sweet smell.
Once you got an image of something related to a sense of smell, it seems to be hard to remove.

Posted at Wed Mar 18 04:18:17 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/107124 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/107124 popo Wed Mar 18 04:18:17 UTC 2009 Now I have short hair, I feel refreshed.
Speaking of hair, I've made a embarrassing mistake about "hair".

When I booked a B&B in Belgium,I exchanged e-mail with the owner.
She offered to pick me up at the station,and wrote about her car (Nissan micra) and she was in a red coat.
I replied adding a descriptions of myself.

"I am black short hair."

I realized my mistake later.(There're a lot of other mistakes in my e-mail)
But it seems a common mistake when Japanese write in English.

"わたしはpopoです" in Japanese.→"I am popo." in English.
"わたしは黒髪です" in Japanase. →"I have black hair." in English.

Every time I write in English,I have a tendency to translate from Japanese to English directly.
That's why I always write a strange sentence by mistake.

It is very helpful to correct my mistakes on lang-8.

Posted at Fri Mar 13 12:03:32 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/104354 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/104354 popo Fri Mar 13 12:03:32 UTC 2009 I often confuse how to use "would" or "could" or "might".
I read some grammar books in Japanese. But I can't distinguish the difference.
These seems to be almost the same meaning in Japanese.

He would be a millionaire.
He could be a millionaire.
He might be a millionaire.

What is the difference between these three sentenses?

Posted at Tue Mar 10 02:10:04 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/102156 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/102156 popo Tue Mar 10 02:10:04 UTC 2009 It is also known as "Momo no Sekku" (桃の節句 the Peach Season Festival)

This day we wish for the happiness of girls and drink "amazake" and eat "hina arare".(a sweet drink made from fermented rice and rice crackers)

We usually display a set of dolls(雛人形) in our house.
This consists of a emperor doll ("obina" 男雛 )and a empress doll("mebina"女雛) and attendants and some belongings.
A full set of dolls is very large and high.
When I was a child,I had seen the full set in my friend's house.It occupied alomost one room!
There was not any of these dolls in my house.So I made origami dolls and put on my desk.

This set of dolls must put off the day passed.
If you keep it out, it is said that the girl will be past marriageable age!

Posted at Tue Mar 03 11:48:07 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/98053 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/98053 popo Tue Mar 03 11:48:07 UTC 2009 "Did you get picked up in Italy ?"

They had the image of the Italian as a sort of person who picked up a woman for some reason.
Actually nobody didn't pick up me.
Most of the people who talked to me were tourist couples.
They asked me to take their pictures and I was happy to do.

My friend looked thoughtful after listening to me.
"Didn't you wear any makeup,did you? And you must have worn cheap clothes as always...."
Apart from my clothes and makeup, I think the Italian would have thier type of woman.

I wonder how true this kind of image would be and what made us have these funny biases.
Such as "The French don't answer when you speak to them in a language other than French. "
This is an extreme example.
But I’ve heard of this term several times.

What image do you have of people in other countories?

Posted at Sun Mar 01 13:25:06 UTC 2009
]]> http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/96807 http://www.lang-8.com/18386/journals/96807 popo Sun Mar 01 13:25:06 UTC 2009