Thursday, May 28, 2009

Adam's Positive Attitude

Not only does he have the charisma, the voice, the stage presence, and the whole “package” that makes for a superstar. He's also humble, gracious, courteous, respectful, genuine - rare qualities that I hope he keeps as he continues on his journey to megastardom!

Want more American Idol videos? Click here.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

Adam Talks about What's Next

This guy not only has everything it takes to be a superstar - the voice, the looks, the stage presence, the creativity.  He also has enormous poise, respect for others, and, above all, real class.  I can't wait to buy his recordings, albums, and - some day - a ticket to his concert.


Preview of Retirement Days

The way I spent my afternoon and evening is how I'd like to live when I'm retired (if ever).  I went with friends from my international women's group to the Sapporo Modern Art Museum to see a Yuzo Saeki Retrospective (oil paintings from 1923-1928 by a Japanese artist who lived in Paris).  Then we had a delicious Italian dinner at Tanto Travoletta.  Finally, I got home in time to watch the “rat pack” performances on American Idol.  This kind of leisure time is rare, but I'm hoping it's a preview of days to come.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Gratitude During Ups and Downs

UP - My weight was down another pound this morning.

DOWN - ADAM LAMBERT LOST (although he's still going to be the biggest superstar ever to come out of American Idol)!

UP - Today was an incredibly warm, gorgeous day - like July in mid-May.

DOWN - I'm supposed to send out a bulk mailing about our language teachers' conference this Sunday, and my Mail hasn't been working right since Monday.  I made an appointment at the Apple store with the Mac Genius at lunchtime, thinking I could get it fixed, but they couldn't so I left my computer at the store while I went to teach my afternoon class.

UP - I got a ticket to the Simon and Garfunkel (who are actually coming to Sapporo) concert in July.

DOWN - I got on the subway going the wrong way and had to backtrack.

UP - I got to my afternoon class (Enjoy English! which I inherited from a colleague) just in time and it was delightful, as always.

DOWN - The Mac Geniuses still hadn't figured out the problem with my Mail and, in fact, now it's worse because I've lost all the rules I had for sorting messages into folders.

DOWN - I didn't get my afternoon nap and have my usual no-nap migraine-like headache.

UP - I don't have the flu, which has resulted in schools getting closed in other parts of Japan.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Simon on Susan

I appreciate Simon's candor and also the fact that he really is impressed by Susan Boyle.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Piers Morgan on “Unconventional” Contestants

I love the part where Piers says he got through customs by saying he was a friend of Susan Boyle's!

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Occupations of Parents of Japanese University Students

It's really interesting to me the different kind of work that my students' parents do. In some cases, I'm fairly certain that the student may be the first in the family to attend university.

I've made a list, exactly as they were written on the students' information forms. Since the students are from various universities and I've included no names, I haven't compromised anyone's privacy.

My father is a office worker. My mother is a homemaker.

My father is engineer. My father is working on telephone company.

My father is office worker. My mother is Yakult lady.

My house is cleaning shop.

My mother is a nerse.

My father is the Ground Self-Defense Forse.

My father is a professor of biology.

My father is teacher. My mother's job is part time.

My mother work in hospital as nursing assistant.

My father is a taxi driver. My mother is a hotel worker.

My father is carpenter.

My parents work each other. NTT. Seikyo.

My father is Tochikaokutsyosashi.

My father is a hight school teacher. My mother is midwife.

My mother:s workshop is Kanpo drugstore.

My father works in Sapporo city ward office. My mother is a housewife.

My father is driver.

My father is a official civil.My father and my mother work Hotel in Furano.

My father work factory.

My father works at city hall. My mother is homeworker.

My father is a car engineer.

My father is a bussinessman.

My father is a public employee. My mother is a librarian.

My father's work is covering buildings and stations with tiles. My mother is home keeper.

My father is a doctor. My mother was a nurse.

My parents's job is agriculture.

My father is an architect. My mother was kindergarten teacher.

Parents manage to jazz bar.

My father is a junior high school teacher. My mother was a elementary school teacher.

My father is a veterinarian. My mother was a nusery school teacher.

My father manage gardening shop. My mother teach mathematics for school child.

My father is cook.

My father works in factory. My mother works a part time job.

My mother is office worker.

My father works in bank.

My father is a lab technician.

My father sells car. My mother is housewife.

My father is plumber.

My father makes cakes. My mother and sister work for hospital.

My father has his own soba restaurant. My mother is good at cooking, too.

My father is a carpenter. My mother works in a factory which makes clothes.

My parents own outdoor school. This shool is teaching outdoor sports and outdoor life, for example, canoeing, rafting, etc.

My father is a taxi driver. My sister is a nurse.

My father is an architect. My mother is full-time housewife.

My father job is peace keep of Japan. My mother is homekeeping.

My father sales office computer.

My father is a official. My mother is sado teacher.

My parents are drunker, always drinking. My eldely brother is gambler.

My father was a headmaster of a junior high school. He is sick and receiving treatment and resting at home. My mother is a housewife.

My father is a fireman. My mother works part-time.

My mother is long-distance bus tiket publisher, and my older sister is insurance saleswoman.

My father is a bus driver. My mother works in an office.

My father is a public official. He works for a hospital. My mother is a dancing instructor.

My father is a teacher of elementary school. My mother works part-time at a supermarket.

My father manages a shoes store with my mother.

My father is a head of kindergarten. My other is a housewife.

My father is a vice-principal.

My father is postman. My mother work at kingdum teacher.

My parents are both junior high school teachers.

My mother is a kindergarten teacher and works almost every day.

My father is an instructor at a driving school. My mother is a cosmetician in a cosmetic company.

My father works at the bank. My mother is a housewife.

My father is electrical engineer. My mother is homemaker.




Thursday, January 01, 2009

Uncle Jay Sings about 2008

A hilarious rendition of news events of 2008 set to Christmas carols and popular songs:

For more episodes “helping small minds understand big news,” check out Uncle Jay Explains the News.

New Year's Resolutions (The Onion)

Think you can keep any of these resolutions?










Check out other humorous “news” stories at The Onion.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Smoothie Move


It all started with my first visit to Costco, which opened not long ago in Sapporo. Imagine, if you will, a store with spacious aisles, spacious shopping carts, and huge piles of cheaply-priced items that can't be found in one's local supermarket. Well, I suppose for most Americans, that doesn't take much imagination, but it's extremely rare in Sapporo.

I went with a friend who has a membership, and filled up his basket with cheese and corn bread mix and Perrier. (Of course, I paid.) I also found a huge bag of mixed frozen fruit (mangoes, papaya, pineapple, and strawberries) that I could barely squeeze into my freezer.

Of course, then I wanted to make smoothies. I’ve missed them so much, although they’ve just started getting popular in Japan. So I just had to buy a juicer. Juicers have also only recently gotten popular in Japan, so I was surprised at the variety I had to choose from, but got a fairly inexpensive, standard model, which is actually a simple blender.

I figured making a smoothie would be a cinch - just throw in some frozen fruit and a bit of low-fat yogurt, and mix. Well, it tasted all right, but it wasn't smooth!

Later I tried one that included a cup of vanilla soy milk, a cup and a half of the frozen fruit, and a half a banana. The texture and sweetness were for that were just about right.

Also, I figured out that it works better to put the milk in first and the pieces of fruit in one at a time. I knew there was some reason for the cylinder in the middle with the hole in the cover! I'm kind of a slow learner when it comes to anything involving ”cooking.“

There are some recipes in Japanese that came with the juicer, and I suppose I could check those out. I notice they have Chinese characters for something like “angle ice,” which I think means ice cubes, although frozen fruit seems to do quite well. Eventually I might add some sort of nutritious powder or the like so that the smoothie could even be considered a meal.

Advice or RECIPES for smoothies are welcome!


Wednesday, November 12, 2008

On Not Coming Full Circle

Today I was asked if I would teach a course for elementary school English teachers. I declined.

In my 30+ years of teaching, I've had students from the ages of 11 to 78, but I've never taught children. I have neither the experience nor the expertise to teach children, much less to teach others how to teach children. I could not, in good conscious, agree to teach such a course.

Ironically, my very first major in college was elementary education. That lasted a little over a year. As much as I love children, I couldn't get into the courses, which seemed rather petty to me. I easily got seduced (almost literally) by the Head of the English Department into majoring in English, a major that I later discovered (and was warned by my father) would get me nowhere when I started looking for jobs.

I toyed with majoring in Psychology - and would still like to get a degree in counseling, if I could - but the Psychology Department at my college was pathetic. I'm not sure, for example, that they were familiar with Carl Rogers and Client-Centered Therapy. It was all still Freud and Jung.

I would also have loved to major in Theatre, and took as many courses in the field that I could, but my tuition was being paid by my father, who considered Theatre an even less practical major than English. I defied him later by going on to graduate school and getting an M.A. in Theatre on my own (and with the help of a full-tuition scholarship). It turn out, of course, that my father was right. In fact, neither English nor theatre ever led directly to jobs.

I ended up taking courses in alternative education and finally getting licensed to teach English for senior high, then junior high. That eventually led to my teaching in Japan, where I wasn't able to teach in public junior or senior high schools, so ended up teaching adults, then university.

And, now, at one of the universities where I teach, I've been requested to teach elementary school education. It's so ironic that my earliest major would have been the one to prepare me the best for teaching such a course. But I never would have had the opportunity to teach such a course had I not ended up teaching university-level English.

What really bothers me is that, now that the Ministry of Education has decided English will be required for elementary school children in Japan, universities are scrambling to find instructors to teach courses for future elementary school teachers. Notice that I didn't say qualified instructors. I have been asked, and I'm far from qualified - even with over 30 years experience teaching English and at least 10 years teaching methodology.

No doubt someone will accept the position (and other such positions in universities all over Japan). Are most of those people going to have the qualifications? I have my doubts, and I have even stronger doubts that teaching English in elementary schools in Japan is going to improve the level of English in this country. Not when it's being implemented in such a haphazard way.

If I had continued as an elementary education major, I might have gone on to become an elementary school teacher and, possibly, supervisor. I might even have ended up teaching elementary education. However, I probably would never have come to Japan. So I would have been fully qualified to teach the class that I turned down today, but I wouldn't have been here to be asked!


Tuesday, November 04, 2008

There's an Erection?

I wore a red, white, and blue scarf with stars and stripes to school today.  However, when I asked my students why I was wearing the scarf, with the hint that it was connected to something happening in the U.S., I had to wait a long time for their guesses.

"Thanksgiving?"

"Independence Day?"

That I was also wearing my "Jed Bartlet for President" sweatshirt apparently didn't help.

At least none of my students answered Halloween!  They all know that was last week.

I wonder how many university students in Japan have no idea there's a presidential election going on in the U.S. today.  At least my students know.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Jokes My Cats Don't Get

I frequently tell my cats jokes. However, they don't seem to get them. I mean, they never laugh or even respond with a groan. Here are a couple of examples, which you may have heard in another context.

“You're funny, but looks don't count.”

“You make a better door than window.”


“Mommy's going to the store, and she'll be back before you can say, 'Jack Robinson'.”


“Mommy has to go to work.  Somebody in this family has to put food on the floor.”


“It's good for you.  It'll put hair on your chest!”


“Did you ever hear about the cat that cried 'Wolf!'?”


Feel free to let me know of any other jokes you think my cats might not enjoy!


Saturday, September 06, 2008

Michiko

About 3 hours ago, I learned that another of my private students passed away. I have lost two students in less than a month to cancer.

Michiko Nakamura was two years younger than I and so full of life. She was always cheerful and optimistic, brightening the classroom with her wit and vitality. As I write this, I can hear her voice entertaining us with one of her delightful stories. It's so hard to believe that I'll never see or hear her again.

A few months ago, Michiko began complaining of asthma and wore a face mask to class every week. Her voice was becoming hoarse, and she didn't seem to be improving. Suddenly I got a package from her returning a DVD she had borrowed (she loved movies and had seen just about every movie that I mentioned). Attached was a note saying that she had been diagnosed with lung cancer. I thought I must be reading it wrong.

She went to Tokyo where she was receiving treatment at most likely one of the best hospitals in the country. Only a few weeks ago, she was showing signs of improvement and fully expected to return to Sapporo this month. We were all looking forward to being reunited. Then her condition worsened, her lungs filling with fluid.

The birthday ecard I sent her last week was never opened.

Unlike the student who passed away last month, Michiko's wake and funeral will be held in Tokyo where her daughter lives, so I won't be able to attend. However, our class will be having its own memorial time for her during our regular class time on Thursday. Because she and the other three students have been together for so long, the only way I can describe it is that it's going to feel out of balance without her.


Sunday, August 31, 2008

Who Is Sarah Palin?

Polar bears are in trouble if McCain gets elected president. His choice for a running mate, Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska for a year and a half (and, before that, mayor of a town of 9,000 people - not exactly the greatest experience for running a country) sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species because she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska. Read the article, “Who Is Sarah Palin?” by Move On.

Is this the person Americans want to be one heartbeat away from the presidency?

Friday, August 29, 2008

When I'm 64 . . .


. . . exactly one month from today. Hardly seems possible.

Life is nothing like what I expected when McCartney and Lennon first wrote the song. No knitting by the fireside, no digging in the garden, hardly any postcards any more (unless they're the “e” kind), and certainly no bottles of wine.

No grandchildren. Not even any great nephews or nieces. I do have cats (something that was, I'm sure inadvertently, left out of the song since “cat” rhymes with so many other words), and I'm hoping someone will send me a valentine!

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Peter Grimes Is Coming!

Peter Grimes will be in Sapporo in less than a month. More information to follow.
_____________________________________________________________
The 511th Sapporo Symphony Subscription Concert
Benjamin Britten/opera, “Peter Grimes” op. 33 (concert-style)
Tadaaki OTAKA, Conductor
Cast:
Peter Grimes: Kei FUKUI (Tenor)
Ellen Orford: Yuko KAMAHORA (Soprano)
Captain Balstrode: Satoru AOTO (Baritone)
Hobson: Tsuyoshi MIHARA (Bass)
Swallow: Kazunori KUBO (Bass)
Auntie: Akiko OGAWA (Alto)
Two Nieces: Eri UNOKI (Soprano), Kaori HIRAI (Soprano)
Bob Boles: Keiro OHARA (Tenor)
Rev. Horace Adams: Akira Yukawa (Tenor)
Mrs. Sedley: Misato IWAMORI (Mezzo Soprano)
Ned Keene: Ken-ichi YOSHIKAWA (Baritone)
Choruses:
Sapporo Symphony Chorus, Sapporo Academy Chorus, Sapporo Broadcasting Chorus (Chorusmaster: Isao OSANAI)
Assistant Conductor: Hidehiro SHINDORI
Assistant Conductor: Masahito OSADA

Anyone who wants information about the opera in Japanese can read an article here.

Monday, August 11, 2008

Setsumaro

Setsumaro_YokoyamaThis morning when I went to radio exercises, a student in one of my classes came running over to tell me stunning news. Setsumaro Yokoyama passed away Saturday evening from pancreatic cancer. He had been in the hospital recently diagnosed with gallstones, and we were concerned because we hadn't heard from him for a few weeks, but I never thought that it was life-threatening.

He was only 75 and still full of energy. In fact, I wish that my university students had his enthusiasm for learning! Although he was always humble about expressing his opinion, he often showed great insight, such as when we were reading the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” together.

Setsumaro also had great respect for others. At our class last week, I joked to the other students that, with his being absent, no one bowed when I came into the classroom.

He has attended nearly all my concerts in the past few years and had already bought tickets for the one in September. I will be thinking of him at that time.

I've made a memorial page with photos of him and the rest of the class. I'll be going to the wake for him this evening.

Monday, July 07, 2008

Germ Warfare

If there's any destruction during the G8 summit in Hokkaido, it's obviously going to be done through germ warfare.

I've been suffering from a terrible cold, going through several tissues per hour. I wanted to discard a bunch of tissues at my local subway station when I realized that the trash bins had all been confiscated. Anyone who wants to plant a bomb is just going to have to find another location.

Meanwhile, I'm carrying these germ-infested tissues around and probably spreading my cold all over school today. Not that anyone's likely to die from my germs, but it could put them out of commission for a while.

It's come to this - carrying our own trash bags around. That's actually not such a bad idea, if it acts as an incentive for people to cut down on their trash. If they discard trash just anywhere, though, the effect from contamination - especially of snot-ridden tissues - could be worse!

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Gee, Ate


Check out the pre-G8 summit Oxfam demonstration in downtown Sapporo at the Oxfam International Blog. Because of a bad cold, I was too sick to participate, but my neighbor, Amanda, volunteered and met the head of George Bush!

According to the blog, “Oxfam will be calling on the G8 to make poverty issues central to their discussions. . . . The message [they wanted] to get across [on Saturday, July 8th] is that the G8 leaders shouldn’t come to the Hokkaidō summit and treat their visit as a holiday.”

Personally, I'm wondering how much can be accomplished in 3 days by world leaders flying in from various parts of the globe. “Flying in.” How seriously can they be taking the rising cost of fuel, to say nothing of its effect on the environment. Among the 20,000-40,000 extra police that have been mobilized for the event, most are not able to stay at the venue of the summit, so buses are transporting them back and forth to their hotels, as far as an hour away. That's an enormous use of fuel!

I heard from one friend that a woman living in Toya was going out to cut vegetables with a scythe. Security forces confiscated her scythe. Apparently this is to protect those who will be involved in discussions on alleviating world poverty. Gee, I wonder what they ate during their breaks from focusing on the poor. Locally-grown vegetables?

[I later learned that, indeed, fresh green asparagus from Biei, a town in Hokkaido, was served. See the Times Online article, G8 leaders feast on 13 courses after discussing world food shortages.]


See photos of Lake Toya that I took on a visit there in 2000.