April 3, 2013
I failed at catching up on everything
in the last post. So here is another attempt.
---Aspect Forum---
On March 5th I attended the
“Aspect Forum” in Makuhari at Josai International University to
listen to presentations on the difference between lexical aspect in
Japanese and English. The presentations were very interesting, but at
a graduate research level, so also a bit dry for someone who isn't
studying the topic in-depth themselves. Something I found really
interesting was the use of the word “in” and “for.” I never
considered this about English before, but in phrases like, “John
ran in five minutes,” it's usage just doesn't quite make sense.
However, if you pair this with a distance such as in, “John ran
500km in five minutes” then the pairing works. But if you use
“for,” as in, “John ran for five minutes,” it only works
without a distance. So if you were to say “John ran 500km for 5
minutes,” the meaning is completely lost.
３月５日は日本語と英語のアスペクトの違いについてのプレゼンを聞くために幕張の城西国際大学のアスペクトフォーラムに行ってきた。プレゼンは面白かったけど、大学院生の研究レベルだったので、アスペクトを専攻していない人には内容がちょっとつまらないかもしれない。特に面白かったのは英語の「in」と「for」の使い方。今までこの英語について考えなかったけど「John
ran in five minutes.」という使い方はあんまり意味がない。が、距離と組み合わせて、「John
ran 500km in five minutes」って言ったら意味は理解できる。逆に「for」を使って、「John
ran for five minutes.」っていうのは距離なしのほうは意味がある。例えば、「John
ran 500km for 5 minutes」っていったら、意味が完全になくなる。
---Traditional Music Concert---
That Friday I attended a
presentation/concert for Japanese traditional music with instruments such as the
koto, biwa, and shamisen. The music was beautiful (if you're into
that whole Heian period thing... (I am)), and we even got to see a
traditional dance performed to the music as well, on top of getting
to try out some of the instruments ourselves. One of the instruments
I got to try was like a large cylindrical harmonica with a bunch of
tubes coming out the top called the "sho."
金曜日は日本の雅楽（琴、琵琶、三味線等）のプレゼン・コンサートを見に行った。音楽はすごくきれいだった（平安時代のものが好きのなら。。。（ところで、大好き））。そこで音楽に併せた舞いが見えて、自分で楽器を吹てみることもできた。私が吹てみたのは大きい、円筒ハーモニカみたいで筒がいっぱい立ち並んでいる「笙」
という楽器だった。
---March Salon---
The following morning was my third
cultural salon. One of the ALTs in my city and myself held a cooking
class on how to make American-style breakfast. She taught everyone
how to make breakfast burritos (we couldn't find re-fried beans!) and
I taught everyone my recipe for french toast. Though I was really
tempted to tell everyone to throw in as much of each ingredient as
they pleased, I actually did manage to write down a recipe for
everyone to use.
その次の朝は三番目の文化交流サロン。私と同じ市に住んでいるALTと一緒にアメリカの朝ごはんの作り方を教える料理教室をやった。そのALTはブレックファストブリットの作り方で私はフレンチトーストの作り方を教えた。本当は「材料は好きなだけ入れて！」とは言いたかったけど、何とかして、皆が使えるレシピーを自分で書いた。
 |
| Biwa Sundae |
Afterward we headed to the little
shopping center over by Dorakuen to visit an eikaiwa friend who had
just gotten a job nearby, and we ended up eating a bunch of loquat
icecream sundaes and hanging out in the nice warm sunlight (which I
have to mention, today is completely devoid of. It's been pretty much
typhoon-ing outside for about three days straight now--said to
continue into the weekend...)
英会話からの友達が最近、近くにバイトをやることになったから、その後、道楽園のショッピングセンターにその友だちと会いに行ったけど、日差しに浴びたり(今日は日差しが全然なし。もう三日間ぐらい台風みたいな天気が続いているーー週末にも続くそうだ。）、雑談したり、枇杷ソフトサンデーを食べたりしてしまった。
---Japan Foundation Japanese Instructor
Training Course---
On the 20th I left for a
business trip in Saitama, where I spent
8 days taking a training
course on becoming a Japanese instructor. Participants learned how to
take their experiences on the JET program and use them in a classroom
setting by incorporating Japanese culture into language learning. I
worked with two other girls on a project making a lesson plan that we
would then present to the rest of the participants. We decided to
make a lesson plan incorporating Japanese television shows into the
lesson, so kids can get an idea of what schools in Japan are like,
while learning the language at the same time.
 |
| View of the cherry blossoms from my room at the center |
二十日は埼玉に行って、８日間をかけて日本語教授法研修に参加した。そこで参加者がJETプログラムの経験を使って、どうやって言語学に日本文化を含めるかを学んだ。二人の女性と一緒に教案を作って、後でほかの参加者にプレゼンをした。私たちが、生徒たちは日本語を学びながら、日本の学校はどんなものかを理解できるような日本のドラマを使った教案を作ることにした。
My group members were the nicest people
ever! I'm really glad
I got to work with them in particular, because
I feel like we have a really similar work ethic, and we were able to
prioritize our time really well. After our presentation we had a
celebration dinner at an Italian restaurant near the station. I can't
remember the name now, but I think it was called Lala? The pasta was
absolutely delicious, and they had really yummy deserts too.
Afterward we headed back for some karaoke at the international center
with the rest of the participants.
 |
| Turns out I had a photo of the place! |
 |
| There was something seriously addictive in the pasta sauce. |
 |
| Cake with an Italian name I can't pronounce. |
私のグループメンバーはすごくやさしい人たちだった。私たちの労働論理は同じように感じたし、効率性が高かったし、グループメンバーがこの二人になったこそよかったと思う。プレゼンの後、駅の近くのイタリア料理のレストランで食べながらお祝いした。そのレストランの名前は覚えていないんだけど。。。確か「LaLa」といったっけ。そこのパスタもデザートもすごく美味しかった。その後、ほかの参加者とカラオケパーティをするために国際センターに帰った。
I had a lot of fun and learned a lot,
but also was a bit
exhausted due to having my usual CIR work to keep
up with in the evenings after our classes. I'm really glad that I got
to meet all of the people that I did at the conference though. The
participants were quite diverse, and their home countries were way
more evenly dispersed than at a usual JET conference. Most of our
conferences have people from all over the world, but there is an
overwhelmingly large number of participants from the U.S. This time
around though there were probably as many Chinese participants as
Americans, and there were also participants from Australia, New
Zealand, England, and Korea. I enjoyed talking with everyone and
learning a little more about their cultures.
 |
| Final Presentation |
いろんなことを学ぶのは楽しかったけど、授業のあとは毎日CIRの普段の仕事をやらなきゃいけなかったのでちょっと疲れちゃった。でも、研修で沢山の人々と会えてよかった。普段のJET研修より、この研修は様々な人々が集まって、普段の研修より参加者の母国が均等に分散された。いつものJET研修はいろいろな国から来た人たちが集まったが、多くの参加者はアメリカ人だったの。でも、今回は中国人は多分アメリカ人と同じぐらいいて、オーストラリア、ニュージーランド、イギリス、韓国などから来た参加者もいた。みんなと話し合えて、みんなの文化について少しでも学べるのが楽しかった。
Upon returning home, we got to read
each others' essays about something that surprised us about living in
Japan. I loved reading these because not only did it reaffirm that
I'm not the only one who thinks some of these things, but it gave me
insight into what things are considered strange to someone who isn't
from the U.S. If you want to read more about the conference, feel
free to check out my column in May. It won't be published for about
another week, but when it does I'll try to remember to link to it on
here.
それぞれの県に帰ってきたら、日本の生活でびっくりしたことについてみんなが書いたエッセイが読めた。それを読んで、「こんなことを考えているのは私だけじゃない」と言うことを再確認できただけじゃなくて、アメリカ人以外の人たちにとって、どんなことがおかしく見えるかを洞察することができたから面白かった。もし、この研修についてもっと読みたかったら５月の「キムのつぶやき」を読んでください。あと１週間がたったら出版するんだけど、出版したらここにリンクを入れるのを忘れないようにしておく。
---March Horse Show---
The March circuit show was the last
show of the short circuit. I rode Macaron and Fururu both in the 80cm
class. Ironically, my times were within .02 seconds of each other!
(Ironic because Macaron is super slow and Fururu is pretty fast). And
even more irony comes from the fact that I placed higher on Macaron,
getting second, and placing third on Fururu. The following weekend
was the 90cm class. I rode Fururu, but knocked a rail on the last
line when he got lazy with a back leg.
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