Blog #6: My favorite novelist

This is Akane Homma. I'm sorry for posting my blog too late.
Some days ago, I bought a novel written by my favorite novelist. So I'd like to tell you about the book and the novelist.

The title of the book is "Ushinahareru Monogatari"("Being Losted Story"-I'm afraid to be innocent of its spelling.), and  it is written by OTSUICHI.  This novel is omnibus of some stories of his work, and contain 8 stories. My favorite story of this omnibus is "Calling(the first one)".It is a eccentric love story, and story is sad and painful but warm-hearted at last.






 
OTSUICHI makes his own atmosphere in his works. It is sometimes dreamy, sometimes sentimental, and sometimes dreadful. He writes both cruel story and delicate story. If you like horror and mystery novels, you should try his novel. For instance, "GOTH", "ZOO", and so on.
If you want some strange love story, I really recommend "MOMOSE, Kocchi wo muite"("MOMOSE, please look to me"). The novelist name of this book is NAKATA EICHI, but he is the same person as OTSUICHI.
I hope you enjoy his wonderful world in the novels.

*Here is information about him from Wikipedia.

Blog #6: Recipes

Hello, this is Yu Yamanashi.

In this post, I want to introduce you my favorite cooking recipe website. It is called COOKPAD(クックパッド), and you can jump to the website by clicking here. COOKPAD is the largest recipe website in Japan, and you can search from over 1,260,000 recipes by just typing in the name of the dish you want to cook. You can also post your own original recipe on this site, which is why most of the recipes are of easy-to-make homemade dishes.
This is what the website looks like.




As you can see, the website is full of appetizing photos of dishes. One neat thing about this site is that it shows you a list of popular recipes, which were chosen by users for their quick, simple and tasty dishes. My family and I are often inspired by this recipe list when we can't decide what to make for dinner.

Do you cook at home? If you do, COOKPAD will surely make your mealtime more fun and delicious, and it will enrich the variety of dishes you can make. If you don't, summer break is the time to start! COOKPAD recipes will teach you how to make dishes of all kinds.
Please visit this website!

Blog #6: Gakushuin Life

Hi! This is Kaori Shimamoto.
     As everybody knows, I lived in Illinois for my entire life until I recently came back to Japan last summer. I don`t know if I can call it "coming back", since I`ve never really lived here but I consider both countries my home town. It has already been a year and a month since I left America and I have been through a lot of changes.
     First, I am finally a University student! I never knew Gakushuin University until my cram school teacher recommended it to me. At first I didn`t know if I would be able to make friends and adjust to the enviornment. However, from the first day of school I made a lot of new friends and I became to make a good start of college life. Joining club activities helped me expand the bond between upper grade students and it helped me live a full life.

                       Graduating High School                and                        entering College!!

     Second, my fashion has greatly changed. In America, we were able to wear outfits like sweatshirts, sweatpants, and flip flops, but in Japan everybody is so fashionable and cute that I had to push away those sweatpants into a box. My friends in America will probably be suprised to see how I look now!

From THIS                    to THAT

     Lastly, my views of Japan has changed. Being a returnee, I was afraid of being looked differently. But I was wrong. Every students and friends I have met in Gakushuin are all very nice and polite. They were unprejudiced that I myself was prejudice towards everybody! Getting education in Japan not only will help me achieve my dreams of being a teacher, but also help me understand my other homeland that I have never seen or lived.

     Everybody has a life changing experience more then once in a life time. My life changing experience is right now. What were everybody elses? I hope everybody is enjoying their life in Gakushuin and hopefully have a great experience throughout the rest of the year!

Blog 5: Film Introduction

Hi, this is Yu Yamanashi. I am sorry to be late in updating my blog.

Today, I would like to introduce you a film I really adore. It is called Forrest Gump (1994), a heartwarming drama starring Tom Hanks and winning 6 Oscars.

The story unfolds with Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks), a man with a low IQ but an innocent, pure heart, telling the story of his life to people waiting at a bus stop in a small town. Despite being poor in intelligence, Forrest's mother raises him to choose his own destiny. Forrest unawaringly achieves many great things in life, obtaining fame, fortune and glory, but his one true love eludes him.

There are two plots in this film: the extraordinary tale of Forrest's life and the heartbreaking romance between Forrest and his only love, Jenny. The message to be passed on to viewers throughout the film is that determination, love, courage and honesty are more important than intelligence. The stories of Forrest's life made me think about how I want to live the rest of my life. Before watching this film, I believed somewhere in my heart that succeeding in society from and gaining fame from an early age was everything. Forrest, however, was never happy even after he captured great fortune. All he wanted in his life was to be with the person he truly loved. Now, I look at life differently. I feel that every person has their own unique goal in their lives, be it large or small, and they have all the time in their life to find that goal and achieve it.

Here is a trailer of Forrest Gump on youtube. It will change your view of life, too!

Blog#5: a movie I saw

 Hi, this is Akane Homma. I'd like to introduce "From up on puppy hill", a movie I watched. This is one of STUDIO GHIBLI movie, shown in 2011 and directed by Goro Miyazaki.

Here is a trailer of the movie.

 The story has two main characters. One is a girl named Umi, and the other is a boy named Shun. They are high school students, and they make every effort for preservation of a old building in their school.
The main theme is that preserving tradition is important. I felt the spirits Japanese people have. I mean the film showed the people took it for granted that they were kind to each other and lived together. Moreover, the time of the story is Showa period, and various scenes reminds us of old Japan, so we can enjoy the  flavor of that era.
 These days, people in Japan are getting used to western style and loosing their own style the people did in the past. lots of new substances are coming from one to another, and many people focus on only such tings. However, there are often important things in the old ones. We must remember that.
 By the way, Story of "From up on puppy hill" has another aspect, in other word it is a kind of love story. Umi and Shun fall in love each other, but they are in strange situation. It becomes obstacle for their relationship... This is also a worth point to watch.

 I enjoyed this movie, so I hope you enjoy it, too!

Blog #4: Chicago Gangsters

Gangster genre has always been a popular theme used in modern movies. I have never watched any gangster movies but my grandfather`s top five gangster movies are as listed below.

1. The Godfather (1972)
2. Goodfellas (1990)
3. The Untouchables (1987)
4. Branded to Kill (1967)

If anybody is intrested in this genre my grandpa recommends it very much, so you should check it out someday.

Now, what I want to share to everyone today is not about gangsters in the movies, but real gangsters that have done many interesting and shocking events in past history. I`m sure everybody has heard of the name Al Capone. The most famous Chicago gangster.

Photo credited to zippycart

His full name is Alphonse Gabriel Capone and is known for the many crime such as, smuggling, bootlegging liquor, and prostitution. He rose to infamy as the leader of the Chicago mafia during the Prohibition era. Born in a poor Italian family, he commited many crimes and robbery for a living. Living in New York, Capone moves to Chicago to start a better life. His biggest crime of all was the big shooting to murder his rival gang group.

Despite all the crimes and murders he has done, he was known to be a generous person. He often came out in public with a bright colorful suit. Flashing off his 11.5 carrot diamond pinky ring, he gave big tips to people and was the first one to open a soup kitchens during the Great Depression.

Capone was arrested in 1931, for tax envasion. The government wanted to use him as an example so they did not let him go off so easily. Sentencing him to 11 years in prison and millions of dollars of fine, it was his end of reign as a crime boss. After a few years in prison, he became increasingly sick and died of teritiary syphilis. He was only 48 years old.

A real gang`s life is full of many extreme events just like in the movies. However, it is really fearsome to think and know that there are real gangs around you.

I have lived in Chicago for 18 years, but I wonder what kind of gangsters there are in Japan? 

Blog #3: Soccer News

   Hi! This is Yu Yamanashi. As we are in the middle of the World Cup Qualifying Tournament, I came across an interesting and possibly shocking news article that I would like to introduce to you. The title is, "Fifa alarmed at widespread 'abuse' of painkillers ".(Matt McGrath, 5 June 2012, BBC News) Please click on the title to jump to the BBC webpage for the full article and to find out what happened to the player in the photo below.

 

   To make the long story short, this article is about the Fifa medical officer and several doctors alerting that too many soccer players are taking too much painkillers too frequently. The article points out that the major factors in the growing use of painkillers in soccer are the pressure on team doctors to get injured players back on the pitch quickly and players to stay on the pitch. Some problems induced by overdose painkillers are damage on the kidney and liver from strong drugs, irreversible destruction of tissue from numbed alarm systems and elevated risk of heart disorder. What concerns the Fifa medical officer the most is the attitude being passed on to younger players.
  
   What do you think about this article? Do you think there is an effective solution to this problem? I was very sad  to hear that so many players were too wrapped up in playing to care about their health. I also felt that with playing being their job, it wouldn't be easy to just take away painkillers from the players. In my opinion, the best way to improve the situation is to act upon supporters and spectators instead of the players and doctors themselves. This is because the major factor in this problem, the pressure to keep playing, is coming from the expectations of supporters and spectators. Also, players wouldn't be able to ignore if the very fans they are supposed to give hope and dreams to pleaded them to stop abusing painkillers. I hope soccer players would soon come to realize that by abusing painkillers, they are hurting the feelings of many soccer fans.


Yu Yamanashi