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Broadcasting to an audience of three (and a goldfish)...
Comment, ramblings and musings... life through the eyes of a Japanologist...
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Monday, December 9, 2002 |
 J-List
Designated cities in Japan (cities with over 1000000 inhabitants)
- Sapporo
- Sendai
- Chiba
- Yokohama
- Kawasaki
- Nagoya
- Kyoto
- Osaka
- Kobe
- Hiroshima
- Kitakyushu
- Fukuoka
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Cold, coat
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Into Hiroshima
Illuminated tram
Bought video camera
Sushi
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As I left Ozu, it looked like there was quite a blizzard over in the region of Miyajima and Hatsukaichi. I hope it doesn't snow on the island...
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Went to Ozu Elementary School in the afternoon. The second- to fourth-years were really irritating: they just sat there like vegetables, with no interest in the skit we were doing. To be honest, I don't think it's very interesting either (the teacher came up with the Japanese, and I just put it into English), but that's beside the point. It took nearly half an hour for the children to be able to say the sentence, 'We are going to talk about one week at our school'. Not memorise it- that would have been far too ambitious!- but just to learn to say eleven short, simple words. And even then, with the famous Ozu lack of hearing comprehension ability, the words came out more like 'we a go-i to tor abouto wan wee a aa su-cool-ru'. I just held my breath, counted to ten, and ploughed on until the lesson ended. I'm going to send a CD of the pronunciation so the children can (theoretically) learn from it, but to be honest I don't see what good it will do- the children in Ozu are never able to hear the sounds in an English word properly, and so even if they listen to the CD they won't get the right pronunciation!
The fifth- and sixth-years, on the other hand, were fun. There's one girl who has trouble repeating what I say, but the rest of the group did really well with the script of Momotaro, especially given it was their first time to even see the text. I was particularly impressed that they were able to mimic not just my pronunciation, but my intonation, which bodes well for the performance in January.
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Spent some of the morning looking at my speech for the High School students' conference next week, and sorting out the English translation of the Japanese announcements. The speech is basically the same as last year's, except that I'm going to shorten it a little, but the Japanese-English translation is, to be frank, a mess. I'm sure the chap from Seinen-no-ie thought he was doing me a favour when he rewrote the English I'd translated last year to go with this year's updated Japanese announcements, but to be honest, I wish he hadn't bothered. It's far more difficult to sort out the way it is now, whereas if the English had been left unchanged I'd have been able to read through the Japanese and simply change the English as I went along. Also, there are inconsistencies and illogicalities on every page; for example, there are ten groups, each giving a five-minute presentation... in thirty minutes. This isn't strictly my problem, but, judging by the way things have gone during the past three years, I'll be the one who ends up sorting out these sorts of problems during the actual conference, so it's in my interest to make sure that the chap (nominally) in charge knows about his planning (or lack of it).
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The Etajima International News had an effect; I got an email this morning from a lady who'd seen the newsletter and wanted to know about the International Club! Even if only one person responds like this, it makes it worth producing the newsletter. I think I'll continue; keizoku wa chikara nari...
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© Copyright 2003 Nathan Duckworth.
Updated: 20/1/03; 2:24:21 pm.
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