samurai_tofu

It is snowing in tokyo today.
Rather wet snow. Can't be helped.

First time in this winter.

As much as children can make snow men.

More quiet than usual.

I want go skiing.

I hear Japanese good ski resorts, as Niseko in Hokkaido, are full of foreigners, especially the Australian.

Australians and Europeans find prices in Japan very cheap.

Yes, euro has become very expensive.

I always wonder how intelligent conscientious people in the US and other countries of so-called new continents can live in their countries mentally or psychologically peacefully without feeling guilty.

Because it is very clear, if you study the history, that it was not their land untill only very recently. Their land belonged to the people who lived there and were forced to move from where they used to live.

If they say to their children, "if you take something from others against their will, you have to return it", they have to return their land to those who it belonged to.

I hear Australians have returned some land to the natives.
I can see that they felt that things were not quite right from the ethical viewpoint of the second half of 20th century.

A friend of mine says "that is called loser's psychology".

We, the Japanese, must return Hokkaido, the nothern island, to the Ainu, though. I feel guilty.

Wars for resources forever ???!!!

A Chinese student studying in a Japnese university told me that it was more difficult for her to learn Japanese than English because of its very different syntax.

A teacher who is teaching Japanese to overseas students in a Japanese university told me that the Chinese learn Japanese twice as faster than the European and the Korean learn it three times faster than the Chinese.

Maybe, Chinese language is somewhere halfway between English and Japanese.

I feel strange that (relatively) many people have visited my blog in this month though I haven't written anything since July. Why?

A bit about Japan.
My son, 7 yrs old, told his teacher, a woman in her 50s but very sporty, that his friends often pat or even kick him.
She told us that these things among boys should be tolerated to some extent.

A couple days ago, Japanese public TV (called NHK) started to show English football. I saw ManU vs Blackburn which was interrupted by my wife.

The NHK is showing "Doctor Who" too but only the ninth doctor series.

Today, i read "cricket and ants" with my son (Year 2) which was given to him to read for this week with other 2 books.
"Oh, small world. The same everywhere" i thought.

The book goes,

In the summer, cricket sings and plays and laughs at ants who collect foods for winter.

Winter came and cricket runs out of food and shivers.

Meanwhile, ants were preparing their party underground.
One ant says "something is missing for our party. ??? entertaiment!"
The other says "Cricket!"

The ants went to the cricket to invite him to sing songs at their party.

They enjoyed the party very much, especially cricket, of course!
Warm place and plenty of foods!!! But...

party was over and cricket got sad as he had to go.

When cricket was about to leave reluctantly, ants said
"why not stay with us for the whole winter and play music for us!"
"oh! yes! thank you!!!" "you are welcome!" !!! -END-

????? what is this book all about?????

You should do what you are good at and exchange your products/service?

The book was published by "Jolly Learning Ltd".

Another result from 7 countries questionnaire which can be relevant to the present situation in the world.

http://www.ism.ac.jp/~yoshino/arito/eg/top_e.htm

Q64. Some people say that although there are many different religions in the world, each with their own beliefs, their teachings really all amount to the same thing. Would you agree with this or disagree?

____________________1.Agree__2.Disagree__8.Other_9.D.K.
1992_ITALY__1,048____60.9______27.7_______-______11.5
1987_FRANCE_1,013____57.8______33.0_______1.0_____8.2
1987_FRG____1,000____61.8______20.7_______0.4_____17.1
1993_NL_____1,083____70.1______22.3_______1.5_____6.1
1987_UK_____1,043____71.2______24.5_______0.9_____3.4
1988_USA____1,563____56.5______39.9_______1.0_____2.7
1988_JPN____2,265____63.3______16.4_______0.5____19.9

Now, 20 years on, maybe "Disagree" has increased?!
(I don't know how different people think now.)

Basically, though 20 years ago, I am surprised at the fact that 2/3 of Europeans (+Americans) agreed with the proposition.

The Japanese exchange Christmas presents, go to Shintoism shrines for New Year, get married in Shintoism shrines/christian churches(regarded as fashionable), and have funnerals in buddism temples.

No wonder they "agree".

found an interesting questionnaire survey.

http://www.ism.ac.jp/~yoshino/arito/eg/top_e.htm

Some results are below.

Q62a. Do you have any personal religious faith?
________________n____1.Yes___2.No____9.D.K.
1992__ITALY___1,048___87.8___12.0____0.2
1987__FRANCE__1,013___64.4___34.8____0.8
1987__FRG_____1,000___74.8___21.8____3.4
1993__NL______1,083___57.1___38.7____4.2
1987__UK______1,043___64.2___34.3____1.4
1988__USA_____1,563___85.3___13.9____0.8
1988__JPN_____2,265___36.5___63.5____-

Q37. Home is the only place where I can relax and feel good"?
(year and n are the same in the question above.)

________1.Yes____2.No____8.Other__9.D.K.
ITALY___73.6_____24.7_____-_______1.7
FRANCE__65.4_____29.7_____3.3_____1.6
FRG_____56.1_____37.5_____2.0_____4.4
NL______31.6_____65.5_____0.8_____2.1
UK______50.7_____48.0_____0.4_____0.9
USA_____44.8_____54.4_____0.1_____0.7
JPN_____80.3_____16.3_____0.6_____2.8

My 6-year-old son has been in a local english school for more than one year and has come to speak in english better than I.

One thing shocked me a little is that he and other children (and people at large) often use the expression "loser!"

It sounds very strong to me.

We usually think that when one won, one should not say that one won too much because someone lost and that is the rule.

In sumo wrestling, a japanese traditional sport, you will be warned if you display your victory. A mongolian Yokozuna-champion was once really critised very much. (judo, kendo, the same, but being internationalised, things are a little changing.)

Calling someone who lost "loser" after you won over them is impossible.

Is it because the english have been always winning against their enemies in wars?

Or just that is the world standard (shared at least by the english and monglian) and we are minority as is often the case.

Usually japanese women do better than men in international sports competetion.

I don't mean that japanese women run faster than japanese men or women football team is stronger than the men's team.

but i mean that japanese women got the first olympic gold medals in swimming, volleyball, figure skating and marathon earlier than japanese men as far as I know.

japnese women do better in tennis tour than japanese men.

In football, too, the women's team does well though only very small number of women play football in japan.
(generally, football was not popular untill only recently.
the (men's) professional league was established only 15 years ago. no women's professional league.)

My hypothesis is that sexual difference between men and women is smaller with the japanese (or mongoloid, in general) than with europeans or africans and this is the cause of the fact above.

Men do better in most sports when they are more masculine while women do so when they are less feminine.

According to medical research,
black girls have their first period earlier than others and then whilte girls and finally yellow girls, and
black men have largest balls and then white and finally yellow.
(length of poles may be a little difficult to measure.)

Of course, individual differences are large.
And ther should be more factors to decide success in sports.

I sold my car half a year ago using autotrader website.

There is autotrader "journal", but it was not very cost-effective, as far as i know.

i recommend you to use the "website only" option.

Prices people give to their own cars are usually too high for others to buy.

Reasonably-priced cars are sold soon after the prices are offered.
So most of the advertisements you find in their website are those left without buyers, often more than several weeks because their prices are not attractive enough for the cars.

By the way,

Even too-high prices invite many e-mails
which usually say something like,
"i am interested in your car,
but i am living in spain(or somewhere else) and so someone on behalf of me comes up to you to pay you for the car and send it to me. So, tell me your final price as soon as possible. i am really interested in your car"

yes, very many. (why buy an ordinary second hand car in UK to send to Spain for not-reasonable price???)

i happen to have a neighbour in car business, and he told me "This is called "money-laundering". Ignore them."

Sometimes i think, could i get 1k pounds more?

but i am not a gambler.