The Taiko performance at Gifu Teragoya on Saturday night was great. The guys put on a powerful performance - we were all impressed.
Afterwards they let us try drumming on the big drum (in this picture) if we wanted to. I didn`t try, because I`m not good at keeping a beat, & I didn`t want to embarrass myself (well, more than usual anyway) but some students & teachers tried. Some could do it, but others weren`t so good...
Have you ever tried taiko drumming? Could you do it?
Today is Australia Day, so to mark the occasion, here are a couple of songs by a famous Australian band called Cold Chisel. They were huge (= very popular) about 30 years ago. Then they split up.
Then they reformed.
Then split up again.
Then reformed.
Then split up.
Then finally last year they reformed again - Yay! They`re all pretty old now (& the drummer passed away last year), but I still like their music. Mostly it`s hard rock, but you might find these three songs a little easier on the ears:
Choir Girl (1979): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzyDVcnLJ7U
My Baby (1980): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJLy_3LV7K0
Flame Trees (1984): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILd1O44BDqc
Happy Australia Day!
What`s the connection between these 4 items? Can you guess?
Would you like a hint?
Too bad! No hint! (Maybe I`ll give you one in a day or two...)
UPDATE:
Okay, it`s hint time. The first letters of the items are:
1.k_____ 2. s_____ 3. o_____ 4. (Mazda) B_____
By the way, are you going to the Gifu Teragoya party this Saturday?
UPDATE:
Time`s up! I`ve put the answer in comments.
It was my turn to choose Ichinomiya Teragoya`s Student of the Month for January.
I chose Atsuko because she has a fantastic attitude to studying & using English. Not only is she attentive in class, she also also does a lot of extra study at home. For example, she writes every day in her English diary, & she checks out English language websites. And of course she reads my blog & sometimes comments on it too - excellent!
She has improved so much since joining Teragoya - good job, Atsuko!
A former staff member of Ichinomiya Teragoya has set up a website (mostly written in Japanese) about teaching English phonics to kids. If you`re interested in that kind of thing, please take a look.
The address is: www.easycrazyabcs.com
Vegemite is a kind of strong-flavoured, salty spread (paste). It tastes good with butter on toast. Yum!
Well, I think it`s yummy because I`m Australian, but people from other countries often say it tastes terrible.
Anyway, one of our staff recently went to Australia & she bought these new, vegemite-flavoured chips (`crisps` in British English) for me as a souvineer. Thanks, Yuki!
Have you ever tried Vegemite? If you really want to try it, you can get it at Kaldi stores.
When I went to pick up a couple of friends from the station, they weren`t the only oversized, attention-seeking foreigners I found there - I was super-surprised to spot this mean machine parked nearby.
It`s a 1959 Chevrolet Impala. It must be difficult to park - it`s about two metres just from the back wheel to the back bumper! Actually, it must be hard to do anything in this car on small Japanese roads, it`s so long.
It`s easy to look at though. Niiiice car!
* click on the picture to enlarge
Quite a lot of snow fell on Christmas night, so we made a snowman the next day (called `Boxing Day`). However, the next few days were sunny, so he started to melt pretty quickly, as you can see. Owen learnt a new word: melting!
We used green cherry tomatoes for the eyes, a red one for the nose (I found them in the mother-in-law`s garden), stones for buttons & mouth, sticks for the arms, & pine needles for hair.
I hate winter, but I quite like making snowmen.
Happy New Year! 2011 was a tough year for many people, but I hope you found things to be happy about too.
Thanks everyone who read my blog, and especially those who left comments. Please keep reading it in 2012!
This is my design for my New Year`s postcards for 2012 - year of the dragon. It`s a lino-block print, using black watercolour paint.
Good luck in 2012!
The other night my wife cooked roast beef, mashed potato & steamed vegetables for dinner - yum! I guess she liked the presents that I gave her for Christmas.
Anyway, this gave me an opportunity to teach Owen one of my favourite nursery rhymes (a kind of children`s song/poem), which features roast beef. It`s called `This Little Piggy`:
This little piggy went to market.
This little piggy stayed home.
This little piggy had roast beef.
This little piggy had none.
And this little piggy went wee wee wee all the way home!
When you say each line, you touch a toe on the child`s foot (big toe first). When you say the final line, you run your fingers from the little toe up the child`s leg & tickle them. You can see how to do it in this Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8qMwieKTGA
Kids really love it, which is probably why it`s still popular after so long; it was first published in 1760.
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bokushi 
エメラルド 
田仲なお美 
TERAGOYA おとな 
birdy 
内倉憲一 
yukio 
PSPINC JP 
KUMA 
mokomoko