hayuru’s Neighborhood

Recently, I started to read the scripts of VOA Special English Web site.

VOA has some features, is written with limited words and easy grammars so that non-native Speakers of English can understand, and the audio of VOA is read out more slowly than normal speed as well.
Despite of that, it’s difficult for me. I import the scripts of VOA into the LingQ site, and then I read them on LingQ, while looking up words and phases that I don’t know in the dictionary. After that, I memorize vocabularies with flash cards test system.

I intended to read them carefully and understand them well. However I couldn’t remember the contents. Though I can remember what I read in Japanese, I can’t remember what I read in English. The contents that I read in English tend not to remain in my head. I need to read them over and over until I can explain the summary.

It's been a while since I wrote on this blog last.

To tell the truth, I have spent the toughest time in my lifetime: my father was diagnosed as having cancer. His cancer is in its terminal stage and cannot be removed in the operation.

No one in my family noticed his illness until he said he was so tired that he stayed in his car while we went shopping together.

He was so shocked to hear that and so was I.  I could do nothing but cried everyday.

so tough... and so much tears...

I couldn't write how tough it was.

However, after a long struggle, I have come to appreciate the time we are given.

I am very busy taking care of him in my parents' home. (as I live next to their house, I can stay with him any time.)

I am very happy to do so.  Actually I feel happiest in these ten years or so.

I will write on this blog again.  This blog will be a wonderful memory.

The other day, my husband was said that his heart was becoming larger size as the result of the medical examination.

He likes sports very much. He has been playing a lot of sports since he was young, base ball, athletic sports and so on. His doctor said to him, though sports was one of the causes, the most important cause was his fatness. He needs to lose his weight.

A few days later, we told some people about the enlargement of the heart at the English conversation school. At that time, we first heard the words “Negative Calorie Food”.

A negative calorie food burns more calories to be digested than that of the food. In other words, the more to eat them is the more to lose calories. Apparently it has more effect to take in them in five or six times divided meals, not three meals a day.

The way seems that people get satisfied because they don’t feel hungry, no frustrations and no rebounds as well.

We got the great advice! Today, my husband left for work with four small lunch boxes.

Since my children moved out of our house to go to universities, I feel a sense of freedom from raising them.  I have spent a long time being in front of my computer in the name of learning English almost every day. At other times, I play with my dogs.  As a result of that, I haven’t tidied up the rooms. My house is really in a mess.

In my elder son’s room, my clothes are scattered all over the place. In my second son’s room, a sewing machine is placed and some cloths are spread to sew something some day. In my daughter’s room, the table is placed to trim and groom my dogs’ hair, there are many dogs’ tools as well. In addition, there are even many mementoes of my ancestors and unnecessary household goods in the closets.

I need to clean the closets and rooms. I need to recognize that no longer need things that had never even been used for three years.
I will throw out them in the near future.

Last Saturday, my husband asked me to go together to a real　English school.(compared with on-line school)

He sometimes goes abroad on business. After he returned to Japan, each time he said to me he needed to learn an English conversation. However, he never tried to take action. This time he finally decided to go to school.

The school is a 5-minute walk from our house. The teacher is from America.　Two women were learning in the class.  My husband and I received a trial lesson for fifty minutes. The class was very interesting. Actually, I could understand what he said and I could speak in English. I was very happy.

Whereas, my husband asked me some words which he couldn’t remember, when he spoke English for the lesson. To my surprise, the things he asked me were very simple words. They were “carrot” ”potato”!　Actually he knows much more vocabularies than I. Despite of that, he couldn’t remember almost all English words to speak.

We talked to each other about the importance of speaking English in the car home. We felt like that something different was in the real school compared with on-line school.

We‘ll go to school twice a month from October. One lesson costs 2,500yen a person.

My son is still single and a jurist.
Even though he has a driver’s license, he doesn’t try to drive a car. Because he is afraid that the problem would grow larger when he caused a traffic accident as a jurist.
In addition, he holds something with both hands on the train in order to avoid himself from being wrongly accused of a sexual molester.
I hear his teacher in the legal profession holds up both his hands over his head on the train. Though my son doesn’t do so like his teacher at the present time as he is still young, I think he’ll do so in the future. As a result, he must be looked like a strange character, so he won’t get a girlfriend.
He said that a young couple was supposed to show each other’s property before they got married. I asked him the reason. He said, because they must manage well so that the problems won’t become complex when they divorce. (He just told me it in generality, It's not his idea.　I think he won't do like that. )
I think something wrong that he is thinking of getting married with an assumption of divorce. I feel that the more law young people study, the more strange they become.

I have been cleaning and tidying up my kitchen for about two weeks.

Honestly, I haven't finished it yet :(

I have been reading 'Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui' for a month, and I found an impressive episode in that book.

One man decided to tidy up his kitchen and eat all the food he had in his kitchen. And he also decided not to buy any food until he finished eating everything.

Can you imagine how long it took for him to do that?

It took eight weeks!!

He ate everything except ten cans of food he didn't like and happily he went shopping to buy some food.

Actually that's exactly what I wanted to do.

I did start to manage not to buy anything but vegetables or things I am running out of.

I am so happy to see there is a little food and well organized in the refrigerator.

I will go on to the food stuck under the sink.

I have been too sleepy for this week.

Since my son came back to school last week, I had to wake up early in the morning.

My baby often wakes up in the night and kept me awake for a while many times.

It is so tough for me. I usually need eight hour sleep.

I took a long nap in the afternoon many times this week.

I have so many things to do in my mind, but I can't do so as I would like to, which makes me frustrated.

I will meet one of my friends tomorrow, and I hope we can be inspired by each other to learn English more.

I usually watch a news show in the evening. I like a documentary part and watched it today, too.

I was so shocked to see that: In Nagoya, many non-governmental groups deliver cooked rice for homeless people.

One group was featured on that program. They have a free medical check service as well, inviting volunteer doctors, nurses, doctors-in-training.  

Many people come to see a doctor, but they rarely go to hospital even when they are advised to do so.

( In that program, they said there was a hospital in Nagoya for those who didn't have money. The hospital itself bears the cost.)

One homeless men was featured in this TV program a few years ago, they broadcasted today.  And, to my surprise, it was reported that he died without being noticed by anyone in his apartment this year.

I was so shocked to see that, and became so sad...

He was 58 years old. He said he had to continue to work till 65 years old so that he would be able to receive a pension.  He actually seemed ill in that program. And he died solitary death.

I can't find the word except shocked, but only thing I can say is I hope this won't happen again.

炊き出し：soup run

A couple of weeks ago, I heard a new Whitney Houston tune on my car radio. It sounded okay. I had been wondering what she has been doing. And finally, she released a new song! She came back!

Today, I read an article on the net about her comeback performance in New York's Central Park. It said that it was disappointing. Her voice was hoarse and cracked. Oh, My God! What a shock! Her recent picture was not like her before. Old and not beautiful..... What happened to her?

I know about her tumultuous marriage with Bobby Brown and an arduous battle with her drug addiction. She still hasn't recovered from them?

She had a incredible beautiful high voice. She was decent, not like Mariah Carey. However, she is already 46!

More disappointing to me is she said the reason for her bad voice that day was because she talked with Oprah Winfrey too much on her show. That might be one of the reasons, however, to me it just sounds like an excuse.

I believe she can sing. I hope she will come back to the scene as a diva again, it doesn't even have to be like her heyday.