ハイキング (hiking)

今日は土曜日家族全員が休日、遅い朝食を取った後、ハイキングに行くことになった。
車で２０分ぐらいのところに広い公園がある、公園といっても日本の公園とは違い何しろ広くて大きい、１３キロメートルを乗馬で楽しめる所ですから、殆どが森林で平地に小高い山と言った感じ、森林の中を散策していると、鳥の鳴き声、黒いリス、鹿、小さな蛇、池には亀や小魚と色々な生き物が見られる
残念ながら樹木の種類は分かりません。５キロメートルを約２時間かけて散策して楽しみました。
帰りがけにメキシコレストランで食事、以前メキシコに在住したことがあり、食事となま演奏のマリアッチが懐かしくかった。

It's Saturday today so everybody was off. After eating a late breakfast, we decided to go hiking. There was a big park about 20 minutes car ride from the house. I said "park" but it's not a "park" you can think in Japan. It's really big and there was a 13 km horse riding track. So it's like a forest. Most of the place is flat but some minor hills. While walking, I heard a lot of birds chirping, saw black squirrels, a dear, a small snake. I also saw a turtle and small fish in a pond. Unfortunately, I don't know anything about trees so I couldn't tell what sort of trees growing there. We enjoyed walking about 5 km for 2 hours. On the way home, we had a dinner at a Mexican restaurant. There, we enjoyed food and a Mariachi live performance. I used to live in Mexico so I felt nostalgic.

日本食とWiiソフト (Japanese food and Wii)

今日、娘の仕事が休みなので昼食を日本食レストランに食べに行った、ラーメン、そば、天丼等なんでもある、私たちはうな丼を注文、大きなどんぶり、何処に行っても大きい物が多い、うな丼にレタスの大盛と味噌汁食べ切れなかった。味は個人個人の好みなのでなんとも言えません、これでチップを含め一人前役1,2oo円安いと思う。
夕方旦那がWiiのソフトを買ってきた、早速、孫が説明書を読み(写真は、孫が説明書を読んでいるところ）ゲームを始めた。旦那さんはゲーム買ってきてしまったと娘に言ったみたい。うな丼を食べた私たち、ゲームを楽しむ旦那と孫これでいいのだ。

My daughter was off today so she and I went to a Japanese restaurant for lunch. The restaurant offered many Japanese food such as ramen, soba, tempra, etc. We ordered Unadon (Eel bowl). Unadon came with a big bowl (everything in US is big). Also, came with a big bowl of salad and miso soup - I couldn't finish it. I don't want to comment about the taste of the Unadon because the taste is a subjective matter... but it cost about 1,200 Yen including the tip so I thougth it's a pretty good deal. In the evening, my son-in-law came home with a new Wii game. My grandson read the instruction (see the picture) and started playing the game right away. I heard my son-in-law told my daughter, he couldn't resist buying another Wiil game... My daughter and I had a good time at a Japanese restaurant, and my son-in-law and my grandson had a good time playing a new Wii game - it was another happy day!

蛙 (frog)

日が強いので、芝生へのスプリンクラーによる毎日の水遣り、１週間～１０日に一度の芝刈り、家の周りすべて表玄関側、裏庭側等広いので大変、娘の旦那さんが芝刈りの準備をしている時、偶然蛙を見つけてきた、小さな蛙で種類は分からないがおとなしい蛙だ、手の上に乗せても逃げない、逃げるどころか手の上で居眠りしそうになってしまう、種類が分からないので手乗り蛙にしておこう。蛙を眺めた後旦那さんは芝刈りを始めた、芝刈り機を使って約１時間かかった。
The sun's been really strong, so we have been watering the grass every day and mowing every 7-10 days. The grass grow everywhere around the house - in front of the house and backyard - so it takes long time to mow. When my son-in-law was ready to mow, he found a frog. I don't know what kind of frog but it's small and very quiet. I put a frog on my hand but the frog didn't try to run away. Actually, instead of running away, he almost fell sleep on my hand. After my son-in-law watched the frog for a while, he started mowing. It took about one hour for him to finish the job.

スペースシャトル (space shuttle)

昨日午前中まで降っていた雨が上がり夜になって快晴、午後１０時半西から東の空へひときわ輝いて飛んでいくスペースシャトル、スペースステーション２機、家の真上を通過して行く、こんなにはっきり見えるとは思っていなかたのでびっくり、約３～４分位かな見上げている頭上を通過して行った。 (写真はよく取れなかったけど、よく見ると二つ光っているものがみえます）。
庭の方に一服しにいたら朝方雨だったためか蛍が多く飛んでいた。昨夜は輝くものが見れる日だった
幸運なことです。
Yesterday, it rained until noon but we had a clear sky last night. Last night, around 10:30 PM, I went outside and saw two bright star-like objects moving from west to east directly about the house. They were a space shuttle and a space station! I watched them for 3-4 minutes until they disappeared. I didn't think I could see them that clearly, so I was surprised. (the picture didn't turn out well... but if you look at it closely, you can see two shiny objects).
After that, I went to the backyard to smoke. Perhaps because we had a rain in that morning, I saw many firefly. It was a time to see all "shining" stuff last night. I felt lucky.

猫２匹 (two cats)

今日は朝から雨が降っていたようで雷の音で目がさめた、ここ一週間晴天が続いたので調度よいお湿りだなと思っていたら午前中に止んでしまいました。今日も私は猫２匹と留守番、何の種類か分からないが大きな黒いオスが２匹、名前は毛が多いほうがパンダ、太っているのがエムジャーのっそりと家の中を歩いている、絨毯や壁に爪あとの痕跡が多数ある。猫用の缶詰を買いにいた、大きなスーパーの様だが動物専門店で動物に関係するもが数多く売っていた。

It was raining this morning. I woke up with sound of thunder this morning. It's been a clear day every day for a week so I thought it's nice to get some rain but it stopped before noon. I stayed home today with two cats. I don't know what sort of cats they are. Both of them are male. The one with longer hair is "Panda" and the chubby one is "Mgarr" (pronounce EM-Jar) who walks around the house leisurely. The cat scratches are everywhere on the carpet and on the wall. (Yesterday,) we went to buy cat food. The place we went was like a big supermarket for "pets". They sell all kind of pet related stuff in the store.

ドラム (drum)

夕方孫がドラムのレッスンに行くので娘と一緒に見に行った。ピアノ、ギター、ドラム等の個人レッスン場、小さな部屋が１０室位ありそれぞれの音楽レッスンを専門教師が教えている。レッスン時間は孫の場合は３０分、時間は希望により調整が出来るようです。ドラムを叩くのが上達しているか素人の私には良くわからないが、５才の子にして結構うまく叩いていました。
My grandson had a drum lesson this evening so I went to see it with my daughter. The music school (Axis Music Academy) offers individual lessons for piano, guitar, drum, etc. There are about 10 small rooms in the building, and in each room, a music teacher gives a lesson to a student. The lesson lasted for 30 minutes for my grandson. I don't have any music background, but I thought he played really good as 5 years old.

日本食 (Japanese food)

日本食を作るため、日本食の食材を買いに隣町へ高速に乗り１０分、小さなスーパーと言う感じ日本食用のものは何でも揃っているが数は少ない、刺身用マグロ、煮魚、その他魚介類、調味料、お菓子、インスタント食品、etc、大根、ごぼう等日本独特野菜、さすがに肉類、野菜、果物は値段で勝負出来ない為か置いていない。日本製のタバコマイルドセブンを買ってみたが１カートン7,400円もしてびっくり日本の倍以上だ、聞くところによると州によてタバコの値段はまちまちとのこと、ちなみに日本では表示してあるタバコのタール量とニコチン量の表示は記載されていませんでした。
Went to a Japanese store. We took a highway and it took about 10 minutes to get there. The Japanese store we went was like a mini-supermarket and it had many different items but numbers were few. There were tuna for "sashimi", boiled fish, shell fish, Japanese condiments, snacks, frozen food, daikon, gobou, etc. It didn't have too many meat, other vegetable, fruits - I think for these items, they couldn't compete other stores for price wise. I bought Japanese cigarettes called "Mild Seven". But surprised to find out it cost 7,400 Yen for 1 carton. The price was about twice as much as Japan! I heard that cigarette price varies state by state. Also, when I buy "Mild Seven" in Japan, the package tells the amount of tar and nicotine but the one I bought here didn't say anything.

花火 (firework)

今日も快晴、昼は外が暑いので家の中で孫とゲームをしたり、パソコンで日本の情報を得たりして、のんびりと過ごした。夜になって市民祭りの締めとして、花火が打ちあがるのでメイン会場に近い公園に見物に出かけた。花火は日が落ちるのが遅いので１０時２０分頃から始まり１１時過ぎに終わった、日本では考えられない時間、公園も殆どが芝生で横になて見ていた。
It's a clear day again. Since it was very hot during a day time, I spent a time relaxing - I spent most of time playing a video game with my grandson and surfing a web to get information about Japan. At night, at the end of the festival (see my yesterday's blog), there was a firework show. So, we went to a park to watch the show. The sun didn't go down until late so the firework started around 10:20 PM and finished around 11:00 PM (that doesn't happen in Japan... usually if there is firework, it starts around 8:00 PM or earlier...). The park was mostly grass and we laid down and watch the firework.

お祭り (festival)

こちらに来て一週間、毎日晴天が続きあくまでも天高くスカイブルー風も弱く夕方には（日が落ちるのはPM９時半）飛行機雲が十数本見ることができる。ただ戸外は暑いすぐに日に焼けそうだ、湿度が低いせいか屋内、木陰にいればいたって快適である。今日は市民祭り（フェスタ）が行われ夕方６時ごろ家族揃って出かけ楽しい夜（まだ昼の様に明るい）を過ごした。フェスタは広大な公園で模様され民芸品、地域特産品、絵画、装飾品、飲物、食べ物等々色々な店が並び又、広場では子供用アトラクションが行われ沢山の子供たちが楽しんでいました。
It's been one week since I got here and it's been clear day every day. The sky's been blue and not much wind. Everyday, I see a lot of contrails right before the sunset. The sun goes down around 9:30 PM these days. Today we headed to a local festival around 6:00 PM (yes, it's still very bright... as you seen in the picture) and we had a fun time. The festival was held a big park near the house. Arts, crafts, food & drink vendors were everywhere. There were also children's attractions (carnival games & inflatables) and many people were having a great time.

孫の終業式 (graduation and award ceremony)

今日は、孫が一年間の勉強を終えての終業式、娘夫婦が式に出席するので一緒に就いていった。学校に着いてびっくり、式の前に野外パーティが始まっていた、食べ物はPTAの方々が作ってバイキング方式、飲み物は各自持参（アルコールはなし）１時間ばかり食べて、飲んで、おしゃべりをしてから式典が始まった。式典と言っても堅苦しくなく和気あいあいの中で勉強で何か優れたことが出来た子達の表彰が行われ、最後に８年間を過ごし上の学校へ行く２名の卒業式が盛大？に行われ式は終了した。
ちなみに、社会、数学、読み書き等３件の表彰を受けた孫は自慢できる孫である。
学校は私立学校で日本的に言えば幼稚園から高校までの一貫校、年少、年長、小学６年、中学２年、高校４年となっている。孫は今年の９月から年長に上がる。
It was my grandson's school's "graduation" and "award ceremony" day. I attended with my daughter and her husband. When I got to school, the outdoor pot-luck party was already started. Each person brought some drink (no-alcohol). After eating, drinking and socializing for about an hour, the ceremony started. The ceremony was very casual. First there was an award ceremony, then there was a graduation ceremony. Only two students graduated from this school this year. I would like to add that my grandson got awarded by winning in three "bees" (math, social study and language art) this year (yes, I am bragging...) The school my grandson goes is a private school which caters from Pre-K to 8 th grade. Next year (from this coming September) he will be in Kindergarten class (he was in Pre-K this year and last year).