英語学習にも役立つ、札幌の外国人英語教師の英語日記 札幌 英会話 [ステップアップ]

Autumn surgery

2011年10月3日 (月)

Hello everyone! I hope you are all well. I have been very touched and moved by everyone`s concern about my injury.  I will take the reconstructive operation this Thursday, so I am going to be absent from Step Up for about 3 weeks. I will be relaxing in hospital and making my knee fit and healthy again. Please don`t worry, I`ll be back before you know it! Please take care of yourselves during this cold October.

My Injury

2011年9月5日 (月)

Hello everyone! I`m sure you will have noticed that I am on crutches at the moment.  I injured myself playing sports. Basically I have ruptured a ligament in my knee and bruised my knee bone. It sounds much worse than it is!!! (I`ll be walking again in 2 weeks). Dont worry about me, it only takes a small operation and a little recovery time to fix.  I am not going anywhere, so if you want to know more about it, please ask me!!! Hopefully I`ll be running around stepup soon. A massive thank you to everyone who has been helping me and worrying about me, I really appreciate your kindness. Have a great week everyone 😀

What vacation?

2011年9月3日 (土)

Hey people ~ I trust everyone had a nice rest over Obon? What’s that? You didn`t travel anywhere? What`s that? No time off? Just one day? That`s not a holiday, is it?

For my Obon I traveled around Singapore, Malaysia and Cambodia for nearly 3 weeks. It was a fantastic trip. I saw many great places and had some cool experiences. Many people told me I was lucky to have such a long vacation and, to a degree, I agree with them – I am lucky to have time to travel. But this brings me to my point – should finding a job that gives a few weeks of vacation be considered “lucky”?

Or should a few weeks of vacation time be a standard part of a full time job contract?

I think we all agree the latter is better. Unfortunately, business culture (especially in Japan) insists there is no time for extended vacations. Too much work to be done. I realize many people are locked into work routines that give them little to no chance for extended travel. But if you believe like I do that life is short (and only happens once), perhaps you`ll find a way to make time for yourself.

I’m very happy to work for a company that gives its employees ample time to travel. And as best I can, I always will work for such a company. So get out there and see the world. It’s your right;)

Is summer almost over?

2011年8月25日 (木)

Hello everyone!  How was your summer holidays?  I hope everyone had a good time.

For my summer vacation, I went to Seattle for a week to attend my friends` wedding.  It was really fun!  And the weater was absolutely perfect.  I ate a lot of delicious food and drank a lot of alcohol.  Seattle is a really nice city to visit.

I also went to Marine Park in Noboribetsu.  It was my first time to go there, so I was very excited.  I love aquariums!  The aquarium at Marine Park is quite nice.  I enjoyed it a lot.

Recently the weather has gotten a bit cooler.  I wonder if summer is almost over.  I hope not because I still want to have a BBQ, go to the beach, go hiking and maybe even go camping.  Unfortunatly, I don`t think I will have the time.

I hope the weather is nice in September!!!

Get your study on!

2011年7月7日 (木)

If you look at Joe`s most recent post, you`ll see that he`s studying for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test Level 2 (日本語能力試験二級）. Well, so am I! Actually, I just took the test last Sunday, but am not sure if I passed or not. I won`t get the result until September. If I passed – great! If not – too bad, keep studying! Joe, Luella and I have a bet going: whoever gets the highest passing score on the test will be treated to dinner and drinks by the losers. Really, I`m at a disadvantage because Luella studied Japanese for 2 years in a private school in Maruyama and Joe has lived in Japan for nearly a decade. I`ve just been studying by myself…

Anyhow, hopefully I`ll be enjoying a nice dinner next January when the December test results are sent out. Until then, I`ll keep studying hard. Hope you`ll do the same!