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The book became a bestseller in Japan last year, and I finally read it lately.
It shows about a lifestyle of a madam who lives in Paris, including the following
descriptions.
*******************************************************
Live your daily life as something special
Snacking is not chic
When you eat, focus on enjoying food
Get rid of clothes you no longer wear
Feel happy with yourself just the way you are
Act beautifully even when you are alone
Treat people around you with good manners
Don’t buy too much
Enjoy moments of silence
Read books or newspapers
Content with what you have now
Find little pleasure
Focus on one thing
*****************************************************
As I read through the pages, I thought what it said was similar to Zen teachings
which have much influenced the lifestyle in Japan.
I never thought that there were some common points between a madam in Paris
(and moreover, she is an aristocratic pedigree! ) and Zen teachings.
Maybe peace of mind which people ultimately get to can be narrowed beyond race or religion.
(H.S)
I went to the annual air show at Komatsu Base of Japan Air Self-Defense Force on
September 19th. The day, it was unfortunately raining and windy and I worried about if
the show would go on as planned. But when I arrived at the base, the rain stopped.
As I was waiting in line for baggage check, I heard the roar of a fighter approaching.
It sounded like the opening flights started. It brought back a sense like “This is it! I came to the air show!”
After the opening flights, exhibition flights of F-15 and F-12 start.
They show maneuvering flight which appeals their performance, formation and turning flight one after another. A demonstration of a rescue aircraft is another feature.
The members train on a routine basis, so their rappelling looks completely effortless.
I’ve heard that hovering is also very difficult to control.
In the afternoon, Blue Impulse’s acrobatic flight starts finally.
First, all the pilots from the first to sixth craft walk down to each craft orderly. And the fifth craft takes off to check the weather in the sky and the acrobat programs are
decided by the result finally.
However, as expected, it was fewer than half the number of normal due to bad weather.
Even so, I was happy to see their “corkscrew”.
Annual visitors to Komatsu Air Show’s are about 150,000 people, but this year there were only about 72,000 people. That said, I was overwhelmed by the number of tour buses and headed back home. And I am already looking forward to next year's show. (H.S)
.
From last year’s Komatsu Air show (0:51) The fifth Blue Impulse’s takeoff is a traffic violation? That might be, but I want to see that in front of my eyes :)
Viewed more than 100,000 times.
Do you know what “Yosakoi” is and when it was begun?
Simply Yosakoi is a type of Japanese dance which people dance with “Naruko (clappers)”.
The name, “Yosakoi” came from an old Japanese way of saying “yosarikoi (come at night)".
Yosakoi was started in Kochi Prefecture in 1953.
Members of Kochi Chamber of Commerce and Industry became the act of taking the lead to come up with ideas for establishing a new festival which would be better than
“Awaodori dance” from Tokushima Prefecture.
Awaodori dancers perform without holding anything so people from Kochi Prefecture thought that in order to make something better than Awaodori dance, they should have something while performing to distinguish Kochi’s from Awaodori from Tokushima.
Finally, people from Kochi decided to have “Naruko (clappers)” for the new dance.
This was the start of “Yosakoi” dance.
Let’s watch the video of Yosakoi!
This is a video which I took in Phoenix Festival, please enjoy!!
The piture is Egg Foo Young of “Fukui Gen”, a Chinese restaurant located near the entrance of Katamachi area in downtown Fukui. It’s within 10 minutes walking distance of GEN's office.
I’m not sure if their Egg Foo Young is the real thing that people in China make but I often go there for my lunch. I like how they make it very simple and large at Fukui Gen.
This is 530yen. Plus a few hundred yen, I get a lunch combo which comes with a regular size of rice dish (or noodles), a small bowl of ramen noodle soup (or a small rice dish) for about 800 yen. I’ve had their lunch combo a few times before. It was very hard for me to eat all of it because their “small size” is as same as regular size at many other restaurants in Japan. Therefore, every time I go there now, I order anything a la carte but I still become full though.
On a TV show, an animal photographer Mitsuaki Iwago, who is well-known on Japan’s NHK BS TV’s cat show, talked about the secrets to take cute photos of cats.
To take cute photos of cats, first you need to get along well with cats.
In order to do so, you need to,
1. First, greeting You can say “Good morning” or “Hello”. Your local language is better. When Iwago greeted a cat in London with “Good morning” but it ignored him. Because the greeting was American accent!
2. If there are kittens, you should say hello to their mother cat first Where there are kittens, there must be their mother cat and is watching them. So you need to greet the mother cat first. 3. Praise Every time Iwago meets a good cat, he praises it “You are a good boy” or “You are beautiful”. It seems that cats don’t feel bad hearing those words :)
After you became friendly with cats, it is time to take photos.
Iwago said,
1. First, greeting again with the eyes of cats
2. When you pet a cat, you should show your hand and pet it
(Don’t pet its head from above suddenly)
3. Use camera lower position, and take photos with praise
4. When you take photos of a black cat, it depends on light.
So you need take photos according to the light.
And now you might be able to take nice photos like Iwago?
By the way, Iwago doesn’t take photos by using a smartphone. One time when he went to a cell-phone shop to get one without camera, and its woman staff told him “I will show you how to take cell-phone photos :) （H.S）
My cat "Gil". This angle is unusual.
The most popular cat "Mofu Mofu"in Gotanjoji Temple in
Echizen City, Fukui Prefecture. The Zen temple is well known as a "Cat Temple"
Its back shot is pretty good too. Mofu Mofu
is a Norwegian Forest Cat
Due to the typhoon, it has been raining all day. The girl depicted in this statue looks cold under the heavy rain. Fukui City placed this statue in the center of the city as one of the statues for a development project of "community with statues" in the 1990s. When I walk around this area, there are figurative statues like this, and I can also see abstract ones. There are about 20 of them altogether. （T.S）
The other day, we visited “Tree Picnic Adventure Ikeda” in Ikeda-cho in Fukui Prefecture.
Today, I’d like to introduce “Mega Zipline” which is the longest and highest in Japan (according to research by Ikeda-cho in April, 2016).
The participant starts from the mountain ridge (elevation 60 meters which as high as 20 stories high) and glides across two valleys. It is 480 meters for outward trips and 510 meters for return trips. It must be thrilling for sure to go between and over mountains and valleys.
At “Tree Picnic Adventure Ikeda”, there are several other activities beside the “Mega Zipline”. This is the first place in Japan that has several outdoor activities combined together.
Other activities are exciting and enjoyable as well.
There are “Discovery Course” which has 38 elements and participants walk high above the tree tops, “Tree Climb Course” which has 3 elements and participants climb trees,
"Picnic Course” which has 4 staying areas high above the ground and participants get to relax on a hundred years old tree, “Kids Course” which has 6 elements and children can enjoy walking on trees safely with assistance, “Adventure Boat” which is a river rafting course for beginners and there are also places where guests can sleep and/or enjoy having barbeque.
How about enjoying outdoor activities at “Tree Picnic Adventure Ikeda”?
“Tree Picnic Adventure Ikeda”
Adress: Siduhara 28-16, Kochi, Ikeda-cho Imadate-gun, Fukui, 910-2523, Japan
Phone: 0778-44-7474
For more information: http://www.e-ikeda.jp/play/p004052.html
*If you would like to participate any of the activities, you need reservations.
I wanted to eat out for long lunch last
weekend, so I went to a restaurant “Koharu Biyori “ which has recently become popular. When I got there,
it was a big restaurant than I thought, and I am happy to find their parking
lot was not narrow.
When you walk the entrance approach of a
restaurant which you go for the first time,
you feel excited, don’t you? I feel
excitement while walking.
Inside, there are white walls and
antique-looking tables and chairs.
The windowsills and curtains are also nice. I am sure that women like such an atmosphere.
Wakasa beef (Fukui’s local beef) fillet
steak set lunch. The beef was tender and good.
Fillet pork cutlet curry rice set lunch. You can fill up.
Petite dessert which you can add to your
order.
They have several regular dessert menus but
it was good enough as the lunch was hearty.
As you can see in the photo above, actually
the restaurant is just next to a graveyard.
Although I didn’t know, there
was a rumor that shops located close to graveyards would prosper. So possibly, also
this restaurant is popular because of the graveyard. （H.S)
Remarks : "Koharu Biyori" means like Indian summer.
On September 11th, 2001, there were terrorist attacks in the United States which shocked the US and the world.
The terrorists attacked New York, Washington, D.C. and Shanksville, Pennsylvania and killed nearly 3,000 people. The attacks left the entire country in mourning.
I used to live in New York and my apartment was a little distant from World Trade Center which was attacked by terrorists. I still remembered that morning clearly.
Even from a distance, I could see so much smoke coming out from World Trade Center which made me stunned and speechless. I kept hearing sirens of ambulances and police cars all day long. The connections for home phones, public phones and cellphones became poor and all the transportation system was dead. The whole city was in chaos. The road was filled with no means of returning home and those people were walking sadly.
A week had passed by since World Trade Center collapsed, I visited World Trade Center area. There were many police officers, emergency workers and volunteers looking for missing people from under the destroyed buildings. The smoke was still coming out.
Because there were still hopes that people might be still alive under the buildings and possibilities of explosions or fires, the atmosphere of the area was tense.
There were American flags and many photographs of people who were still missing everywhere.
There were also tanks and soldiers from New York National Guard standing
on the corner of busy areas in the city.
Smiles were gone completely in the city for a while.
15 years has been passes by since that terrorist attacks, and there is new building built called “One World Trade Center (also known as the Freedom Tower)” on the same area where World Trade Center buildings used to be. The construction was started on April 27th, 2006, completed on July 2013, and opened on November 3rd, 2014. The name of the building was changed from “Freedom Tower” to “One World Trade Center” because to remember the original name and what happened to the old buildings.
In May, 2014, “911 Memorial Museum” was opened.
Since March 11th, 2002, “Tribute in Light” was started by Municipal Art Society and it has been lighting up the sky of New York from where World Trade Center used to be.
As I will not forget what happened on September 11th, 2001 in New York and what I saw there, I strongly hope terrorism will be stopped.
I would like to share a video of “Cameron Michael”, “9-11 Tribute in Light”.
T.F
We would like to express our deepest sympathy to all those who passed away from the terrorist attacks.
I went to see the film “Your Name”, which is now on a smash hit in Japan.
The theater was crowded with many high school students and young people.
In the film, there were a lot of beautiful images, also it had surprising plot and vibrant songs,
so I felt like I experienced something special rather than I just saw a film.
Because it was an animation, it was able to depict several spectacular scenes.
Also, I was amazed that it drew minutely about tradition and culture have been handed down in Japan. And the young audience also watched such scenes in absolute silence.
I liked the feeling of unity in the theater as if it was a part of the film.
When I had no prior knowledge about the film, I thought it was a remake of another film
“Your Name” of 1953. But it was completely different.
People who know the old one must be earlier generations.
“Machiko-maki”, which means an actress Keiko Kishi’s head scarf style in the film,
took the world by storm at that time.
And, I think that young people today think about this new “Your Name”
by Makoto Shinkai if they hear the title in the future.
I think that it’s natural that the film would be picked up a nomination for best animation
for Oscar. In fact, the film will be released in 85 countries!
So let’s see what kind of response we will get from all over the world. (H.S)
In recent years, shooting outdoor sports with “GoPro”
has been popular all over the world.
In Japan, there are many people using GoPro taking videos of many things including outdoor sports, fireworks display, animals and so on. There are also some Japanese comedians wearing helmets with GoPro during TV shows. They shoot themselves making funny facial expressions while jumping into mud puddle, hot water, ocean and or anywhere they can shoot their own funny reactions to the circumstances.
You can find many kinds of videos taken with GoPro from Youtube.
As you may know already but let me introduce a little bit about the “GoPro”.
GoPro is a product of GoPro, Inc., in the United States (formerly Wooman Labs, Inc.). It is a digital camera which specializes shooting outdoor sports. It is also called “Action Cam”(product of Sony Corporation of America) or “Wearable Camera” (product of Panasonic Corporation).
GoPro comes with a shockproof and waterproof case so users can shoot any scenes including underwater, on the water, on the land and/or in the sky. There are also other parts are available for GoPro so the users can make videos however they want.
In recent years, many “GoPro users” shoot paddling a conoe/kyak, surfing, cycling, dancing, skydiving, running and everything in between.
Now, let’s see an actual video taken with the GoPro.
I would like to share a video of “Ben Brwon”, “Go Pro Hero 3 Japan Kayak Adventure”.
Please enjoy!
Did you enjoy watching the views taken with the GoPro?
At Gen Japan, we will take many videos with the GoPro as well, so stay tuned for it!
“Sold only locally” …I believe I am not alone in feeling that the word is tempting.
Also, have I ever felt such superiority in living in Hokuriku region?
Because the Bourbon’s “Lumonde Ice Cream”, which has been become a big topic on the internet this summer, is sold in Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa and Fukui Prefectures only.
(※Bourbon’s headquarters is in Niigata Prefecture)
In fact, the “Lumonde Ice Cream” is a test marketing product in the four prefectures in order to enter ice cream market for the first time for Bourbon.
So yes, I also immediately ate it! It is made of round wafer filled with vanilla ice cream and crisp Lumonde cookie is in the center.
I wonder that an ice cream like this has never been before because the flavor was well-balanced.
I also liked the BOURBON logos on the wafer.
Come to think of it, the president of a wholesaler of confectionery gave an interview
on TV that “What do you think the most delicious confectionery is?” “It is Lumonde.”
As I watched it, I felt I very much understood his answer.
I ate the Lumonde for the first time when I was in high school.
I remember I was amazed that there was such delicious confectionery!
The Lumonde has been sold since 1974 and the taste has not changed.
Unfortunately, the “Lumonde Ice Cream” has sold so well that they cannot ensure sufficient supply,
and they have had to stop selling temporarily. (except Niigata Prefecture)
So if you want to eat the “Lumonde Ice Cream”, you should go to Niigata ;) (H.S)
