Lost in translation?

This is a little clip I stumbled across, as you can see English is not as common in Japan as one might think, compared to other countries. This clip reminds you of it and makes light of the Japanese ability to speak English.



There are many web-sites that capitalize on this such as http://www.engrish.com/. I sort of wish I had sattelite TV and able to get some foreign channels outside of the Spanish ones.

California here they come!

Aya had booked a flight and trip with a company that deal specifically with exchange student organizations “Explore America Tours”, I didn’t even know there was such a niche in the whole entrepreneurship world.

http://www.explore-america.com/

She is very excited since she will be able to visit California, her ideal state she had hoped be a part of during this exchange program stay. Sorry to say – but how it works is there are a whole lot of exchange students trying to find a placement in the United States (where they go isn’t a choice for each student, they get placed where there is a spot available, which would include a school district that is willing to accept them).

She has been updating me on other student within her organization and from her country that are having issues with their respective host families. Sometimes they get put in to families, not able to deal with hosting a family, though they signed up to be one. Sometimes the host parents and siblings have dislikes about personal interactions are and are not willing to make sacrifices. In other cases, a temporary family is found just to place a child into a home; in order to buy time to find a permanent family that will receive the student for 1 full school year. (I digress)

Aya told me she has a cousin who lives in Los Angles and wants to be able to meet up with him during the trip. I am thinking it will be difficult, since this is a tour group and where they go is dictated by the organization and not by the individual.

Her trip excerpt will be similar to this:

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“There is so much to see in our time in Los Angeles and our tour will take us to some of the most famous sights. We will visit Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive, Santa Monica and Venice Beach, Hollywood Boulevard and Melrose Avenue (the best place in Los Angeles for fun fashions). And tonight, after dinner, we see a live theater production.

We will spend our last day LA day riding the thrilling rides and exploring the attractions offered by Disneyland.

We will visit the South Rim of the Grand Canyon National Park and watch an IMAX show that teaches us about the Park's history - and we will have a chance to see both the Sunrise and Sunset over the Grand Canyon. We will grab our cameras and hike some of the trails around the Canyon's South Rim to photograph the Colorado River, which rages through the Canyon's floor.
We will venture into Las Vegas for an exciting tour of America's favorite playground.

Downtown Las Vegas with the Fremont Street Experience is always a student favorite.
We will drive and walk the "Strip" and explore many of the thrilling sites and attractions Vegas has to offer, from its glamorous casinos to its huge shopping facilities and roof top roller coasters.
Our days in Vegas will end with dinner and a Vegas Show.
· 1 night is spent sleeping on the bus from Los Angeles to the Grand Canyon.

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I am thinking that last note can’t be too much fun, falling asleep on a coach has got to be uncomfortable to say the least.

I suppose I can say I am a little jealous, as I lived here all my life and have not had time to go L.A. or even the earlier Niagara Falls in up state New York - sad how jobs and life styles dictate where we go and what we do. I think more of us should take the time and stop and smell the roses before the only roses we smell are the ones laid on our coffins. Life is too short to live to work, see Aya get to do all these things along with her fellow students from abroad has brought to me another light.

Having said this I want to organize the time and make time with my own family to go on trips we've dreamed about but somehow couldn't save enough or get the time off to go to. We only live once and one of us could be gone tomorrow and never get to live for today, I wonder how many people say this and never have the opportunity to fulfill their dreams.

This is Halloween

Aya expressed that she was interested in the American traditions such as Halloween and Christmas.

I thought it was only fair to introduce her to what teenagers enjoy during the spooky season.

We took a trip with my daughter’s arts & craft club to Salem, Massachusetts. The town was having a festival specifically to celebrate Halloween and the fact that Salem is deemed the town in America to have its first Witch Trials back circa late 1700’s.

It was a little over 2 hours to get there and once there we did a lot of walking. She entered one of the Nation’s first candy shops there and viewed the “House of the 7 Gables” from the parking lot. Heard it was an interesting tour (though we did not have time to do the tour).

Some of the bizarre things we viewed that days while walking around town was this family dressed in blood-spattered clothing (much like the people in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie) walking around pushing a baby carriage fully of severed body parts (disturbing to say the least) – it’s the side of the Halloween that could be left to the imagination. I supposed one could call it a roving art exhibit of the macabre.

We also isolated a date to visit a Haunted House walk-through (not a real one). I was doing a search on the web for something fun, similar to what I was used to as a kid and found this place in Douglas, Ma.

The Haunted Mansion Douglas

Of course, the night I choose was dark and stormy, literally. Fortunately for October, the weather wasn’t freezing. The rain was relentless – I can’t remember the last time I was more drenched – though I had partial cover from an umbrella and wore what I thought was a water-proof jacket. The cue for entry of this event was winding outside by a garage. The entry fee of course was the best part – all we had to do is purchase canned goods (vegetables and the like). At first I thought, how good could a thing like this that doesn’t charge real admission – I later was surprised all the work these people put into, I left impressed.

I brought all my daughters (Aya and my own). I hadn’t completely made up my mind about bringing my youngest 10 to this place, but since no one else was home to watch her, I thought she would be able to handle it; and she did.

Though Halloween has passed, I did pick up pumpkins to carve one night this week – it’s not just the day, but the events she will remember and bring home with her.

She had made a few friends at school, one of whom is that girl from Thailand who invited Aya to go Trick-or-Treating. Even though we expressed our dismay, since she is approaching 18 years old and that American kids aren't usually given candy at that age if they go door-to-door. She went to a neighboring town where there are more homes in close proximity (more candy) and accepts older teens (probably in lieu of getting their cars toilet papered, eagerly give out candy instead).

Life at school...sometimes b-o-r-i-n-g

We’ve (my wife and I) have gone to a couple of Parent/Teacher conferences. My wife usually goes to my daughter’s teacher and I split up and go to our exchange student’s teachers.

I am happy to say things are going well. The teachers seem to have an understanding on how Aya comprehends and grades accordingly. As I would imagine, it isn’t in their best interest that a poor grade is given if a student is trying and does over 5-6 hours of homework every night (compared to an average American student who does 2-3hrs). There are 2 other exchange students at the High School both from different organizations, one from Brazil and the other from Thailand.

I had learned that both of them had many more years of English than Aya (who had only 3 years of it). I know I say only 3 years, but if you were to take Spanish or French and get placed into an All Spanish or French school – I would expect more than half of us would flounder under the pressure of mental translation and understanding and to perform the written homework in a non-native language. It boggles the mind to think that someone can do it on only 3 years of English.

Aya doesn’t feel she is getting better in her language skills; both auditory and spoken language. On the contrary I sense that she is improving very well, hence the whole idea of immersion.

I recently learned the girl from Thailand had been taught English since the 3rd Grade. I am not sure about the boy from Brazil, though I heard he was a good soccer (football) player but wanted to try something different and chose to take American football and joined the team – not sure how successful he is, however he had made the sport cover page of the local paper.

We told Aya, she could suffer a letter grade in order to enjoy life in the America a little more - since most of her time home from school was put into doing essays for History class.

Blog Slacking

Red Sox
World Series
Celebration!


Sorry for the slacking in the Blog updates. I think I’ve been relishing in the Red Sox victory and overcome with Fall activities and the depressing nature during the transition from Summer to Fall.

At best I can summarize the events that unfolded since I’ve last posted.
I will try to break it up into individual posts – all intentions are good, only the end result will prove that there was success or not.

Initially I was typing my Blog on your basic notepad.exe though it was simple, it provided no way to format and spell correctly – as I cut and pasted into the Blog I noticed all my paragraphs were shifted and single lines automatically changed to double-spaced – Argggh!