ダニエルの冒険

There’s a speech competition next month and I’m considering taking part in it. I’d be really nervous and probably choke, but it would be a great experience. For homework today we have to write the outline of a speech and do a short one-minute speech to be delivered to the class. Every morning a name will be drawn and that person will have to give their speech to the class. I have a lot to say about Japan, but it seems to all be divided into two categories:

• Things which have already been spoken about in previous years, or that are just very obvious.
• Things which really would not go down well in a Japanese audience, whom I’ll be addressing in the end, if I go ahead with it.

I had my first elective class today: Conversation 3. I was sitting with two Taiwanese from my class on my right and a Taiwanese guy who looked like Johnny Depp on my left, and there were about 9 Taiwanese altogether in the class of thirteen. I quite like Taiwanese though, since I came here, and since I don’t speak Chinese and their English is usually (but not always) their third language, Japanese is the lingua franca. It usually ends up in English with Americans or English, unless they really want to speak Japanese. I find that the first time I speak to someone, the language we use is decided. My friend Scott is American, but we agreed to speak Japanese during our first conversation and whenever we meet we just use Japanese.

I was delighted that Suga-sensei is the teacher for our Conversation elective. Class is always really fun with her, especially because she tries really hard to teach us casual conversational Japanese for people our age (which is very different from more formal Japanese used in shops, with teachers, etc). And there’s that soothing voice, which coupled with the average room temperature of 24ºC and the daily 1200mg of Ibuprofen I’ve been taking for my foot can make staying awake a challenge.

I’m off to Tokyo tomorrow. I’m just going to turn up at the station and talk to someone about getting there. I’m not sure if I should go via Nagoya or Toyohashi, or if there are other options altogether, but I’ll find some solution and end up there eventually. I’m not meeting my friends until Saturday anyway and it’ll be an adventure anyway.

Well, it’s dinner time. I think I’ll use up the rest of the onion with more of my Pow Burgers and maybe make a small bit of mash.