The video of google's self-driving car

Tourists rate Tokyo top city

I use blogger after a long time.

At this time I post a article "Tourists rate Tokyo top city".

Tokyo was voted the world's most satisfying tourist city for 2013, according to a poll by online travel site TripAdvisor.

Tokyo came out on top in  five sections: local friendliness, taxi services, cleanliness, transport and overall satisfaction.

For my part of Japanese, this result was excellent! Tokyo was considered as best city for tour.

please check next link to know more details of this topic.

www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/.../tourists-rate-tokyo-top-city/

How to study for TOEIC

Hi, I'm Kazuki.
I took TOEIC 4 days ago.

When you take TOEIC, you need to solve 200 questions.

I think you can not solve all of them within the limited time which is approximately 120 minutes ( 75 minutes for Reading sections.) without some tips to take TOEIC.

Therefore, you should learn not only English but also how to solve TOEIC.

Here is the URL which I recommend you to study.
It gives many tips to solve TOEIC and exercises.


http://www.toeic-fc.ne.jp/ca_st1.html

Studying TOEIC on YouTube

I would like to introduce one method to study TOEIC. that is to do it on Youtube.

 A lot of materials are shared on Youtube. You can practice listening section as a real test form and watch some lectures or exercises.

Web Sites For Studying TOEIC

I would like to introduce a website below for studying TOEIC.

http://matome.naver.jp/odai/2134267729150031701

This isn't a particular website but there are some websites for studying TOEIC on it.
I haven't taken any TOEIC tests but  I think this will help you study TOEIC.

Thank you.

Interesting food

 When I went to Maine, find a extremely interesting, funny gummy candy. That name is... Twizzlers!

When my hostmather said it was good taste and gave me, I did not have any opinion but "interesting"
please guess that mean...

Please try it!! You might possibly like it.

Hi, everyone.

Today, I am going to introduce one of my ramen 嵐げんこつラーメン 醤油.

I'm really bad at cooking so I don't know how to cook it.

Well, I think I can cook it if I just need to boil some water and put the noodle in it.

Anyway, I am not talking about instant needles but one we eat at a ramen restaurant.

My favorite ramen shop in Hirosaki is called らあめん花月.

I like 嵐げんこつラーメン 醤油 the best at the shop, which means storm fist ramen, soy sauce flavor, maybe.

Although I really like 塩ラーメン, I prefer the soy sauce flavored ramen at the restaurant.

A lot of garlic is used for the soup, so when I see the soup, I can see that the surface is covered with the garlic.

On the top of the ramen, there are some sliced roasted pork fillet, bamboo shoots, chopped up scallion and a boiled half egg.

Everything on the ramen does match the soup.

Actually, it is sort of heavy but tastes very good.

If you haven't tried, I highly recommend you go to the restaurant and try it.

There are a lot of kinds of ramen so if you are not good at soy sauce flavored ramen, you can choose another one.

 

Thank you.

Okroshka

Hello. I would like to introduce "okroshka (окрошка)" today.

It is Russian cold soup which contains small diced hard-boiled eggs, onions, bologna sausage, small thin strips of cucumber and mashed potatoes. It is flavored with vinegar, salt and sour cream which called "kvass."

Kvass is a fermented beverage made from black or regular rye bread. It include 1-2.5% of alcohol, however, drunk as a kind of soft drink in Russia. 

I have eaten this soup in a Russian and Uzbek restaurant which Uzbeks run in Korea with my Russian friends and I think this soup is a suitable dish for upcoming hot and humid summer in Japan.





Here is the recipe.  If you are interested in okroshka, try to make it.

http://www.mydeliciousmeals.com/recipe/russian-okroshka

My favorite food

Recentry, I made breakfast myself.
And I usually made omelet for breakfast.
The recipe of omelet is easy, and the ingredients are cheap.
But there are various seasonings for omelet. When I eat withe rice, I make omelet salty. When I eat with bread, I sweeten omelet.
If I want some ingredients, I can add the bit of sausage or ham.
You can change taste as you like! So I like omelet.

Image is from this site: http://www.cgegg.co.jp/products/006egg.html

My Golden Week in Hirosaki

Between Golden Week, there is "Cherry Blossom Festival" in Hirosaki Castle.
I went there four times.
At first time, I went there at night with my parents. After that, we went to tarvan.
The second time, I sit there for saving seat for father's party. It was good weather for reading book!
Third time I went there with my friend. We had some food at stall.
The forth time, I walk botanical garden in castle with my grand parents. There were various flowers blooming.

I tired for walking in castle, but I enjoyed the festival!

My Golden Week

I devoted my Golden Week to Yosakoi !

First, our Yosakoi circle held a cherry blossom viewing party in Hirosaki Park as a welcome party for new students. This is an annual year event. A lot of freshmen participated in the party, so we had a very good time.

Second, we joined the Yosakoi Spring Festival held in Aomori city on May 5th.  This is one of the biggest Yosakoi events in Aomori, and every year, a lot of teams from not only Aomori but Hokkaido or outside the prefecture, join this festival !

For the rest of the week, I was practicing and practicing very hard !

My Golden Week was so tough, but I really enjoyed !!

Golden Week and Food

 Last Golden Week, I went to Seibien with my friends by bicycles.
Seibien is in Hirakawa city and it is known for the stage of "The Secret World Of Arrietty".
Riding bicycles made us tired, but the scenery is beautiful filled with green.
The Japanese garden is impressive and we also could a tree which has lived from Gouzoku age!
In short, we were satisfied with this trip.

 At lunch time, we ate "Miso Curry Butter Corn Ramen".
I know it is popular in Aomori, but this was the first time to eat.
I was surprised that the taste is mild although it looks heavy.
The sense of taste is different, so I can't explain well.
If you like ramen, should try this!

No Golden Week

My classes at the University of Maine finished on May 9th, and I left the US the next day.  That's why I didn't have Golden Week this year.

I stopped in Philadelphia and Los Angels before coming back to Japan.

I'm just going to say, that was exhausting.  I couldn't sleep well in the planes because of the narrow seats.  I got a window seat in each plane so i couldn't even go to the bathroom because I would feel sorry for the person sitting next to me.  I really felt Japanese in those moments.

Anyway, I am really happy that i met you guys in this class, and I would love to get along with you all.
I still feel tired, but I will do my best in this class.


Sincerely,


Tasuku Kimura

The Golden Week

 In this year's Golden Week, I did not do anything special.I just worked every day!! A restaurant was very busy during Golden Week. Quite a lot of people came to Hirosaki to see cherry blossoms then came to the testaurant. Really any special things did not happen! So this was my Golden Week!!

About Whaling Problem

The Answer to a Question About Whaling problem

 I had a seminar today and Ayaka and I asked Mr. Sawada who is the teacher of Oceania seminar if New Zealander eat a whale or not. He taught us that in New zealand even Maori people eat a whale but they eat only a stranded whale. They eat a whales or use for something. I was surprised as I didn't expect he said so.

 Then in this discussion, a student who is one of seminar students said an interesting story. She went to Canada to study and was said "Japan should not fish whales" by two New Zealand guys. I thought there are various people with various ideas. right?

Anyway, the conclusion was New Zealander eat a whale!!!

What I did during this Golden Week

Hello, I'm Kazuki.
Today, I would like to write about "what I did during this Golden Week."

One thing what I did is going to Koriyama city in Fukushima prefecture to make an advance arrangement for an English teaching internship which starts at the end of this month.

The high school where I will do the internship is my alma mater and my supervisor is a teacher who taught me English when I was a third-grade student in this school. Since we know each other, we could talk easily.

We talked about his class which I will join during the internship and the schedule of the internship. I felt that the internship is going to be little bit difficult because there are much bigger differences of level of English knowledge among the students in his class than among students which I belonged when I was a student in there.

To attract their attention and explain in easiest ways are main subject when I teach them English. I would like to them to know how English concerns them and to get interested in learning English.

The other thing what I did is to meet my friends who have already graduated from their university.

Each of them is working in Hachinohe city, Rokkasho village, and Akita city. Two of them just graduated on this March and started working. We went to Hirosaki Park to see cherry blossoms and drank alcohol together.

It was great to see them and that I could hear about their jobs. I thought I also have to work hard to get a better job.

How did you spend during Golden week?

A way to be polite when you speak English

It may help you to be polite when you speak English.
Please check it out.

http://dictionaryblog.cambridge.org/2014/04/30/would-you-mind-reading-this-please/

Information about TOEFL and TOEIC that may be useful for you:

Two of the most popular English-language proficiency tests in Japan can no longer be used to obtain student visas to Britain after a British TV program exposed fraud in the test-taking process.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/04/25/national/toeic-toefl-axed-route-u-k-visa/

Introduction of a guy you guys might not know yet

Hi, everyone.

I'm Tasuku Kimura.

I was born in Kanagawa but I moved to Aomori when I was a kid.

So I grew up in Aomori.

I think no one knows who I am because I haven't attended the class yet.

The reason why I haven't is because I'm not in Japan.

I have been studying abroad at the University of Maine for about a year and a month.

I extended the period of my studies so I have been able to stay here longer than the others.

Therefore, I'm going to join you guys halfway though the class after I've finished the spring semester at the University of Maine.  Through this class, I would love to improve my English skills, especially my accent.

A topic I would l like to introduce is why Japanese people are poor at speaking English.  

I have found an interesting article.  I had studied English for about 8 years in Japan before I came to the US.  Sounds really great, right?  However, I bet the improvement of my English skills while I was in Japan doesn't even compare to what I've learned in the US for 3 months.  

It seems there are some reasons why we are not really good at speaking English.  

Check out this awesome article below. It might help improve your English skills.

http://japaneseruleof7.com/why-are-japanese-so-bad-at-english-5-reasons/

Thank you for reading my blog,

Tasuku Kimura

Hello everyone.

Hello everyone, I'm Moe Sasaki.
I'm from Goshogawara so I always speak Tsugaruben! I'm a member of Yosakoi circle, "HIRODAI Enbujin" and practice hard three time in a week.
Honestly I'm not good at use computer and this is my first blog. That's why I'm little nervous, but I will try to write interesting blogs.

I recommend following two topocs.
The first is food culture around the world. For example, though many Japanese eat Osechi or Ozouni on New Year's Day, what do people in other country eat on the day? I want to know what people around the world eat on a special day!
Another is about pets. In Japan, many people have a dog, but more and more people part with their pets because masters get old. Even pet is a member of the family! People should keep them until the last moment, or if people cannot do so, should they  not have a pet?