Recently in private remark Category

   My mother tongue is Japanese and English is my second language. I think the difference between these two languages are huge. Learning German at my university days, I found out similarity of them, their words order, pronunciation, spelling and so on. When I was young, I was impressed by an European or an American speaking two or three languages. But looking back, it shouldn't have been so admirable. That they do so is the same level as that I speak standard Japanese and my dialect.

   By the way, English is my second language. It is difficult for me still now. when I translate some, I am always confused. For example, there are two words which don't have much different meaning, but one is positive and the other is negative, and I have no measure which is which. What can I do?

   On the other hand, "the" makes me sick. Do I need "the" here or there? Why does he/she use "the" with this word? I feel difficulty. If someone whose mother tongue is English reads my translation, he/she will notice some parts whose meanings are not clear. At that time, please let me know it without hesitation.

Do you know the sweets, Akafuku?
It is the famous sweets of Ise. It is the decent Japanese-style confection of simple structure which covered rice cake with red bean paste.

Although there were various food camouflage scandals last year, Akafuku is one of them.
But is it only me who consider the some difference between Akafuku problem and others?

Though it is bad that they were telling the lie, I think it wrong to measure problem solving towards stopping frozen storage.
If they will not carry out neither market expansion nor technical innovation, I can understand this solving. Are they going to back for 100 years?

in japan, even today, most people think many non-living-things have lives, though they cannot take to say clearly. so, japanese horror movies have nonsence creatures from point of western modern viewing. but we've thrown out our traditional thinking. therfore, for young people in japan today such creatures might be thought nonsence.

town and countryside overflow with garbage. we are wasting a lot of things. it's not our traditional style.

do you know the word 'mottainai'? we use this even for gods. gods are 'mottainai' and 'arigatai' beings.

long time! too long. so, i can't remenber what i was going to write.

but, of course, about gods.

in old days, all over the world, all human races had a lot of gods in their myth. their gods were not far from themselves. originally, gods were familiar people and things, like ancestors, heros, heroines, rivers, mountains, forests and so on.

in countries the christianity and islam had spread to, their old gods fell.

in modern times, most of advanced countries are the christianity nations in western europe. so, even today, christianity ideas of western europe are predominant in the world.

other countries, however, have a different way of thoughts of gods.

in japan, we have a lot of gods still now. some japanese people think an excellent old artificial thing makes itself a god someday. all living and nonliving matter have the ability to be a god.

this is maybe a blasphemous idea for a monotheist. the japanese accepted the buddhism in the former part of the 6th century. we also did the christianity in the middle of the 16th. but nature of japanese is an animist, i think.

japanese say "i'm an atheist.". and i think the word atheist probably surprises monotheists, like christians and muslims. but it does not have the original meaning of the word. it perhaps means "i'm not one of believers of monotheistic religion."

still now, most of japanese believe their old gods in somewhere of their mind. if we don't, why do we go the beach or the mountain and worship the sunrise on new year's day?

off-talk voice : i'm not young anymore. so, the younger generation's opinion might be different.

to resume the thread of my talk :
have you read kojiki? this is one of the oldest books in japan and a mixture of the history and the myth. originally, kojiki is all written by chinese character. not chinese language, but chinese character. our ancestors made up a phonographic writing system by using chinese character. the system is called a manyogana.

when i read kojiki for the first time, i was a junior high school student. of course, i couldn't read senteces written by manyoganas. so i read kojiki was written by old writing of chinese character Japanese syllabary mixing.
still it was very difficult for me. but stories in it were very intresting.

the first part of kojiki tells us how the japanese islands were born. a god and a goddess looked down expanse of water. sea? this is biginning. kojiki tells nothing about before the biginning time.

but water as far as they can reach!! it probably means they had a big flood, like the deluge. don't you think?

two gods, izanagi and izanami, stirred it by a pike slowly and drops dripped from it when they pulled the pike up. the drops hardend and became an island.

this is a myth. izanagi and izanami were parents of the japanese islands and some gods. but when did they make or bear ordinary people? ordinary people in kojiki appeared unnoticed. gods izanagi and izanami didn't bear existed. where did they come from?

we have no history book is older than kojiki in japan. besides, kojiki is not a pure history book.

in its long history, japanese have accepted various religions and thoughts, such as the buddhism, the confucianism, and the christianity, etc. but we still have our original religion, the faith of mother nature.

all living and non-living things have own spirit.

do you know the one of the Studio Ghibli's animation, 'Heisei tanuki gassen pompoko (1994) '?

if you were raised in japan, it is a last idea that this is not for children.
i am a japanese, so I agree with you.
but if you are not, you may not agree with us.
on the contrary, you don't think it must be shown to children. if you profess the monotheism, like Christianity, Judaism and Islamism.
because in the animation there are gods whose true character are tanuki or so.
apart from this, some people may blame this animaton for drawing mail tanuki with his testicles.

as tanuki is one of popular animals in japan, we have a lot of folklore about it.

in folklore, our image of tanuki has a jocular mood compared with kitsune's. both of them can turn themselves into other things. but kitsune is clever and smart. on the other hand, tanuki is foolish and soft-hearted.
according to folklore, great mail tanuki has very flexible testicles. when they extend the biggest, its size is 8 tatami width.
in japan, even today, sigaraki ware tanuki can be seen evreywhere.

in 1951, shigaraki ware tanukis greeted showa emperor along the route at shigaraki town. such is not rude, they are very popular.

when i think about my religious belief, i find myself neither a buddhist nor a shintoist. i don't believe in god which christian, jew or muslim have a faith in. i have a faith in something of nature, though.
when i pay a visit to a shrine, i join my hands in prayer and make a bow. at that time i don't think i call some image of gods to mind. but i have a pious feeling or somethig.
it's narural feeling for me.

as one of my student lent me it, i've read 'The Da Vinci Code' in japanese.
i love books. but i hate best-selling books. it's reaon why i didn't read it till now. my comment after reading through is that "it's an entertainment for adults is the same as 'HARRY POTTER' is an entertainment for children".

for christians, its theme is shocking. but for me, it's no problem.

Christ, Buddha, and Muhammad, they all were born as mail human beings.
there's no doubt in these facts.

i found this here. have you seen the drama on TV?
http://www.ntv.co.jp/hotaru/message/index.html

～ドラマ化に寄せて～　原作者　野坂昭如

　ドラマは、原作を離れて自由である。
　ぼくの小説が戦後六十年経った現在、違う形となり、今を生きる人たちに、戦争の惨たらしさを少しでも伝えられれば、原作者として有難いこと。「火垂るの墓」は、戦時下を懸命に生き、死んでいく、美しい兄妹愛のお話と受けとめられている。だが、実際のぼくは生き残り、さらに、あんなに優しい兄ではなかった。あの時代は、誰もが生きにくかった。男たちは命を懸け、女たちもまた戦っていた。

　ぼくは、戦場は知らない。けれど戦争は空襲で焼け出された者として身にしみて知っている。戦争を知らない世代にぼくが伝えること、戦争は何も生まない、戦争は人間の判断を狂わせる。

　今の若者にとって、国際情勢や国内における問題は、自分たちの頭上をただ通過していく雲のような存在であるらしい。それが直接戦争へと結びついていなくても、どこかで関わり合いを持つ。日本は、少しずつ戦争に近づいている。
　先のことを本気で考えられるのは、これからを生きる若い世代なのだ。
　新聞やテレビなどマスコミで報道されている内容について、鵜呑みにしてはいけない。それが正しいのかどうか、まず疑ってみること。
　さらに、大切なのは言葉。意見が違っても構わない。自分の言葉をつかって、他人と喋りあうこと。それは、国と国とが喋りあうことに繋がるのだ。

「ザ・テレビジョン」No.44号より

and i translated. i apology about my poor translation in advance.

'The message for the drama'  From Nosaka Akiyuki

  I know the drama and the original novel are completely different productions.
  I, as the writer, am happy if my novel has a different role and can tell the disaster of the war to people who live now, 60 years after the end of WWII. People take "Hotaru no haka" as the story of the beautiful love between a brother and a sister during the cruel war (because of the animation). But in fact, I was survived, and in addition, not such a gentle elder brother. No one lived easily in that time. Man risked his life in the war and woman also struggled to survive.

  I had no experiences to attend the battlefield. I learned, however, the war the hard way, which made me a person who was destroyed and lost one's home in air raids. What I must tell the generation in Japan today which has not experienced the war is the war creats noting and drives human's judgment mad.

  For the young person in Japan today, the international situation and the national problem seem to be existence like the harmless cloud passes overhead of them. Even if they are not related to the war directly, they have relations each other someday. I think Japan is approaching the war little by little.
  It is a young generation who can have the serious vision of the future.
  Do not believe all content reported in the mass communication such as the newspapers and the televisions. First, doubt whether it is correct.
  Besides, a word is important. The opinion may be different. We must talk each other by using our own word. It will make a talk between countries.