Thursday, November 24, 2011

Jigokudani Monkey Park Trail and Monkeys Video

Baby Snow Monkey Fresh from the Bath

Baby on the Shore

Monkey Couple

An Inn and Bath-house Within the Park

The Park Entrance, Me with Mom, Mother in Law, and Max!



For my first break (had 2 days off, 4 day weekend!) I was fortunate to go with my mother and mother-in-law to Jigokudani Snow Monkey Park near Yudanaka, Nagano, Japan. It can be a little expensive and takes some hours to get there, but can be accessed from Tokyo or Nagoya. We stayed at a Japanese style in that is oriented to both Japanese and Foreign tourists, called Shimaya. The couple that ran the inn was extremely friendly and helpful and the room was spacious with comfortable futon. The inn owners will give you a lift to places around town for free, and the price is reasonable. Japanese inns usually charge per-person and offer breakfast and dinner- usually you buy them in the per-person price per-night staying at an inn. Prices can become fairly high at those types of inns, but the price for the Shimaya inn was extremely reasonable for what was included. Enjoy the video and the monkey images.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Students of English: The Chaos Poem

Proof the English Language is Just Plain Irregular: Speaker's of English, Students of English, a Challenge!

The Chaos (by G. Nolst Trenit�, a.k.a. "Charivarius"; 1870 - 1946)

Dearest creature in creation
Studying English pronunciation,

I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse

I will keep you, Susy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.

Tear in eye your dress you'll tear,
So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer,

Pray, console your loving poet,
Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!

Just compare heart, beard and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,

Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written).

Made has not the sound of bade,
Say said, pay-paid, laid, but plaid.

Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as vague and ague,

But be careful how you speak,
Say break, steak, but bleak and streak.

Previous, precious, fuchsia, via,
Pipe, snipe, recipe and choir,

Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery:
Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore,

Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles.
Exiles, similes, reviles.

Wholly, holly, signal, signing.
Thames, examining, combining

Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war, and far.

From "desire": desirable--admirable from "admire."
Lumber, plumber, bier, but brier.

Chatham, brougham, renown, but known.
Knowledge, done, but gone and tone,

One, anemone. Balmoral.
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel,

Gertrude, German, wind, and mind.
Scene, Melpomene, mankind,

Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather,
Reading, reading, heathen, heather.

This phonetic labyrinth
Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth.

Billet does not end like ballet;
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet;

Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.

Banquet is not nearly parquet,
Which is said to rime with "darky."

Viscous, Viscount, load, and broad.
Toward, to forward, to reward.

And your pronunciation's O.K.,
When you say correctly: croquet.

Rounded, wounded, grieve, and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive, and live,

Liberty, library, heave, and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven,

We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.

Mark the difference, moreover,
Between mover, plover, Dover,

Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police, and lice.

Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label,

Petal, penal, and canal,
Wait, surmise, plait, promise, pal.

Suit, suite, ruin, circuit, conduit,
Rime with "shirk it" and "beyond it."

But it is not hard to tell,
Why it's pall, mall, but Pall Mall.

Muscle, muscular, gaol, iron,
Timber, climber, bullion, lion,

Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, and chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor,

Ivy, privy, famous, clamour
And enamour rime with hammer.

Pussy, hussy, and possess,
Desert, but dessert, address.

Golf, wolf, countenance, lieutenants.
Hoist, in lieu of flags, left pennants.

River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.

Stranger does not rime with anger.
Neither does devour with clangour.

Soul, but foul and gaunt but aunt.
Font, front, won't, want, grand, and grant.

Shoes, goes, does. Now first say: finger.
And then: singer, ginger, linger,

Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, age.

Query does not rime with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.

Dost, lost, post; and doth, cloth, loth;
Job, Job; blossom, bosom, oath.

Though the difference seems little,
We say actual, but victual.

Seat, sweat; chaste, caste.; Leigh, eight, height;
Put, nut; granite, and unite.

Reefer does not rime with deafer,
Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.

Dull, bull, Geoffrey, George, ate, late,
Hint, pint, Senate, but sedate.

Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific,

Tour, but our and succour, four,
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Sea, idea, guinea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria,

Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion with battalion.

Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay.

Say aver, but ever, fever.
Neither, leisure, skein, receiver.

Never guess--it is not safe:
We say calves, valves, half, but Ralph.

Heron, granary, canary,
Crevice and device, and eyrie,

Face but preface, but efface,
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust, and scour, but scourging,

Ear but earn, and wear and bear
Do not rime with here, but ere.

Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen,

Monkey, donkey, clerk, and jerk,
Asp, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation--think of psyche--!
Is a paling, stout and spikey,

Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing "groats" and saying "grits"?

It's a dark abyss or tunnel,
Strewn with stones, like rowlock, gunwale,

Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict, and indict!

Don't you think so, reader, rather,
Saying lather, bather, father?

Finally: which rimes with "enough"
Though, through, plough, cough, hough, or tough?

Hiccough has the sound of "cup."
My advice is--give it up!

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Mindblowing PI


I would love to give credit to whoever deserves it for this mindblowing picture.

Please enjoy the truth about 3.14 (which we lovingly know as PI)

If you know who to give credit/link to, please comment.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Homage to Meaphe~~

One Legendary ALT Vlogger Meaphe

One of the coolest peoples on Youtube to me is MEAPHE.

I think I introduced her vlog before... but anyway, she even inspired me to make my own. And while I am not as dedicated to working on my vlog as she is... she is still pressin on and showing a lot of her life in Japan to the world.

Thumbs up!

Anyway, you can of course find her at http://www.youtube.com/user/meaphe

And today I am doing an homage to her when I am announcing: 3 days until something somewhat epic happens, and 7 days until something REALLY epic happens! and there's another pretty freaking awesome thing going to happen sometime this week.

And through all of this I may have 2 more videos to put on my vlog. Leftovers from Halloween, and my most recent exploits of today.

Already halfway through November (nearly) and I've posted nothing! My views this month don't reflect that at all, so, I would like to thank my viewers.

Thank-you!

Numbers in English: Teen vs. Tens and "TY"

Daily I'm starting to be confronted with just what a confusing language English can be. We have crazy spelling, inconsistent rules... (most languages do), but our spelling is just especially confounding because English borrowed from so many languages and made little changes throughout the ages. Anyway, this discussion is about numbers: there is confusion about there about "Teen" and "TY", especially in the situation of talking about years and dates. This how I have chosen to break it down (in Japanese)

Numbers in English: Teens and Tens

Teen: ティン(最後に聞く・言う音 13-19)  Tens: 最後の聞く・言う音は「ティ」 TY  

13  thirteen 20 twenty (ty)

14 fourteen 30 thirty (ty)

15 fifteen 40 forty (ty)

16 sixteen 50 fifty (ty)

17 seventeen 60 sixty (ty)

18 eighteen 70 seventy (ty)

19 nineteen 80 eighty (ty)

                              90 ninety (ty)

年を言いたい場合には:

BEFORE 2000: 2000年前の年

例: 1989  (1)年を二つに分ける  (2)番号を一つ一つと言う

    (1)二つに分けたの: 19   89

    (2)分けた番号を言う: じゅうきゅう  はちじゅうきゅう

    (3)英語で言う: nineteen eighty-nine

1988 1949 1984 1999

(Practice)

AFTER 2000: 2000年のあと

Two thousand ( OO ) と言う 

例:2011 : two-thousand eleven (この場合にも、二つに分ける人もいます)

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