日本のブログ

 今学期はとても楽しかった。大学で日本語を勉強する始めた時私が頑張ろうと思っていました。でも、難しくても日本語をもっと優しく話せるようになった。教えてくれてありがとうございました。私の目標は自信をもつために日本語を勉強したほうがいいとおもいました。日本に夏休み留学するので日本にチャレンジするつもりです。

 I watched this blog fully in Japanese with Japanese subtitles and even though I couldn't understand some words, it was quite easy to follow what they were doing and what was happening. The guy is promoting a Lacoste brand (which he is wearing), but he's also just going around Ueno, first to the park, then to the onsen and then to ame-meishi (I think?) market. Most of the Japanese was casual and there were some sarcastic jokes thrown around that I was surprised I even understood. Anyway, I thought Ueno looked to be a pretty cool part of Tokyo, so I'd like to go see it when they have some festival going around (like they did at the park). 

 For this blog post I decided to watch some more of one of my favorite youtuber: Abroad in Japan. I think he has some other great videos, and I also watched the most recent one where he talks about how living in Japan has changed some of his perspective and mannerisms in his daily life. This video focuses a little more on the Japanese dining culture though which I also find really interesting. Japan, especially during the lunch hour, is a place of efficiency. People come and go throughout restaurants and go back to work. Because of that, the Japanese view on eating out is a lot more different than how we view it in the west. While we may see eating out as a leisurely, sometimes expensive activity, Japan has a lot more of a practical view on dining.  This is not completely true for the dinner hour though, and not true for all restaurants, but dining alone is a very common thing for the Japanese salaryman. I kind of got a taste of this when I was in Japan, I had to dine alone a ...

 I found the lecture really interesting although at points the terminology got really complex and convoluted. I thought getting insight into the Japanese game industry and its view of arcades as being this "other" space than normal life was especially different than American views. Although in America we have specific times where youth can be in the arcades, I think in Japan the settings are a lot more strict, probably due to its connection to the "underground" desires, especially gambling (although not much evidence was provided for such).  Overall, it gave me a good insight to the Japanese culture of maintaining social harmony, and Japanese arcades have such funky but different history about them that reflects that.