Reflections on Water

Too much information...

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 02:52:43 -0230

Ah, dear Katty, how we have missed you. But we certainly have not forgotten you at all. It's been a year since we last saw our friend from Japan, but her presence still echoes loudly in our home. My wife May and I often reflect on the fond memo...

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Tales from the Classroom, Vol. 18

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:42:40 -0230

Wow, time really does fly as one gets older. I can't believe that it has been over five months since I last did a blog entry, and even longer since I wrote TFTC. Well, to make up for lost time, I have a few great quotes from the past little whi...

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The Winter of Visitors

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:51:32 -0330

The anticipation that usually comes with the Christmas and New Years holidays was particularly high for me this year. In December, at different times, my wife "May" and I were privileged to have had three of my former students from Japan come to...

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Tales from the Classroom Vol. 17

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 20:46:36 -0230

The vocabulary game of Taboo is great for conjuring up all sorts of funny descriptions. It's the game where you work in teams, and each team's player has a word that he or she must make his team say, but without using any of the TABOO words for ...

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Looking Back - Leaving Japan

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 23:22:12 -0230

As you can tell, my time in Japan had a huge impact on my life, which is why so many of my blog entries are devoted to it. I have been asked by many - friends and students alike - about what it felt like to leave after spending over one year in ...

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Looking Back - Endless Story

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 23:04:25 -0230

It was probably on one of those days when I was at the OptiCafe, the Internet cafe in the Yodobashi Camera building in Umeda, that I heard it for the first time. Probably in the late fall of 2005, and it was playing on the muzak system. I thoug...

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Like sakura in the spring...

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 02:15:43 -0230

The single element that I missed the most after leaving Japan was that of the people. I had been an English teacher to the locals for 15 months, and it was inevitable that friendships would grow. Upon returning to western Canada, I would freque...

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A Chicken is a not a Chicken...

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 17:06:23 -0230

When cattle are alive, we call them cows or bulls, but when they are in the grocery stores, they are called beef. When pigs are alive they are pigs, but in the stores they are called pork. When chickens are alive they are chickens, but in the sto...

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The Nation's Capital

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 04:35:38 -0230

At the beginning of June, I visited eastern Canada for the first time in 28 years. While my wife and I were in Ottawa to spend time with family, we also took some time to take in some of the sights of our national capital. Most notable, of cour...

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Tales from the Classroom, Vol. 16

nobody@vox.com(Me) — Fri, 18 May 2007 20:51:41 -0230

Having taught English in Japan, I know that my subject is very hard for people from both Japan and Korea, mainly due to the fact the entire sentence structure of those respective languages is completely different from that of English. The order ...

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