Otto's blog

Iwato Shrine Festival

4月

28日

My local town festival was held last Sunday. At around 7:30am I went to see my son play drums in one of the floats (山車). He wore a 法被 coat & a 鉢巻 headband around his head. At that time it wasn`t crowded; some parents & festival staff were standing around, & vendors (的屋) were setting up (組み立てる) their stalls (屋台). However, at around noon I went again to look around, & it was crowded. At around 2pm, I joined around 50 other people in pulling one of the floats along the road by rope. That was fun.

Vocabulary:
'Around' usually means:
- about (くらい) e.g. around 6pm, around 50 people, around $100
- here & there (あちこち) e.g. look around, move around, run around
- surrounding (巡る, 巻きつける) e.g. around my neck, around the float

Koala Girl

4月

18日

Poor girl - the shadow makes her look like a koala! Poor me - I missed my chance to cross the road while taking this photo.

Vocabulary:
- 'poor' usually means 貧困 or 下手 , but here it means かわいそうな

Purple Lamborghini

4月

14日

Right next to our school is an expensive boutique. Right outside it was this fancy Lamborghini. Right away, I got my camera & took a photo.

What do you think of it? Actually, this is not my kind of car. I prefer older, classic cars. Also, the driver`s seat is right down near the ground. It must be difficult to get in & out of this kind of car.

Vocabulary:
- 'Right' has various meanings e.g. 右, 正しい, 権利 but 'right + 前置詞' usually means 'ちょうど___' or　'すぐ___'

#車

Star Wars Car Decals

4月

7日

I got a new car. It`s longer, higher, & roomier (roomy = 手広い) than my previous one. Now, with these Star Wars decals on it, it`s way geekier too.

I bought them on ebay ( http://www.ebay.com/ )
Vocabulary:
- 'way ___er' = much ___er e.g. Australia is much bigger than Japan, but Japan`s population (人口) is way higher than Australia`s.

#車

JASDF Hamamatsu Air Park

4月

4日

On the weekend I visited Hamamatsu Air Park. It`s a kind of museum, with lots of planes (including two F-86 Sabres, a kind of jet that I blogged about recently: http://en.bloguru.com/otto/295189/f86-sabre ) and other displays related to JASDF. It`s kind of far from my home, and the park entrance is kind of difficult to find, but my family & I really enjoyed it. Oh, and entry is free (入場無料) - my kind of place!

Hamamatsu Air Park website: http://www.mod.go.jp/asdf/airpark/

Grammar:
- 'a kind of + 名詞' = 名詞の一種
- 'kind of + 形容詞' = ちょっと形容詞
- 'my kind of + 名詞' = 私好きな名詞の種類'

#飛行機