♪Po～nyo Po～nyo Ponyo, I watched Ponyo (Ponyo on the cliff by the sea). It is the cutest movie ever!!!

I thought the movie was for children because I heard Hayao Miyazaki, the directer of Ponyo, said he made this for children expecting it would be the first movie for them because there were too many scary and violence films recently. But it is also enjoyable for adults. The screen is so colorful, it's always cheerful and sometimes bright. And the animation is just amazing. The movement of jelly fishes and waves is so big, quickly and unique. I couldn't believe they didn't use any CG and it was all hand written!!

The story is also cute and simple. 5-year-old boy met a cute golden fish girl and he named her Ponyo. Their expressions are so cute and straight. They repeat their words each other, run and jump around and suddenly fall asleep. I like that they are saying 'すき！' each other :) Other characters are also attractive. I like Sosuke's, 5-year-old boy's, mum and her way to drive a car. She is so cool.

I laughed and smiled a lot. I looked around the people in the theater right after the ending roll finished, all of them were smiling. The movie makes us happy. I went to see it by myself because I thought my gaijin friends were not interested in Japanese movie without subtitles. But I should have brought them. The story is easy to understand, I was seeing it trying to translate into English and I could do 90% of them. (Childish words might be difficult to understand, but it's not a big problem, I think.) So I recommend seeing Ponyo in a theater, it's worth it. :)

I was on TV and a magazine last weekend. It was so unusual!

It was a local TV news, they showed about the Moon viewing festival last weekend, and I was on TV just for 3 seconds!! haahaa It was strange to see me on TV. I laughed at me at the first time. Then I felt guilty. There were only I and a womam sitteng next to me who were zoomed in, we are neither a concert master nor a part leader. We were just sitting in the middle of the front row. Sorry!!! The TV news repeated 3 times a day and it lasted for 1 week. So I watched it 3 times, then I thought it was enough. hahaha

On Sunday I got a message from Steff and she told me our magazine was out! I didn't write about my trip to Singapore here, but acctually I got a photo shoot in Singapore with Steff during GW.  Steff's friend Pam is a stylist and has her pages on a local magazine. She needed models who had different body shapes for jeans, then I became a model for small size (No wonder. I'm small even in Singapore.) and Steff was for medium size.  We had hair and make-up done and were taken pictures by a proffessional cameraman. I got tense there, so I didn't think I did well. I am not used to hold a pose and smile in front of a camera. So when Steff sent me a picture of our page this week, I saw it nervousely. Then I was surprised that I was on the one third of the page. So big!!! The picture of me is... OK! Pam chose the best one. Thanks! Steff was next to me. The size of her picture is same as me. We look totally different because of the make-up. She will send the magazine to me, can't wait to see us in a real magazine next :)

I had heard about the moon viewing festival in front of the castle, but I didn't know it was so big and fun! I played the mandolin on the stage at the festival last weekend.

We played at the festival after 2 days practice in Yamasaki. That practice was for our next concert in November, not for the festival. I don't usually practice so much, so I got tired and my fingers hurt. We also practiced the songs for the festival, then I realized our part had only 2 people to play for the festival. And we heard there would be two microphones for each parts, that meant I was gonna have a microphone! I was getting nerves.

At the festival a microphone was set close to the sound hole of my mandolin. I was thinking 'Oh, I can't make mistakes. It's gonna be announced to the whole festival!' Luckly I coudn't hear the sound from speakers because they faced to the audience. That made me feel better. There were thousands of people in front of us. That was big! I was excited to play for a lot of people outside and it was so good. One of our songs was Ponyo. It's popular among children, so some children were singing there. And after we finished playing it, one kid said to us 'もういっかい！(one more!)'. That was so cute!

After that I joined a big gaijin group for drinking. There were more than 10 different kinds of sake, I got a sake cup for 500 yen, then 'all you can drink!'. I had 3 cups of sake, that was a lot for me, especially after 2 days practice and a small (but big) concert. So I got really drunk and couldn't walk properly. hahaha (Shell had 6. さすが) Sake was good, the moon was round and beautiful and there were many funny drunk people. (It was like Hanami!) I regret that I missed this fun festival over the past 25 years. (I couldn't drink sake 25 yeas ago tho. haha)

I'm taking Chinese class. I started going to Chinese school 2 weeks ago. I studied Chinese for a year when I was a university student, I already knew some Chinese words, but it's difficult to listen and speak in class. At the first class I couldn't even say yes or no in Chinese. I don't know how to answer a question!! Then I asked about it to Steff. She explained the differences between shi(yes) and dui(correct) well..... of course in English. So now I'm taking Chinese from a Chinese teacher (She can speak Japanese very well), asking questions to a Singaporian, and getting the answers in English. Great way to lean other languages. :)

There are 4 people in the class, all of us has different reasons for studying Chinese. My reason is that I need it at work and I want to talk with my Chinese friends in China. One guy has almost same reason as mine, and he started talking about his Tiwanese friend in class. So our teacher asked him 'Ni xihuan Zhongguo ma? (Do you like China?)' He paused, then said 'Should I be honest?' (The answer was NO.) HAHAHA I think the situation people learn Chinese is different from English.

I had been waiting for the movie for months, and finally I could see it. It was Sex and the City. I knew it already finished showing in other countries and my friend had the DVD. But I needed Japanese subtitles!! I went to a cinema theater with Shell. When the opening music started, I got goose bumps. This is it! I felt like I met my old friends. The story was great and the dresses were fantastic! I like the movie, so I hope this is not the end of the story.

The other day Steff, Shell and I were talking about going to see Batman movie online, and I managed to spell 'BaDman'. Then they started laughing at my mistake so hard! OMG! embarrassed! But my mistake was not only that. I was thinking 'dark knight' was 'dark Night'. So here is a new title. 'Badman The Dark Night'. ....sounds like a scary or funny movie.

I want to see Ponyo (Ponyo on the cliff by the sea) next! Anyone who want to watch it with me?

It has been really nice this summer. We had Jo and Steff here. It was a reunion!

Our fun time started with a party. Shell and I were planning to have a welcome back party for Jo and Steff. Shell set a date and invited people, and I was ready for that. But actually the party was for ME! At the begining of the party people let off crackers and said "Happy Birthday!" Surprised!!! :D It was really nice, and I was supposed to be happy. But I had been believing that the party was for Jo and Steff for a month, so I couldn't change my thinking quickly. During the party I was so confused and still believed people came there to see Jo and my birthday party was just an additional thing even though there were some people who didn't know about Jo and I got a bunch of presents and a birthday cake. After the party Jo asked me if I was surprised, then finally I understood everything. I was the only one who didn't know anything. There were 12 people and all of them came there for me! I wanted to say thanks to everyone, but the party was already over, it was too late. Dumn! I really enjoyed my first surprise party, and now I know that it's not easy to be the center of a surprise party. hehe

I had more fun from Tottori trip, Firewords festival, Olympic watching party, Summer sonic and watching movies. And my recent favorite summer fun is having a night picnic in front of the castle! It's just great! We can have drinks seeing pretty scenery. The castle is lit-up, the moon comes up and there is nice warm night breeze. It feels good. We also can hear some noise from a zoo. (ok, this one is a bit strange. haha) I had a night picnic 3 times so far, and I want to do it again! Love it.