語学の勉強

出典： Lang-8 Some British people reportedly regret that they voted for leaving the EU. They are complaining that the leaders of the Leave campaign told lies. The lies are mainly about the immigration issues and the UK's contribution to the EU budget. Many people took the lies as truth. After the referendum results were released, the Leave campaigners began to change their words, and people began to feel that they had been deceived. There was a similar situation in Japan seven years ago. It was when the Democratic Party of Japan won the general election and came into power. Before the election, the leaders of the DPJ said that there were great amounts of financial resources hidden by Japan's bureaucracy, and they would reveal them. The DPJ leaders also said that they would relocate the Futenma U.S. air base to a location outside Okinawa, or do away with it completely. Eventually they gave up both promises. We have to be able to judge whether politicians' words are tr...

出典： Lang-8 북한이 또 미사일 발사를 시도했어요. 북한 (名) 北朝鮮 발사 (名) 発射 시도하다 (他) 試みる 하지만 발사는 실패한 모양이에요. 실패하다 (自) 失敗する

出典： Lang-8 어렸을 때 과학자가 되는 것이 꿈이었어요. 어리다 (形) 幼い 어릴 적 … 幼いとき 어렸을 때 … 幼いとき 과학자  (名)  科学者 꿈  (名)  夢 하지만 고교생 때 물리 시험에서 8점밖에 받지 못했기 때문에 꿈을 포기했어요. 고교생 (名) 高校生 물리  (名)  物理 시험  (名)  試験 점  (名)  点 밖에 (助) ～しか 받다 (他) 受ける、もらう、取る

出典： Lang-8 Some people say, "Anybody would be better than him/her," to express their complaints about the leader of some organization. However, they should remember they said the same thing about the previous leader, and they will also do that with the next one. It would be great if things could get better and better gradually through the replacement of leaders, but people sometimes want to get back to the past. In such cases, people say, "The previous leader was better than the current one." Thus, things never change at all.

어젯밤은 술을 마시지 않고 일찍 잤는데도 피로가 풀리지 않아요. 어젯밤 [名] 昨夜 일찍 [副] 早く、早めに (動詞)＋는데도 … ～なのに 아마 잠이 얕았다고 생각해요. 아마 [副] おそらく、たぶん 잠 [名] 眠り、睡眠 얕다 [形] 浅い

出典： Lang-8 큰 딸이 영어에 흥미가 있다고 했기 때문에 다음주 토요일에 영어 회화 교실에 데려가게 됐습니다. 흥미 [名] 興味 다음주 [名] 来週、翌週 토요일 [名] 土曜日 회화 [名] 会話 데려가다 [他] 連れて行く 그 교실에는 저도 다니고 있으며 호주인과 미국인 선생님들이 있습니다. 다니다 [自] 通う 호주 [名] 豪州、オーストラリア 딸이 어떻게 수업을 받을지 조금 걱정됩니다. 수업 [名] 授業 받다 [他] 受ける 걱정되다 [自] 心配になる、気にかかる

出典： Lang-8 오늘 막내 딸이 유치원에서 저와 아내의 그림을 그려서 가져왔습니다. 막내 [名] 末っ子 막내 딸 [名] 末の娘 그림 [名] 絵 그리다 [他] （絵や図を）描く 가져오다 [他] 持ってくる  저와 아내의 얼굴을 거의 비슷하게 그렸습니다. 거의 [名] ほとんど 비슷하다 [形] ほとんど同じだ、似ている 차이점이라면 머리의 길이가 다르게 그려졌다는 것 뿐입니다. 차이점 [名] 差異点、違う点 라면 … ～と言えば（라고 하면の縮約形） 머리 [名] 髪 길이 [名] 長さ 다르다 [形] 違っている、異なっている 그려지다 [受動] 描かれる 뿐 [依名] ～だけ 딸은 저희 부부 사이가 좋기 때문에 비슷하게 그렸다고 말했습니다. 저희 … 私ども（우리の謙譲語）

出典： Lang-8 어젯밤 2시까지 깨어 있었기 때문에 몹시 졸려요. 昨夜は2時まで起きていたので、とても眠いです。 오늘 밤은 일찍 자려고 해요. 今晩は早めに寝ようと思います。 깨다 (自) （眠り・夢・酔いから）覚める、起きる 　↓ 깨어 있다 … 「起きている」という状態を表す

出典： Lang-8 오늘은 딸의 친구가 왔어요. 今日は娘の友達が来ました。 같은 유치원에 다녔었지만 지금은 각각 다른 초등학교에 다니고 있어요. 同じ幼稚園に通っていましたが、今は別々の小学校に通っています。 오래간만에 만나서 아주 기뻐했어요. 久しぶりに会って、とても喜んでいました。 같다 (形) 同じだ、同様だ ⇒ 같은 (現在連体形) 다니다 (自) 通う ⇒ 다녔다 (過去形) ⇒ 었が付くことで過去完了形に 각각 (副) それぞれ 다르다 (形) 違っている、異なっている ⇒ 다른 (現在連体形) 기뻐하다 (自) 喜ぶ、うれしがる

出典： Lang-8 I went to the theater to see the play "Nocturne". It was written by Sou Kuramoto, one of the most famous scenario writers in Japan. I was deeply moved by the performance. I couldn't hold back my tears. It's a little difficult to explain the story even in Japanese, but I'll try it in English. The story was about a man who lost his two daughters to the huge tsunami 4 years ago. When the earthquake occurred, he was working as a plumber in Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. His wife was working as a nurse in a hospital. Both of them couldn't get out of their workplaces because they were busy with handling the emergency situations. They both believed that their spouse was taking care of their daughters in a safe place. However, despite their expectations, their daughters were waiting for a train at a station near the ocean and were swept away by the tsunami. The man and his wife blamed each other for the death of their daughters. Each of them felt gu...

My Rolex watch, which I bought 14 years ago, suddenly stopped working last week. Ideally, I should have had it overhauled every 5 years, but I didn't. I took my watch to a watch shop near my house that deals in expensive brand watches. The shop sent my watch to the Rolex authorized service center to get a quote for the repairs. get a quote … 見積もりを取る The shop called me yesterday to say that the repairs would cost about 69 thousand yen. To tell the truth, it was even more expensive than I expected. I had an option to cancel the repairs and send my watch to an unauthorized repair shop that offers more affordable services. However, the shop strongly recommended that I have my watch repaired by the authorized service center. They said that if I sent my watch to an unauthorized repair shop that might make improper repairs, the authorized service center would no longer accept the watch for further repairs. I was convinced by the shop's explanation and told them to start the...

<Revised on Dec. 12, 2019> Yesterday my wife told me that Thailand Fair was held at a nearby shopping mall, and authentic mango parfait was available there. We immediately set off to enjoy the parfait with our children. After arriving at the mall, we looked for the sign of Thailand Fair, but couldn't find it. Instead, we saw a sign of "Taiwan Fair," which served mango parfait at one of the booths. My wife said, "Oh, I mistook Taiwan for Thailand." However, I couldn't understand how she could have mistaken them. In Japanese, Taiwan is written as "台湾" in Kanji characters, and Thailand is written as "タイ" in Katakana characters. There is no possibility of mistaking them. I didn't ask about it persistently because it wasn't a big deal after we enjoyed excellent mango parfait.

One day I told my wife that I wanted to go to Hawaii someday. She said that she couldn't understand why I wanted to go there even though I couldn't swim and I didn't do any marine sports. I said, "I just want to go there!" [ source ]

In my last English lesson, my teacher told me to choose the most important thing for my happiness from several choices. I chose "not wanting more than you've got". The teacher asked me why I thought so. It was a bit difficult for me to explain the reason in English. I said something like the following. - The more we get, the more we want. - We can't be satisfied no matter how much we get. - We can't get everything. - We should live within our limits. However I'm not sure whether my answers were to the point. [ source ]

I went to see the movie "Godzilla" this morning. It was certainly a fun movie. However I felt the storyline was a bit shallow, though this could be said for all Godzilla movies. The movie was screened in two versions: 2D and 3D. The 2D version had English audio and Japanese subtitles. The 3D version was Japanese-dubbed. To be honest, I prefered the English audio version. But I actually chose the 3D version because I wanted to see how much the 3D effects provided realistic vision. My result was, to my disappointment, I didn't feel the movie took advantage of the 3D effects effectively. I thought it might have been unnecessary for the movie to be 3D. I should have seen the 2D version with English audio and Japanese subtitles. [ source ]

aptitude (n.) ... natural ability to do something I work with a lot of freelance translators. My job is checking translated documents for mistakes. Most translators are very competent. However, to my disappointment, there are some translators who I think lack an aptitude for translation work. predicament (n.) ... a difficult or unpleasant situation in which you don't know what to do Benesse is one of the largest correspondence education companies in Japan. One of the staff was arrested for hacking the personal information of several million customers. Benesse is in a predicament where it has completely lost its customers' trust. [ source ]

I've read in a web article that, in Australia, people celebrate Christmas in July as well as in December. According to the article, Christmas in December is in the hot season in Australia. Therefore people want to have a Christmas party in the cold season as people in the northern hemisphere do. I wonder how common celebrating Christmas in July is among Australian people. [ source ]

pang (noun) ... a sudden strong feeling of physical or emotional pain In my childhood, I accidentally broke my younger brother's plastic model while we were fighting. He picked up the plastic model and wept over it silently. I felt a great pang of guilt at the sight of his grief. [ source ]

It has been the rainy season in Japan. We have a lot of rain almost every day. I went to the bank to check the balance of my account a little while ago. It was very windy and the rain got blown sideways . I had to put my umbrella horizontally. I got soaked. sideways … 横に、横から、横向きに I hope the rainy season will end soon. [ source ]

Before going to bed, I usually watch TV shows over a few glasses of beer, wine, or shochu (distilled liquor made from sweet potato). Sometimes I fall asleep on the sofa while watching TV, and my wife wakes me up and tells me to sleep in my bed. I know this is a bad habit. I want to break the habit . break a habit … 習慣をやめる、癖を直す [ source ]