Japanese Speech- Busy weekend

Sunday? Emotions, repeating the speech, dressing up, preparing to speak in front of almost 100 people. I debutated in the 12th edition of the local Japanese Speech Contest for foreigners living in Aomori and in the nearby areas. A few friends of mine joined the competition and I had the chance to meet other foreigners from China, Egipt, Russia, Phillipines, England. I was the only one from Romania.

Everyone picked their favorite theme and had five minutes to debate on it. All the themes had interesting titles . It was good to meet all the other participants before the contest. We all gathered in a room next to the hall where the contest took place. Some of us were eager to meet and talk, some of us had emotions just like before a contest when tens of people are waiting for you to speak. It was fun to speak to everybody. To some of them I was speaking in English and to others I was speaking in japanese. Don` t know why. Free choice?!?

I was the third one to enter the stage, after Alex from England( "Friends") and Son from China("One night in Tokyo"). Amazing! Fluent japanese, good introduction, beautiful theme, polite ending and smart responses for the jury.

And... here I am, on the stage, with the microphone that was near my chest. I had bend over to speak in it( not too smart to adjust it to my mouth). The name of my theme was- " My son, my good rival" . The crowed laughed a few times and then, off stage.
All the following speeches were original, funny, to the subject and well thought. I was standing in the middle of the hall, right in front of the stage. Even for me, a competitor, it has been interesting to see the others make their speech. A few times I couldn` t stop from laughing. If the next time I won` t be competing I will sure be standing behind looking at the competitors.

When the speech finished, the jury gathered in another room to decide the winners, while we had the chance to see a nice Hula Dance Show.

One competitor from China was nominated with " Beautiful performance" prize.
The competitor from Philippines was nominated with " Amazing Voice".

3rd place for the competior from France- "Mountain Hakkoda"
2nd place for the competitor from Romania- "My son, my good rival"
1st place for the competitor from Malaysia- "Japanese and Malaysian gastronomic culture" .

At the end of the competition we swapped telephone numbers. I would like to meet everybody now in a while and talk about... everything.

Today I took a trip to Hakkodate for an urgent visit.

Tommorow back to work

Did I tell you that Saturday after work I went for just two hours up the mountain? Yes I did, it is the previous post :D It was great, but from what I` ve heard from my friends, today and on Sunday, there was so much powder, almost 4 metres. No way to go off course.

Have a nice week!

International dinner

This picture was taken at our previous meeting in July 2007

Today I had dinner with some of the foreigners living in Aomori. The initiative was taken by Ms. Emiko Kamiyama, japanese teacher, President of a volunteer corporation, English interpretator, a person of so many great values. We had the chance to eat delicious food and discuss on many subjects related to Japan, japanese language and culture, different cultures around the world like Thai, Vietnam, Canada, China. I also had the chance to meet again one of JICA` s Coordinators for International Cooperation and shared our thoughts about " a better tomorrow".
I also had the chance to speak to other foreigners living in Japan in japanese and I was impressed of their japanese knoweledge. Some of them have been in Japan for a short period of time and their fluent in japanese( I should restart learning japanese). At the end of the meeting we thanked two of our members for their achievements made while in Japan and wished them good luck in their future projects as they are leaving Japan in March.

Back home, browsing through JICA` s website I` ve found this interesting interview with Ms. Iuliana NEACSU, Head of the National Reference Air Laboratory, National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA). Iuliana Neacsu has been working in Japan with japanese experts in a tehnical cooperation project, has been a counter-part in the Project on Strengthening the Air Quality Monitoring Capability of the National Reference Laboratory since its inception in January 2007 and in November 2007, participated in a counter-part training course in Japan.
It has been a pleasure reading about her thoughts in what concerns japanese way of working, thinking and collaborating spirit.
Read Ms. Iuliana NEACSU` s Interview

Have a good week