8 posts tagged “writing”
I am so happy that I felt like posting something on VOX again! I thought I would never come back here when I was too busy with my new boss.
I speak English all the time at work even with my Japanese colleagues, as well as with my boss. I also translate Japanese into English and vice versa. Yet, there was not enough time to study English.
The podcasting of The Linguist is very helpful when I have no time to log on onto The Linguist. When Jill and Steve talked about "think of" and "think about", I tried to think of the differences by myself. Those two can be used almost in the same way according to their conversation.
First, I thought "think of" is more emotional, passionate, also and passive.
"Think about" is used when you think about something more logically. When a person is offered to be transferred to somewhere by his/her boss, the boss would say, "You don't have to answer right now, but you think about it...". But However, you could also say to your loved ones, "I thought about you", not " I thought of you".
Well, I am getting confused!
Tammy corrected my writing. Here is her comment:
Different phrases can be quite confusing in English. "Think of" is usually used to refer to something that comes to your mind quickly, such as "Oh, I just thought of that!" whereas 'think about" refers to something that you are or will be contemplating, such as 'Well I will have to think about that".
"Contemplating" is the word I wanted to say when I mentioned "logically" in my writing! Thanks! Tammy!
Today's THY
We had a new member, Mai, joined our group! She is Japanese. Her English was IS very good. I am always surprised to meet Japanese members who speak beautiful English. I hope she enjoyed the discussion also and comes back again! I enjoy talking to my group so much and I get too convivial.....even without alcohol....! I hope I didn't scare her!
A little bit about my new boss: (I need some time to be Carrie Bradshaw yet)
She must be a tough and smart lady to work at her current position. Certainly, working in a Japanese society is not easy for her. However, she never stops smiling at our colleagues. When she sees somebody sitting there who looks unhappy, or someone who people never care to look wat when they pass by , she calls their names and says, "Hi, Mr. Suzuki, how are you?" while wearing her beautiful smile! Those people look puzzled at first. However, by the time they see her again, they look up and call her name and greet her nicely.
There is a New Yorker at work who is kind of isolated because of his character (he does no work but talks too much). He came up to her and said, "I am glad that I have you here. We have non-Japanese committees." She smiled even at him, but said, "You know, you can't survive by yourself living in Japan. You need Japanese people to help you! Actually, it is not the nationality that matters, but your appreciation of other people, which eventually helps yourself!" He turned very red with embarrasement and looked miserable. When I saw him later on, he was talking to his Japanese colleagues and he was doing what he was supposed to do at work, and doing it happily.
My new boss knows how to treat people! She says, "if you want other people to change for you, you change yourself first. Then, naturaly, you can influence other people to change."
I am lucky to be her personal assistant. .....to be continued.....
腰元Cappuccino in matsuken samba kimono
I enjoy podcast video since I have bought my new iPod. This morning, I watched on ABC WORLD NEWS. They talked about "Rejection Show" which was getting hot in New York. The show looks like a stand-up comedy show. The person on the stage talks about how s/he has been rejected and treated badly by others in humorous and witty way.
They share such bitter experiences with audience and laugh them out together! It is kind of a healing process, as they say.
mmh?
So my previous diary is like a "rejection show"! No wonder I feel better and healed every time I write something!!!
I am going to join an "MP3" discussion this coming Saturday. I used to have a walkman with a cassette tape, and a portable CD player which often skipped if I walked. Then I tried a minidisc player, which took too long to transfer music from a CD player. I would usually listen to English learning materials with those players.
A few years ago, I found an IC recorder at a shop. To my surprise, the small stick type player/recorder does not have a tape, CD, or MD cassete. It can record 48 hours at maximum with a tiny IC chip installed inside, which you can never see.
The sound quality is very good and it can record a lecture in a big space. I need this when I have to minute the proceedings of an executive committee members' meeting at work. I also use this IC recorder to record one-on-one and group discussions at The Linguist, because the sound quality is much better than Skype after the data is transformed to MP3 or WMP. It is only recently that I found out each program has its own way or recording signals, such as Skype in ogg, iPod in MP3 or AAC, and so on. I do not know the technical terms. I heard Apple Computer has started to sell a small microphone to go with the iPod!
Talking about the iPod, I first saw an iPod that one of my friends had. It looked very big. Then, later on, my boss proudly showed me his pale blue iPod mini (1st generation). One month later, ironically to him, the
second generation of the iPod mini with a better battery went on sale. I immediately decided to buy. Then, the iPod shuffle came three months later! The boss bought the stick right away, telling me that he needed it when he jogged! I stamped my feet again when the cutest ipod nano debuted with color display! I knew I would not need such a fancy display just to select titles. My ipod mini held 4 gigabytes. 4 gigabytes, whatever that means, seemed like a gigantic amount of memory. However, when I started to store most of my audio books and other recordings, I found out those files are rather big. The 4GB soon became full!!Yeah! I found a reason to purchase a new, bigger and better iPod with video!! Ta-dah! I do not think I would watch videos, but I enjoy podcast videos of ABC news as well as The Linguist content on the train!
This recoding file is available on Steve's blog http://stevethelinguist.vox.com/ ありがとうスティーブさん！
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zk5M1IRbUE4
I keep on writing no matter how many mistakes I make! This time, I have made basic mistakes..I do need to spend more time saving and reviewing words and phrases. I should also save some phrases with 'a', 'the' and 'an' in them so you become familiar with these articles, just as Tracey suggests.
(My original writing)
I was selected to visit a kimono shop near our company to tape PR video for internal-use, not for public!
You can catch a glimpse of me on the video. The elder lady in kimono owns her Kimono shop and designs kimonos by herself. She explains that kimono create the aura of inner beauty deriving from latent potentiality in yourself. Can you see it? The kimono I wore was dyed with "Okinawa" pattern.
(Tracey, a tutor at The Liguist, corrected as:)
I was selected to visit a kimono shop near our company to tape a Public Relations video for internal use, not for the public!
You can catch a glimpse of me on the video. The elderly lady in a kimono owns the kimono shop and designs kimonos by herself. She explains that kimonos create an aura of inner beauty derived from the latent potential in yourself. Can you see it? The kimono I wore was dyed with an "Okinawa" pattern.
Most of my friends know I am a dog lover. I do have some other treasures. I love green plants. I carefully chose those green plants which are unusual ones that you can not get easily at local flower shops. One cloudy day when I was feeling rather down, I entered a supermarket on the way home from work. It was cloudy but very damp and I needed to cool myself down. The supermarket carries several types of flowers and green plants which are very common in Tokyo. I wandered the green corner as it made me feel relaxed just as I do whenever I visit there. I saw a bargain corner on that day and I picked up a tiny green plant to take home with me just because it was 100 yen. It had two pale green leaves on a skinny looking stalk. It looked like a plant that a toddler would draw at her/his nursery school. I put it on a window sill in my room and I did not look at it for a few weeks.
When I felt that I had to water it, I was surprised to see the plant! Those two green leaves had got bigger, and there were itty-bitty leaves with roots growing on the edge of the mother leaves! I could not believe what I saw. The leaves were prolific. Those baby leaves with tiny roots will fall off eventually and grow there. I never expected buy such an un usual green plant at a local supermarket.
One of my favorite things is to watch DVDs of the "Sex and The City" series. I wish I could write an essay like Ms. Carry Bradshaw does on the DVDs. Well, let us give it a try!
I am currently working for an international company as a personal assistant to one of the executives.
Last month, my boss, Mr. Tall, could not put up with his new big boss and decided to change his job.
I was pretty much shocked when he first confessed to me about his leaving this company and me, most importantly. He said he would have taken me with him if the situation around him allowed. He was a nice-looking, middle-aged man. He was tall and spoke in his nice low voice. He was, of course, married.
Although I have never been in love with him, nor expected he would take me with him, I was certainly flattered by his words. However, he left by himself.
One rainy day, when I was cleaning up his desk, literally a mess, a young lady, who joined our company last year, came to our office. This lady looked like the heroin of "memoirs of a Geisha". She was very young and feminine. Any woman would hide her boyfriend or husband from her!
She came to me and said how she missed Mr. Tall. She was almost sobbing when she talked about Mr. Tall. " Well, Mr. Tall was certainly adored by his staff", I thought.
"Why don't you email him? He would be very happy to hear from you. Ask him if he could see you sometime." I cheered her up, feeling responsible as the secretary of her former boss.
Then, she said, "I am always impressed by you and other senior secretaries. Your are so frank."
I could not figure out what she meant exactly by saying "frank". She kept on: "You know, to tell you the truth, I wrote him a note to say good-bye." Her eyes were glowing with tears, or with something else.
"Oh, yeah?"
I said, becoming a little suspicious.
The geisha girl in her pink tube top and white see-through jacket continued,
"When I opened his email at midnight at homeI burst into tears. He said, you know, he said he would choose me as his personal assistant when he becomes the president."
I could not do anything but tried to seem calm. I wanted to shout, "How dare you say that!"
Instead, though, I said, "That is very nice of him to say that! I am so happy for you. Yes, you would be a good secretary for him! Don't cry!" I tried my best to be a mature woman, and to encourage her, instead of slapping her face. Then, she was somewhat satisfied and finally left.
Well, I was like an angel becauseI did not tell her that Mr. Tall shaved and picked his nose in his office.
I did not tell her there would be a rare chance of him becoming the president.
Meanwhile, I sent my former boss an email expressing my deep sorrow that I would not be able to help him as his personal assistant in the future, but the geisha girl would be very happy to take my position.
I guess we all can be angels and devils once in a while. (Let's hope this is fiction!)
Someone brought flowers for me to my office today! Unfortunately, they were not from someone special.
The person who gave me these beautiful flowers is a part time worker in our company.
She calls me "Ms. Governor" and giggles and gives me chocolates, cookies, and crackers, etc. whenever I visit her office!
She is Japanese, well over 60 and looks very young! She is one of our cleaning staff. She says working here makes her stay healthy! To my surprise, she speaks English, Korean, Mandarin and French, as well as Japanese. she learned Korean all by herself by watching Korean movies and reading gossip magazines written in Korean.
One day, when we had a guest from Korea and there was no one who spoke Korean in my office, she came to me quietly and offered her help. We somehow made it through. Therefore, I shoud say, in a sense, she IS very special.
