Hello, everyone.

My computer is not in good condition so I couldn't watch the movie.
I'll try other time.

I got driving licence few weeks ago.
So I drove with my father today.
At first I was very tensed up so
I put on the brakes too much
and drove at very slow speeds.
But my father told me I had to drive faster
because my car interrupted other cars
(they may have been impatient with my drive)
so I tried to do that.

Finally I was able to drive faster
but I think I should practice more.

Many people went or are going to go out
during Silver Week　by car so
please drive safety and enjoy holidays! !

•  green★
• 2009年9月21日 18:55

Hi David,
I watched the video, and I didn't notice their trick! I only watched the card. As you said, I'm not as observant as I like to think I am!

Hi everyone,
How is your Silver Week? Yesterday, I went to watch the show "Blast" with my friend. Do you know it? It has performers of brasses, percussion and dancers. Their performance were amazing! I went to watch it before, and I was so impressed at that time. Since then, I had wanted to watch it again all the time, and yesterday, I could do it, so I was very happy! "Blast" has a member of Japanese, his name is "Naoki Ishikawa". He is a top percussionist in the team. He is going to leave the team after this tour, and he has started his solo project. I want to watch his performance again!
Today, I went to go shopping with my mother and my sister. Everything was crowded, so I was very tired....
Tomorrow, I'm going to go out with my friend.

Have a nice Silver Week!

Amica

•  Amica
• 2009年9月21日 22:31

Hi David,
Thank you for your help with the question about numbers:) Nao's question was how to read 西暦, so we were talking about the year. I never thought of the problem of what to call this decade. 'The noughties'? It sounds a bit strange to me because the sound of the word 'noughties' reminds me of the word 'naughty', which means ‘itazurana’, but it's interesting.

By the way, I watched the video, and I was very surprised! I didn't notice anything but the change of the cards. I showed the video to my son, and he had the same reaction as me. As you say, we are not as observant as we like to think we are.(By the way, I didn't know the word 'observant', but I was able to guess the meaning because I knew the verb 'observe'. They are members of the same word family, aren't they?)

Hi green★,
Congratulations on getting your driver's license!!

Hi Amica,
It sounds like you are enjoying your Silver Week. I didn't know the show "Blast", so I checked the Internet. It sounds interesting!

I'm going to go shopping tomorrow. I hope it's not that crowded.

See you soon,

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月21日 22:58

Hi David

I had a look at the video and I could notice what were changed. When I watch these kinds of videos, I usually focus not only the cards but also other things. I felt that it’s not fair when the camera zoomed in on the table, the woman and the man. They could do anything when the camera zoomed in on something.

Hi Anne

Regarding your question:
When I read your comment, the words “言葉にできない” came up to mind, so I would say,
That’s amazing! It’s too beautiful for words.
The colors of sunset are amazing! Especially the color red is so beautiful.
I know it is too long, but I couldn’t think of any.
I see what you mean and sometimes it is difficult for me to express my feelings in English.

Hi green★

Glad to hear from you again!!
I have a driver’s license but I have no confidence in my ability to drive a car. It is really good for you to practice. Don’t be like me!!!

Hi Amica

I know “Blast” but I have never watched it. It seemed like you really enjoyed their performance. Good for you.

•  amo
• 2009年9月22日 02:15

Hi David,

Thank you for sharing an interesting video with us.

It gives us another way of watching magic show on TV.

Of course, I couldn't find any hidden changes, I was afraid.
I think it is one of antitheses.

However, I feel a complicated feeling that it may be happy unless we don't know such kind of gimmicks nowadays.

Don't you think so, everyone?

See ya,

•  Gussan
• 2009年9月22日 04:45

Hi David,

I can't take it as a magic but I can take it as a Lesson of way to think.
It was an interesting thing as a lesson.
（物事の見方の教訓として面白かったです）

Kazu

•  Kazu
• 2009年9月22日 06:52

Hi Mark!

I watch the magic show video.
I coudn't find out trick until I watched the latter harf.
I always can not find out magic trick and in this case either...
Is that a kind of TV show?

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月22日 09:59

I'm very sorry.
I made a terrible mistake.
Mark is an other English blog author's name.
I'm very very very sorry.

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月22日 10:13

Hi David,

Thank you for sharing the interesting video. As you said, we usually focus on what we are interested in; here it's cards, and don't pay attention to other things.
This video reminds me of ideas or way of thinking "aha- experience(アハ体験）" which Kenichiro Magi, a brain scientist, introduces on TV or in his books.
By the way, I could spot two changes; the color of a table cover and a curtain.^^)
After watching the video, I watched two more videos; one is "Vanishing Head Illusion" and the other is "Interactive Personality Test". Both of them were interesting and you would know why the latter was interesting if you took a test. It's the secret of "curious Psychology", I think.

I had no idea about "the noughties", and it's new to me. As Tomo said, when I saw it, the word "naughty" first came to my mind.

Hi green★、
Long time no see!
Diving with your father at the passengers seat is a good practice, isn't it?

Hi Amica,
Did you went to see the show"Blast"? Good for you! I know it and have wanted to see it, but haven't .

Hi amo,
Thank you for your ideas.
Maybe I need to be more flexible when I write sentences in English. By the way,I like your sentences!
I've learned a lot from you guys, Gussan, Tomo and you. Thank you!

Speak to you soon,

Anne

•  Anne
• 2009年9月22日 11:24

Hi David,

Unfortunately I couldn’t watch the video so I’ll try again later. I’m usually amused easily so I’m sure I’ll have a good surprise! Anyway, I’ve heard ‘noughties’ but not so often. I wonder the same thing happened back in 1901-1910 or 1801-1810 etc. Do you know?

By the way, what is Silver Week? I can’t remember Japanese public holidays but I don’t think I’ve heard about Silver week when I was there…

Green,
Congratulations!! Enjoy driving 

Everyone,
Sounds like you guys are having a great Silver Week. Is it like another Golden Week holiday? Anyway, have a good one!

Michelle

•  Michelle
• 2009年9月22日 13:10

少し訂正；
Did you went to see →Did you see

Hi　Michelle,
This year we have a five-day break starting from Sep.19(on Saturday)including "Respect-for the aged Day" in Japan. We call it "Silver Week" as a counterpart to "Golden Week" in May. Actually, this is a result of the "Happy Monday" law. Since 2003, ’敬老の日’has been shifted to the third Monday of September. To be honest, I'm not accustomed to this shift, and Sep.15th first come to my mind.

Bye for now,

Anne

•  Anne
• 2009年9月22日 15:35

Hi David

Thank you for your advice.It helped me.
When I studied at school,my teacher said me"the Christian era is spoken by parting in the middle."But the Christian era like 2000-2010 is spoken as same as counting number,isn't it?(For example, 2010 isn't twenty ten.Two thousand is okay when we write it.)
So did grammer of the Christian era change?right?
I want to know how English teachers teaches about the Christian era.

And I was interested in 'the noughties'.I think there isn't Japanese word that expresses 2000-2010.What does everyone call it?(９０年代の次は２００年代でしょうか？それだと２９９９年まで含んでしまいますね。）

By the way I watched the video,too.And I couldn't notice the changing.I heard that our brain choice the information because there are a lot of information in our life.Maybe it wasn't necessary for my brain.This is very interesting for me.

Hi everyone

How are you?Do you enjoy Silver week?
I really enjoy it.I meet up many friends,we have a good time.Every time I met my friend,I felt happy.
It is important for me to talk with friends.
Tomorrow is the last day..It was a little sad.
But I want to have a good day.

Bye for now

Nao

•  Nao
• 2009年9月22日 18:12

Sorry,I corrected.

Two thousand is okay when we write it
→Two thousand ten is okay when we write it.

９０年代の次は２００年代でしょうか？
→９０年代の次は２０００年代でしょうか？

•  Nao
• 2009年9月22日 18:18

Hi,Amika

I know Blast and I want to see it very much!!
I belong to a local brass band club and I plays trumpet so I'm very interested it.
However, the ticket is a little bit expensive ...　
so I hesitated to go.

But you seem to have enjoyed it very much!!
so I will go next time!!!

•  green★
• 2009年9月22日 22:56

Hi everyone,

Excuse me,

Everyone may know this but let me check whether green★ and Green are different person or not.

Both of you are different person, aren't you?

Kazu

•  Kazu
• 2009年9月23日 01:03

Hi David and Everyone,
That was an interesting video. I didn’t notice the tricks either. But I wasn’t really surprised because I knew I’m not observant at all! Seriously, you guys are about the same as me? Now that’s a surprise!

Hi Green,
You got a driver’s license? Congratulations! I have a driver’s license too, but it’s only serving as my picture ID ;-) Keep it up!

•  Lily
• 2009年9月23日 01:10

Hi Lily and everyone!

I'm Green,not green★.
So I don't have driver's license...
I　guess 『gｒeen★』is younger than me and I'm sure her English is better than mine.

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月23日 09:12

Thank you Anne!

Having more holidays sound cool to me ;) Australia doesn’t have as many public holidays as Japan does so I’ll be ecstatic about any long weekend!

Hi Everyone,

I had a quick thought about how to read numbers. As I can’t see Japanese word on my PC I might be totally out of line but I thought ‘1,000 separator’ (‘,’ between 1 and 0 as in 1,000 above) could help you to read the number. Let’s say 1,000 is one thousand, 10,000 is ten thousand etc. Japanese read 10,000 as 1-man so from Japanese to English translation is still a little tricky though.
Another thing about numbers is that we don’t always say big numbers as the way we usually learn in schools in Japan. For example, we probably learn 230 as two hundred and thirty but you can also say two thirty. I’m not sure if it’s Australian thing or not but sounds more casual to me. What do you think David?

•  Michelle
• 2009年9月23日 14:13

Hi Green and green★

Oops, you are two different people! Got it :-)

•  Lily
• 2009年9月23日 15:46

Hi everyone

How did you spend “Silver week”?
First two days, I just stayed home and watching movies and studying English. Third day, I went shopping with my sister and bought a bag and some clothes. At that time, I did a lot drawing and I got a chance to “catching caches(現金つかみ取り)” and I took 2080 yen. Lucky me!!! Yesterday, I met some people from previous work and went for drink. I haven’t met some of them for about 5 years, so I had a good time. It was a good occasion to catch up with ex co-workers. Today is last day, and it getting over.
I hope everyone would have a nice holiday.

Hi Green

Have you enjoyed the concert(play)?

Hi Michelle

How was Yanchep National Park? Did you take a lot of picture at the park?

•  amo
• 2009年9月23日 18:00

correction

Did you take a lot of picture at the park?

=>Did you take a lot of pictures at the park?

•  amo
• 2009年9月23日 18:07

Hi amo!

My daughter and I enjoyed the play and concert very much!

We watch the play 『DREAM　BOYS』　every yeas.
To get the ticket is very very very hard.
Kazuya Kamenashi and other performer plays acrobatics for example hang in the air many times.
And their songs are marvelous!
We exactly had dreamy time.

TOKIO concert was good,too.
This year is the fifteenth anniversary　that TOKIO came out.

Have a nice day!

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月24日 12:57

Hi Green

You watched "DREAMS BOYS"!I'm jealous of you.
I have watched it once.It is very great play.
I like not only concert but also play.I think we can see them more nearly.

And I remembered my friend said,"I will go to TOKIO concert soon" It was also good,wasn't it?That's great!

Nao

•  Nao
• 2009年9月24日 14:07

Hi David and everyone,

Did you enjoy 'Silver Week'? I guess most of you are missing the holiday, but as a full-time mother, I'm glad it's over. On the first day of the holiday, there was a sports day at my son's junior high school. I was one of the volunteers to help the event this year, so I had to go to the school by 8:00 a.m., and of course I had to make lunch for my family before that. It was very tiring, but it was nice to see the students get sweaty and trying hard. My son is a third-year student, so it was his last sports day in junior high. Unfortunately, his team lost, but I think he had a great time with his friends.

Nao - I don't think there is a translation for the decade '2001-2010' in Japanese, either. I wonder how we call it, too.

Kazu - Actually, we used to have a lot of members who have colors as names, such as White green and Blue green. It seems like 'green' is popular on this blog;-)

Michelle - Thanks for sharing your thought about numbers. We started the discussion with the question: "How do you read the year '1999', '2000' and '2001' in the Western calendar?" And then I added one more question '2010' to the discussion.
By the way, as you say, we learn in school that 230 is 'two hundred and thirty', but it's also okay to say 'two thirty' if you are talking about the year, right? I read somewhere that English speakers choose the easier way to say when they read the year or numbers. For example, how do you read this number '1900'? You can say 'one thousand and nine hundred' or 'nineteen hundred'. I'm not sure, but I guess the latter is more common because it's easier to say. What do you think?

See you soon,

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月24日 14:25

Hi Tomo!!!

☆☆☆　Belated Happy Birthday!!!☆☆☆

A lot of good things will happen to you!

I don't know why, but I thought your birthday was Sep.26th! While I was reading former entries, I suddenly noticed that your birthday was Sep. 22nd.

Now I got the secret of two bottles of wine! You had a great time with your husband,right?
I'm glad to know that you had a lovely time with your hausband^^)

Anne

•  Anne
• 2009年9月24日 17:14

Hi Tomo,

I was just teaching a class and one of the students said 'it's my birthday', and I remembered that your birthday is about now. I just checked my phone, and I realized that it was two days ago! I'm so sorry! I don't know why a message didn't come up on my phone. I have your birthday stored, so it should have given me a message saying 'today's birthday'.
Anyway, I'm really sorry, and I hope you had a great day.

•  David
• 2009年9月24日 17:23

Hi Tomo!
Sep 22th is your birthday?
Happy Birthday!!!

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月24日 17:56

OMG, OMG! It was your birthday, Tomo!!

♪♪♪ Happy Belated Birthday　♪♪♪

Now I figured why you and your husband drank two bottles of wine the night before last ;-)

•  Lily
• 2009年9月24日 18:08

Hi Anne, David, Green and Lily!

Thanks for your messages! But please don't apologize. That's okay:) My birthday was in the middle of 'Silver Week' this year, and I had forgotten about it myself until the school event was over. On that day, my husband and my daughter did the laundry and cooked dinner for me, and my sons washed the dishes and massaged my shoulders, so I didn't do anything but eating and drinking!

By the way, I didn't know that mobile phones have a function that gives you a message saying 'today's birthday'. That's useful, isn't?

Anyway, thanks again for the birthday messages. I had a lovely day;-)

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月24日 18:19

Hi Nao!

You have watched 『DREAM　BOYS』,haven't you?
We watched it Sep 22th.
It was Subaru Sibutani's birthday.
After the play performers and audiences celebrated his birthday.
We sang 「Happy Birthday to you」.
It was secret from　him until then so he was surprised by that.

Green

•  Green
• 2009年9月24日 18:25

Hi Tomo,
Happy birthday!
I know you've got a little bit more to be loved.

Hi Nao,
I think we may call '2000-2010' as '2000年代初頭'.

•  Appoh
• 2009年9月24日 20:23

☆☆☆Happy Birthday Tomo☆☆☆

Amica

•  Amica
• 2009年9月24日 20:46

Tomo,Happy birthday!!

I hope you have a lot of happiness this year.
You had a very good day on your birthday.Your family is very nice!

Hi,Green

You went there on the special day!
Singing a song for him was a nice surprise.
I went there a several years ago・・・I want to go again.
I couldn't go there but I went to the concert of Domoto Koichi. It was very good.He is very cool.
It gave me happiness.

Nao

•  Nao
• 2009年9月24日 21:53

Hi Appoh

Thank you for answering.
We can say "初頭”　as you pointed.
If 2010 pass,we may say "１０年代".
I felt that languages are changing.

Nao

•  Nao
• 2009年9月24日 22:02

Hi Appoh, Amica, and Nao!

Thanks for the birthday messages! As a woman, I'm not happy about getting old, but I'm very happy to get your messages:)

Hope you are not suffering from post-holiday blues!

Tomo

PS Appoh、『2000年代初頭』←なるほど～

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月24日 22:51

Hi Tomo,
☆Belated Happy Birthday!!☆

Glad to hear that you had a lovely time with your family. I'm just wondering if my e-cards had reached your cellephone on that day. I have doubt about my useing the e-card system.;-)

Hi David,
I watched the video and surprisingly I didn't noticed anything but the changing cards! I focused all my attention on the cards. As you say, we are not as observant as we like to think we are! I also remember "アハ体験", which Anne mentioned. Anyway, it's really interesting!

As for "the noughties", it's new to me, and I also remeber the word; naughty.

Hi Everyone,
It seems that you all had a good time during 'Silver Week'. I went to Taipei from 20th to 23rd with my collegue. It's still very hot, but I had a lot of fun! I enjoyed Chinese food, of course, massages and sightseeings. I was also interested in guessing what Chinese kanji means, because the meanings are sometimes very different from Japanese ones. I'm glad that there are one more working day for the weekend!;-)
Bye for now!

•  Maki
• 2009年9月24日 23:10

ずーっと「アクセス不可」涙
とうとう携帯から送信を試みました。みんなもコメントできないでいるのかなぁ。
おやすみなさ～い。

Maki

•  Maki
• 2009年9月24日 23:15

Hi Tomo,

Happy Birthday! ;->

Kazu

•  Kazu
• 2009年9月24日 23:31

ひゃ～！！スペル間違いだらけ！
Sorry about that!

•  Maki
• 2009年9月24日 23:33

Hi Maki,
As I said in my e-mail last night, I didn't get the birthday card. I'm not sure, but my cell phone might have blocked it because it was not from your phone. I'm sorry about that. I'll try to change the settings on my cell phone for the next year;-)(Just joking, but I'll try to figure it out.) Anyway, thanks for the thought. It made me so happy!

By the way, you went to Taipei? Wow! I thought you went somewhere in Japan. Was it the first time you had been there? Anyway, I'm glad to hear you had a great holiday!

Hi Kazu,
Thank you!:) Sorry for the late reply, but there was something wrong with the server, and I couldn't post a comment from my computer last night.

Have a nice day, everyone!

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月25日 07:23

Hi Maki

You went to Taipei,didn't you?Sounds good.
Chinease food!That sounds perfect.
I want to go to Kyufun in Taiwan because I heard there is a town like "千と千尋の神隠し”.
I'm happy to hear you had a good time.

Nao

•  Nao
• 2009年9月25日 11:30

Hi amo,

That’s good hear that you had a nice holiday. Yep, I took lots of pictures at the park and uploaded some of them on my blog. (If you click on my name in purple with underline underneath the comment it’ll take you to the site or like David I’ve got my Flickr page. The link to my Flickr page is on my Blog site!). I saw lots of kangaroos and some koalas! Koalas were sleeping in the tree and that was really peaceful and cute!

Hi Tomo,

Thank you for letting me know how the discussion started! I quite often hear people say 230 two thirty or 350,000 three fifty thousand and things like that for any numbers really. So years are one thing and probably most commonly used is for money! Anyway, I’m not a true blue native English speaker so it’s probably better to ask David about it ;)
By the way, was that your birthday a couple of days ago?? Happy birthday! Sounded like you had a lovely one. Sweet!

Hi Maki,

Taipei! Cool. What it was like over there? I’ve been there once but it was long long time ago. I remember the city was so energetic and never slept!

Hi everyone,

Have you all had a good Silver Week Holiday? Well it’s Friday today and weekend is coming!! Have a good weekend too! By the way, we’re having a long weekend this week! That means next week is a short week! It feels even better ;)

Talk to you later.

•  Michelle
• 2009年9月25日 11:40

Hi Michelle,

Thanks for your reply and the birthday message!:)
As for numbers, I didn't know that the way can be used for money as well! So, you can say, "That will be 230(two thirty) dollars" or something like that? I prefer this way!(because I'm not good at saying big numbers in English..)

Anyway, thanks again for your comment, and I hope you have a great weekend.

Talk to you later,

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月25日 13:50

Hi David and everyone,

All you were enjoying "Silver Week"
I enjoyed looking at David's photos in Hokkaido and watching the video on You Tube. I love "Kussharoko(1)" best. And I told my friends about the video.

Happy birthday,Tomo!
I found out why the blog was lively today. A lot of nice comments to Tomo showed up.

Bye for now,
May

•  May
• 2009年9月25日 16:16

Hi Tomo,

Hmm, I’m not too sure if ‘two thirty dollars’ sounds all right. Also those abbreviations make sense in a conversation which everyone understand what you are talking about: e.g. A: ‘How much was that?’ B: ‘Two thirty.’ In this case two thirty can mean $2,30, $230 or even $230,000 depend on the subject. So when it is very clear that the price you are talking about is a couple of dollars, two thirty makes sense as $2,30. However if you are talking about the price of a property or something, two thirty would be understood $230,000. So it’s all depends. From my experience I don’t think I’ve hard two thirty and dollars together yet again I’m not too sure.

David,

What do you think about those numbers above?

•  Michelle
• 2009年9月25日 16:52

Hi May,
Thank you for your message! As you said, I got a lot of nice comments, so I'm very lucky. But unfortunately, I can't post a comment from my computer after I made the one in the morning, so I'm posting this one from my cell phone again.. Anyway, I was wondering how you were doing, so I'm glad to hear from you:)

Hi Michelle,
Thanks for your help again! "Two thirty can mean $2,30, $230 or even $230,000 depend on the subject." I see. It seems it's not as easy as I thought it would be. Sorry I asked you many questions, but I understand your explanation, so it was a big help. Thank you!

Hi David,
If you have time, would you give us your answer to the question Michelle and I were talking about? I'm looking forward to your new entry!

Tomo

•  Tomo
• 2009年9月25日 20:18