Hello everyone,

I hope your week is going well and you are dealing with our ever-changing spring weather! It’s been a week of winter, spring and summer weather so far so prepare yourselves for all seasons.

Recently I have been trying to focus on my Japanese learning which has been difficult at times. Unlike our students, I don’t have an awesome English teacher to help and set homework to keep track of so it’s very easy to let my busy life-schedule get in the way of learning. I have very limited free time during the day so like most of our students I have chosen to spend some time learning by listening. Podcasts, instructional videos, anything I can listen to while commuting to work. You would be surprised how little Japanese practice someone can get when your life is speaking and teaching English!

One of the podcasts I have been listening to introduces a new Japanese phrase every week. I’ve always been fascinated by the origins of idioms in English so this section of the podcast was very interesting! My favourite Japanese idiom so far is 十人十色 the literal translation meaning 10 men 10 colours. This phrase is used to describe how all of us have different personalities, interests and desires. We have a similar phrase in English which is, “different strokes for different folks”. Even though we speak different languages, we still use our idioms to express different on life!

What are your favourite English or Japanese idioms?

– Matt

みなさんの１週間が順調であり、この変わりやすい春のお天気にも対応できていればと思っています！

最近私は日本語の勉強に集中しようと頑張っています。日本語学習は時として難しいものです。

生徒の皆さんとは違って私には助けてくれたり、宿題を与えて管理してくれる素晴らしい英語の先生はいないので、

忙しい日々の予定は学習の妨げになりやすいです。

そのため多くの生徒達と同様に、ポッドキャスト、教育ビデオ、なんでも仕事中に聞けるものをときどきリスニングすることによって覚える方法をとることにしました英語を話し、英語を教える毎日を送ると、どれほどわずかな日本語の練習しかできないか、みなさんは驚く事でしょう！

いつも英語の言い回しの由来に興味をそそられるので、このセクションはとても面白かったです！

今のところ私の好きな日本語の言い回しは「十人十色」です。文字通り訳すと１０人の人１０色の色です。

あなたのお気に入りの英語、あるいは日本語の言い回しはなんですか？