On the first night, Motoshima-san and his family visited our guesthouse, and we all had a great meal and chat. The Hitonoma children had all grown significantly over the past seven years. Some of the boys were now taller than him, while the majority of the girls were now wearing makeup. They seemed a bit nervous around each other, but soon got back to their old ways. We adults, on the other hand, hadn't changed much. Of course, Motoshima-san and I had gotten a bit older, but we were perfectly at ease with one another, as if we'd met up just the day before.
Motoshima-san has three daughters and one son. I'd met his daughters in Toyama, but had never met his three-year-old son named Kan, who was born in Ueda. Kan-kun seemed to be enjoying listening to the adults chat and joyfully shouted something out of nowhere. I didn't catch what he said, but according to his mother, Emiko-san, he said: "Ouch! A mosquito bit me on the chin! Help me! Help me!" He wasn't actually bitten by a mosquito, though. She explained that he was repeating something that had happened to him recently:
His big sister, Yui-chan, belongs to a painting club and plans to do an oil portrait of him lying on the back of a tiger in the dappled shade of a tree. So, she asked him and the second sister, Miki-chan, to pose under a tree in their backyard. Miki-chan played the part of the tiger. A mosquito came and bit little Kan on the chin, and he made a big fuss.
It seemed to satisfy him to be able to talk about his strange experience. I was impressed by his drive, which I thought was similar to mine wanting to share my experience on Journaly. His Japanese skills will easily surpass my English ones in a few years. I don't think that the way native children learn their mother tongue is particularly useful for adults learning a foreign language. However, I believe he and I share an innate desire to express ourselves.
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I struggled to decide which tense to use. I wrote the third paragraph in the present tense, as if I were discussing a film scenario, but I'm not sure if that's correct.
Headline image by hassanmd619 on Unsplash
tite: Three-Year-Old
@CocoPop Thanks, Uly! I like the phrase in the dappled shade of a tree.
You're very welcome. I do too! Also, in the part where you say the girls are now wearing makeup, I wanted to point out that using now directly in front of the predicate (or the main verb) has a different feel in English. It's more emotive and personal. In this case, it signals that you were somehow struck by the passage of time when you saw the girls in makeup.
To give you another example, say there's a homeless person who lives in an alley outside your favorite café. You see him every day, sitting on the ground when you go for your coffee. You always say hello, but that's it. In your own words: "I see him every morning and always wave, and he waves back. Last month, I was walking by and I saw him saving a kitten from a pack of dogs. It was so touching to see him cradle it gently in his arms. I offered to take the kitten and he's now my pet. I used to just wave at him, but I now buy him a cup of coffee every morning." Here, using now in front of my pet and buy signals an emotional or personal change of heart and action in the speaker, that isn't present in "Now he's my pet" or "Now, I buy him a cup of coffee every morning," which are just statements of fact with no such emotional/personal nuance. You can read more about it here: https://www.smissle.com/reference/now-temporal#h.i6myvu66yr9d
Now that you've implemented the corrections, I did a second reading. I've added just a few more stylistic edits. Great post!
@CocoPop Thank you so much, Uly! This post is now succinct and readable! Furthermore, I think it has a deeper meaning. I learned English is a highly delicate language in which the placement of commas, the presence or absence of apostrophes, and the arrangement of adverbs can alter the nuance.