Akiko

Akiko's avatar'

speaks: Japanese

learns: English

likes: reading, travel, cooking, language learning, health, art, cinema, language exchanges, philosophy, music, history, tv shows, programming, movies

Akiko's avatar'

I live in Toyama, Japan. In winter it snows a lot and we have to dig our cars out of the snow. I was a single mother raising my only son. Now he is independent and lives in Tokyo. Later then, I have started to relearn English during the Covid lockdown period and also started playing guitar at the same time. I am a web engineer and working remotely for a company.

Toyama, Japan

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 6 What I've Learned About The Wind Cave

In this post, I'm going to write about what I found online later and what I heard from Motoshima-san about the Wind Cave. When was it created? The oldest record of its existence is from 1871.
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Sep 19 - 2 min. read

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 5 Wind Cave

After checking out of our guesthouse, we all headed to the Wind Cave. It was me, again, who suggested visiting there, after seeing a tiny photo and a brief description in a brochure for
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Sep 17 - 1 min. read

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 4 Earthworks Guesthouse

The Earthworks Guesthouse was a cozy and lovely place to stay. It's owned by a couple, Roberto and Rumi, who are both ceramic artists. It was originally an old silkworm farmhouse and they totally
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Sep 13 - 1 min. read

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 3 Three-Year-Old Kan-kun

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
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Sep 10 - 2 min. read

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Interlude: Strange Calendars in Japan

Unfortunately, all of my friends who came with me to Ueda disposed of the calendars we received at the Anraku temple. So I found similar calendars online: 自分の使命を生きるための 日めくりカレンダー あなたの人生はあなたのもの What's
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Sep 6 - 1 min. read

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 2 Zazen Meditation Experience

I was intending to write about my recent trip following a timeline, but I'm still recovering from my shingles, so I'll write about the easiest one tonight. On the second day, eight of us out of 18
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Sep 5 - 1 min. read

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Shingles

I was going to write about my trip, but I currently have shingles and don't have the energy to write about a complex topic. I’m writing this in my bed with my cellphone, so my English skills might be
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Sep 1 - 1 min. read

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My Short Trip to Ueda: Part 1 Hitonoma Children and Motoshima-san

From Monday to Tuesday, I visited Ueda in Nagano Prefecture with some friends and my son. When he was middle-school age, my son didn't go to public school but instead attended Hitonoma, an
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Aug 29 - 1 min. read

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The Biggest Earthquake I've Ever Experienced: Part 4

We hadn't been able to reach Aya, who I mentioned in this post, for more than a week. We breathed a big sigh of relief when she finally tweeted for the first time after the earthquake. A few months
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Aug 23 - 1 min. read

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The Biggest Earthquake I've Ever Experienced: Part 3

Sadly, the reason my ex-husband picked up our son before me wasn't that he was concerned about his safety; he just wanted to harass me because he was mad that I'd blocked him on Twitter and he
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Aug 20 - 1 min. read

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The Biggest Earthquake I've Ever Experienced: Part 2

After leaving the building, I killed some time in a park. I needed to pick up my son from his elementary school, but the Toei Oedo Line, which I regularly take, was of course suspended. The park was
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Aug 17 - 1 min. read

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The Biggest Earthquake I've Ever Experienced: Part 1

The biggest earthquake I've ever experienced was the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake in 2011. I lived in Tokyo at that time and the seismic strength there was lower 5 on the Japanese seismic scale. I
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Aug 12 - 1 min. read

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My Favorite Korean Artist

Korea and Japan are geographically and culturally close, and indie musicians from both nations routinely visit each other. My favorite Korean artist is Lee Lang. She's best known for her music, but
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Aug 7 - 1 min. read

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A Reed Blind And A Mosquito Coil

It's almost midnight, but the thermometer in my room still reads 31 degrees Celsius (87.8 degrees Fahrenheit). I can sleep with all the windows open, which is a plus. A reed blind is draped over the
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Aug 5 - 1 min. read

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Remember Isn't The Same As 覚える

I'm learning a lot from the posts by Japanese learners. They frequently make mistakes similar to the ones I make when I write in English, but from a different perspective. As an example, I frequently
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Aug 3 - 1 min. read

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Sanrio

I don't believe the Sanrio characters are from any picture books or animations. They have no stories, however, but they have profiles with information such as their birthday, favorite food, hobbies,
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Jul 28 - 2 min. read

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Record Player

When I initially became interested in music as a teenager, the only way to listen to it at home was on vinyl records. So I owned a cheap record player and a tiny collection of records. CDs appeared
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Jul 25 - 1 min. read

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The Simple Past And The Present Perfect

If you're an English learner and struggling with the present perfect, I recommend that you read the comments of my previous post. In both General and Outdated, @Simone- and @CocoPop are having an
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Jul 20 - 1 min. read

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A Hidden Scenic Site: Part 2

Part1 is here. I heard that the hidden route will be open to tourists this summer and the website for it has already been launched. Here's the link. https://canyon-route.jp/en/ I might go there, so I
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Jul 14 - 1 min. read

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A Hidden Scenic Site: Part 1

Locals in Toyama, where I live, really like the Tateyama mountain range. People see it on a daily basis, and when they get good views of it they never stop praising its beauty. On days like these,
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Jul 9 - 1 min. read

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