Listening to the radio in English

I listen to English radio progrems every morning via TuneInRadio, usually BBC, NPR or VOA.
At first, I was not able to hear any of the words but I used to do that now. I enjoy some programs. My favorite program was the making of a nation by VOA. It was not only American history but olso democracy's history. I listened from the American Revolution to the Bush administration. It was so much fun and I learned a lot about the history of democracy. I used to look forward to listen to the program but it is over now.

The news thre is different from Japanese one. For example you can get lots of news about Middle East, Southern Asia, Europe and of course America. You can get what's going on all over the world.

A little about my city

I live in Matsue, Shimane prefecuture. The population here is 150,000 so Matsue is not a big city. You can easily find convinience stores but we have NO starbucks here until this year. Because of the few population we don't have good pubric transportation. Many adults own a car even very old person.
 Here, we have the sixth largest lake in Japan, called Lake Shinji. The lake is famous for beautiful sunsets and yamato shijimi, a kind of clam, and its water is brackish.
Matsue also faces the Japanese sea. Many kinds of fresh fish are sold at local fish markets. You can eat tasty sashimi or other sea products here.
Our city has a 400-year-old Japanese style castle called Matsue-jo. This castle is the second largest, the third tallest (30m) and the sixth oldest one in Japan. You can tour the inside of the castle and see the whole city from the top floor. In Spring, you can see beautiful cheree blossoms there.
If you like tasty sea food and are interested in old Japanese castles, why don't you come here!

Set a heater

It's getting colder and colder these days. I set a heater in the living room and bought a tank of kerosene yesterday. It cost astonishing 99 yen/l and that'll be killing me until next April. 

The first blog in five years

This is the first blog  post in five years. Since the last post, I didn't write anything in English but just read books in English. To be honest I simply lost interest in writing because no one read my blog at all. But from now on I'll keep writing for the sake of simply improving my English ability.
Since I did not study English grammar I had my blog corrected by online teachers at that time but I'll do it all by myself as much as I can. I'd really appreciate receiving corrections from anyone, though.
Anyway, it's snowing over here but only a little bit. Please take care everyone,

The Second Day of a Family Camping

It was fine on the second day of our family camping this summer.
My two sons got up early to find beetles in the woods but they did not find a lot of them.My wife and I made breakfast; bacon, fried eggs, salad, miso soup and rice. I think having meals outdoors is the most delightful thing with camping. I love doing that very much.
After breakfast, my sons went swimming and played in the river which was across from the campsite. I fell asleep and I took a nap for a while.
Then we checked out of the campsite and had lunch at a restaurant in Kakeya and then we went to Yakumo Wind Cave where a very cool wind blew up from underground. We went down into the cave. The temperature was over thirty degrees Celsius outside that day but in the cave it was ten degrees Celsius. I was almost frozen! The cave used to be used as a natural refrigerator for storing some agricultural crops in the summer for neighbors.
After that we went to a hot spa and bathed there then had dinner.We enjoyed the two days of camping. I hope we will go camping in the winter next time. I think the idea of camping in the snow is really great.

The First Day of a Family Camping

Our family has just returned from camping. We went camping at Ogidani Campsite.We went there for five years in a row.
It was the first time that we used a rented log bungalow; we used to use our own tent before. That was more comfortable using a log bungalow than I expected. The interior was wide and cool and my two sons loved the loft-style bed.
The weather was fine through the days we were camping and the air was cool.
I enjoyed playing tennis and volleyball with my older son there and I lost a tennis match 4-2 with him because he had learned to play tennis two years ago.
My younger son swam in the river which was across from the campsite. The water of the river was clear and crisp. He caught six rainbow trout in the river when the children's fish catching event was held there and we ate the fish at a barbecue. He even caught some dragonflies, beetles and cicadas. He looked very happy.
Before we had our barbecue, we took a bath in a Rotenburo, a Japanese style outdoor public hot spa. I think it is a luxury to take a bath outdoors when it is light.We took a walk under a starry sky at night and we could see the Wain very clearly and big in the north. Then we played Uno, a kind of card game, until we went to sleep.

Family Camping

My family, my wife, two sons and I, go camping every summer. Before my sons were born, my wife and I went camping alone together.We are going to go camping in Ogidani Camp Site, Hiroshima Prefecture next week and we are all looking forward to doing that very much.
Ogidani is our favorite camp site because it has a river, a mountain, woods and open fields. We can swim and catch fish in the river, we can hike in the mountain and the view from the top is amazing. We can find beetles in the woods and we can play baseball or other ballgames in the fields.
My older son would be eager to play volleyball because he began to play that this April. My younger son is studying where he can find beetles in the woods. My wife is looking forward to having a barbecue. I will be happy when they feel joyful in the camp.The camp will be only two days because of my job but I wish we could go camping for at least one week.
The whether forecast said it will be fine there on the days we are there so it is quite certain that we will have a good time at the camp.