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Brun_Ugle flies again (TAC 2012 team い)

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Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 145 of 276
17 June 2012 at 9:59am | IP Logged 
For those who don't read my blog:

雨月物語 (Tales of Moonlight and Rain)

Success comes at a price and we pay in suffering.

That line pretty much sums up this movie. It is about how greed and ambition lead to downfall. The film is directed by Kenji Mizoguchi. It premiered in 1953 and won the Silver Lion Award at the Venice Festival that year.

It takes place in the 16th century during the time of the civil wars.

Genjuro is a potter who dreams of money. He is determined to become rich at any price. His wife, Miyagi, begs him to think of her and their son, Genichi. He is risking his life for riches and what will become of them if he dies?

Tobei dreams of glory and is determined to become a samurai. His wife, Ohama, calls him a fool and begs him to give up this dream.

Both men leave to seek their fortune, leaving their wives behind. Miyagi, carrying her son on her back, is forced to run from the soldiers as they invade the village again and again. Ohama is caught by the soldiers and raped.

Genjuro makes his fortune selling pottery in a city across the lake, but while there becomes enchanted by the mysterious Lady Wakasa. He marries her and goes to live in her palace, forgetting his wife and child. One day when he returns to the city to buy her presents, a priest stops him and says that he is possessed by an evil spirit. Genjuro doesn’t believe him, but allows him to perform an exorcism and write sutras on his skin to protect him from spirits. When he returns to the palace, Lady Wakasa and her nurse discover the sutras and become angry. They refuse to let him leave. He grabs a sword and swings it at them and finally manages to get out of the palace where he faints just outside the door. He comes to in the morning when some men find him. They see the sword and say it’s been stolen from the temple. He says he found it in the palace. But there is now palace there, only a ruin. The men take his money and the sword and let him go. He makes his way home having lost everything he’d gained.

After taking the head of a general and presenting it to his leader, Tobei is made a high ranking samurai with a horse and vassals. He is riding proudly through the town intending to return in glory to his wife, but the men beg him to stop at a brothel to spend the night. There he finds his wife. Again she calls him a fool and says to look at what his ambition has done to her. He realizes his foolishness and returns home with her, throwing his armor and spear into the river.

Genjuro finally makes it home too. He searches his house, but his wife and child aren’t there. He goes around the house again and then he sees them. His wife is cooking dinner and his son is sleeping on the floor. He apologizes to his wife, but she says the only important thing is that he came home safely. She gives him sake and dinner and then he falls asleep next to his son. He is awakened when the village chief knocks on the door. The chief was looking for Genjuro’s son. He said that the boy had been staying with him, but had disappeared in the night and he was worried. Genjuro calls out to his wife, and the others look at him strangely. They tell him that she had been killed by the soldiers.

The film is very well directed. Many of the scenes are almost like paintings and add to the feeling of mystery and enchantment the film gives. The real and the supernatural mix together in such a way as to make it hard to tell where the one leaves off and the other begins.

The film certainly deserved its prize and I recommend it, but the Japanese is not always easy to understand. There were small bits of the movie that were pretty easy to understand and other bits where I could catch a word or too, but some places were almost unintelligible for me.

It’s in black and white, by the way, and a little grainy, so if you don’t like those kinds of films…. you’ll be missing a great movie.

1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 146 of 276
17 June 2012 at 10:09am | IP Logged 
Update:

Log for 2012.06.03 - 2012.06.16 inclusive

Not really a great couple of weeks. I started out flying high, but then I got a little distracted somehow. Then, I got invited for an interview, and now, I can hardly sit still. I read half a page of HP and then think of something and jump up. Then I go back to HP and try to find my place, by which time, I usually think of something else.

Reviewing the Kanji: Time = 0:46.

Reading: Time = 51:27. I may have mentioned this before, but if anything can make me never want to read HP again, it will be reading it in Japanese at 5 minutes per page.

Listening/movies: Time = 4:51. Another fabulous movie. See the previous post for my review.

iKnow: Time= 9:55.
     
Total for period: 66 hr, 57 min
Total since start of TAC 2012: 672 hr, 38 min
Total since I started keeping track (2011.11.06): 867 hr, 0 min

Only 1621 hours, 29 minutes and 34 seconds to go ;-)

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Woodsei
Bilingual Diglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Woodsei
Joined 4623 days ago

614 posts - 782 votes 
Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)*
Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian

 
 Message 147 of 276
18 June 2012 at 7:57am | IP Logged 
It's hard to focus when important things like job interviews come up. Good luck! I'm sure
you'll do great there, as well as with your Japanese. As usual, great reviews! I read
them all on your blog earlier :) Keep it up, you've inspired me to check out some of the
titles there.
1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 148 of 276
18 June 2012 at 8:37am | IP Logged 
Thank you. I am getting very excited about this job. I was a little unsure at first, both because it is a step down from what I do now and because it is temporary -- only three years. But now, I'm realizing that after the treatment I've received there, it would be quite impossible for me to go back to my current job and would be unhealthy for me to do so.

I do hope I do well in the interview. I did well on the last two interviews I was on. That is, for this job and for the job I had before this one. The reason I did so well on the interview for this job is that I didn't really want it. (I took it, because it seemed like such a great career opportunity.) Interviews are harder when you really really want the job. Although there are the two negative points I mentioned above, this job seems otherwise to be quite perfect and suitable jobs are not easy to find around here since the market is so small.

Edited by Brun Ugle on 18 June 2012 at 8:38am

1 person has voted this message useful



Woodsei
Bilingual Diglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Woodsei
Joined 4623 days ago

614 posts - 782 votes 
Speaks: English*, Arabic (Egyptian)*
Studies: Russian, Japanese, Hungarian

 
 Message 149 of 276
18 June 2012 at 4:39pm | IP Logged 
It's always funny how we seem to do handle better the things we don't want, and the
things we do usually go rather awry. I think it's a confidence thing. If you want
something, you look like you're trying to hard, but if not, and you act normally,
employers take it that you're so confident and sure about yourself, and my guess is
most of them base their hiring hugely on confidence. Of course, confidence and
arrogance are two entirely separate issues, but that's another story :)

My point is, you can do it! Just be who you are and don't let nerves get the best of
you. Even if you think it's a step down in status, like you said earlier, you never
know if this could be a great opportunity. Easier said than done, but I hope all works
out for the better.

Hang in there!
1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 150 of 276
21 June 2012 at 8:44am | IP Logged 
I had my interview yesterday. I'm just glad it's over and I can breathe again. I feel kind of guilty not saying anything about my diagnoses, but I also know that doing so can prevent one from getting a job. Although, this job is located at the hospital, right between the habilitation clinic for autism and other developmental disorders and the psychiatric section, so maybe they wouldn't mind. It'd certainly be convenient for me.

I only have two people as references. I couldn't use my boss of course because he would definitely give me a very bad reference. I have another person I've worked for who would have been a perfect reference, but he'll only do it on the condition that I tell them about my diagnoses and that he also is allowed to talk about them. The employment agency advised strongly against that, so I can't use him either.

One of the interviewers knows my boss. He's the kind of person everyone knows. They said they wouldn't call him, since I hadn't told him about the interview, but I wonder if she will talk to him anyway. I'm sure she wouldn't mention my job hunt, but she could always talk about it casually. She could just say something like, "I met someone who works for you ..." without saying that it was at an interview.

I halfway want this job and halfway don't. A part of me is afraid. Even though I in many ways don't like my present job, I don't want to leave. Part of it is that I know I will never see most of these people again. I know most of them don't like me and have probably halfway forgotten me already, but I like them, so it will be hard to go. My therapist says a large part of it is probably because it is so hard for autists to accept change. Her opinion is that it would be a great opportunity for me. I guess she's right, but it will still be scary.

1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 151 of 276
21 June 2012 at 9:04am | IP Logged 
Brun Ugle wrote:
SHAPES

It’s always important to keep in shape and here are a couple of kanji-based shapes I learned from Harry Potter.

大の字に倒れる(たいのじにたおれる) -> If hit by the Avada Kadavra curse you will not only die, you might also do this – fall down in the shape of a 大, which interestingly enough is pronounced だい, which sounds an awful lot like “die.” Not that that means anything, I just thought it was an interesting coincidence.

十字架 (じゅうじか) -> the shape of a cross

指を十字架の形に組んで祈る(ゆびをじゅう じかのかたじにくんでいのる)-> crossing one’s fingers (for praying/wishing for something)




I should've known there would be another one. This one describes things in a straight horizontal line (or in a horizontal line-segment for those mathematicians out there who want to get technical about it.)

Here is a quote from the book describing how Professor McGonagall presses her lips together when angry.

“マクゴナガル先生の唇は...真一文字に 結ばれていた”

真一文字:まいちもんじ: in a straight line; as the crow flys


1 person has voted this message useful



Brun Ugle
Diglot
Senior Member
Norway
brunugle.wordpress.c
Joined 6446 days ago

1292 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*, NorwegianC1
Studies: Japanese, Esperanto, Spanish, Finnish

 
 Message 152 of 276
02 July 2012 at 9:33am | IP Logged 
Another rough two weeks. What with stressing over my job and stressing over my job interview, I haven’t gotten much done.

I’m starting to get tired of Harry Potter. I’ve always loved HP, but at five minutes per page, it’s getting a little tedious. It’s starting to feel like work, and that’s not good. So I think when I finish nr 5, I will read other things for a while. Maybe by the time I tackle nr 6, my reading speed will be better. Also, I must agree with what others have said; HP gets harder with each book. Now, I keep the English book within reach so I can check from time to time when I get confused. I didn’t do that with the earlier books.

About my interview: The first interview went really well. Then I got called in for a second interview. The reason they called me in was that I had mentioned a slight shyness as one of my weaknesses and they wanted to ask more about that. I of course hadn’t mentioned that I am a crazy autist; that would guarantee that I wouldn’t get the job, so I just said I was a little shy. Well, it turns out that this job involves spending huge amounts of time on the telephone, and even giving lectures.

I said to them that there was nothing about that in the job-ad. There it said that the job involved bookkeeping and various things of that nature, which I unfortunately don’t know the English words for, but which mostly only require things like sitting at a computer punching numbers or checking things off on a bank statement. And they said, “But it says ‘good communication skills.’” I don’t think I’ve ever seen a job-ad where it didn’t say “good communication skills.” Usually that means that you are able to get your point across to someone and can understand what they are trying to say. I’ve never encountered a case where “good communication skills” means giving lectures.

I think it was probably lucky that I mentioned that I was shy. Imagine if I had gotten the job and found out afterward that it required giving lectures. Since it wasn’t mentioned in the job-ad or in the first interview, it is quite possible that that could have happened had I not mentioned shyness.


Log for 2012.06.17 - 2012.06.30 inclusive

Reading: Time = 26:55.

Listening/movies: Time = 1:59. I brought a movie home from the library, but didn’t get to watch it my usual 3 times because of being so busy trying to figure out my answers to all the standard interview questions. Anyway, I only got to watch the movie once, without subs, before I had to return it, so I think my understanding might be rather limited. That’s why I haven’t written a review yet.

iKnow: Time= 6:01. Not only have I been short on time and concentration, but my internet has been acting up again, making internet-based studying difficult.

Writing: Time= 3:14. Don’t assume that I wrote a lot. I wrote 313 words. So that’s about 100 words per hour. Part of the reason it took so long is that I had to look up quite a few words and also some grammar points. Also, I wrote it out by hand first to get practice writing the characters and such. Since I’ve been slacking on RTK, my kanji have gotten pretty bad. I really have to get back to that.
      

Total for period: 36 hr, 8 min
Total since start of TAC 2012: 710 hr, 46 min
Total since I started keeping track (2011.11.06): 905 hr, 9 min

Only 1583 hours, 21 minutes and 26 seconds to go ;-)


Edited by Brun Ugle on 02 July 2012 at 9:35am



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