英会話教室Pure English（旧ファングリッシュ）

Hello all!
So it’s Monday night and I’ve just finished preparing for tomorrow’s classes. I’ve been very busy with life lately. How’ve you been?

It certainly feels colder outside these last few days. At least it’s not raining.

Saturday was my birthday, but unfortunately it was pouring all day and night. I did go out for some sushi with my family in the early evening though. Birthday sushi is gooood!

I have some exciting news (for me) that I can finally announce on this blog. I’ll be going to Canada during Christmas and New Year’s this year. I haven’t been back for almost 4 years so this trip is long overdue. Hopefully I’ll be able to post in this blog with pictures from Canada. I’m working on it!

I hope you have a great night. Stay warm and don’t catch a cold!
Paul

Good evening everyone!

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything. Lately there has been a cold bug going around and I managed to catch it. It took all my energy and wasn’t much fun. But I have recovered now and am feeling much better. I hate colds!

Today I went to a ramen shop with my family. It is very close to my apartment, about half a block away. I can’t remember the name of the place but I’ve included a couple pictures so maybe some of you will recognize it. It was my first time to go there and it was very good! I ordered the pork (cha-shu) shoyu ramen for 600 yen. It was sooooo good and I left very satisfied. I think I’ll have to go to this place again sometime.

It’s also starting to get a bit cooler outside. The morning in particular is a bit chilly, but the daytime is still nice (for me anyway). It feels like autumn!

I hope you will all have a great week and don’t catch a cold.
-Paul

Hello and good evening!

It’s Friday night again. I can’t explain why but I want to go out… right now. (>.<)
Oh well, maybe next week.

Funglish classes were very nice this week. Last week we had an autumn break and there were no classes. So it was nice to see all the students again. One of them had been travelling in Europe and brought me back a nice little souvenir. Thanks for that!

Today I had a bit of time so I decided to go for lunch. I went to a place in Hiratsuka on route 129. It’s called Don Tei and it’s a shabu shabu place.

The food was very nice and they have a good lunch menu there. I had the beef (gyu) sukiyaki set and I also ordered the salad bar. The salad bar there is quite good. All of the items are fresh and look tasty!

I think I might go back there someday and try the shabu shabu. It looked very good. And I just like to say “shabu shabu”. It has a nice ring to it, haha.

Tomorrow it’s back to work, and then also for a bit on Sunday. No day off this week! I hope I’ll have time to blog again this weekend.

Thanks for reading and have a great night!
-Paul

Good evening and happy weekend!

It’s a cool Sunday evening and I’m getting ready for the week ahead. I hope you’ve all had a nice weekend and had some time to relax.

Last night (Saturday) I went into Tokyo to see a live rock show. One of my students is singing in a band and he was nice enough to invite me out. He’s singing a couple of songs in English too! The band name is “Babylon Shakes”.

The venue was called the Black Shark. It is located close to Waseda station. It’s a tight little club in the basement level. There were quite a few people that showed up to see the band and the atmosphere was good.

The band had good stage presence and was very entertaining to watch. The songs were all originals and their sound was very tight (the timing was good). They also actively tried to involve the audience with the show, which made it much more fun. There was an anket (a short question paper) which was handed out by the band. The audience members were asked to write down their 2 favourite songs from the performance and leave a small comment. After giving the filled out paper back to the band we were given some special Babylon Shakes manju as a gift. A very original idea and it was very tasty!

Afterwards I had a good time chatting with the band members and a few of their friends. It was a good chance for me to practice some Japanese conversation and for them to try some English phrases. Language exchange!

If you have a chance to see them play sometime then you should go. I think if you enjoy rock ‘n’ roll then you’ll have a great time at their show.

So my weekend as a whole was very good! It was my first time going to the Waseda area and I had a great time.

The photos at the side are:
1. The stage at the Black Shark, just before the show started.
2&3. A couple of pics of the band during their performance.
4. The tasty manju.

I hope you all have a nice week and thanks for reading! Special thanks to Babylon Shakes for the fun evening. See you next time.
-Paul

Hello!

Today is a bit chilly out. It feels like fall and the leaves are changing! I actually quite like this temperature, although I know many in this area don’t share the same opinion.

I will post some pictures today of a weekend mission. This actually happened yesterday but I’m posting about it now.

It was lightly raining in the morning and the weather looked like it might stay that way all day. So I had to figure out what to do with my boys on a Sunday at home. We decided to go on a mission for melon pan! (Little boys like it when you make things sound like an adventure).

First we found a recipe online then watched a short video about how to make it. Next we checked our inventory at home then made a shopping list of the items we would need. With our list complete we headed to Shimamura to gather the necessary supplies for making melon pan.

Once we had everything we headed home again and began preparations. It was a bit messy but the boys had fun trying to measure out the ingredients on our little electric scale. It took longer than we had thought but we finally finished and baked our prize.

It actually turned out pretty good for the first time. It was very tasty! Maybe next time it will be even better. We are experienced melon-panners now, haha.

The first picture is in the middle of preparing the bread.
The second is just before we put the buns in the oven.
Finally the third picture is after baking. I think I might need a bigger baking tray! The buns are not supposed to be touching each other, oops.

Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed the story and pictures. Bye-bye until next time!
-Paul