Blog #8 the theme of my summer report

    I'm Yusuke. This summer, I concentrated on writing a report of labor law. The theme was "Problems about dispatched workers in Japan". Although it was a short report, the theme was a little complecated. But it was meaningful to research this theme. I would like to write the outline of dispatched workers. Dispatched workers are kind of nonpermanent employees that are often seen everywhere recently. The point at issue of dispatched workers is what should be done so that the dispatched workers can work under better conditions of employment. The concepts of dispatched workers are devided into two categories. One is about dispatched workers who are employed regularly by  temporary agencies,  regularly dispatched to somewhere and get relativery stable wages. The other is about those who are registering themselves with temporary agengies and are easily dismissed. If dispatched workers were employed like this way, their income would become unstable. This is one of the big problems about dispatched workers . However, it is allowed at present to employ dispatched workers like this way. Therefore, the law about dispatched workers must be improved to solve the problems.

Blog #7 Meeting with my old friends

    I' m Yusuke. This summer, I didn't go traveling anywhere because I was busy. But one day on a weekend, I met one of my good old friends when I was a junior high school student. I haven't met him for more than two years. We went to the Fiorentina in Hotel Mets. We ate lunch for the first time there together. He were surprized at the delicious meal in Fiorentina. The au hors d'oeuvre was buffet style so we ate a lot until we felt full. Because he has really taken to Fiorentina, we will go there together again somtime if we both have time. Also, we chatted about various things each other. One of the topic is daily lives of my old friend today. He graduated university in March this year and has been working as a company employee. He entered the university one year earlier than I and studies business administration. He told me that he is satisfied with the job he has because he could take summer vacation for two weeks and his place of work is near his home. However, he also said that he is often very busy. Every time he goes working, he has to work overtime and it is not till 8 or 9 o'clock that he can eat dinner. He usually doesn't feel like doing something on weekends. He warned me to prepare myself that I will have to be extremely busy when I start to work. To hear about the daily lives  of may old friend, I realized again that it is important to study English and laws and to do what I want to do in the last five months of my student life at Gakushuin university.

 

 

Blog #6 my favorite brand

I’m Yusuke. My favorite brand is Adidas. It is a company that mainly produces sport goods. The origin of this company comes from Germany.

The brief history is as follows. After World War Ⅰ, one German, Adolf Dassler started to produce sport shoes on his own. In 1924, his brother Rudolf began to cooperate with him. Then, they started venture. In 1936, Summer Olympics were held and the shoes of brothers were sold out rapidly. Their business expanded after that. However, Adolf and Rudolf split up in 1947 because Rudolf wanted to establish a new company named Puma. From that on, Adolf named the old company Adidas. Finally, Adidas and Puma became rivals. The two brothers never reconciled after that. In 1948, Puma produced many kinds of sport shoes. They were more popular than those of Adidas. Therefore, goods of Adidas couldn’t be sold for several periods. In 1987, Adolf’s son Horst, the successor of him died. Then, Adidas was absorbed by the French Industry Tapie. But Tapie went bankruptcy in 1994. After that, Adidas got independent again. It began to produce many kinds of sportswear, sport shoes and so on and they are bought by many people all over the world. Nowadays Adidas also produces daily goods. For example, my rucksack is from Adidas which I bring to university.

Yusuke

Blog #8: Chiba

Hello, this is Yuki Shirai.

Another place I went during this summer vacation is Kamogawa, Chiba. It was extremely hot, but was very fun. I went to "Ichihara Zou-no Kuni" (市原ぞうの国), which is a place where you can touch and play around with animals. At first I wasn't really interested in touching animals since it was very hot and I thought they smell... However, they were super cute and adorable! I saw horse, elephant, lesser panda, capybara, and many other. My favorite was capybara. They were so slow and were eating leaf the whole time. They didn't move even when I touched from the back.

I wanted to take pictures of other animals too, but I was too excited that I forgot about taking them. Dinner we had at the hotel was very good too :) It was a viking type and I was able to eat several types of food such as Chinese, Japanese, Italian. I should have taken pictures of dinner too.

Blog #8: My second visit to Milano

Hello, this is Naoko.

During my stay in Italy, I visited Milan with my mother. Milan is well known for Duomo, the fourth largest cathedral in the world. It was my second time visiting Milan. When I visited there for the first time with my family, it was snowing that we couldn't get on the top of Duomo. So, my mother and I went to Milan for revenge.

We bought tickets at the Turin station and left for Milan. The weather was great and we managed to get on the top of Duomo :) After that, we walked around and found a funny tailor. Here is the picture of it.

It's called SuperdryStore 極度乾燥（しなさい）! My mother and I laughed when we first saw tailor's name XD

We ate lunch there and went to Intel fan club shop to find uniform of Nagatomo, a great Japanese soccer player who belongs to Intel soccer team.

Here is the picture of his uniform with his autograph! I was really happy to see his uniform because I love soccer<3 I bought Intel's uniform and we headed home to Turin. It was a nice trip :)

Blog #7: Izu

Hi, this is Yuki Shirai.

This summer, I could not go anywhere far from Tokyo since I was working most of the time. However, I went to Izu with my best friend and had so much fun there! We stayed there for two days. On the first day, we went to "Cactus Park" (シャボテン公園). There we saw many animals such as monkeys, bambi, flamingo, and so on. And of course there were many types of cactuses since the park is named "Shaboten" park. This picture is the cactus which I liked the best. The flowers around look very cute<3

Next day, we took a cableway at a place called "Oh-muro yama" (大室山). I'm afraid of heights so I couldn't take pictures of how high the mountain was, but I was able to take a photo of Mt. Fuji. I was very touched when I saw Mt. Fuji, because it was the first I saw it so closely.

Although it was only for a short time, I had so much fun with my friend :) I wish I could go there again when I have time and money.

Blog #7: Cruciani

Hello everyone, this is Naoko.

I visited my parents in Turin, Italy, during this summer vacation and stayed there for about a month. When I arrived in Turin, my mother gave me a white bracelet which looks very cute and she told me that the bracelet is popular in Italy. As she told me, I saw many people wearing this bracelet and it seemed to be in fashion. So, I thought I'd like to tell everyone about the bracelet by writing about it on this blog.

The bracelet is called "Cruciani". There are 28 different colors and there are different designs. Four-leaf clover is one of the most popular designs. Here is the spell of the design, "A wish for every-leaf a four-leaf clover for every wish. The first being reputation. the second wealth, the third health and the fourth true love".

The bracelet can be worn with any kind of clothes. In addition to that, they don't cost a lot (about 1,000 yen each) in spite of the high quality and its cuteness <3 Moreover, it is people's trend to wear two or more bracelet, so when I found a shop of Cruciani, I bought another bracelet for myself. I bought many Cruciani for my friends in Japan for souvenir.

If you are interested, please check it out!

Blog #8: Visiting Shanghai as an exchange student

Hi, I'm Tomohiko Ebashi.

I was in Shanghai during August from 4th to 25th, as an official exchange student of  Global Campus Asia 2012 program hosted by Gakushuin University. We took China Eastern Airlines to Pu-dong International Airport, and stayed at a hotel near Fudan University, where we took our Chinese lessons. It was located at a fairly nice environment beside an avenue with trees. I went there with a experience of studying Chinese for only 2 months, so I was very worried if I can keep up with other intermediate students from other countries. However, the lesson was set at a level for students who have been learning the language for 5 month, I was able to follow along.

 

It was such a precious experience to be able to communicate with local Chinese people, in terms of political prejudice. China and Japan is now in a severe relationship mainly because of  Senkaku Islands, so I was afraid if the Chinese people attack us physically or verbally. However, they never said anything bad to us; they were rather interested in Japanese cultures, and we all had a good time communicating with them. I will not believe in media anymore, in terms of international relationship.
Also, I strongly recommend this exchange program for anyone who are interested in studying abroad, especially in Asia.

Blog #7: Enjoying the spiritual air of Nikko

Hello, I'm Tomohiko Ebashi.

Just after the summer vacation started, my whole family went over to experience the famous Kinugawa hot spring in Nikko for the first time. I was so excited to see all the historical sites in the area, which were mostly related to Tokugawa dynasty of Edo period.

On July 29th, we headed over to Kinugawa-onsen station by an express train called "Tobu Spacia"(the picture on the left). After a long journey, we finally got to the destination, and had the local Japanese noodle, "nira-soba" with tofu-like "yuba" as topping. Then, w went to a peaceful themepark called "Tobu World Square" to see all the well-made miniatures.  (the picture on the left is the miniature of Narita International Airport! Isn't it realistic??)

 Next day, we went to one of the most spiritual places in Japan : Nikko Tosho-gu Shrine. This place is well known as a "power-spot", since it is said that this shrine was made specially for Ieyasu Tokugawa as his mausoleum. Of course, I saw the tomb itself, but I also saw the famous "san-saru (three wise monkeys)", which symbolizes three keys to smartness. Going around every single site was such a exhausting mission, but all in all, it was such a wonderful experience to learn more about Japanese history. We finished the trip with a refreshing cup of Nikko's 100% natural "kaki-goh-ri (scraped ice)".

If you are interested in learning more about Japanese history, or just interested in cold treats, Nikko is the place where I strongly recommend you to check it out.