Contents in 1991


no. dating title

1

1/31

- - -

The Draft

2

4/2

- - -

From News about Space

3

9/5

- - -

O-Ring

4

9/19

- - -

What Makes Me Happy Most?

5

9/26

- - -

About Weekly Magazine

6

10/24

- - -

What Made Me Most Upset?

7

10/31

- - -

A Viewpoint

8

12/12

- - -

Julfest(Yule)

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January 31, 1991


The Draft


This is my friend's story.

Her nephew from America visited her family in Japan, stayed for a week and left Japan last Sunday. His family lives in America and all members have the right of permanent residence. For them, therefore, the Gulf War is a more serious problem than for us. Because grown-up male citizens will be drafted on and on as the war is going on.

To my surprise, there is a shocking order in draft. At first black people are called up, next Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, and next, Chinese and Japanese are sent, and at last the white people are gathered. When I think over this situation, American way is beyond my comprehension.

The friend said to me that her sister, the mother of that nephew, didn't want him to come back to America. And now Japanese is becoming a target because of the less contribution so that it is very dangerous to go out carelessly.

Only a month ago my friends and I talked about the future travel to America that seemed easily to be realized in the near future, but now our dream has become only the castle in the air.

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April 2, 1991


From News about Space


Mir, the scientific space station of the Soviet Union nearly collided with Progress, the unmanned space-freighter with only 12 meters distance in March.

That's why the orbits of the two that the computer worked out were different on the docking point. And the two astronauts nearly got involved in the accident. According to Reuters from Moscow, the near miss occurred on the 23. At the very moment when Progress was to collide with Mir in 20 meters left, a ground controller noticed the serious situation on TV. His immediate judgement let him stop the computer steering and change the orbits. As a result, Progress passed Mir at intervals of less than 12 meters, barely touching antennas and the like.

The TV of Soviet Union reported that this accident seemed "as if a large truck at full speed rushing upon the picture of a gate on the wall." And besides, as TASS (the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union) from Moscow said, another docking mistake had been made before, on the 21. The cause was said to be the trouble of antennas. Progress was docked with Mir on the 28. It had been launched on the 19 in March, and was carrying supplies to Mir.

It was so amazing to me to operate the machine far away up in the space from the earth.

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September 5, 1991


O-Ring


The TV reporter told about O-ring test last night. The O-ring test can show the affected parts of our body.

My O-ring is the ring made of my thumb and another finger, and it is so strong that another person cannot break it. But if someone touches my ill part, he can easily break my O-ring.

The doctor who has discovered this impressive effect says that there is a kind of relation among the O-ring, the cranial nerves and the affected part. To my more surprise the doctor can break the O-ring of a person who touched the ill part of a patient with a chopstick.

Recently another doctor has developed the new method that can discover the stomach cancer with an easy blood test. It's a very happy thing that we can avoid the painful tests to examine our health.

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September 19, 1991


What Makes Me Happy Most?


This is a very difficult question for me to answer. I think I am curious, and I am so much curious that I enjoy almost all-general pleasure. Only subject to good health of my own and of my family.

I have many things that make me happy. For example, reading, listening to music, walking in the woods, watching movies and so on. Sometimes I'm very troubled with choosing one of them when I have some time.

But I know I'm always longing for the moment when I can devote myself, I mean, I can forget time and the surroundings disappear. It is when I read the book I'm very interested in, when I watch the great arts and when I'm faced with the ancient remains or marvelous nature.

When Mrs. Ono talked us about her younger son who wouldn't leave the Ishi-butai(the old remains in Nara), I envied him very much. At that time he must have had the very moment that I want to have.

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September 26, 1991


About Weekly Magazine


I have almost nothing to say about weekly magazines because I hardly read them.

Sometimes I could come to know some articles in their ads or newspapers, but I wouldn't believe in them, especially when they refer to the private matters of the people in the news.

Not only these magazines but also TV programs like "wide show" violate people's rights too much, I think. They rush not only at the people in the world of show business but also at ordinary people in order to fill the blank of pages, in order to improve sales or in order to raise the audience rating.

When they are blamed for violating privacy, they shamelessly insist on their justice of the right to know. That's their excuse, I think. They ignore the right to guard privacy on purpose.

Whenever I think they use the privacy of other people for their own profit, I feel offended and angry. And so I want neither to read weekly magazines nor to watch TV programs like that.

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October 24, 1991


Whayt Made Me Most Upset?


When I was a student, I often had a cold and was absent from school.

A few times I couldn't take a test of German composition. In those cases we had to make up for it by translating Tensei-jingo into German, and we had to hand in our translation with the original text in Japanese. This compensation was much harder than taking a test, but I rather liked it because the professor corrected the translation very carefully.

Once in such a case I handed in my work. At the next time I met the professor, he told me to write the text by myself. At first I couldn't understand what he said, and as soon as I found it out, I was very shocked, depressed, angry, and felt betrayed. He doubted that somebody helped me with Japanese writing, only because my writing resembled somebody's.

If he had understood what I am, it could have never happened. After that I lost my trust in him, and I quit attending his lecture.
Whenever I remember this affair, I feel deeply hurt even now. Both in teaching and learning it is very important to be able to believe each other, I think.

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October 31, 1991


A Viewpoint


Last night I watched the TV program of NHK.

In the Gulf War the American Military Authorities offered the films of their bombing of Iraqi military facilities. They intended to cheer up the people. The announcer said on TV that the buildings which were aimed at were the munitions factories and so that the general people could not be involved.

But a woman watching the program was so shocked to hear that comment that she became very sick to her stomach. Because she experienced the World War II and at that time she worked in the munitions factory. So she knows bombing could kill the ordinary, innocent people in the very munitions factories.

The reporter of NHK said the viewpoint of the authorities was different from the woman's.

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December 12, 1991


Julfest(Yule)


"Yule" meant the festival of the winter solstice in the ancient north Europe.

Nowadays it means Christmas in Scandinavian. I had never known that until last week. Though I looked into Christmas in my Japanese-German dictionary, I couldn't find the word. When I did in German-Japanese dictionary, however, I found it.

According to the dictionary, Christmas in German is Weihnachten, which means the nights offered to God. And to my surprise, at first in the end of the second century, it was January 6. And then in the fourth century it was moved to December 25.
January 6 was the day when Christ appeared in public for the first time. December 25 was the winter solstice of Roman, the birthday of the Roman God of the sun.

In order to make Christianity popular with various races, different customs and festivals of various districts seem to be mixed up.

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That's all in 1991.


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