2013年11月の記事一覧

          Long ago in Ireland we celebrated "Samhain". A great cultural festival that marked the boundary between our world and the spirit world. It was celebrated as the Celtic New Year's Eve that belonged to neither the past nor present.

          Samhain was considered the last harvest of the growing year. Fruit and nuts were gathered and the apple in particular was the symbol of the harvest. The apple and fruit picking is still very much a part of Halloween today. It is not uncommon for children to receive fruit and nuts when "trick or treating".

         At this time spirits walked amongst the living and this time is known as "All Hallows Eve". To guide loved ones who had died home, people put candles in their windows. To keep evil and unwelcome spirits away the candle was put in a pumpkin that had a demon face cut in to it. This is known as a "Jack O'Latern" and is still found in many Irish homes during Halloween.

          That's all for now. Thank you for listening and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Vocabulary:
Spirit - Ghost
Boundary - A border or a liimit
Amongst - Around
Symbol - Object that represents an idea 

Good morning Seiryo,

             I hope you are all well !! Welcome back to school. I hope you all had a great summer vacation and settled back into school ok. I sepnt my summer vacation getting ready to move to Japan. I was sad to say goodbye to my family and friends back in Ireland but I am so happy to be living in Japan.

            My first month in Japan I spent a lot time preparing class, I also had a lot of fun learning about Japanese life. I have learnt about Utsunomyia, baseball and most importantly "Macha" ice-cream. I was very happy to attend Utsunomyia fireworks festival, it was amazing!! Did you go? I hope so.

            This month we also had our school cultural festival. It was my first ever one and I thought it was fantastic!! I was so happy to see everyone having fun, singing and dancing. Also, I must say a big congratulations to the brass band who came second in their recent competetion. Well done to all the students and teachers involved.

            Thank you all for listening. Have a great day : )