FT Island- Barae

This is one of my favourites asian music groups, FT-Island, in my opinion this is their best song, give them a chance and listent it ^^

It's time to eat!

This time I'm gonna write about the Japanese food; this issue is a "new" trend in our society,at our countries(the occidental ones). There are more and more J-restaurants in our cities, and it's agreat notice,although a lot of people have many distrust about this kind of food because of several reasons like the raw fish,but I want to invite all of you to taste this delicious food if you haven't done it before,because it will be worthwhile.

And at the same time I'd like to take this opportunity to teach a bit of new vocabulary very useful if you are going to go to a Japanese restaurant, or if you don't, it is useful too :)


First of all, it's interesting to know the Japanese name of the most important and common fishes,I 've made this chart with the wild animal and the food in the way we commonly eat it(not in j-restaurants) in the corners, and the names below that I have made in hiragana, romaji, english and Spanish(my mother tonge :P)

I hope it's useful to all of you:

These fishes aren't served in the common way,but they are served in a different way.You can find them in many ways, some of them are "maki", "nigiri", and "temaki"

A maki is a roll of rice with the fish inside(commonly with a bit of wasabi),the cylinder of rice is covered with seaweeds called nori.It must be mentioned "name of fish + maki" (tekkamaki = tekka(salmon) + maki)

Nigiri is only the fish on the ball of rice, sometimes held with a strip of seaweed.To mention that we must say only the name of the fish, for example a nigiri of tuna is "tekka"=tuna.

Temaki is a kind of maki,bigger, it 's a hand rolled sushi.

So if we join this chart eith the previous one we 'll get the aim that I wanted to show you :)

I know that it is only a bit of all Japanese food,so I 'll continue with this later on.

And I would like to thank my friends(that give me the opportunity to eat with them this great food,although in a home way) and to my darling^^(that took me to a Japanese restaurant buffet for the first time).This is for you. =)

C'mon now this is your time,take a good company and go to a J-restaurant,or a take away...for luch..or for dinnner...a Saturday night...or whenever you want...and remember...eat it on the whole form(vamos, de una vez ,entero a la boca...sino...preguntarme a mi...no Marta? xD)

*If you want to know more about this food follow this link : http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sushi

A week in London

A few weeks ago I went to London,exactly on April 14th,the same day that the Iceland's volcano erupted,my return flight was cancelled, so I returned by bus some days after the day that I had to come back.But in spite of that problem,my visit to London was an incredible experience that I’ll never forget,it's an historic ,clean, kindy and beautiful town.I 've seen a lot of interesting things in this place, but here I'm going to centrate in some specific topics relationed with Japan and China.

At The British Museum

This is one of the most important museums at the world,so there's a lot to talk about, but this time I'm gonna centrate in one room ,the Japan Room.
This gallery travel through the history of Japan,from the prehistory to the present.This room begins with the recreation of a traditional tea house at full-size,where sometimes a show of the tea ceremony tooks place,but unfortunately I couldn't see it.Like I've said before the system of the gallery consists of a way from the prehistory(ancient original objects like paintings,figures,cups,weapons,clothes and other issues)to the modern era.


This time I'm going to talk about one object that I was strucked by it.Exactly it was at the section of modern art.

It consists of a Japanese artist’s picture called Mauro Suehiro.It’s one of the first works of art recognised at the currently art panorama.Below this picture there was something written on a board:


"A terrified woman is being dragged into a swamp at night.....sailed by a giant flying octopus and other supernatural beings.She clutches at a wooden grave marker(sotoba).The style of this lovingly painted work by manga artist Mauro is classified in Japan as "erotic grotesque",or ero-guro. Mauro says his favourite movies are those of US director David Lynch."
Personally,I think that it is a great work of art,
the election and combination of colours give to the picture a dismal and ghoulish atmosphere.I would like to analyze tis painting deeper: Attending to the tittle, the main figure(apart of the woman) is a giant octopus approaching to her,below this creature there is a spooky baby grappling her hair.On the top there is a bat ,at left a snake on the grave wood's sticks or sotoba with some kanjis drawn(I don’t know the meaning of those kanjis,but I’ll make a special section in order to decipher them),in the troubled water pokes an undefined creature that grabs her leg until bleed her,it seems to me like an amphibious monster man,at the background there’s a dark blur's shadow of a endwise human, and at forefront I found a baleful image of another human figure, but this time it’s completely different, it seems like a kneeling and naked old man, and this time it isn’t dark,but very fair, translucent, almost transparent, he’s landed on a strange object with 3 or 2 wood’s sticks that I haven’t found the meaning yet. And to finish I would like to highlight a shiny round light between the water and the surface, at first you can deduce that it’s the reflex of the moon, but it’s impossible because it isn’t altogether at the water...

Through the streets
Walking by the streets I realized the beauty and the essence of this city, its buildings, its atmosphere, its people, its culture...its magic. London is a cosmopolitan city, where people of all cultures, religions and breeds and countries live in harmony.Here I let some pictures that I made with my compact camera.

A telephone cabin(it really smells a bit strange...)

The only manga shop that I found,but I couldn't entry!!!

the Japanese fresh take away food restaurant where I ate!!!!delicious... ^^ but at Spain there isn't anything like that...

Chinatown

And to finish, Chinatown.There aren't words to describe it...it's simply fantastic, different, special.You have to go!!!

Me at Chinatown.^^
 
 
 
 
 
 
I hope that you have enjoyed with it,I would like to invite you to go to London, because it's worthwhile, it could be a magnific unforgettable experience.

To begin,some notions of basic Japanese.

It's interesting in order to see anime series that you have almost a bit culture of the Japanese language.We must start by the begining.


Step 1:Alphabet

The task of learning any language requires always the knowing of its alphabet, because that is the base of every language.

I supose that all of you know that Japanese hasn't got the occidental characteres like a,b,c,d...but it has a special ones, It has 2 strict alphabets : hiragana and katakana ,and then the kanji.

The hiragana and the katakana are only syllabarious, the characteres alone don't have any meaning,they are used in order to form words, like the syllabes of our alphabet.

Hiragana

If you look it well, you can see that there are some letters that are ausent, well, the letters g, z, d, p, and b only can be pronunced if we modify some sylabes:

Katakana

We use the hiragana in all the Grammar in general, it's the most extended alphabet, because the katakana is only used in the traslation of foreign words and onomatopeias.

And then , the kanji is the other alphabet,it has more than 50.000 characters but currently we only use about 3.000
In order to "study" the kanji I 'll make a special section.

 

Step 2: Basic expressions

 

If you want to comunicate in Japanese this is extremly useful ,there are some expressions that you are going to listen commonly.

To make the task easier I'm going to write them in romaji(the sound of Japanese written with occidental characteres)

Step 3: Numbers

This is very important too to understand any language.

Step 4: Personal pronouns

Step 5: Some basic vocabulary

                                      

Now, dont't think that you are going to understand the whole series, but maybe a word, two words, three... :P