One other thing that happened this past summer, which I haven't told you about yet, is that I had to give a 90 minute speech about "America." Now, with a topic that broad, I didn't have a problem with coming up with 90 minutes of material.

The problem was, I had to give the speech in Japanese.

It was pretty nerve-wracking, to say the least.

The audience was about 30 members of the Higashiichiki Retired Persons Club, so, naturally, they were interested in how senior citizens lived in the United States. Naturally, I told them a lot about Florida. [/rim shot] No, seriously, I tried to explain that, just like in Japan, retired people in the states live in a variety of ways. I mentioned retirement homes, snowbirds, Winnebagos (that was difficult), part-time jobs, etc.

I also touched on a wide variety of other things about the States, and how different -- and the same-- it is from Japan. Schools, television, cars, electronics, people, houses. . . a lot of stuff.

Judging from the question and answer session (one of the community center staff was kind enough to translate the questions from Kagoshima dialect. . . into Japanese), the audience enjoyed my speech.

Since then, I have noticed that the people here in Higashiichiki town (already very polite) have been even friendlier than before. It seems like the Retired Persons Club has continued to discuss about me and my speech, to more and more people.

Cool.

Fall is coming, and the weather is finally cooling off. Thank goodness.

Rob