━━━━━━━━━━━ <受験レポート>(1) ━━━━━━━━━━━ ●プレゼンテーションの内容(日本三景) There are three most famous sceanic locations in Japan, which are Matsushima, Amanohashidate, and Miyajima. First, Matsushima is located in Miyagi prefecture. Literally means "Pine island", the island is covered by many trees. The harmony between pine trees and sea is very beaufiful. Second, Amanohashidate is located in Kyoto prefecture. Amanohashidate, literally means "Heavenly bridge", is a lond sandbar. (ここで1分) Finally, Miyajima is located in Hiroshima prefecture. Miyajima, literally means "Shrine island", is famous for its magnificent Itsukushima shrine. It is a shrine over the sea on the long pillars. A Torii of Itsukushima shrine is also very famous for the image(impression)of floating on the sea. Torii itself is a gateway to Shinto shrine consists of two upright posts connected at the top by two horizontal crosspieces. (ここで2分のため終了) 今思えば、最後に鳥居とは何かと説明をするのではなく It is hoped that more and more foreign tourists will enjoy such beautiful locations. That's all, thank you. と時間内に終わらせればよかったと思います。植山先生にあれだけ使えるフレーズを教えていただいたのに、と悔やまれます。
●「日本的事象英文説明300選」の説明(参考) ・松島 Matsushima is regarded as one of the three most famous scenic locations in Japan. Matsushima, which means Pine Islands, is distinguished by its many small pine-covered islands. The harmony between islands and sea creates breathtaking beauty which is outstanding in any season or weather." 松島は日本三景の一つとされている。松島は、「松の島」を意味し、松に覆われた数多くの小さな島々で有名である。島々と海がよく調和して、どんな季節や天候においても、息を呑むほどすばらしい景観を見せてくれる。
・天橋立 Amanohashidate is regarded as one of the three most famous scenic locations in Japan. Amanohashidate, which means Heavenly Bridge, is a long sandbar lined with pine trees. To see the heavenly bridge, you are supposed to turn your back to the scenery, bend over, and look from between your legs." 天橋立は日本三景の一つとされている。天橋立は「天の橋」を意味し、松の木が並ぶ長い砂州である。天の橋を見るためには、その景色に背を向けてかがみ、脚の間から眺めるとよい。
・宮島 Miyajima is regarded as one of the three most famous scenic locations in Japan. Miyajima, which means Shrine Island, is famous for the magnificent Itsukushima Shrine extending over the sea on long pillars. Its large red torii is renowned for the impression it gives of floating on the sea." 宮島は日本三景の一つとされている。宮島は「神社のある島」を意味し、長い支柱で海の上に張り出している荘厳華麗な厳島神社で有名である。厳島神社にある朱色の大鳥居は、それが作り出す海の上に浮いているように見える印象で有名である。
●質疑応答の内容 (A)Have you ever been to Amanohashidate?(なぜ天の橋立?と思いましたが、試験会場が京都だったから?) (私)No, I have never been to there, but I have been to Miyajima.(宮島しか行ったことがないので何とか宮島につなげたくて) (A)Which location do you recommend for foreign tourists? (私)I would like to recommend Miyajima as the best for foreigners, because Shinto is indigenous Religion of Japan, so I think it is very good to see it. There are no other places that you can see such shrine floating on the sea, well...actually not floating but looks like floating. It is build on long Pillars. (A)Are there ○○? 聞き取れなくて2回くらい聞き返した結果、deersということがわかり、 (私)Yes, there are many. (A)Do they ○○? 聞き取れなくて2回くらい聞き返した結果、biteということがわかり、 (私)They don't bite..well..there are a lot of tourists, so I think they are not used to bitingと曖昧な答え... ここで終了
━━━━━━━━━━━ <受験レポート>(2) ━━━━━━━━━━━ ●プレゼンテーションの内容(日本三景) Let me talk about the three scenic locations in Japan. It's Matsushima in Migyagi prefecture, Amanohashidate in Kyoto prefecture and Itsukushima jinja or Itsukushima shrine in Hiroshima prefecture. They are regarded as the three most scenic locations in Japan. Let me talk about the three places. First, Matsuhima means pine islands. There are a lot of islands where pine trees are planted. The contrast of the pine islands and the sea is very beauriful. Second, Amanohashidate. It's a long sand bar where also pine trees are planted. You are supposed to turn your back,bend down and see it between your legs. Third, Itskushima shrine. It's also designated as a world heritage site. You can see a large torii gate on the sea.It looks like floating on the sea.
●質疑応答の内容 (A)You said that at Amanohashidate you should turn around and look the scenery between your legs.Why do you think so? (私)Because... it's a customary way of seeing Amanohashidate...
(A)Why is it a custmary way of seeing it? (私)Because... it looks like a heavenly bridge.
(A) There are a lot of beautiful places in Japan.Why are those three places among them called the three most scenic locations? (私)I suppose they have characteristics.They are characteristic and original. For example,aboutItsukushima shrine,you can see a large Torii gate on the sea.
(A)If you go to one of the three locations after this exam,where would you like to go? (私)Actually, I've been to two of the three places. I would like to go to Itsukushima shrine because I think it's the most beautiful place in Japan. When I went there, I felt the large red Torii in the sunset was extremely beautiful and I was moved very much. So I would like to go there again.
━━━━━━━━━━━ <受験レポート>(3) ━━━━━━━━━━━ ●プレゼンテーションの内容(宝くじ) Let me tell you about Japanese Lottery, “Takarakuji”. There are two big lotteries in Japan. One is the year-end super lottery, that's we call “Nenmatsu Jumbo”. And the other is what we call “Summer Jumbo” lottery. These two lotteries are very popular for Japanese people wince they are the biggest lotteries in Japan in terms of winning prize money. The winners are decided and released on the New Year's Eve. So, it is considered as a part of the Year-end ritual for many Japanese people. Recently, in the year-end lottery, if you win the first prize, you will receive 300 million Japanese yen. The amount of first winning prize used to be 100 million yen, but it was changed by the national government several years ago. In fact I am not sure about the timing, but certainly they did. A part of the reason is that they wanted to sell a dream to the people. Japanese economy at that time was not yet recovered, and the people would like to have a hope for the New Year's coming. If they win, they will be able to receive big money. I think this idea is very close to the people's visit to the shrine for their new year's first prayer wishing for a happiness. There are lots of places you can buy those lotteries. One of the famous place is Ginza, which is also famous as a shopping district in Japan. On average, Japanese people, I mean individual, will spend ten thousand Japanese yen for purchasing lottery.
━━━━━━━━━━━ <受験レポート>(4) ━━━━━━━━━━━ ●プレゼンテーションの内容(鎖国) National isolation is a political system in the Edo period. Adapted by the Edo government for security from European countries, it also ensured to rule over provincial lords by depriving them of their ability to conduct foreign trade. As a matter of fact, in the Edo period, there were no wars for about 200 years. Compared to other countries, it was amazingly peaceful era. It is said that the national isolation helped to keep the peace. And, when you heard "National isolation", you would imagine " Japan was totally isolated". But actually, Japan traded with Netherlands and China. So it was not totally isolated. About 50% of trade was conducted with China." ここでタイムアップになってしまいました。
●質疑応答の内容:外国人試験官=(A) (A)当時オランダや中国とどのようなものを交易していたのですか?(英語でどのように表現されたのか、はっきりと覚えていませんので日本語で書きます) (私)I think, with China, raw silk and seafood. With the Netherland, I think・・・food and cards and・・・(交易されていたものについて、全く思い出せず、仕方がないので思いついたものを述べました。そして苦し紛れに 「Therefore, a lot of word of the Netherlands remain in Japanese.と述べてしまい・・・ (A)for example? (私)ここでまた、頭に浮かぶのがポルトガル語由来の外来語ばかりで・・沈黙するよりましかと「Sorry, I'm so nervous.」と言ったところ (A) Oh, no,no it's OK! と笑って盛り上げてくれたので (私)Oh, yes, KASUTERA! (両試験官が「I see!」と笑顔でうなずいてくれたのですが、後で考えたらカステラもポルトガル語由来でした) (A)鎖国していたことによって独特に発展した文化がありましたか? (A)Yes. For example, lacquer ware, such as Wajima, Aizu.(塗りを言うのを忘れてしまいました) And, there are many theatrical arts in Japan, such as Kabuki, Noh, Bunraku, Kyogen. They are so original. (江戸時代に発展した歌舞伎と文楽だけを答える方が適切だったと後で気づきました) ここで、外国人試験官の方が日本人試験官に大きくうなずき、終了となりました。