Are you watching the Beijing Olympics? The Japanese word for "Olympics" is "gorin," which is written with the kanji character for "five" and "ring". Japan hosted three Olympics in the past: Tokyo Summer Olympics in 1964, Sapporo Winter Olympics in 1972 and Nagano Winter Olympics in 1998. Beijing is the fifth Asian city (the other one was Seoul in 1988) to host the Olympics. I was quite excited about the Nagano Olympics and proud to be a host country. I am sure the Chinese feel the same way. By the way, Tokyo is one of the cities (Chicago, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro) that bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. Japanese translation

If you are an anime fan, you’ve probably heard of Hayao Miyazaki. He is a great director of animated movies. All his work is amazing, but "Spirited Away" is my favorite. His highly awaited new film, "Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea (Gake no ue no Ponyo)" was released in Japan a few weeks ago. The film is inspired by "The Little Mermaid" and tells the story of a fish-girl, Ponyo, saved by a five-year-old boy, Sousuke. It is done completely with traditional hand-drawn animation, not using any computer graphics. I am really looking forward to seeing this film. It is supposed to be a simple story for young children, which means you will probably understand it even in Japanese! I hope you are able to enjoy the film with sub-titles when it comes to your country. Japanese translation