2019年2月1日金曜日 - 
Ben: My first trip to Japan
The
first time I came to Japan, I had been working at an Environmental Education
Centre in Hong Kong. My friend and I had been running camps for thirty to sixty
children every day for the long hot summer, so when our friend invited us to a
festival in Shiga prefecture we were very excited. The flight from Hong Kong is
only four hours whereas the flight from
the UK is twelve hours or more, so of course we took the opportunity to visit
Japan.
The
festival was on the shore of Lake Biwa
and the atmosphere was more friendly than many festivals in Britain. There were
a lot of families and a variety of good music but not many foreigners, so we
felt very privileged that our friend had
invited us! The setting was beautiful, we could cool off in the lake and take in the vista of mountains painted across the
horizon while eagles dived from the sky to snatch
fish from the water. A distant thunderstorm lit the air with red lightning
between two mountains, and at night we could see so many stars through the
faint green glow of high level clouds;
not something we could see in Hong Kong! We were taken aback by how well looked
after the natural environment of Japan is.
After
the festival we visited a local shrine and the historical town of Omihachiman,
which was full of historical architecture and very beautiful. We then spent a
night in Osaka before flying back to Hong Kong on the last flight that landed
before the city was wracked by a typhoon.
(The weather in Japan had been perfect.) The experience had such a big impact
on me that I decided Japan would be the next place I would work, and I have
seen much more of the wonderful environment of Japan since.
whereas：～であるのに
shore：岸
privileged：光栄に思う
take in：見物する
snatch：素早く捕る
glow：光
wracked：破壊される