Some people are born deaf. They can’t hear, but they learn how to communicate without speaking. They talk with their hands. This is called “sign language.” I started to wonder if deaf people who come from different countries could communicate. Are their signs the same? The answer is no. Japanese Sign Language (JSL) and American Sign Language (ASL) are completely different languages. People who only know one language cannot communicate with someone who only knows the other language. You can see a comparison of the two sign languages in the following video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/3Hl8_T1WAHM  The 2025 Summer Deaflympics were held in Tokyo last month. Deaf athletes from different countries took part in the games, but how did they communicate? They used a special sign language called International Sign.   (127 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

This is the season for ginkgo nuts. My wife bought some the other day, and we had Japanese savory egg custard (“chawanmushi”) with ginkgo nuts on Monday night. Then she roasted some for me later. I ate more than 15 nuts that night. I started to wonder if I had eaten too many, so I used Google to check. It said that an adult should eat no more than 10 nuts. Oops! It was too late, but I was feeling okay. Then, in the middle of the night, my body started to shake, and my stomach hurt. Google was right. I shouldn’t have eaten so many ginkgo nuts! I’ll be more careful the next time.   (115 nuts) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

There is a fruit tree behind the environmental center where I work. It has pretty orange-red flowers in the spring and early summer. Then the fruit begins to grow. The outside of the fruit is hard, almost like a nut. It becomes red and can be picked in October and November. This fruit is called a pomegranate. I pick the fruit when it cracks open because I know that it is ready to eat. There are a lot of seeds inside. They have a sweet jelly-like covering. You can eat the seeds, but I prefer to eat the sweet covering and spit the seeds out. Pomegranates aren’t easy to eat, but they are very tasty!     (115 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

Many Japanese adults have great memories of old-fashioned sweet shops, called “dagashiya.” The sweets sold there are unusual and use simple ingredients such as millet and brown sugar. These are different from “wagashi,” which are used in the tea ceremony. There were 228,123 old-fashioned sweet shops in the year 1972. However, the number shrank to 74,304 in 2016. “Dagashi,” the old-fashioned sweets, are inexpensive and varied. That gives kids a sense of choice about how to spend their pocket money. Although old-fashioned sweets are found at convenience stores today, one expert says that these sweets are “cheap but uninspired.” They are not as good as the ones at real “dagashiya.” The oldest “dagashiya” in Japan is Kamikawaguchiya, which was established in 1781.  (122 words)

Today is Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. It falls on the fourth Thursday of November every year. If I were in the U.S., I would roast a turkey, make mashed potatoes, and bake a pumpkin pie. However, my daughter is visiting from the U.S. She wants Japanese food, so we are going to have a Japanese-style Thanksgiving dinner: chicken wings instead of turkey, taro (“satoimo”) instead of mashed potatoes, rice, vegetables flavored with sesame sauce (“gomaae”), and sweet bean jelly (“yokan”) instead of pumpkin pie. The day after Thanksgiving is the start of the Christmas shopping season. Do you know why it’s called “Black Friday”? Everyone used to go shopping, and the traffic was terrible, so the police started to call it “Black Friday.” Now, thanks to the internet, there are Black Friday sales everywhere, and the traffic is not so bad because many people shop online.    (147 words) You can send me

I went to Tokyo with two other people over the weekend to attend a workshop about IT tools and AI for teachers. Then, some of us went to a public bath before the evening party. I’ve never seen such a full bathhouse! “That’s Tokyo,” I thought. “Even the bathhouses are crowded!” Later, at the party, I had a chance to talk to teachers who use Jaremaga for their classes. I asked them what stories their students liked, and I was happy to hear that they all liked different stories. I certainly agree with the idea that “variety is the spice of life.” We had more variety the next day, too. We went to a special Hokusai exhibition near Tokyo Station. I didn’t know that Hokusai was called “the father of manga,” but after seeing his “yomihon” novels, I understand why.    (146 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com