It is 6 p.m. on Tuesday, May 28, and the weather has been bad all day. This morning and early afternoon, there was a lot of rain. I waited for the rain to let up, and then I went to the supermarket after lunch. As I was driving, the rain started to come down hard. I used my windshield wipers and chose the fastest speed so that I could see through the rain. Thanks to the supermarket’s covered parking lot, I didn’t get wet. When I came back home, it wasn’t raining so hard. Now the rain isn’t so bad, but the wind is very strong. This isn’t a typhoon, but it certainly sounds like one!  (116 words)

His real name is Nakamura Daiki, but he is known by his sumo name. His high school teacher called him the “Ohtani of sumo.” He was an amateur champion at university, and when he entered professional sumo, he rose quickly to the top. He won his first championship after only seven tournaments. That is the fastest pace for any sumo wrestler. It looks like his high school teacher was right. On Sunday, the father came from Ishikawa to watch his son on the last day of the Summer Grand Sumo Tournament in Tokyo. He started crying when he saw his son win. Unlike the father, the son kept calm. This 23-year-old from Ishikawa is the new hero of sumo. Do you know who I am talking about?  (127 words)

We have a year-long program for children between the ages of 10 and 15 at Fujimae Tidal Flat in Nagoya, and in May, we have a two-day camp at the center. This helps us get to know the children, and they to get to know each other. Last Saturday, we put up tents together, and everyone made dinner. After dinner, children used supermarkets ads to find out where the food in Japan comes from. Only 37% of our food comes from Japan. Yesterday, the children got up at 5 a.m. and started playing. They were so excited that they couldn’t sleep. We took them out onto the tidal flat in the morning and in the afternoon, and everyone had a great time, but now the adult staff really need a day off!   (132 words)

The number 200 is very important to pitchers in baseball. Only the best pitchers can win 200 games in their professional careers. In the history of Nippon Professional Baseball, 24 pitchers have won 200 or more games. Between the Japanese leagues and Major League Baseball in the U.S., there were only two Japanese pitchers with 200 or more wins. The first was Nomo Hideo with 201 career wins. The second was Kuroda Hiroki with 203 career wins. Now there is another pitcher with 200 wins, Darvish Yu. He won his 200th game last Sunday. He is pitching very well this season, so I think he is going to break Kuroda’s record soon. How far will he go? 210 wins? 220 wins? Or more? Only time will tell.  (127 words)

Have you ever seen a nutria? I’ve seen two. One was by the side of a lake, and the other was swimming in a river. Nutrias are not native to Japan. They were brought to Japan from South America for their fur, but now there are many nutrias in the wild. They are a problem because they eat the vegetables that farmers grow. Someone caught a nutria and gave the meat to a volunteer at the Fujimae Tidal Flat center. She cut it up and cooked it in olive oil with salt. Everyone liked it. I thought that it tasted a little like beef. Someone else said that it tasted like deer, and another person thought that it tasted like ostrich. The meat doesn’t have much fat and is high in protein. In other words, nutria meat is nutritious.   (139 words)