My wife and I have been watching the morning NHK drama called “Bakebake.” It’s called “The Ghost Writer’s Wife” in English. It’s the story of the daughter of a samurai. At the beginning of the Meiji period, her family suddenly became very poor, so she started working as a maid for Lafcadio Hearn. He was one of the first westerners to live in Matsue. He was a newspaper reporter, but he was teaching English there. The drama is very interesting to me because I didn’t know how difficult life was for samurai at that time. While I was talking to my sister in the U.S. last weekend, I told her about “Bakebake.” Then she emailed me the next day. She found the drama online and started watching it with English subtitles.   (131 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

It’s Sho-time again. That means that it’s time to talk about baseball and Ohtani Shohei. He has won the Most Valuable Player award for the fourth time. Only Barry Bonds has won more MVP awards. There are 30 baseball writers for each league, and everyone voting for the National League MVP chose Ohtani as number 1. That’s amazing, but Ohtani is an amazing player! In the American League, the votes were much closer. There were two favorites: Aaron Judge of the Yankees and Cal Raleigh of the Mariners. Judge got 17 votes, and Raleigh got 13 votes for number 1, so Judge got his third MVP.   (106 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

How many passwords do you have? I have just checked my password manager, and I have 208! Why do I have so many? Because I need a password for everything these days: email accounts, bank accounts, shopping sites, etc. Passwords are important because they stop bad people from hacking your accounts and stealing your information. However, they are difficult to remember, and you shouldn’t use the same password for different accounts. The more passwords you create, the easier it is to forget them. We can’t get away from passwords, so you should keep yours in a safe place. You can write them down in a special notebook or get an online password manager. Doing this will save you a lot of trouble in the future!     (125 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

People with disabilities can do many sports like blind football and para table tennis. These sports are called “parasports.” Next year, the Asian Games and the Asian Para Games will be held in Aichi Prefecture, and the government wants more people to get interested in parasports. A week ago, they had a special event where people could try wheelchair fencing. I sat in a wheelchair that didn’t move. I only used my right arm and my upper body when I competed against a volunteer. I had a great time! Then I tried a special wheelchair for basketball. It was easy to handle. I could go fast, stop, and turn suddenly without falling over. The event was successful. Now I want to see both parasports!     (124 words) You can send me a comment or your own story at jaremaga@gmail.com

I went to a festival at the Nagoya Biodiversity Center last Saturday. It was a sunny day, and the place was full of young families with their children. Some environmental groups had living creatures on display. Others had displays of stuffed animals like racoon dogs, Japanese badgers, and weasels. The most surprising thing I saw was a live Asian giant hornet. It was on a piece of banana eating. The volunteer picked it up and showed it to me. “Isn’t it dangerous? Doesn’t it sting?” I asked. He told me that it was a male, and males don’t sting. The females are the dangerous ones. A boy held out his hand, and the volunteer put the hornet on the hand. The boy looked a little scared but happy. But it isn’t easy to tell a male from a female. Stay away from giant hornets in the wild!   (147 words) You can send me