Japanese Airfare

Well I'm trying to book a plane ticket and I got a recommendation for a travel agent from my teacher, Mr. Aikawa. Here's my conversation with him, if you're interested. The important thing to take away from this is that my Japanese has improved at least a little.

Anyway, here it is.

------------------------------

From: Will <>
[name removed]様
こんにちは。
相川まさおさんから教えてくれましてウェッブのサイトでちょっと検索しました。
北アメリカのポートランドへの空港権のTYUUNUSASP-Y002をみつけて、私にちょうどいいじゃないかと思いました。本当に安いですから、特別な条件があるんですか？
ご連絡お願いします。
- ウィル・ロクド
Mr. Aikawa told me about your company, so I did a search and I found a ticket to the North American airport in Portland, TYUUNUSASP-Y002, and thought "Wow, that's perfect!" It's really cheap, so are there any special conditions or something?

From: IACEトラベル　[name removed] <>
Will 様
お世話になります。こんにちは。
お問合せありがとうございます。
こちらの商品は東京成田空港～ポートランドの往復になりますので
大阪からでは無いですが大丈夫ですか？
ちなみに出発日と帰国日お決まりですか？
To Will: Thanks. Good day. Thanks for checking us out. Our tickets right now are only from Tokyo Narita Airport, and only round trips to Portland. Is it okay that there's nothing from Osaka? By the way, is your departure date decided?

ＩＡＣＥトラベル　[name removed]
From: Will <>
本当に詳しいですね！実はここから一番安い方法でポートランドへ行きたいだけです。二月に出発できたらいいんですが、値段がほぼ一番大切なことです。と言うのは、貧乏な学生なのですから、出発日はそんなに大した物ではありません。
新幹線で一万三百円をかかっても、東京までできると思います。それでも関西空港からのチケットがあると、そちらのほうがいいのです。
-ウィル
Wow, you're good! Actually, I just want the cheapest way to get to Portland. I'd like to leave some time in February, but whenever's cheapest is good. Price is pretty much the most important thing. When I say that, I mean that I'm a poor student and the departure date doesn't matter that much. It's about $130 to get to Tokyo by Shinkansen, so if I can get a cheap ticket from Tokyo, it's all good. But if you can find a ticket from Osaka, that'd be cool. - Will

From: IACEトラベル　[name removed] <>
Ｗｉｌｌ　様
お世話になります。東京まで交通費を考えますと下記の関西空港発が
お安いですがいかがでしょうか？
[generic intro] Thinking of transportation to Tokyo, how about the following? It's cheap, but, what do you think?

２月１０日 UA 886便　関西空港～サンフランシスコ　　 18：55 11：18 KIX>San Francisco
　　　　　　UA5886便　サンフランシスコ～ポートランド 13：11 14：58 San Francisco>Portland
２月１９日 UA 372便　ポートランド～サンフランシスコ 07：15 09：04 Portland>San Franciso
　　　　　 UA 885便　サンフランシスコ～関西空港　　 11：46 16：35 San Francisco>KIX

※日程は暫定です。

◆航空会社：【ユナイテッド航空】
航空券代金 ３５，０００円 Airfare: $350
出入国諸税　　　　　　　５，０００円 Export tax: $50
燃油特別付加運賃　　　４４，０００円 Fuel surcharge: $440
空港使用料　　　　　　　２, ６５０円 Airport usage tax: $26.50
　
合計　　　　　　　　　８６，６５０円 Total: $866.50

From: Will <>
わあー。。。速く高くなちゃいますね。サイトの値段の全部に50,000円が追加されますか？
じゃあ、もし自分で東京へ行けたら　（例えば新幹線でいけるかな）、どれぐらいの値段できますか？
- ウィル
Wow, that gets expensive quickly, doesn't it! Will all the prices from the site have $500 tacked on? If I can get to Tokyo on my own (for example, maybe I could go by Shinkansen), about what kind of price should I be thinking about?
[That's about the end of random English I'm up to translating for now, 'cause it all goes something like this and it's boring as hell.]

From: IACEトラベル　[name removed] <>
Ｗｉｌｌ　様
お世話になります。東京からの料金は下記になりますが
新幹線で行くと実際は大阪からの料金と変わらないと思いますが
いかがですか？

１９，０００円　航空券代金
４４，０００円　燃油サーチャージ
　５，５００円　現地空港税
　２，０４０円　成田空港使用料
６８，７４０円　合計
ＩＡＣＥトラベル　[name removed]

From: Will <>
アメリカのＶｉｓａ・Ｍａｓｔｅｒｃａｒｄで支払えますか？私に代わって、両親が支払っていただくつもりですからね。
因みに、その６８．７万円の航空券、いつに出発しますか？それと、いつまでその値段が使っていただけますか？

From: IACEトラベル　[name removed] <>
Will　様
お世話になります。こちらに関しては現金振込み専用とります。
また基本的にカード利用の場合はご本人様限定となりますので代理は不可となり ます。また成田発のキャンペーンの分は残念ながらお時間とルートが未定となり ます。その分ご料金がお安くなります。２月基本的に同じ料金ですが出発日に
より変わりますので先に往復の日にちを決定して頂ければ思います。
ＩＡＣＥトラベル　[name removed]

From: Will <>
あっ、すみません！片道の航空券だけが必要なのですが。それで、もっと安くなりますか？一年間前に片道切符で来たので、も一度それをしたいのです。
それで困らさせますか？

From: IACEトラベル　[name removed] <>
Will 様
お世話になります。片道になりますと東京発で７２，０００円となります。
諸費用全部込みでトータルは１０１０４０円となります。少し片道は
割高なのですがこれのみとなりますのでご検討よろしくお願い致します。
ＩＡＣＥトラベル　[name removed]

From: Will <>
じゃあ、結局、本人のカードしかを利用できないのですかね？
- ウィル

Church Toilets

I went to church with Jesimee on Sunday to show her where it was and I was surprised to discover the rather interesting signs they used on the doors to mark which bathroom was for which gender.

I also went to translate, but that didn't go nearly as well as trying to find it, which somehow went flawlessly. Translation... not so much. I can inbetween a conversation with a Japanese for her, but the sermons were completely hopeless. If I told her what was going on, I'd miss the next thing that was said. Really frustrating.

「日本：その土地の2つだけのProngs」

So... machine translation.

I went through and corrected some errors I saw right off, but it seems in general much more lucid than the going from Japanese to English. I mean, there are plenty of errors, and I'm sure I'm just missing a lot of weirdness because I'm not a native speaker, but at least what it spews out makes grammatic sense more than half the time, which is more than I can say for most other languages to English.

If you don't have Japanese font support installed, you can still see what this page looks like in terrible, machine-translated Japanese.

Rice Cooker, Translated

I don't know why I never did this post before and I feel a little silly just getting around to it now, but I put the diagrams together over the past hour so. I think spent half the time playing around with fonts and stuff, and trying to figure out how to label all the stuff and make everything fit, with the remaining time devoted to looking up kanji and actually positioning the labels.

I finally decided on using two separate pictures, as I can't realistically fit all the labels on one picture unless I overlap with the labels themselves, which would defeat the purpose of the entire thing.

First up is the buttons, since they're the most important. Everything should be pretty self-explanatory.Second are the translations for all the various labels. No, I've never used most of the modes. I just use timer-cook and the start button. It'll start on its own though if you leave it alone for about two minutes after setting a timer.
I've also never made okayu.

A Piece of Proof?

Now, I'm really not that confident about my writing in English, let alone Japanese, but in an effort to show that I'm actually doing something over here, I thought there might be some interest in my end-of-quarter presentation.
I don't think any of you will be able to make much sense of it, but I can assure you that it sounds roughly like my 7-year-old little sister trying to explain nuclear waste using a four-year-old's grammar and the generic politeness level. I feel sorry for our teachers that have to listen to 100 of these.
Anyway, I haven't proofread this, and I probably won't since it's nearly 3AM (I am tired). and I need to present this tomorrow around 9AM. Also, it's hard to proofread your own writing. Also, I am very tired. Also... well, I'm pretty tired.

[Edit: I should have put this up earlier, but here's a vocab list that will probably help a lot if you try and read the Japanese. It's got some pretty brutal 漢字 in it.

[

なんでしょうかな～ (What is it?)
核廃棄物といったら色々な産業が作った有害な放射能のゴミや副生物です。核廃棄物は水道や大気中に出なかったらそれほど危ないものではありません。　それらは体に入るまでに大部分は事実で少ししか危なくないですから。体に入ったら、なかなか速く損害し始めます。
広い範疇の二つあり：高レベルと低レベル放射性廃棄物です。減力発電の色々なもの、または種類が多くのものは低レベル放射性廃棄物です。アメリカのこれほどのことに関する規制では、普通のコーヒーなどは低レベル放射性廃棄物でも、みんなの安全のためにそれほどにきびしい規制は必要だと思われています。もっと普通の例は防護マスクやフィルターや二冷却税の管など名者です。これらのようなものの放射性能は割合に危なくなくても、あるえりますから、十・五十年間に待っての方がいいと思われています。この期間の後に普通のゴミになって、土に埋められることになります。
高レベル放射性廃棄物は本当に危ないものです。放射能が高くて、百・千・億年間も残ります。例として、放射性同位元素の一つは沃素の百二十九中性子の半減期は億五十万年間ものです。他の例はウラン・プルトゥニアムの使用済み核燃料またはもう使ってしまった核燃料です。

いつから始まりましたか (Since when was it a problem?)
核廃棄物は千九百の後半までに問題ではありませんでした。その時までに、人口な核廃棄物はなかなか珍しかったのですから。その上、一番目 使用できる原発は千九百五十四年でした。

何の結果ですか (What causes it?)
普通 核廃棄物源の中から病院と原子力発電と原子爆弾の軍縮です。癌を殺すためし、体の液処理を確認するために、病院では色々な放射性 液体を使います。

どこ問題ですか (Where is it a problem?)
オーストラリア以外工業先進国の全部原子発電を使いますから、核廃棄物を作ります。オーストラリアも病院がある結果、少なくても核廃棄物は世界の環境問題だと思います。
特に核廃棄物の捨て場がある国では大問題です。誰でもは家と近くにそんなものが日しくなくても必要ですか、質問は「どこがいいですか」というふうです。
テロルをしたい人ご多すぎるから、この国は核捨て場に関してとても心配です。

どうしましょうか (What’s being done?)
今の人気がある核廃棄物の処理の選択肢は大部分に二つです。
一番目はどこかに埋めることです。ある人は深く土に埋めて方がいいと思っています。ただし、他の人は潜り込みところに埋めて方がいいと思っているのです。潜り込み所に埋めたら、核廃棄物を地球の中に戻すので、問題なくなると言われます。
その他の選択肢は高レベル核廃棄物を変えることです。ブリーダーと言う原子力発電をしたら、機能的に核燃料を使えて悪い放射性物をそれほどの悪くない放射性物に変えます。でもブリーダー種類はプロトゥニアムを作るので、便利すぎで取り消しました。

]

And that's all there is of that. As much as I would've liked to write it in Japanese to begin with, I couldn't get anything straightened out and it was all very confusing to write. By writing it in English, I was able to mostly keep up with what i was thinking, which allows for a much more natural writing style.
And that's all there is of that. As much as I would've liked to write it in Japanese to begin with, I couldn't get anything straightened out and it was all very confusing to write. By writing it in English, I was able to mostly keep up with what i was thinking, which allows for a much more natural writing style.
I have a sneaking suspicion that translation by way of hitting something with a dictionary helps to rid the writing of any naturalness it has... S'what I did. You may also notice that I reordered the paragraphs. The flow is a little awkward in this English one, I felt.
Here's the English draft I translated it from:


[What is nuclear waste?
Nuclear waste is the trash and byproducts of the nuclear power generation industry and the disarming of nuclear weapons. It’s not very dangerous until it gets into the water supply or the atmosphere, where it can be ingested or inhaled. Once on the inside, it starts doing damage fairly quickly.

There are two broad categories: high-level and low-level.

Low-level nuclear waste is anything that was used in the process and may be contaminated. Some people joke that the United States’ laws on this are so strict that a normal cup of coffee would qualify due to the amount of radiation given off. More serious examples would be the protective suits workers wear and the pipes that carry coolant. Low-level waste typically becomes no more dangerous than normal trash after 10-50 years.

High-level waste is the really dangerous stuff that lasts hundred, thousands, or even millions of years. Iodine-129, for example, has a half-life of 15 million years. Example include spent uranium/plutonium fuel and the (usually Boron) control rods.


Where is it a problem?
With the exception of Australia, all the industrialized countries of the world produce both high- and low-level nuclear waste because they use nuclear power generation. Until very recently the world’s nuclear waste was all stored above-ground, but they make very attractive targets during war and for terrorism, in addition to natural disasters. In addition, countries fear that nuclear waste may be stolen and reprocessed to make nuclear weapons or dirty bombs.

When did it start?
Nuclear waste didn’t really become a problem until the second half of the 19th century. Prior to this, the only sources of nuclear waste were largely experimental, as working nuclear power plants were not developed until the late fifties. The burning of fossil fuels releases significant amounts of concentrated radioactive material into the atmosphere, and still does today. Someone who smokes cigarettes also receives a considerable dose of radiation due to the concentration of radioactive materials in tobacco plants.

What causes it?
The most common sources for nuclear waste are nuclear power generation facilities, disarmament of nuclear weapons, the medical industry. Various radioactive materials are used in the treatment of cancer and to track fluid flow throughout the body.

What is being done?
The most popular options right now are various forms of burying it. Some suggest burying nuclear waste about 1000m underground in stable geologic areas and simply ignoring it for a few thousand years, while other s say it would be best to bury nuclear waste near subduction zones of the Earth’s crust and let the waste be carried into the mantle, where such things are not a problem.

Another solution is to transform the long-lived high-level nuclear waste into short-lived waste by transformation, such as in fast breeder reactor or through chemical means.]

Now all I need to do is read that a few hundred times so I don't forget how to read the kanji once I'm under pressure...