Your Japanese word of the week is...

"kashish" which is the word "cassis" translated into katakana. Cassis itself is actually a French word which English speakers know better as blackcurrant. Blackcurrant, at least for me anyway, is better known as those delicious candies in Mentos-esque purple tubes I used to eat in Hong Kong (or buy from Chinese supermarkets).

I bring this up because, on a grander scheme of things, katakana really is a double edged sword I find. For starters, I understand the need for a purely phonetic pronunciation alphabet in a syllabic language. It happens in Chinese newspapers, for instance, where characters are used for their sounds rather than their meanings.

But then again, to people who speak that foreign language, it really doesn't make any sense sometimes. Or worse, it just flat out sounds like something else.......

I'm sure most of your recognize the "Calpis" name. For those of you who don't, Calpis is, according to their website (where I got the logo [in case they sue me hah]), a "cultured milk drink" that has a distinctly yogurty taste to it. If you've ever have those "Yee Lik Doh" yogurt drinks, it's sort of like that but less thick. Actually, Japan has those small plastic bottles as well, sold here as "Yakult".

You also might be able to guess that the word "calpis" just generates lots of giggles........... hee hee "cow piss" hee hee..........

In the picture, above the word itself is their new slogan, "karada ni piisu". "Karada" is body, "ni" is in, and "piisu" is peace. So, "peace of body" or "peace in the body". Anyhow, it's certainly a nice idea.........

The only problem is that it isn't any stretch of imagination to read it in another way. In English, the spelling differentiates the meanings, but when it's written purely based on phonetics, it opens up lots of different ways of reading the word. Like the "piisu" sound...... or "kashish", which sounds a lot like "hashish". Imagine ordering that at a restaurant. You get my drift.... =P

Which is too bad, because the drink is quite tasty....... especially Calpis Soda, which is a carbonated form of the drink. Urinary jokes aside, it's quite good.....

Speaking of bodily functions, I've semi-confirmed my curriculum for my students this year.

For math, the 1st year student (or Gr 10) will be doing stuff like rational numbers, polynomials, equation solving, and trig. The 2nd year students will be working on algebra, so more equation solving, factoring, quadratics, exponents and log functions, conics, etc. That'll stretch through to their 3rd year.

In science, because all three students are soccer athletes, they're quite interested in anatomy and physiology for futures in kinesiology (or being a soccer pro), so the 1st year curriculum will be about body systems while the 2nd year curriculum will go into more depth about bones and muscles (composition, mechanism of action, naming) as well as going into the human body with more detail. Sort of like high school bio but with more focus towards certain areas.

Lastly, I'll be leading them through history, which will be World War II. Depending on their interest and how fast we get through the major events of it, we'll move on to latter century events like the start of the Cold War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War......... they're kids so conflicts seem to interest them heh.....

I have textbooks on order for all but the history subjects, so once those come in, it's full steam ahead.

So that's it. Last week was a nice slow start to the school year (I taught two classes out of my scheduled 16 per week) but starting Monday, everyone settles into the schedule and pushes on through the year............ thumbs up on that =P.......