A week off

I am off next week. My school has a catch-up week after every six weeks term and the week is for the students who haven't been competent for the previous subjects. Basically I pass all the assessments without problem in regular weeks, so I always have a week off every term. I haven't used this catch-up weeks for substantial way. I have often wasted time ever. As such, I want to use the week to enjoy myself. Actually I have a lot of things I really want to do, but I couldn't have done them because I didn't have enough money or I was not just in mood for doing something. At this time, though, I decided to travel. I am planning to go to North Land which is located in the northermost of North Island. I am going to rent a car and I will cordinate the travel plans all by myself. That would be exciting. I actually like to travel with my friends, however, I sometimes want to go alone because it would be free to go here and there. I don't need to be in other person's timetable. It is the biggest advantage to travel alone.

I need to book a rental car and an accommodation. Although it will cost a lot, I can afford to go there and I should go now. There is no time like the present. I don't know what happens to me in the future, so I should do the things I want when I can do.

By the way, what I am worried about the most is the weather. It has been cloudy and rainy everywhere in New Zealand lately. I hope it will be fine when I go there.

Spoiling myself

I am spoiling myself. My life at the present is definitely dull. I haven't found any part-time job. I don't try to make an opportunity to talk to native speakers. I don't put myself in the pressure. I just go to school. That's it. Although I listen to English in podcast and reading books in English, I can do such things in Japan. I should do what I can do only in foreign country. Needless to say, this country is full of native English speakers and there should be a plenty of chances to hang out with them. I have to create the ways to live more earnestly. I must change the present situation. I have to move out to other flat to live with kiwi people or backpackers hostel. I have to make an opportunity to talk to native English speakers. I have to be more positive and active. Time went by much faster than I expected. I need to have a think about the ways to live more seriously. I am going to graduate from the school in December. There are still five months. I can change myself to spend time ahead more effectively and earnestly.

New Blog

I started new blog in Japanese. At first I wanted to improve my English writing skills and I started this blog. However, I have been feeling that I want to write more precisely and naturaly. My expression in English is absolutely limited. I can write only 50 or 60 % of what I want to express indeed. It sometimes made me irritated. Needless to say, to keep writing in English is very important for me, but at the same time, to express my real feeling is also important. And how I can do it is to write in Japanese. It is the only way at the moment. In the future I want to express more freely in English, but now, I have to use Japanese. That's why I started new blog in Japanese. I guess I can upload more often than this English blog. Of course I will try to keep uploading this blog as well at least once a week.

My new blog's URL is here. If you are Japanese, please check it.
http://very-good-man.blogspot.co.nz/

Adidas Auckland Marathon

I registered to Adidas Auckland Marathon which will be held on 3 Nov 2013. Actually I was not planning to participate in this marathon because I had already run Rotorua Marathon and I was satisfied with the fact that I experienced marathon in New Zealand. What made me to register to Auckland Marathon is that I lost the objective. I had barely run since Rotorua Marathon. Of cource I like to run and I want to practice everyday even if there is not a race. But I realized that it is so difficult to motivate myself to keep running without the goal. I definitely need to decide where I am going for. I want running to be a part of my life. I never want to give up running because basically I like it and I need it. Recently I have been making excuses not to run as it has been cold enough to make me stop running. But I dared to start running again and it was so easy. Just to be cold can't be an excuse. I could get it over. I believe I can keep running from now on.

Anyway I have four months to prepare for the marathon. My objective is as same as ones in Rotorua Marathon - finish within 4:30 and never walk - and I think I can do it. Yes, I must achieve it. I have repeated same mistakes for a long time, i.e. the lack of practice. Although I know it is difficult to keep running everyday for a couple of months, I really break this bad habit.

Now I am just excited that I can try marathon here again. I hope everything will go well.

1,000 pageviews

I noticed that the pageviews of this blog have finally exceeded 1,000. I am so glad to see this number. According to my experience, I always fail to keep doing something for a long time. It could be sometimes very hard for me to do that. But I did it. I set up this blog in last October and it means I kept bloging for more than six months. The total number of the posts are 81 so far. Actually the access in each day is not that big, though, the most important thing is that I could continue it without giving up. The more the access increases, the higher my motivation will be. I want to keep my effort not to let this blog broken off.

I really want to thank everyone all over the world who came to this blog and read the articles.

Running habit

I haven't run since I finished Rotorua Marathon. I don't want to excuse, though, I have been tired and I couldn't start to run again. Moreover, it has been getting cold here and it makes me hesitate to do something active. Did I lose enthusiasm? - No, it must be incorrect. I still have enthusiasm for running. What I should do to restart running is to make an objective. When I registered to participate in Rotorua Marathon, I started to practice a lot. I totally headed for completing the Marathon. When I was in Japan, I also kept running by resistering several running races. To make an objective makes me be enthusiastic. So, I should try marathon or half marathon again. Fortunately as there are many running races in New Zealand, it is not difficult to find suitable race. I haven't decided which race I choose yet. Hopefully I want to try the race as near to Auckland as possible.

Talk to myself

As I told before, I am recording the time I spend on learning English. So far so good. I have been able to spend more than five hours everyday. Meanwhile, I would like to spend time more effectively because I realized that I am wasting much time in using internet and taking nap and so on. Moreover I also realized that I always use Japanese to think about this and that. This is the most ineffective way, isn't it? As I have much time to think, I should do in English. I feel stressful when I think about everything in English, but I have to do that. That should improve my speaking skills. I have to be aware that understanding by reading and listening is totaly different from speaking and writing as a practical matter.

Keeping this blog is also important to express in my own words. I hopefully want to increase the number of uploading the article.

Believe in myself. Just do it. Talk to myself in English!

What I want

I still keep learning English. Just doing again and again everyday. But recently, I got bored. I can't take it any more in the way I am. I have to change something. What can I do indeed? I guess I need to be more active to change myself, but I don't know exactly what I should do. I have no idea. It's too difficult to be positive. My feeling have been absolutely unstable and I often get me down. After that I get better sometimes, then I am discouraged again. And this kind of things repeat over and over.

I definitely need new stimulation. I must have some objectives. I need to not only learn English but also do something else which I really want.

Short Trip - Tauranga & Coromandel

Two weeks ago, I had a short trip with my friends on Saturday and Sunday. The destination was Tauranga & Coromandel in North Island. The both are not so far from Auckland and it took approximately 3.5 hours from Auckland to Tauranga by car. We left Auckland on Saturday morning and the weather was quite nice. To tell the truth, I didn't expect that the weather would be fine because it had been rainy in Auckland and especially on Friday, the day before the leaving, it was raining a lot. Fortunately, however, it was sunny on the day. Although it rained sometimes on the way to Tauranga, we could spend really good time in the main beach with really great weather. Moreover the next day in Cormandel was as fine weather as the day in Tauranga. We were really lucky. I realized how amazing the nature in New Zealand is once again.

By the way, I drove a car on the way back to Auckland on Sunday. It was the first time for me to drive in New Zealand. Actually the traffic rule is almost same as Japan, so I could do relatively easily. The only problem was that it was raining a lot and I didn't know the way. (Although we had GPS and I could manage to get to Auckland, I wish I should have known the way to some extent.)

Needless to say, our trip was absolutely fantastic. I can't help but being thankful for all my friends who attended the trip. It was really great experience and I will never forget it.