Japanese Writing Lab #4: Hobbies

This is the 4nd assignment of a program I am running to help myself and others improve Japanese writing skill. For details, see this post. Also see this post for a list of all assignments.

This time the topic will be “趣味”, which is “hobby” or “hobbies”. Feel free to write about a single hobby you enjoy, or more than one. If there aren’t any interesting hobbies you are doing lately, you can use one you’ve had in the in past, or something you want to do in the future. Recommended length is a few sentences to a few paragraphs.

If you are having any difficulty thinking of what or how to write it, feel free to check out my submission below for ideas. Remember this isn’t a contest, it’s more about each of us improving our respective writing abilities. If you don’t know much Kanji but still want to participate, it’s OK to use just Hiragana with some Katakana here and there if you know it. Beginners can even use Romaji, as long as you promise to learn Hiragana soon (:

Once you finish this writing assignment, please post it via one of the two following methods:

1. For those who have a blog (WordPress or anywhere else is fine): post it on your blog, and post a comment on this article including a link to your post. I also suggest adding a link on your post back to this article, so people who find your post can follow it to read other people’s submissions.
2. For those who don’t have a blog: simply post it as a comment to this article with the text you’ve written. [Note: creating a blog is pretty easy and free on many sites, so if you have a few minutes I’d just consider just trying to create a blog on somewhere like WordPress. Several people have already done this in order to participate in this program.]

Also, I will be tagging every one of these assignments with the tag “japanese_writing_lab“. I’d recommend you do the same for your entries, so others can easy read through all them.

I’ll be reading all the entries received and commenting, and other users are welcome to do the same.

My submission

僕は困るほど多趣味です。つまり、毎日どの趣味をすればいいか迷うほど多いんです。

４歳の息子がいますけど、何かをやる時はなるべく息子と一緒にやりたいです。それで最近、「レゴ」のブロックでしょっちゅう遊んでいます。

小さいころから僕はレゴが大好きで、その頃から買ってもらったたくさんの部品はまだ持っています。しかし、レゴ社は幸運にもすごく売れてて新しいセットをどんどん出してるので、たまには新セットも買って遊んだりしています。

セットには必ず説明書がついていて、最初はそこに書いてある組み立ての説明に従ってブロックをくっつけて完成させてみます。それはそれでいいんですけど、やっぱりレゴのメリットというか魅力というのは、完成したモデルをバラバラにして、自己流に新しくデザインを作っていろんな物語を演じることです。

こう言うのはちょっとマーケティング臭いかもしれませんが、レゴが「想像力を育む」玩具だと僕は信じています。研究の結果によると、こういう「ごっこ遊び」は育っていく上で成長するための肝心な要素らしいです。

ブロック自体の他にも、レゴの映画を観たりそのサントラを聞いたり、Youtubeで「ニンジャゴー」の動画もみちろん見てます。考えてみると、レゴがすさまじい勢いで我々の生活に浸透してきてるかもしれませんね。