The World of Patricia Daly Oe

2012.01.25 Wednesday

Storytelling session at Chihaya High School

Despite both the Chuo line and Yamanote line grinding to a halt this morning (a train driver saw some smoke, apparently), I managed to arrive at Chihaya High School in the Senkawa area of Tokyo just in time for my storytelling session today.

It was the first time for me to visit the school and I was so impressed with the friendliness of both the teachers and students. Many students were very outgoing and so it was certainly a very responsive audience.
I enjoyed narrating two of my stories - "Peter the Lonely Pineapple" and "Princess Lizzie" and I hope that the students found the real-life story about my experience with having picture books published a little helpful or interesting, as well.

I would like to thank Nobuko Shimoyama-sensei and all of the other teachers for organizing today's session and I hope to have the opportunity to visit the school again.

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2012.01.15 Sunday

Zeneiren High School English Speech Contest National Finals

The finals for the Zeneiren High School English Speech Contest will be held on Sunday 5th February 2012 at the National Youth Olympic Center in Yoyogi.
Admission to watch the contest is free and it is always an extremely interesting event with many excellent speeches about many different topics.
I would recommend anyone who is interested in English speeches or hearing the opinions of some young Japanese people to attend the contest finals.
You have to register your name first though.
Please do so via the Zeneiren website:
http://www.zen-ei-ren.com/
But you have to hurry - I believe the deadline is the 16th January!

This will be the fourth time for me to give a narration concert at the contest. I will be giving the narration concert from around mid-day whilst the judges are making their decision regarding the winners.
This year I will narrate a story about a Samurai (originally a Rakugo story) and the story of the space probe, Hayabusa, with projected pictures and accompanying music.

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.12.17 Saturday

Recent Picture Book Readings in Tokyo

During November and December I gave a number of picture book readings of my stories or stories I have translated from Japanese to English. The most recent one was the Cosmopier event on Sunday 11th December which was in celebration of the one-year anniversary of their e-hon picture book club.

I always enjoy hearing comments from members of the audience afterwards.
At the NPO Forum event in Mitaka there were a number of adults at my book-reading. One lady told me that she was 61 and although she had studied English at university she hadn't used it recently. I was so happy when she said to me, "Your storytelling made me realize that we must never give up having a dream - even when we are older."
At the Cosmopier event I read "Stacy Strawberry" and "Hayabusa's Story." The latter is based on the true story of the Japanese space probe that collected samples from the asteroid, Itokawa, and then went missing for a while. The story was written by Nagisa Imai and I translated it from Japanese to English.
After the reading a little boy showed me a picture of the Hayabusa space probe that he had drawn at home. He had come to the book reading event especially to listen to "Hayabusa's Story" and his mother explained that he had become really interested in space since hearing the story the first time in the summer. She said that he spends a lot of time studying books and pictures of planets, asteriods and other objects in space.
How nice to play a role in inspiring someone.
And through these connections I feel inspired to write more, too.
I have several books I am planning to work on during the next year, including a novel that I started writing three years ago and abandoned for a while...

Here are a couple of pictures of the Cosmopier event.

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.11.27 Sunday

English Picture Book Reading Event in Tokyo 11th December

To mark the one year anniversary of the "e-ehon" picture book club set up by Cosmopier Publishing Company with a membership now surpassing 1000,
the company will be holding a special all-day English picture book reading event with activities on Sunday, December 11th.
The event will be held in Cosmopier's seminar room near Hatsudai station in Tokyo.
Please reserve early as there are a limited number of spaces.

://www.e-ehonclub.com/index.asp?patten_cd=4&page_no=30

I will be reading Stacy Strawberry and Hayabusa's Story 11:40-12:30 with some fun language practice and activities connected to the stories.
Stacy Strawberry is a story I wrote for Cosmopier in 2009 about a strawberry who wants to be a pineapple...

Hayabusa's Story is based on the true story of the space probe "Hayabusa" and has inspired many children to become interested in space.

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.11.10 Thursday

Recent and upcoming events in Mitaka

This Halloween I held a Halloween party in Mitaka which was organized by Kodomo no Kaisha. I hope the children enjoyed the stories, songs and games.

After 15 years (or longer perhaps...) of being a witch, this year I decided to be a cat instead.

The picture below shows some of the children trick or treating around the Mitaka shopping area after the party. 13 shops cooperated with this event and the children really got some wonderful presents to take home.

My next event will also be in Mitaka.
I will be reading some of my picture stories at the Mitaka NPO Forum at the Mitaka City Shimin Kyodo Centre on Sunday 20th November from 11am.
There are many wonderful workshops at this event attended by over 50 NPOs, including musical workshops, art and craft activities, plays and many interesting booths.
More information (Japanese only) can be viewed on this link:
http://www.city.mitaka.tokyo.jp/c_event/028/028707.html

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.10.25 Tuesday

Halloween event for children in English 英語でハロウィーン

I am holding a Halloween event for children hosted by Kodomo no Kaisha on Sunday 30th October in Mitaka, Tokyo.
For further information or to reserve a space (max 20 children) please contact Kodomo no Kaisha on the HP, e-mail address or telephone number on the poster below.
Hope to see you there!

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.09.13 Tuesday

Webサイトの更新・updated web site

Webサイトを更新しました。
最近の絵本や活動を紹介して、新しい写真を入れ替えました。
I've updated my web site with details of recent publications and activities and have changed the photos.

http://www.patricia-oe.com/

私のHPをデザインされた会社をお勧めします。
Webデザインとイラストの専門家です。
アドレスは http://www.couleurcafe.jp です。

I highly recommend the company that designed my web site.
You can see more examples of their work on this link:
http://www.couleurcafe.jp

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.08.09 Tuesday

Hayabusa's Story はやぶさのものがたり

Recently I had the great pleasure of translating the story of the space probe, Hayabusa, from Japanese into English.

Hayabusa was developed and sent into space by JAXA (the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) in 2003 to collect samples from the asteroid, Itokawa.
Hayabusa experienced many technical problems but did actually land on Itokawa. After that it experienced many other problems and contact with the space probe was lost for a while.
But the news of the Hayabusa space capsule miraculously returning to earth seven years later in June 2010 and that the capsule actually contained some tiny samples from the asteroid was rather awe-inspiring.

The story is aimed at children and is in the form of a picture book.
The original Japanese version is in hardback and you can see more about it here (in Japanese only):
http://www.cosmopier.com/shoseki/ehon_04.htm l

The English translation forms part of a book about English picture books published by the same company, Cosmopier. Details of this publication can be seen (in Japanese only) here:
http://www.cosmopier.com/eio/backnum/backnum_ehonclub.html

I will be giving some book-readings of Hayabusa's Story - There And Back Again, in the near future and will give details about that at a later time.

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.08.06 Saturday

Documentary film "Bokutachi wa Mita"

Last year I had the opportunity to translate and edit the English sub-titles for a documentary film made by the director, Mizue Furui.

Today (6th August) the Japanese sub-titled version of the film opened in Eurospace 2 cinema, Shibuya, so I went along for the first public show.
The film is called "Bokutachi wa Mita" and is about the traumatic effect of the attack by the Israeli army on a small village in Gaza at the end of 2008. The film focuses on four children in particular and is very moving. It shows these young children trying to come to terms with the violent deaths of their parents and siblings and total destruction of their village. The film is made from a very personal perspective by showing the situation through the eyes of children and does not directly address the political issues involved in the conflict that we usually hear about in the news.

The film will be showing for 3 weeks and during the first week there are talk shows with guests involved in documentary film production in Japan after the film.
Today's talk show featured Mizue Furui and Tatsuya Mori and what they said about the challenges involved in making documentary films was extremely interesting. They also talked about their recent visits to Fukushima to film after the earthquake and nuclear catastrophe and the experiences that they had there.

Please go and see "Bokutachi wa Mita" if you get the chance.

Information about the film showing at Eurospace and the talk events can be seen on this link (sorry, in Japanese only!)

http://www.eurospace.co.jp/detail.html?no=332

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Posted by : Patricia Daly Oe

2011.08.02 Tuesday

Kids' Carnival Koganei, 2011・キッズカーニバル小金井２０１１

On 26th June I participated in the Kids’ Carnival Koganei, 2011. This is a wonderful event for parents and children held at Gagukei University Koganei campus with many booths and activities to enjoy including dancing, storytelling and craft activities.

This year I collaborated with Obaasan no Chiebukuro (a picture book shop in Kokubunji) and we named our project “A Storytelling Journey Around the World.”

We held a number of mini-events at our booth including craft activities and storytelling in English and performed some stories with projected pictures and music on the stage for one hour.

I really enjoyed meeting many different people.

今年のキッズカーニバル小金井２０１１では国分寺の「おばあさんの知恵袋」と協力して、「せかい・おはなしのたび」の団体名でブース出展とステージ出演しました。

英語の話や世界の話、読み聞かせ・ストーリーテリング・工作・ゲーム・歌などを行いました。
とても楽しかったです。