We discussed marriage in conversation class. I was a discussion leader so I researched marriage. I was surprised that it is only Japan, Korea, and Taiwan to have a family registry system. Family registry is an official paper on which our name and family relationships are written. I think a family registry is like a box of a family. When a man and a woman get married to each other, their names are taken from each family’s registry and put on a new family registry. When they have a baby, the baby is put in the family registry. I think it shows Japanese value. Japanese think that group is important. Family is a group and a family registry shows they belong to the same group. We are in the same box. If children marry, they get out of their parents’ box and make new boxes. I had a interest in common-law marriage. Common-law marriage is not legal marriage so common-law couples have problems. I wondered why they don’t get married legally and I also thought that why people get marriage. If we just want to live together with a partner whom we love, we can live together freely. I think it is better to marry because being married is to be considered to be a couple legally. We can get some support from a government or law because we are a legal couple. On the other hand, common-law couples have a reason they chose not to get married or they have a reason they can’t marry each other. Being married is not always the best for us. Common-law marriage is one of the choices to be happy. Through this topic I felt we can see Japanese culture or value in family registry system. Also, I thought marriage is a big event in our whole lives and may change our lives completely. My dream is having my family with my husband in the future, but I noticed there are many choices to be happy.
Last week, we took a trip to the Southwest for 7 days. This trip was an absolutely wonderful memory. I had never been to these areas so I was stimulated by every things, for example, cactus, adobe style buildings, Native American culture and amazing dessert views. It is one of the most interesting trips I ever took, because I experienced some rare things like visiting Grand Canyon, visiting high school and so on. On this trip I could understand about Indian culture from a folk art museum. I would like to introduce some my best memories on this Southwest trip. My first best memory is Georgia O’Keef museum. Actually, before this trip, I was not familiar with her and didn’t know about any of her artworks, but I was looking forward to visiting here because I like art museums. Her artworks were very unique, abstract and absolutely fabulous, and these were very fresh to me. I especially liked bone’s paintings which one of the most famous her artwork, because the color contrast is very c...