Ireland : Beaghmore stones circles

En français
After the American folk park, we went to Beaghmore to see the celtic stones circles. It's really strange to see that so many years after the construction, the circles of stones are still there and that they are hiding so many secrets about human history. The celtic culture and especially the celtic constructions such as megaliths or stones circles remain unexplained by science until now. Who knows how many years will be necessary to unravel such mysteries and understand what happened so long ago? What was the purpose of those constructions?
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Ireland : American folk park

En français
On Sunday we went to the American folk park. The American folk park is a open air museum which tell the story of the immigration from Ireland to America. The immigration was mainly due to the famine that touched Ireland with the potato decease. A lot of poor people died in the period of Irish history and a lot of others saved money to pay the transport by boat to Pennsylvania. In the American side of the park, houses from Pennsylvania have been imported to complete the museum.
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Ireland : cathedral St Patrick and Inch Abbey

En français
We then took the ferry in Portaferry to go to Downpatrick where we visited the St Patrick museum telling the story of St Patrick's life when he was kidnapped from England and sold as a slave in Ireland then escape before coming back to Christianize the pagan island. Then we went to see the cathedral St Patrick and to the ruin of Inch Abbey.
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オレンジデイズ (orange days)

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オレンジデイズ is a Japanese drama in 11 episodes from 2004.

 Sae Hagio is a very talented violinist but four years ago she lost her hearing and felt into despair refusing to communicate and to socialize, using sign language to keep people away from her. Kai Yuuki is senior at the university graduating into welfare and people care study currently looking for a job. Kai's friend is interested in Sae but decide to avoid the date when he discovers that she is deaf, Kai finds himself going there instead and so the relationship between Sae and Kai begins leading to the creation of the orange society, a group of friends.

Casting :
妻夫木聡 as Yuuki Kai
柴咲コウ  as Hagio Sae (Galileo, Galileo episode 0)
成宮寛貴 as Aida Shohei
白石美帆 as Ozawa Akane (Nodame Cantabile)
瑛 太  as Yashima Keita (Nodame Cantabile)



I like this drama, especially because of Sae's personality. She is really impulsive  and make life hard for Kai is a very funny always making him stay around even when he wants to complain about it. I also like how she never gives up music even though she can't hear what she is playing anymore. I also like Keita, he is the good guy all the way is a sense and don't really get recognized for it. I think people don't really trust you so much or find you interesting when you are genuinely nice, that's a pity.
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Ireland : Mount Stewart

En français
At the end of July and beginning of August, I went back to Belfast for ICPEAC 2011. It was nice to have a conference in what I can now call my home University even if I only did my PhD there. During the conference, several tours were organized during the week-end so I could actually have a look at all the touristic attractions that I never took the time to see when I was living in Northern Ireland. The first part of the tour on Saturday was the visit of one of the national trust attractions, the house and garden of Mount Steward. We were lucky not to have so much rain to walk through the garden.
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Japan : 東京国立博物館

En français
Yesterday the 東京国立博物館 organised a cultural exchange day for foreign students the Tokyo national museum was free for foreign students (and accompanying Japanese friends and foreign researcher, three people got lucky here or sneaky whatever you wanna call it.) So I went there with my friends. The exposition at the museum was about Japanese culture and was explained either in English and simple Japanese or in simple Japanese only. The Japanese part was still difficult for me to understand but hopefully I had nice guys to explain it to me. I think I would need a lot more time to be able to assimilate all the discovery of the day.
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Japan : 船の科学館

En français
お台場's museum of maritime science, 船の科学館 is closing its doors for good so it is now accessible for a reduced price. I went to spend the afternoon there with some friends before visiting お台場's 温泉. I really like this museum and I think it's a great attraction. It also looks very nice from the outside as it has the shape of a boat. The 温泉 was really relaxing after walking all day. It was a very agreeable experience.
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