☆POLO☆in New Zealand

This week I'll talk about a popular sport in New Zealand. In New Zealand horse is a familiar animal to people who live there. For New Zealanders, riding a horse is not a special occasion. At first children start horseback riding with a pony, and as they get better and older, they can practice with bigger horses. Amateurs often sell and buy horses at popular prices, which differs from Japan. In Japan buying a horse is a big business and the owner must be rich to own a horse. For New Zealanders, going on a picnic with their horses are everyday experience. People who own horses mostly has a horse car and they'll often go hunting in winter, shows in the summer.
Polo, which is considered as a noble sport is commonly played in New Zealand. Polo is played by the common people, not by nobleman.The best season for playing polo is in the summer. Members get on a horse and tries to lead the ball into the opponent's goal. Each match(which is called chukkas)lasts for 7minutes, and in a polo game 6chukkas are played. Each person can take 4 horses to a game, and is essential to take at least 2 horses. In Japan it is even difficult to own a horse, and there are only three official registered members. As a result they are not able to establish a polo team, so they mainly join polo games held in Hong-Kong.

Moon Festival

Last week while surfing on the internet I found an interesting event called Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as Moon Festival. It's a traditional harvest festival which takes place in China around mid or late September. It is one of the two most important holidays in China, and has 3000years history. The Chinese thinks circular shaped moon as a symbol of a happy family, and with the harvest close at hand relatives gather and pray for a happy and peaceful life. This is a memorial event for rebellion fleeing from Mongolians in 14th century, and said to be one of the Chinese soldier hid a memo in a cake and succeeded to recapture their castle.
At the festival among "moon cakes"(cake made out of lotus,sesame and eggs) colorful lanterns are sold at shops. Families and lovers will gather to admire he bright mid-autumn harvest moon, and goes to parks and mountains with the lanterns of various shapes and colors and eat the moon cakes together until midnight. Sounds fun! Doesn't it? In the future I'd like to pay a visit to this special occasion! There are also many legends of the Moon Festival, so if you are interested you should search it on the internet.

How About some ♪MOVIES♪

I love watching movies. Especially Action and suspense. This summer I watched many interesting movies, so let me introduce some of them.
The most enjoyable one was "What happens in Vegas". The story was simple, one night a Joey(Ashton Kutcher) and a Joy(Cameron Diaz) meets in Las Vegas and gets too carried away from too much liquor. Next morning they wake up to find out that they got married while they were dead drunk. Both of them decides promptly to divorce but at the same time Jack wins a Jack Pot in a casino. At the press conference Joy insists on her right to get half of the money. As as long they are married Joy can get the half of the money, so they reluctantly start their forged marriage.
I think people who doesn't watch comedy usually can enjoy this movie. I also watched 300, Fool's Gold, Wanted , Veronica Mars and etc.
"Wanted" was also enjoyable. It's directed by Timur Bekmambetov, who is famous for directing many good movies.The story was about an assassin's son taking revenge on his father's murderer. At first he was an ordinary businessman fainthearted, but after he joined a assassin organization he became stronger on his mental and physical side. At last an unexpecting ending is waiting, but you should find it out yourself. After all I think watching a movie is a great way to spend your weekends!

●Avoiding heart attack caused by bad eating habits●

A heart attack occurs when the blood supply to part of the heart muscle itself is severely reduced or stopped. It happens when one or more of the coronary arteries supplying blood to the heart muscle is blocked. This is usually caused by the lump of plaque. The plaque can eventually burst, tear or rupture, creating an obstacle,where a blood clot forms and blocks the artery. This leads to a heart attack. If the blood supply is cut off for more than a few minutes, muscle cells suffer permanent injury and die. This can kill or disable someone, depending on how much heart muscle is damaged. When this happens the artery narrows and blood flow to part of the heart muscle decreases or stops. This situation causes a heart attack.

Maybe you can avoid heart attack by eating healthy organic food and low choresterol fish atheroma. If you　are anxious about your health you can try out some excercises like Swimming, cycling, jogging, skiing, aerobic dancing, walking or any of dozens of other activities can help your heart. They all cause you to feel warm, perspire and breathe heavily without being out of breath and without feeling any burning sensation in your muscles. Whether it is a structured exercise program or just part of your daily routine, all exercise adds up to a healthier heart.

●Laughter, Health And Dogs●

There are many advantages of laughing. To begin with laughing makes an improvement on the blood circulation. It keeps us healthy by enriching the blood with ample supplies of oxygen. According to an experiment laughing increased blood flow by more than 20 percent, and lasted for 30-45 minutes. Next laughing reduces negative effects of stress, like high blood pressure and heart disease and even expands the blood vessels. Laughing even reduces pain. Children watching comedy films relax more and tolerate pain more easily. In fact, humorous videos are being used in anesthetic rooms at Manchester Children's Hospital, and an American nurse has found that telling jokes to her patients before she administers a painful treatment reduces their discomfort.

Look what I found on the internet last week. This video clip shows dumb dogs acting weird in a funny voice, like one of the dogs walks upside-down and the other gets too exited and falls in an aquarium. I can’t explain why it’s so funny, but it makes me fun and relaxed. People who like dogs will especially enjoy these video clips.