Perigee Moon in Utsunomiya, Japan

 According to CNN news, the moon was said about 14% bigger and 30% brighter one week ago. Having read the news, I looked up at the sky from my room, found a slightly bigger moon and took a couple of pictures of it.

It’s very beautiful, isn’t it?

I’m wondering how long it will take my office to recover? My boss sends emails regularly about how operations to restore the office rooms were going on. He said the day before yesterday that part of electricity supply was back but water was not back yet .

Sigh.

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(CNN) -- If the moon looks a little bit bigger and brighter this weekend, there's a reason for that. It is.
Saturday's full moon will be a super "perigee moon" -- the biggest in almost 20 years. This celestial event is far rarer than the famed blue moon, which happens once about every two-and-a-half years.
"The last full moon so big and close to Earth occurred in March of 1993," said Geoff Chester with the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington. "I'd say it's worth a look."
Full moons look different because of the elliptical shape of the moon's orbit. When it's at perigee, the moon is about 31,000 miles (50,000 km) closer to Earth than when it's at the farthest point of its orbit, also known as apogee.
"Nearby perigee moons are about 14% bigger and 30% brighter than lesser moons that occur on the apogee side of the moon's orbit," the NASA website says.
This full moon will rise in the east at sunset and should look especially big at that time because of what's known as the "moon illusion."
"For reasons not fully understood by astronomers or psychologists, low-hanging moons look unnaturally large when they beam through trees, buildings and other foreground objects," according to NASA.
Even though it may look close enough to touch, Saturday's full moon will still be at a healthy distance -- some 211,600 miles (356,577 km) away.
As rare as it is, it may be worth a look. Miss it and you'll have to wait until 2029 to see it again.

Utsunomiya Central Park

All employees in my office including myself have been told to stay home till repairing our office damaged by the quake should complete. We don't have to work.

More than a week has passed since the earthquake on March 11.
Yes, I know: the damage is too severe to repair it within a week.
I got an email from my boss last Friday, saying that it might take another one week to repair the office at a usable level.

I recently feel tired of staying home and watching TV news about the quake or firefighters’ work against the nuclear power plants.
I think it’s true that not a little Japanese want to look brighter side of things as well as understanding current situations.
So, I went to Utsunomiya Central Park to see flowers today and yesterday.

Plants and flowers, of course, didn’t care about the quake or N-plants at all. They were just blooming as beautiful as they had been one year ago.

Damages Done by The Earthquake in Utsunomiya

Thank you for kind messages. We are receiving messages, encouragements, offers and supports from many countries. These kindness will help us and our lives. I never forget you guys.

The sign says, "DANGER: Do not come close." in Futara-yama shrine.↓

The wall of a parking lot has fallen and hit the car.↓

Gravestones have fallen over in a cemetery.↓

A Powerful Earthquake Hits My Town, Utsunomiya.

When I was working, suddenly a strong quake hit my office. My colleagues and I hid ourselves under each one’s desk.
In the meanwhile, not part but the whole ceiling in my office room collapsed and fell from the above.

White dust smoke covered our room. I heard one of women in the office was crying. After the big trembler ceased, I heard a voice asking me help. I removed a big fragment of ceiling covering his desk and rescued him who was trapped.
Then, I saw that some PC monitors fell but still kept emitting lights between broken ceiling boards on desks in the dark.
My boss, my department manager, a division manager who was holding hands of crying woman, colleagues and I barely escaped from the 4th floor of the building in a heavy white dust smoke and various piles of rubble.

On hearing a big sound of falling the ceiling and having kept my body in a small space beneath my desk, I thought a death myself as reality for the first time in my life.

I was very scared at the time but all my family members are safe.

Emi Passes College Entrance Exam.

Congrats to Emi on passing the exam!

  Emi holds certificates of passing exams.

Emi has successfully passed her college entrance exam; Sophia University is the name of the college in Tokyo. The college is her most favorite one and she was studying to target the college for a whole year.

To celebrate the outcome, we, my family members went to an Indian restaurant named ‘Gitanjali Mahal’ where she requested for lunch last Saturday.

 We also had a lunch party in an Indian restaurant named ‘Taj Mahal’ when Rina, my younger daughter, had passed a high school entrance exam exactly one year ago.


To be honest, I prefer ‘Taj Mahal’ to ‘Gitanjali Mahal’ in terms of its food taste, furniture in it, its music and an overall atmosphere.

But, anyway we were all happy to have been able to have the occasion together.