サトシさんの英語との出会い
Hello Asami. And hello Satoshi-san. Hello.
That was... Sorry, I caught you at the wrong time.I was just having a sip of water. Such timing.Such timing. I am such a great host.
Well anyway, this episode will come out after, aweek after the previous one, so if you haven't
listened to that episode, we are talking withポッドサイエンティストのサトシさんとアオイさん.
In the previous episode, we had more time and wespent more time with Aoi-san on her background,
how she became bilingual, and how she's findingher life in Australia. So this time,
this episode, it's more of a Satoshi-san episodeand we want to, you know, ask him about his
studying abroad experience, etc, etc, but... Yeah,maybe he'll also try to convince me to try coffee.
Why don't you reintroduce... Huh? I said maybehe'll also try to get me to do coffee again, youknow.
Oh, that's just gonna be part of it, you know.That's just it, so... Okay.
Yeah, Satoshi-san, why don't you talk aboutyour... Okay, I'm back. I'm back. Yes. Welcomeback.
Yes. Much energy.
So, I am Satoshi and I do a podcast calledポッドサイエンティスト. Yes. And I work in a university.
So, I... So, I tend to be liked when I speak less.So, last episode, I didn't talk that much,
so I probably gave fairly okay impression, butthis time it seems I'm gonna be talking,
so I'm not sure what's gonna happen. Okay, I'mgonna... We've started very critical of ourselves
at the beginning of this session. Satoshi, we arehere for you. We are supporting you.
I just wanted to explain why I'm saying this,because when I'm in Japan...
Well, no, no, no, I wouldn't say that. So, when Iwas in Canada, obviously, I speak less because,
well, English is not my first language, and Ifound that people like me more there than when Iwas
in Japan. And then, I was kind of graduallythinking that when I speak less, I liked more,
but it was clear to me when I went to China. So, Iwas just... There was a party, and I was just
sitting and being quiet and just smiling, andpeople liked me so much. So, sometimes my friend
just did the translation for me, and then I justspoke a little bit. And then, you know, people
later asked that friend, like, told that friendthat I was just such a nice person, and thatperson
liked me a lot. That never happens in Japan. So,it seems when I don't speak, I give goodimpression.
Well, I would like to insert myself by saying thatthat is just n equals two
observations, Satoshi. That is not a good science.
No, but no, I mean, at the same time, this isreally interesting that you noticed this. It
seems like it was a very strong memory you haveabout moments that you spoke less,
and seemed to have had some sort of positivefeedback. The same thing happened when I went toKorea.
Okay. N equals three. Okay, now it's n equalsthree. It is growing. That's why this memory,
there's something in there. It's growing, it'sgrowing. Wait, but maybe my general hypothesis
about human beings, in very, very general terms,is that people like
thinking and talking about themselves, just bydefault, usually. So, by you being quiet,
maybe they just assume that you're listening tothem, and paying attention to them,
giving them air time, and they're like, oh,Satoshi, what a nice guy.
That's true. So, this podcast episode is, I'mgoing to be an interviewee, right? So,
I think this is the opportunity I can talk moreand be happy.
Yeah. Exactly.
Yeah. We want you to be the talking person, right?You don't always have to be that nice listener.
Okay, let's get to it.
Let's get to it.
All right.
That is a good energy now.
海外ドラマと英語学習
Yeah, you're already speaking pretty comfortablyin English, from what I can hear, but what was
your first encounter? When did you have to startdoing this? What's your background in English?
So, when I was about six years old, my mother, Igrew up in Japan, rural side of Japan.
My mother put me into an English class, but that'slike 40, more than 40 years ago,
unfortunately. So, there's not very many goodteachers in the countryside, and I didn't learn
anything, but at least I know that there arepeople who speak some other languages
in some other countries. And then when I was about10 years old, I think, I went to United
States because my father was sent to work therefrom...
Okay. Okay.
Yeah. And then we stayed for a year and a half,and then I came back. So, that's the first time
I actually learned English a little bit.
Okay. And this time you went to Genshiko? Did yougo to the public school there?
Yes. Yes, we would. I mean, me and my brother wentto just a regular elementary school.
Wow.
How was that? Did they have any English as asecondary language type of like,
you know, let's ease you in type of program?
So, it was in Maryland, and there are manyforeigners in that region.
So, yeah, even in my same grade, or even in sameclass, there was a Japanese kids,
more than one of them. And we also had the ESLclass.
Okay. Okay.
During the time when other kids study English,Kokugo English, we were sent to a separate class,
and those who were not proficient with Englishwould be learning English there.
Okay. Yeah, same exact thing.
I remember we called that class ESOL, E-S-O-L.
What was that?
Yeah, I think English.
God, I don't remember, but I know because it'sfrom TESOL, isn't it?
It's the same. I think it's the same ESOL. Yeah.
Well, anyways, I mean.
It'll come to me, or I'll find it, but please.Yeah. So, it was ESOL, right?
Call it ESL then.
Anyways, I didn't become perfect. It's only a yearand a half, but I learned to get by.
Right. It was enough to get you some sort offamiliarity.
You already came into it not with any real strongEnglish training, but you were familiar.
You were like, okay, English is out there.
Then you were sort of dropped into a high Englishenvironment,
but at least with support to some extent.
Exactly. Yes.
Okay. Okay. So, you're 11, 12 when you come backto Japan.
Yeah, I think I was 11.
That was the final year of elementary school inJapan.
Then I went to junior high school soon after that,and then the English class starts.
Right, right.
So, my brother just lost his English very quickly,but I somehow-
This was your younger brother?
Yes, yes, yes. So, he was like three years youngerthan me, but I kind of maintained.
I also liked those TV shows, American shows,
so, but that was a time back when there was noNetflix or Amazon Prime or even no cable TV.
Yeah, no YouTube.
There were like really few shows on NHK, likethere was Full House.
Yes, I remember that.
Elf? Do you know Elf?
No, not that one.
Elf like the-
Puppet, not puppet.
Yes, yes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Living in an old man's house.
Right.
That I remember.
Yeah, that was what I watched when I was in juniorhigh school, high school.
So, I just video recorded them.
So, on TV, it's voiceover.
So, it speaks Japanese, but if you videotape itand then change the language,
I can listen to it with English.
And I just repeatedly watched those.
Okay. All right.
Gotcha.
Yeah, then later we, yeah, there were more, a fewmore shows I really liked.
Do you know Dama and Greg?
That was my favorite show.
Oh, I don't-
That was when I was like in university.
Maybe.
That one, I remembered Elf, but I forgot what Elflooked like.
Asami, at some point, I'll show you what Elflooked like.
Would I be traumatized?
Well, you know what?
You can just have a link and, you know, you canchoose if you want to look at it.
But yeah, these are calling memories back, so.
Yeah, around the time I was watching Full House,and it was probably like,
you know, but I remember ER and also Sabrina.
I don't know the English title, but it's likeSabrina the-
Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
Yeah, the Teenage Witch is basically the same, so.
Yeah, but this was like pre-English Asami,
so I was listening to it, all of this in like thevoiceover.
Okay, okay, okay, yeah.
That's, yeah, it's good to have some shows likethat,
but you really sort of latched onto them,
like you kept watching and like listening towhatever you could find.
Somehow I liked them.
I mean, I watched the movies too.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
That probably helped.
トロントのポスドク生活とスポーツラジオ
So, and then I went to university, grad school,
and I finished, after I finished my grad school,
I went to Canada, Toronto, to do my postdoc,
and I stayed there for like seven years.
Wow.
In terms of English, I think I was mostly okaywhen I went there,
but surely improved a little, yeah.
So, that's when I started listening to radio,
because I didn't own a TV,
and yeah, that's before the time of the flatscreen.
You had to get the big boxy ones, right?
Or it wasn't a thing, so.
I was just a poor postdoc.
I didn't have a TV.
I mean, you need to have cable subscription towatch TV reasonably.
Not like here, we can just, well, maybe you haveto pay for NHK,
but other than that, you don't really need cableto watch TV.
But there, you don't really get any servicewithout cable,
and cable costed, I don't know, $50 to $100 amonth,
so that's too much.
That's pretty expensive, yeah.
I mean, yeah, it's expensive.
So, I just got radio, and I happen to likebaseball,
and I just kept listening to sport talk radio.
Okay.
Yeah, the radio culture is kind of different fromhere,
in that there are a lot more stations,
and each station has some speciality,
and there is like sports radio, which does sportsall day.
Obviously, there's only like actual games atnight.
So, during the day, they just talk about sports.
Like, it's often like old guys talking aboutbaseball,
and I just kept listening to those.
Yeah, that's pretty normal, most of the states,yeah.
Yeah, and also these call-in shows as well.
So, people just call to the radio,
and ask questions to the radio host.
That's what I have done.
ポッドキャストと声の魅力
And then the podcast came to the world,
and that's before like Spotify.
You don't stream podcasts.
You actually download and put it into your iPod.
Yeah, people probably don't know what iPod is now.
Oh, I hope our audience is relatively aged.
I don't know. I'm old enough to know what it is.
They also might, no matter the age,
because a lot of people are buying iPods now.
They're attempting to essentially like upgradethem, shall we say?
But they're getting them, so it's this simplifieddevice, right?
It only does, right?
So, they can like not be distracted by all thescreens.
It's a little like, you know, removal.
It's a rejection of the, you know, smartphoneeverything type of thing.
Or it's just a Y2K aesthetics. I don't know.
It's a little bit of everything, right?
Like hobbyist electronics folks are like, youknow, making them do more.
Damn, are you saying that I could have sold myiPod Nano for a good money?
You don't want to know the answer to thatquestion.
I'll tell you that.
So, I don't have the exact number, but there arepeople spending a lot of money.
I even had the limited version.
I had the red iPod Nano.
Don't think about it.
I'm telling you right now, don't think about it.
So, anyway, this was the time of downloadingpodcasts, which is a thing.
So, um, yep.
Yeah.
So, you already like this like onse media typestuff?
Yeah, before you started, yeah.
Yeah, I'm not really a book person.
I don't really, I mean, I do read books,
but I don't really like it as much as listening topodcasts somehow.
Yeah, but I'm not one of those people who, asteenagers, listen to these late night shows.
I never did that.
Somehow, I just got into the podcasts throughsport talk shows.
Sure, yeah.
And then moved on to listening to politics orscience, those kind of things.
So, do you, right now on your podcast, likesubscriptions,
is it kind of half and half English and Japanese,or do you mostly listen to one or the other?
Yeah, more English, like 80% English, I think.
Do you have any favorites?
Yeah, I have many favorites.
I wish I had my smartphone with me.
But, like, for science, I don't know.
I don't know if you know, but I like the showcalled Unexplainable, which is a science show,
and it talks about some science stuff that's notcompletely solved.
Yeah, they changed the host.
I mean, they have many hosts, and some of themhave changed,
and the atmosphere of the show has kind ofchanged.
And I liked it better before, but I still like it.
Or, I don't know what else, like Freakonomicsradio.
Yeah.
Have you ever read Freakonomics?
I haven't read it, but I've listened to some oftheir podcasts.
Yeah, it's written by a journalist and economist,and that journalist person
started doing podcasts like 10 years ago or more,and it's one of the most listened to shows.
And you said you liked, what was that?
ThruLine or something?
Radio.
ThruLine and Radiolab.
I feel like I've been listening to them for a longtime, on and off again.
So I just counted, and there's, like, 95 showsthat I subscribe to, and not all of them areactive.
And even if some of them, even though many of themare active,
I go through moods of wanting to listen todifferent podcasts.
And sometimes with brainy shows like ThruLine andRadiolab,
my brain is just too tired to listen to them, andI want to listen to stupid things.
Yeah, I understand that.
Yeah, but then there are times I just want to besuper nerdy
and, like, want to know every single thing aboutthe banana trade in Colombia, you know?
And suddenly, you know everything about the bananatrade in Colombia.
Yeah, something like that.
And so it is just wild how, you know, it works,the taste of my podcast.
But yeah.
What's your opinion on audiobook?
You said that you're not really a reader, but howdoes audiobook sound to you?
I actually haven't listened to that much, so Idon't have much of an opinion to it.
But something that is clear is, when you listen topodcasts, most of the time,
not just the content, you like or not like theperson himself or the voice.
Voice is very important.
Not very, but important, right?
It can be really important.
Yeah, if you don't like the voice, you can'treally listen to it.
And when you buy an audiobook and you hate thevoice, then what are you going to do?
Yeah.
That's my concern.
That's fair.
Obviously, most of the time, they hire, like, verygood, what do you call it?
Voice actors and narrators.
Yeah, even with a good narrator, it doesn't meanthat you think it's good.
Or, like, it doesn't really jive with you.
And also, most of the time, many times, peoplejust read themselves to save money.
I mean, I hear some people does that.
Even the famous one, like Malcolm Gladwell.
Like the author does their own reading.
Yes.
There are a number of people as the author whowill do their own reading for a number of reasons.
It does cost.
It costs a lot of money and it's a lot of time ifyou want a really good...
I think we've...
Did we talk about this on one of the previousepisodes, Asami?
Like with, you know, audiobook narration.
It doesn't matter.
But, like, it's really...
We definitely did at some point.
We definitely did.
Because it's, like, really hard and reallyexhausting.
You know, one of the things that audiobooknarrators will suggest, or I've heard suggested,
was, you know, if you want to get a feeling forwhat it's like,
go sit in the closet for six hours and read a bookout loud to yourself.
And, like, that's it.
That sounds like a torture chamber.
And you have to just keep doing it.
And you have to keep repeating it.
一人語り・授業・演技の難しさ
Actually, that's what I did for my podcast.
Which, I mean, that's...
I'm not saying it's, you know, impossible.
And I'm only reading, like, 50...
No, no, no.
5,000 letters.
Right, right.
Something like that.
Well, that's 20, 30 minutes.
And it's torture.
It can be torture, right?
I don't know why I'm doing this.
No, no, no.
Please, we're not going to have you here decide toexit the podcast space.
No, we cannot be the reason of the end of Pod theScientist.
We cannot be responsible for that.
I will support all your attempts.
I think many of the solo podcasters have thismoment.
Just reading, or maybe not scripted, but justtalking to yourself.
And then start thinking, why am I doing this?
I think it's common for...
I only do solo podcasts, like, we only do solopodcasts very occasionally.
And every time I do it, I'm like, I sound so fullof myself.
Like, what am I doing?
I try to lean into it.
You know, I just start with, no, I am full ofmyself.
No, I do.
That's what I do.
I try to channel, like, the YouTuber, influencerpersona.
Like, install it to me.
Be like, hey, guys.
There you are.
So, you have to, like, put on...
We were talking about, you know, so she waslooking for, like, diverse, you know, Englishmaterial.
We were talking about accents, right?
But accents are also a huge thing that peopletrain for.
And it's, like, really hard.
And you're usually going to just get it wrong, airquotes, right?
Like, there's many different types.
And for those in, sort of, you know, acting andperformance, you know,
one of the suggestions I've heard is you justaccept that it's going to be wrong,
but you have to commit to it.
So, you have to, like, you have to just say, thisis what I'm doing now.
And don't hesitate, because if you hesitate, itwill sound worse, right?
It's going to come across definitely the way youdon't want.
And so, I think, you know, just looping thosearound,
when you're in that solo headspace, you're goingto get that meta,
what am I doing here?
Why is this?
Why am I doing this?
Who am I even talking to, you know?
Stares at the fourth wall camera.
But also, if when you get into that space, youknow, we've all done it,
we go, yes, so I am.
It's okay when this happens, when I'm doingpodcasts,
but when this happens, when I'm teaching a class,it's horrible.
Oh, okay.
You've had it while teaching.
Okay, all right.
Just many students listening, and I'm justtalking,
and then I realize, what am I doing?
I'm not qualified to teach.
I, yeah, okay.
I understand.
They're not listening to me.
They're sleeping or using their smartphones.
I'm laughing, but it's laughing out ofunderstanding and sympathy,
or empathy even.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, but I'm over that period.
Yes.
Oh, that's good.
Leave this meta me aside and just keep talking.
Yes.
It's my job.
It's my job.
I have to do it.
I have found that with at least the more seniorstudents,
maybe with the other ones, it depends on theclass,
but sometimes I will pause and I will just belike,
what am I doing here?
And some of the students, if it's a small enoughclass,
I do this because I like to, you know, it connectsa little bit,
but it's like, you know, everybody has thosemoments, I think.
We just pretend sometimes like it doesn't happen.
And, you know, you sharing it here, people willunderstand that.
We've all been there, especially teachers.
So that's true.
Like if you've been teaching the same syllabus forlike 10 plus years,
like you're bound to get one of these days like,
okay, like this is like autopilot enough that youcan like meta recognize yourself
and like be like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
This is too many layers.
You're very aware of, yeah, you're very aware ofyourself and the material.
And you're also aware that there's way morematerial out there
that you as an expert are still never going toknow.
Yeah.
That's, yeah.
It's got very existential.
I feel like we should come back to real life
and, you know, just like end this recording
and, you know, try and try and come back down fora little bit.
Yeah, well, we started with like the entireEnglish story experience from Satoshi-san.
So I guess how can we bring ourselves back toground?
データで見る野球と『マネーボール』
Listening to baseball talk show.
That's a good way to bring you back.
I like those.
So not just, I'm not, I'm never really a baseballfan before,
but I went to, I mean, I lived in Toronto.
They have a baseball team and I went there towatch.
And then what grabbed me the most is thestatistical analysis of the baseball data.
I'm that kind of baseball fan.
Yeah, okay.
So I started watching seriously like 2004 at thetime.
Well, for people who don't know.
So the baseball, at least in the major leaguebaseball,
it's really the statistical analysis has advancedquite a bit in past 20 years.
So before, you know, like there's a thing that wasbelieved to be good for your team.
And then they just, so there's so many dataaccumulated from the years of the play.
You can analyze the association between theoutcome and the process.
And you would know what strategy is the best forthe team.
And then these ideas can be used to pick andchoose which player to hire.
And this, the movie Moneyball is about this.
Oh, right. Yes.
It's a book written by Michael Lewis and was madeto a Brad Pitt movie.
And it's just about that.
There is a famous general manager who built theOakland Athletics to the winning team
with their very small budget.
They used advanced analysis to build a great team.
Wow.
And then at the time, it was not a popular idea.
People, you know, traditional baseball peoplehated these kind of brainy people.
But things just have completely changed.
Now every team, maybe except for one team, hasthis analytical team.
They hire a bunch of people from the top tieruniversities
and do all kinds of, not just statisticalanalysis.
They now do the physical analysis or biomechanicalanalysis to improve the player performance.
So it's really like a science.
So especially like 20 years ago, it was notadvanced
so that I could understand what these articlessaid.
Oh, there's a bunch of blogs talking about thesekinds of things.
Yeah.
And then these people who did the independentblogs are now hired by these
professional teams to run their operation.
It was a really exciting time.
I don't know if you guys are excited, but I'mreally excited.
I mean, I always wonder like, you know, nowadays,if you're watching any baseball
juke, as soon as they do one move, it's like 10different numbers show up on the screen.
It's like, I don't know what any of these numbersmean, but it must mean something.
And they're all being tabulated and data and yeah,crazy.
Exactly.
And I was attracted to this kind of things.
And before, you know, only a handful of websitewas doing this kind of analysis.
And then they started doing podcasts.
And it was just so interesting to listen to those.
And these are not kind of the talk, which is notavailable in the bigger media.
Only like really small.
So niche.
Yes, yes.
But that's made it more exciting to listen to.
And I've been listening to those shows ever since.
I mean, not as much as before, but I mean, it justgot too complicated for me to understand.
I just got so advanced.
It has a tendency to pick up speed when everybodyis getting on board, right?
So yeah.
But I still do listen to some.
I mean, baseball is a fairly complex game as agame design, right?
Like there are so many different roles andsimultaneous movement happening all at once.
And yeah, I always thought even just as a casualwatcher,
I always needed somebody to explain to me whatthey're doing.
And why is this a big deal that this guy catch aball or didn't catch a ball?
I feel almost inspired to go and learn more aboutthis now.
Your enthusiasm has passed its way over to me,which I don't watch a lot of sports.
So yeah, you get to share with people.
This is something that I really, really enjoy isgetting to hear from everyone else.
Yeah.
ニッチな番組を楽しむポッドキャスト文化
And I like that podcast gives a free space forniche people to be as niche as they like,
because the business model isn't to reach to asmany audience as possible.
Or it's just like, I feel like people haven'tfully cracked the algorithm of podcasting,
which is why I like it, because I feel like thereare shows that I will listen to
for years, and it doesn't matter if they godormant for a couple of years,
I'll still listen to it if they come back.
And then there are shows where I was really intoit for the first two days,
and I'm like, I'm done and don't want to listen tothem anymore.
So I don't even know what I like most of the time.
That's a yeah.
Knowing what you like is a hard thing.
Podcasts seem to be a space where you have atleast more of this variability,
or it feels like it.
Maybe the same could be said about those that aremostly attached to books, though, right?
People that will just put them down and notfinish, right?
They just put it off to the sides.
Maybe those that are hyper committed to finishingevery book they pick up, though.
I don't know if there are people who are hyperfocused on finishing every podcast episode,
once they've started listening to a podcast,right?
It's more of a pick up, put down type of medium,would be my guess.
But maybe if you're out there and you'relistening, and you pick up a podcast,
and you're like, I have to listen to every singleone of them until present day
before I make my decision, then please let usknow.
I would be curious.
Some completionists out there.
Yeah, yeah.
Or like reverse completionists.
Maybe they have to listen in most recent to oldestepisode order.
Maybe they have to do it the other way around.
Oh my god.
I try not to think about what's happening to ourold episodes.
I don't know.
They're sitting there in the ether somewhere.
Well, shall we wrap this one up, I think?
Yeah, yeah.
Well, thank you Sato-san for coming and chattingto us about your English background
and your love for baseball statistics.
Again, I've been inspired.
So I think I will spend some time looking into atleast a movie.
You should at least read Moneyball.
Read Moneyball.
Okay, all right.
All right, recommendation for me and for everyoneelse.
I already have plenty.
I'll add it to the list.
So.
All right.
Well, thank you very much.
And thanks everyone for listening.
We'll put more info about Sato-san's show on theshow notes.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Bye.
That's it for the show today.
Thanks for listening and find us on X at Eigo deScience.
That is E-I-G-O-D-E-S-C-I-E-N-C-E.
See you next time.