Question 1

I think I'm a shy person when I'm around strangers. It's difficult for me to approach people I don't know and start up a conversation. I had to learn how to deal with it when I used to be a sales and project management manager in my previous job. I had to meet new people all the time during business meetings and talk to them about our product. I also had to communicate with many different people when managing projects. I got better at faking it and appearing natural and comfortable, but internally, I'm sweating bullets!

Question 2

I was once told that a family member was cheating on their spouse. I really wish they didn't involve me in that conversation because it had nothing to do with me and made it awkward to interact with them after.

Question 3

I use facebook and generally avoid other social media. I don't like sharing too much about myself to people I'm not close to. I like to read about what my friends are up to and also interesting articles they repost and appears on my feed. I mostly post about my travels and food, but I seldom do this anymore. I used to post them to show off to family and friends, but now I just post pictures to document my life. I treat facebook like a digital photo album, curating my entire life, I don't care who sees my posts anymore.

Question 4

I always hate it when sales people come up and approach me to sell something, even if it's just to give me a flyer. If I'm interested, I'll get it myself, but please don't force me to waste paper by just handing me a flyer to something I'm not interested in like getting a new mobile plan. Salespeople in the Philippines are very aggressive, I especially hate it when a male salesperson comes up to me and tries to sell me something by complementing my appearance or something so that I buy their product. It makes me so uneasy.

Question 5

There have been data leaks on Yahoo, which I have an email account in. I don't really care too much since I don't keep anything too important there and I just changed my password.

Question 6

I don't really care too much as long as it's nothing that's going to cost me to lose money or my belongings. I've kinda accepted that putting anything online makes it available for anyone else to see whether it's the site owners themselves or the public. Which is why I don't use too many social media accounts. In the end it's up to you what you put out there. If we accept that anything put online is public (no matter how protected they say your data is) we'll be able to properly protect ourselves.

Tough Vocabulary

- English -	- Japanese -
sweating bullets = very nervous
internally = mentally/emotionally

Question 1

I am very introverted. I need time alone to recharge my energy. That is different from being shy, though. I genuinely like people, so that provides a balance to my introverted nature.

Question 2

I honestly cannot think of an answer to this question. I consciously avoid mean-spirited people, and perhaps I have just been lucky to avoid this in my life.

Question 3

I have friends all over the world, so I used to be a very passionate user of facebook because it was a simple way to keep in touch with everyone. Recent changes to the way the service operates, however, have more or less driven me off of facebook. I use instagram a little, to keep in touch with a very specific group of friends. I am making a conscious effort to limit my use of insta to just those few people.

Question 4

Again, I honestly can't remember. Maybe back in Canada, over a decade ago? Recently a very drunk older man in a tachinomi sake bar tried very hard to explain Japanese sake to me. He would not stop, even after the staff assured him that I had had been a regular customer for many years. He also insisted that I was an American, even though we all tried to explain to him that I am from Canada. After a while, his behaviour made me feel uncomfortable.

Question 5

The Cambridge Analytica scandal where he data-collecting firm illegally harvested facebook users’ info without their permission, exposed in September of 2018, was a pretty big one. I had already more or less given up on facebook by that time.

Question 6

I am very careful about posting pictures of my children or giving any information about my children on any form of social media. My online privacy has already been compromised. All I can do is to try and protect theirs.

Tough Vocabulary

- English -	- Japanese -
behaviour	行動

Question 1

I'm not a shy person though I am an introvert. A lot of people would say they are the same thing. I've heard a different definition however that I am inclined to agree with. Introverts are people who, when they are feeling a little tired or stressed, like to spend time alone. Extroverts, on the other hand, seek the company of others when they need to recharge their batteries. That makes a lot of sense to me. I can come across as shy or outgoing depending on the situation but I often prefer my own company to hanging out in large groups.

Question 2

I used to have a co-worker who would constantly make inappropriate sexual comments because he thought it was funny. There wasn't anything specific that he said that I objected to. But it was constant and there were times I wished he would just knock it off.

Question 3

I'm not really a fan of social media. I think it's kind of creepy at times, people uploading all kinds of private moments to the Internet, and that can be downright dangerous. My wife is always uploading things to her account about our daughter. I really wish she would stop but she pays me no mind.

Question 4

I'm sure this must have happened to me at some stage but I'm drawing a blank right now. I can't think of a single example.

Question 5

The online game store and social media platform "Steam" was hacked about five years ago. I doubt this made the news but it was big in the world of gaming. Millions of users passwords and credit card details were stolen. I was not among them, thankfully. I was reluctant to use the service for a while but I went right back to using Steam after a brief hiatus.

Question 6

I only use my credit card on my home computer, which has anti-virus software installed on it. And I only use my credit card on sites I know and trust. I also have something like fifty different passwords for all of my online accounts. In the real world, I make a point of shredding any documents that have my personal details on them that I won't need again in the future. Identity theft is big business and I don't want to make things easy for anyone going through my garbage.

Tough Vocabulary

- English -	- Japanese -
introvert	内向的
extrovert	外向的
hang out	あそぶ
object to	気分を害する
knock it off	やめろ
creepy	気味が悪い
pay no mind	気にしない
draw a blank	空白を描きます
a brief hiatus	短いお休み
make a point of	要点を述べる