I grew up in a small village. I am the second child of the family, and my sister is the eldest. Our house is on the main street of the village so I always saw a lot of people on the streets There were farmers, fishermen, and a few merchants in the village. My sister and I used to play with the next-door children; their father is an elementary school teacher.

　　Sometimes when we played together in the house we made so much noise that my mother wanted us to play outside, so we went to the seashore to look for crabs and clams, and pretty seashells, too. Also, we enjoyed running on the beach chasing each other.

　　On breezy days we used to enjoy flying kites on the beach. When I look back on my early life in the village, I feel I had a happy childhood.