The Small Book of Big People (Part 1)

Welcome to this page! 

This is a collection of writing about exceptional people that my great writing students here at Daito Bunka have put together. I have collected them into a small volume I hope everyone who reads it will enjoy. This collection might be small, but the people that the students have written about are big – and the students themselves are big for writing what they have.

For all my students – this is for you!

This is Part 1 of this collection. 

People in our families

The people of our own families inspire us and give us great models for us to live by. They move us in ways we have difficulty saying because they are always there, always a part of our lives, and their feelings are deep for us. They do many things for us, big and small alike. Here are some thoughts about how special they can be.

My father is a hard worker. His personality is tender, hard and honest. He looks serious, always knitting his eyebrows, and has short black hair. His hobby is watch cars, soccer and play golf. He is working for about 30 years. He goes to work early and come back home lately. On the weekend, he looks tired, but he always spends time with us. So I love him and I respect him.

My exceptional person is my mother. She is very kind, and she supports my father.

She loves animals and children. She likes listening to music like me. And she is funny. She is positive. I like the dishes that she cooks. For example, I like her pancakes. It is very delicious. So I want to eat them all the time. She looks good with short hair too. Everyone likes her. Of course, my family loves her.

My exceptional people are my parents. My mother is doing housework and she is working part time job too. It is very hard, but she never says complaint in the presence of a child. I always talk her when have a matter causing. My father is a self-employed person. His work is very hard and tired. But, he is working for us every day. My parents always come in on my side in the end and to help. They think about children in the very first. So I thank them and respect. I want to become parent like them in the future.

My father is kind to anyone and is loved. Because I was educated strictly when I was small, I disliked him. But I understood that all the strictness was for me. He is active in local government. He does so much, but he supports me. He supports me anytime. Therefore I call him a superman. I want to become somebody like him, loved by everyone.

My parents reduce my burden a lot so they are special for me! They are happy to do housework - for example, cooking, dishwashing, and doing laundry. If I live alone, I have to do all things by myself! Fortunately, I live with my family. They work long hours every day six days a week but they take Mondays off. They are sometimes strict for things like to get up late and spend too much money.

Sometimes they take my sister and me somewhere, for example Hakone, Nikko or Tokyo. I enjoy going to famous place with my family, like the Hakone Chokoku-no-mori museum, the Nikko Toshogun, and in Tokyo, Tokyo Tower and Odaiba.  So I respect them very much!    

My older brother Shota is who I look up to. He was enthusiastic about cars for as long as I can remember. Now, he studies at university as a maechanical engineering major and devotes himself to experimenting with cars. I think he was very honest when he was a child, so I believe him every time. With this great effort, he got a job at Toyota. 

My exceptional person is my mother because she is very kind to us and does her best every day. She is very busy with work every day, but she is taking care of us. My family is strong in personality and she brings them all together. When I am troubled, she hears my story and feels with me. So I love her.

I respect my mother the best. She does a lot of housework after she comes back home from work. She does it even if she is tired. I started to live alone in this spring and I found that housework is very hard and difficult for me. So I cannot do it when I am tired. She always makes us amused too, and she cheers me up when I am sad. She is perfect person I have ever met. I want to be like her in the future.

My exceptional person is my mother. My mother is very strict. I was not very good in club, so it bad to my mother. But she encouraged and supported me before than anyone more. But I was not even grateful to mother. I hung in there even if it was hard. Favorite phrase of my mother is “please live healthily.” So I think I would like to return the favor even a little to my mother. Therefore I work so hard to the college life now. Someday, I want to help someone like my mother.

An exceptional person is my mother. She is very good at cooking. Her dishes are more delicious than mine. She and my father have been married for 20 years. I want to get along well in there, too. I thank her very much because they greatly brought me up. I want to become the parent whom a daughter is brought up into magnificently. Therefore I respect my mother.

My older brother’s looks are tall, with natural curls, fair skin, narrow eyes, and is wearing glasses. His personality is positive, gentle, a hard worker, an economizer, cautious, placid, a kind person and a supporter. He is highly focused. His hobby is guitar. His skills are average, but he tries hard. His after school job is a cram school teacher. He teaches English. He teaches me too. So I think he is exceptional.

My parents divorced about 16 years ago, but I have not passed an inconvenient life like not being able to go shopping with my friends or enter the university. I owe to my mother that I can pass a normal life, because my mother worked for me. While I have an older sister who entered the graduate school, so it costs a lot of money, my mother doesn’t whine. Rather she always worries about us.

If I will have a family, I want to be like my mother that works for her family and makes her children happy.

My sister is eleven years old. She is an elementary school student. She doesn’t come to me about her student problem. She enjoys her school. Her personality is active and cheerful. Her looks are tiny but so cute. She is good at sports because she runs fast and is strong too. She is a good soccer player. She belongs to the junior soccer team. This team sometimes goes to play soccer for many places and she is active there. She goes to learn hip-hop. So she dances well. My sister and I don’t quarrel. We often watch TV. I sometimes teach things to her. My sister and I sometimes go eat dinner with my family. We often eat sushi. She is very important people for my friend.

I respect my father because he has a neat personality. He works very hard every day. His brown hair and glasses are very cool. And he helped me with problems when I was in high school. For example when I worried, he gave advice. So I got warm feelings from him and I was able to grow until now, thanks to him. He likes golf, so if I become a golf player, I want to play golf with him. I like him and I want to become like him.

Sachiko is my mother. She balances a part-time job with housework. She is busy every day, but she makes time to talk about things with us a lot. I talk with her and she knows how to laugh and be fun every day. I love her for all the things she does and dream of my becoming a mother like her someday.

My father is the one I respect the most. He is kindly for me since I was a child. His job is as a public officer and working in fire station for twenty years. He is good at sports, and his hobby is running. I think he looks thin. Now, I often talk with him in my home. He cooks well too. He is a precious person in my life.

People in our lives

The people we meet and develop connections and relationships with outside our families, like friends, teachers, and classmates, have a great impact on us. Here are some thoughts on these unique and interesting people, and how they touch our lives.

I respect to the teacher when I was child. Because he taught me to common sense and some play. For example, he taught me to soccer. Teacher was good to soccer and taught me carefully. So I liked to soccer. His personality was positive and honest. He did not lie in front of us. We affected him and we didn’t lie too. I meet teacher. He enjoys talking now. When I become an adult, I want to be a man to be proud like him.

My exceptional person is Ogura Shinsaku. He is a high school teacher and my wind orchestra conductor. Before he became a teacher, he was a chorus conductor. Many students loved him because he was very interesting and awesome for everybody. He helped me when I was difficult to play the oboe. He was my emotional mainstay. So he is my exceptional person.

I respect my friend of my high school days. He was greatly honored by the many people. He always was serious for everything. He belonged to soccer club and practiced very hard. For instance he got up at 5:00, arrived at our school and ran around our school every morning in spite of he have practice after school. He had never missed his morning training. If I am he, probably I’m tired of morning training because I have to practice after school. Then he usually prepared for class after finish his training. So I think his schedule was very busy. I couldn’t imitate his daily routine.

Then he has a lot of friends because he was very friendly and gentle. So I respect him and want to model my life after him.

My respected person is teacher of my junior high school. She was a person who very bright and tender. For example, she always guided the students when they were in trouble. Since she was always smiling, we felt more at ease.

Furthermore, she was a challenger. She participated in an athletic meet with students, even running the marathon. She also participated in a singing contest and appeared on TV. She is still the number one teacher for me even now!

I respect my cram school teacher. He was kindly and reliable. Now, I still often go to meet him and talk about various things. When I was a junior high school student, he taught me English, history and Japanese. His teaching was plain and interesting, so I was easy to understand him. He advised me how to study English. I practiced it and took high score in English tests. Thanks to meeting him, I came to like English. That is why I respect him!

My exceptional person is an office worker in cram school of my working place.  The place name is Rinkai seminar. Everyone called her “Chansan,” but she is Japanese. She looks madam and brown. She was used to secretary. So she is very steady and everyone relies her on. Of course me too. Many students and teachers love her. Though she does not get money, she still works overtime because she always thinks about students. If I am same her situation, I never do it. And she supports me for my dream. For example, she negotiated to get to know to work part-time in my place where I wanted to work in the future. After all, I can’t work there, but I deeply appreciated to her.
She has four people in her family with her husband, daughter, and son. She is housewife. Her daughter was good basketball manager. She guided an interscholastic athletic meet for basketball player. Therefore many offers came to her from the company. Chansan’s son is good basketball player. He participated in an international athletic meet. I think that after all it is her power that was brought up by such children. I want to become a wonderful person being like her sometime. 

I respect my teacher when I was junior high. His name is Akihiko Kurushima. He was my tennis club teacher. He was very strict about manners and practice, so my club was very strict, but it was his affection for us that we could learn about manners. When I graduated from junior high, I knew about that. He was strict out of love, and he told us why people should keep manners. So I respect him.

The person whom I respect is my friend Kaede Suehiro. She is a person from Kansai who came over to Kanto to study. She is an always-spirited girl. She loves people very much and is generous. She tells people immediately what she thinks. I do not speak my feelings so clearly, I respect her for her way of life, even though she is still very shy. There is the one side resembling her, so she is my important friend.


The person I respect is my mother. Because she is kind and personable, giving a lot out of herself.For example, she taught swimming to students. Another thing is that she is beautiful. She has great looks with great hair and a great shape, and I respect her consciousness. She got a part-time job at a convenience store six years ago. It is very hard work because my mother deals with many different kinds of people, but she never loses her humor. 


I respect my high school homeroom teacher who taught us world history. He was tall, slender, with his glasses and short gray hair. His character was strict, funny, and sometimes kind. His class was very interesting but it's difficult for me to understand, but his advice was precise when I talked with him. This is why I respect him. 

If you want to read more, please click for Part 2 of this collection. 

Images: Pattern - "Abstract Flowers" (courtesy of rakratchada torsap)/Old man - "Older Man With Hat" (courtesy of Rosemary Ratcliff)/Woman - "Asian Woman Smiling On The Bedroom Floor" (courtesy of Feelart)/all images from FreeDigitalPhotos.net