| Typhoons,
Tiny Fridges, & Sake for the Dead |
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Last night,
a massive typhoon swept over us!!
We closed the school a bit early, as the storm was fast approaching,
and Naomi and I struggled to run to her car, fighting against the forceful
winds that whipped the rain around us. How exciting, I thought, as I
sat, soaked, in the car, asking Naomi a million questions about typhoons
and earthquakes. Apparently, she hadn't seen a typhoon this bad, and
there was a small earthquake yesterday, but I hadn't even felt it!!
She felt it in her apartment, as it's on the 7th floor.
At
home, I got excited to watch the storm, but I couldn't see much from my
rain-soaked glass doors. I could only see the dozens of power lines doing
the wave back and forth, and store banners hanging onto their poles for
dear life. At the 7-11 across the street, people went about their usual
business. In my apartment, the wind loudly rattled the windows and whistled
eerily through any gaps in the door frames. The radio station (which is
Japlish - Japanese AND English) played "I'm only happy when it rains"
by Garbage, and "Here comes the rain again" by Eurythmics. The
DJ was talking Japanese, and then he'd say "R-A-I-N, rain...",
teaching the Japanese listeners the lyrics to the songs.
The
typhoon passed in a few hours, and the next morning, I was awoken early
by the sun and clear blue sky shining through my room! The typhoon had
blown away the past few weeks of coldness and clouds, and left the bluest
sky I had seen in Japan and an outside temperature of 30 degrees (86 Fahrenheit)!
From my balcony, I could even see Mt. Fuji! I spent the day riding my
bike around town in the beautiful sunshine.
I
spent a few days this week dealing with a broken fridge ... having
to buy ice (a ridiculously expensive item in Japan), and put my food on
the ice in huge pots and trash cans out on the balcony so it would stay
cold! (it's pretty cool weather here most days). I also used the work
fridge and just finally got a much smaller replacement today. The new
fridge is so small that I have to kneel to look inside it, but I'm just
grateful to have refrigeration ... a modern wonder I took for granted!
I've been spending Saturdays in Tokyo in the city with a handful of cool
Japanese friends that I've made! We always have a blast, eat lots, and
drink lots, and see a different part of the city each week. I'm really
close with Mayuko, the Japanese girl that I met on the plane last year.
I've stayed at her house twice, and together we are a really crazy, out
of control duo! Her father and her took me sightseeing, out to eat twice,
and to the cemetery to visit her grandmother's grave,
as per tradition on the equinox. We brought her dead Grandma some incense,
flowers, Sake (Jap rice wine) and some sweets to put on the grave. I wondered
if there were cemetery workers who came to collect all the goodies at
night!
Bex
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