Friday, November 18, 2005

Japan life - Autumn

Finally I can stop carping about the intense heat and go straight into carping about the intense cold. Well, ok, not really intense but building up to there I think. Japanese houses don't really do much to keep the heat in. I've taken to pestering my students to help me figure out which option says "heat" on the air-conditioner/heater remote. When in my house I bundle up attractively in track pants, t-shirt and some sort of hoodie (hoody?). I'm afraid to get out of bed in the mornings because I don't want my bare feet to touch the cold wooden floor. I miss the "ondol" heating system in Korea (where the entire floor is heated).

On Monday, on my usual drive to work, I spent half of the drive behind a white sedan. While this in itself isn't anything interesting the antics the driver was going through were. He spent that entire half hour slapping and/or hitting himself. And I mean the entire half hour. The slapping and hitting were pretty much continuous. At one point I actually saw him ball his hand into a fist and then, ram himself with it. In the rare 2 seconds he wasn't doing this, he would run his hand through his hair. I don't know, maybe there was a bee or wasp in the car with him. Or maybe he has some strange driving rituals. Who knows?

Anyhoo, I hope this post find all of you who read it well! Cheers!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I read it I read it! unfortunately this does not find me well as I am also huddling into my poorly-insulated japanese apartment with a nasty cold. your post reminded me of my day today standing waiting for the bank machine watching a guy look at himself in a mirrored wall shooting himself with his hands and making gun noises for 5 minutes straight. he was still doing it when I left. and he was like 35 years old not 5. hmmmm kevin