Week 21: Being sick means I don't want to be productive.

Sooo! I didn't write last week! Why? Because I was sick.  This is the story of how I became sick.

First of all, it was cold.

It was cold enough to snow.  It didn't!  But it was cold enough, which is a little frustrating.  I kept shifting layers to try and find the right level of "warm" mixed with "professional"

Monday, I booked it from work straight to the church, because one of my new friends was getting baptized!

I had NO idea this church had a font

yaaay!

I did not get her the flowers. I did not know this was a thing.

The week was fairly busy.  In one school, I helped with the "after school" craft club.

Yes, all girls. Boys could enter, but they wanted to do science or cooking.

I taught some of them finger knitting.  After taking a little to remind myself how to. :)  It was really fun because one of the teachers in charge would shove the kid at me, probably saying something like "she'll show you how!" and the kid would look at me with real trepidation and fear.  And I would demonstrate and walk them through it with really basic English and sound effects, and they did pretty well! :)

Thursday, I headed into Osaka, because my Wednesday/Thursday school was having an anniversary, so they were having a festival, with no teaching, and so I had what is commonly known as "an office day".  Now, anything can happen on an office day. If there are enough of you, you might be asked to do video demonstrations.  One guy apparently made photocopies all day.  Me, they sat down at a desk and said "Here, lesson plan"

....

THANKS.

So I lesson planned and lesson planned.  I'll admit, I did have SOME to do, but...not 8 hours worth!  When lunchtime came around, they told me I didn't even have to leave the office to eat my lunch.  I explained that I hadn't brought mine, so, darnit, I would have to go out and WALK AROUND and get my lunch.

When I came back, I was all lesson planned out, and so I read my book.  They didn't seem to care.  I gotta tell you though, even just lesson planning...I never want an office job, because my butt was growing ROOTS by the end!  OY.

Also, I don't think my body agrees with office time, because Friday I could feel myself getting a little sick.  I still kept busy.  I needed little figures for a map lesson I'm doing soon, so I made minions!

He's adorable!

FEAR my army!

There are only 18, so the kids will use them in partner work, but I think they'll enjoy it anyhow. I wanted to use googly eyes, but couldn't find any small enough.

I also got some sideways looks because I had the chance to finally catch up on some of the flash cards this school DOESN'T have, so I printed and laminated about 3 lessons worth of flash cards!  And of course they were some of the more prolific lessons, so the people were looking like "HOW much is she going to laminate?  Don't get too close! She'll laminate you next!"

And *I* was thinking "HEY! Not my fault your school doesn't have cards! I'm doing you a favor!"

But they now have more cards, so it is better.

I headed home, hoping my illness would just be a little thing got over quick.

Saturday, it seemed like I was right!  I was feeling a little slow, but better than Friday, and ready to do stuff!

So I went to Nara!

Nara deer!

it was cold, but we were bundled, and had lots of fun.  There were lots of deer of course,  It's Nara.

They're not shy

BABY DEER (in a ditch)

These are deer cakes, for the deer. not of the deer.

We saw the museum, and some shrines

These are "soul lanterns" I hear they light the way for the dead. You don't see a light? Be glad. That means you're alive.

Then there was the real reason we were there.

FIRE

See, this was the time of "cleansing fire"  This particular bonfire is to burn the religious symbols they used to celebrate New Years.  Can't just throw that stuff away, that's disrespecting it. So they had guys there to chant and sanctify the fire and disposal of the items.

I want those hakima.

I hope they're not cold.

People are kept at a distance.

And then found the mountain where the big to-do was going down and ...had ice cream.

"With the angel, the messenger of happiness, as our symbol, we have contributed to a richer life."

Because it was GOOD

The mountain was a little anti-climactic, it was more a hill.

You can tell it was steep by the lean everyone had to use.

But there were people drumming!

And that was pretty neat.

Sunset was a ways off, so we decided to catch some dinner and then come back and peg a good spot before the mountain (hill) got too crowded.  Of course, it decided to drizzle a bit on us. 

my festival friend

And then there was a procession with cool fire and lots of chanting in Japanese.

And then after ANOTHER long while, the came and set off a bonfire closer to US

And then it sleeted for about 10 minutes.  YUP.  SPIFFY.

We COULD feel the warmth from the bonfire, so that was nice.

And then there were fireworks!

LOTSA fireworks.

And THEN, they FINALLY set the mountain on fire!

TOOK them long enough!

BURN!

Only...it didn't want to burn.  They were waving LIT TORCHES in DEAD GRASS and it was having trouble catching.  (sleet, remember?)  it would catch and kinda crawl along, and then die down a little and another section would start up and...we finally left when we saw it was going to be a while.

It was still a fun night, but we were COLD.

We headed back to our homes, and even though I cranked the heat up, I still had to clutch my heated rice pack when I went to sleep.

I'm going to guess that's why I felt like an exhausted version of death on Sunday. :)

All better now!