Week 41: I got sick again.

bleeegh. I dislike being sick.

I was recovering from my day of sickness last week so well, when Thursday, I started feeling...Less well.  I tried to brush it off, but by school time on Friday, I was feeling pretty icky.  I even stayed in and took a nap on my desk for lunch!  (thank heavens for Japan length lunches that let me do that!)  The funny thing about that was...
So. Last Friday, it was beautiful out, so for lunch recess, I went out to hang out with the students.  One girl in particular latched onto me, and asked me (mostly through gestures) to join in.  So I did! I ran around, I hung from bars, I climbed the jungle gym, it was lots of fun.  This Friday I (obviously) didn't feel like it.  During cleaning time, the little girl came into the teacher's room and talked at me (in Japanese) and the only words I could understand were "Kim Sensei" and "dokko" (where?) So I'm guessing she was asking where I was.  I mimed that I was sick and she looked sympathetic at me, patted me on the shoulder and left. :)  It was nice to be missed. :)

Let's see! Interesting things from this week... Well, rainy season has started. This doesn't mean that it rains EVERY day, but it does rain often, and it is really humid. One side effect of this is that many of the little garden patches in town are being turned into rice paddies!

he's weeding it.

I have no idea if this is a neighborhood thing or WHAT, but they really care for their garden patches.  After the ground is flooded and weeded, they plant seedlings.

by hand.

And of course the local fauna moves in.

This could also explain why there are so many mosquitoes...

The students are also growing stuff, but they seem do to this year round. Still, it was fun to see them empty out their old pots and re-fill them!

I think these might be tomatoes?

these are usually flowers.

Anyhow, I decided to get into the whole "growing things" trend and bought myself an eggling.  It's a little egg with all you need to grow some stuff inside it.  All you gotta do is crack it open and water it!  I got Basil.

I hope it turns out better than poor Albert.

And for fun, I took pictures to document its growing!

little wormies!

this is daily, so they're growing fast.

Look at all that green!

I had to thin it out.

They're happy!

I make sure to put it out on the balcony every day so it can get some sun, and after a while I will transplant it into a pot and REALLY pray that I don't kill it.

Something else the students are doing, some of mine are learning to sew!  By hand!

look at them go!

It's REALLY basic stitches, and not really pretty, but they each have a little sewing kit and learn how to thread their needles and right now they're making an apron!

there's the sewing kit and the apron kit next to it.

He's sewing his name onto it so he can find his kit later.

And it was just so neat to see them doing this so...confidently!  (Hey! American schools!)

I also got to see them do an address to the students, giving recognition awards to some students, and reminding them of some basic school manners

like putting your umbrella away appropriately so there's space for everyone.

The kids loved this especially because the teachers play acted it, and the kids got to see them wearing randoseru (the elementary style backpack)

I loved it because I got to see how well they behave in an assembly again.

this part was kid run.  They do so well.

So it didn't rain every day. In fact, we got some very sunny days.  We almost got hit with a serious storm once.

which made for some lovely clouds

And Friday, sick or not, I had to go to the local mall to pick something up.  I treated myself to Ice cream, and the Baskin Robbins was having a special!  Get two scoops, get the third free!

Woo!  Just what you need when you're sick!

So that was nice.

Here is a dramatic re-enactment of what I did Saturday.

You can't hear the whining though

Except  I was feeling better Saturday evening, so I went with some people from the share house to see the fireflies.  It was close, and an easy walk.  Unfortunately, despite attempts to the contrary, you cannot schedule fireflies, so we saw only a couple.  I did take a picture though.

Enjoy!