Is This Normal?

 Last week I started a new blood pressure medicine. For a week, I felt alright, but yesterday I started to feel awful.

My weekly schedule isn't very busy. Tuesday and Wednesday, I go to the other city to teach a few classes. I know that on Thursday I'm going to be a little tired from that, so I make Thursday my easy day. 

Yesterday, however, I felt totally exhausted. Not just I've done too much, and my body feels tired, but more like I was drugged.

My alarm went off at 5am, I couldn't get out of bed; the room was cold, which makes it harder to get up. I felt like I was in a fog; I couldn't think clearly at all. I managed to drag myself out of bed, but just making an obento and breakfast felt like an enormous task. I often joke that I'm like a zombie in the mornings. Yesterday, I really was in zombie mode, I watched as the sausages burnt, I couldn't think what to do! I went back to bed and slept all morning. I managed to write a post, but I think there were many mistakes. I didn't even try to make lunch!

David made a quick lunch, I slept again after that. 

Mikey and I left at about 2:30, my first class was at 4 oclock. 

When we got to the community centre, the room I use was being used for an emergency meeting. Also, I was feeling a lot worse, completely drugged, throwing up, and my head started to pound. Mikey cancelled classes and changed his classes so we could come home early.

I went to bed before 10 p.m., slept until midnight, then woke up for the toilet and slept until 5 a.m. I managed to make obento and breakfast, I felt a tiny bit better than yesterday. But I needed to sleep again after.

David decided to change his room around this morning, a lot of banging, running the vacuum cleaner and cats fighting, but I slept through most of it!

I made a good lunch. Whenever I feel a bit off, I always think good, healthy food will help.

I made hamburgers, rice, salad, tofu and avocado salad plus a tomato soup.

Good lunch.

It was until I put ketchup on my salad instead of mayonnaise.

Why?

I called Hannah this afternoon and asked her to call the pharmacy about the medicine. She did that, but they couldn't help, so she called the doctor. I have an appointment for tomorrow morning, good!

It's likely the medicine, since it's the only thing that changed last week. All of the important numbers from the blood check were okay, the doctor didn't see any red flags for other problems.

I know I'm blowing this out of proportion, but all yesterday and today, I kept thinking about my Mom and Hisao. Mom was 64 when she died, I'll be 64 this year! Two days before Hisao passed away, I noticed he wasn't looking well, his colour was off, I asked if he was alright, he said yes, just very tired! That's what has been going through my head the past two days!

I'm going to have a little walk in the garden now, change my air a bit, it might help!

Fifteen Years

 There are some events that are etched into our collective memory.

I remember people saying that they remember exactly where and what they were doing when President Kennedy was assinated. I can remember what I was doing when Princess Diana died. These memories shape and define us as a people.

One event that is seared on to the collective memory of the people in Japan, both Japanese and foriengers is the disaster of March 11th, 2011.

Even though I live in Japan, I'm at the opposite end of the country and had no idea about the earthquake and tsunami intil one of students told me about it.

My student was a young lad, maybe 4th grade, his lesson was from 4 o'clock. He came but was acting very subdued, he was always full of energy but that day was the oppoistie. I asked what was wrong thinking that he had caught a cold or was tired from school. He said that his Dad had gone to Tokyo but there had been an earthquake and his Dad wasn't answering his phone. I told the lad not to worry that Tokyo is prepared for earthquakes and his Dad would be okay. The lad told me to go and watch the TV, he then added in English "Bad, very bad". That last phrase made me pause, he had never used English before! I turned on the TV and was shocked at what I saw.  The lads father was alright but it took a few days for him to contact the family.

The scenes on the TV were like something out of a movie. 

The intial earthquake struck at 2:46, off the Pacific coast of the Tohoku region of northern Japan. The earthquake was a megathrust quake, it was measured at magnitude 9, one of the strongest ever recorded in Japan, the fourth largest recorded in the world! The quake was so large that the island of Honshu moved 2.4 meters (7ft10ins) east and the earth moved on its axis by estimates of between 10 and 24cm   (4 and 10 ins). There were a lot of foreshocks and of course after shocks. 

I found this video on Youtube that gives an idea of the extent of the earthquakes.

Have your volume on when you watch this.

The earthquake alone was very bad but what followed made it even worse. 

A tsunami that took out whole towns. 

It's hard to imagine the scale of the distruction caused by the tsunami. I remember watching as buildings, houses, cars, trucks were washed away. I tend to think of the structures that are built are strong but not against such a force of nature. 

The last disaster that day was the Fukushima Nuclear power plant that went into meltdown. 

This is only my understanding, I might be wrong and if I am, I'm sorry.

When the earthquake happened the safety measures that are built into the power plant went into action. The nuclear rods were being lowered into the cooling water, this was powered by a diseal generater. This would have been fine if the tsunami hadn't breached the sea wall. The tsunami knocked out all power so the nuclear rods weren't cooled down leading to the melt down.

That day remains in my memory. I cried as I watched families realise that their loved ones weren't coming home, and what made it worse for a lot of people was the fact that people had been washed out to sea, their bodies never to be found. 

People lost everything, loved ones, pets, houses and jobs. I wondered how do you start again from nothing? 

It has taken many years, but the area today has recovered. There are still signs of the destuction caused by that natural disaster, but after 15 years I think people have been able to rebuild lives. Not the lives they had before but lives that bring some joy and maybe a new respect for the earth.

That area of Tohoku is sesimetcally active, there are earthquakes almost every month, most are small, just a 1 or 2. I don't think I could live there. I'm amazed at the people of Japan, their resilisance in the midst of such massive disasters is something to be admired. 

There are a lot of videos on YouTube about this day. Some are fascinating to watch, the skyscrapers in Tokyo look like they are dancing. The cranes on top of Skytree wave like flags, I flet sorry for the operators in them. One mad me smile, it's from inside Tokyo Tower, you can hear the annocement saying "There's an earthquake!", with the way the tower was swaying that was obivious.

Other videos are more harrowing, watching people being washed away in their cars, knowing that you are watching the last few minutes of their lives is awful (those videos I turned off). Some show the heroics of ordinary people as they pulled strangers onto buildings or up the side of hills. 

Today at 2:46 I will stop, bow my head and offer a prayer for the people of that area. I will pray that the survivors will find the strength for another year. 

Sorry if there are any mistakes in this post, I'm not feeling to great plus the app that I use to check spellings and grammar decided not to work today!

Japanese Word Play

 I don't know if other languages have this, but the Japanese language tends to have a lot of puns or word plays.

The ones I like are the word plays using numbers.

Today is March 10th, which can be read as san gatsu toka, literally 3 month 10th day. Which makes today Sugar Day. Taking the "sa" from san and the "to" from toka makes "sato" the Japanese for sugar. This was started in 1991 by the Sugar Industry Association. 

One supermarket that I use has meat sales on the 29th of each month (except February, when the sale is on the 28th). Reading the numbers two and nine is ni and ku; niku is the Japanese word for meat.

Another one is to do with the layout of calendars. 

The 15th day is always above the 22nd. This makes the 22nd short cake day in Japan. Short cake is a basic sponge cake, not the English shortcake biscuit. Usually, strawberries are used as a decoration on short cakes.

The numbers one and five are ichi and go in Japanese; ichigo means strawberry. Because the 15th is above the 22nd, like a strawberry on a cake, the 22nd is shortcake day!

Is that a good enough reason to buy cake on the 22nd of each month?

Making Plans

 I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Hannah and I are making plans to go to Tokyo in the summer. The musical Sunset Boulevard will be playing for a couple of weeks, and Hannah really wants to see that.

The tickets went on sale last Saturday. Hannah managed to get two good tickets, very expensive but I think worth it. She also managed to book a hotel and flight at a reasonable price. The only problem is that the hotel is about an hour away from the theatre, changing trains many times to get there. I'm glad I'm going with Hannah as I don't know if I could deal with that by myself!

It should be an interesting visit. I haven't been to Tokyo since I arrived in Japan, 35 years ago.  I guess it's changed a lot. I was never really interested in going, big cities always feel the same: too many people, too much noise, and everything always seems to be a lot more expensive.

In Tokyo, many years ago.

We are making plans for the other days we will be there. I really don't want to see all the real touristy places, just the thought of the crowds and the heat and humidity makes me panic!

One area that I've read about is the Tokyo booktown, Jinbocho. There are over 130 bookstores; some sources say there are 200 stores. Of course, most are Japanese bookstores, but there are also foreign bookstores. Most are 2nd handstores, but there are also new bookstores as well, plus some stores that sell rare books.  One store that I saw on YouTube is a cat bookstore, so of course, we want to visit that.

I don't know what else Hannah wants to do. She said that watching the musical is the most important thing for her. She loves museums about education or the Show period, maybe we can find something like that. Then, of course, there is always shopping, more like window shopping!

I have to start training to deal with all the walking and the heat/humidity. 

Is it crazy to make these plans? Maybe. But I know I always put off doing things because of ....many excuses! Not enough money, well, that isn't going to change overnight, but I am working on it. Haven't lost weight, well, I can try, I have a few months. It's going to be hot and humid; that isn't going to change. It'll be hot and humid here as well.

I'm at the time in my life when I realised that time is important. We aren't guaranteed tomorrow. I need to make the most of the time I have now, doing things that I want to do, things that bring joy to my life. 

One reason I'm thinking like this is, is the news of a lady I knew, who passed away a few days ago. She was just 70 years old and had been battling cancer for 5 years. That's so sad, from about my age, she was dealing with cancer, hospital stays, chemo and radiation therapy, constantly not feeling well and not having energy to do things. 

So I'm going to live in the here and now, make crazy plans, spend time with those that I love. Also, take care of myself so I can make the crazy plans come true.

Does anybody else have crazy plans?

Japanese Comfort Food VS English Comfort Food

 Yesterday it was so cold. I think it only got to about 10°C; of course, it felt colder in the house!

I decided to make some comfort food for lunch. Something warming, filling, and just feels right on a cold March day.

I made Butadon, Pork Donburi. 

Donburi is a rice dish in one bowl. Lovely, soft, steamy rice topped with either beef, pork, chicken, pork cutlets or vegetables.

For a pork donburi, I cook onions and thinly sliced pork in dashi, then add the usual flavourings: sugar, soy sauce, mirin (sweet sake), and sake. I like the sauce to be a little bit sweet, so I add more mirin. When David makes it, he adds more soy, just personal taste.

To go with this, I made a pot of miso soup. I love miso soup; it's so easy to make and is a good way of adding a few more vegetables to the meal. My kids say that my soup is more like a stew as I put in so many vegetables!

A small side salad rounded out the meal nicely,

Butadon, miso soup and salad, nice lunch.

I ate a lot at lunch, so I wasn't that hungry in the evening. I remembered that I had a tin of baked beans in the cupboard. In the UK, these are standard food; here in Japan, they are a luxury. One tin costs about 500 yen, almost £3. I bought these beans a couple of months ago, so I decided that beans on toast for dinner would be another comfort food for me. This was more about nostalgia. I love Japanese food, but sometimes I just want something English, something that takes me back to my childhood! Maybe not that healthy, but it hit the spot!

Beans on toast with some sausages and mushrooms.

I'm wondering what comfort foods other people enjoy. Drop me a comment!

The Storage Room

 Is a disaster!

The storage area is a large building that has two floors. Most of the downstairs is for parking cars, especially if there's a typhoon.  Part of the downstairs was changed into an office, but it isn't really usable, too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter. Then there's the upstairs, which is one big room. I've often thought it would be nice to convert it so it could be used for something, but there are massive gaps in the walls and between the walls and the roof. It has become home to many different creatures. This time of year, it's okay, but in the summer, I get very nervous about moving things about because I have no idea what is going to run out.

I haven't been upstairs in months. I think the last time was when Hannah came home to find somethings she was storing here. I went today, and it is a real mess. Part of it is things just being moved around without thought of stacking boxes or throwing out stuff that is not useful. Also, David and Mikey had to move a lot of boxes to get to the chest of drawers that I needed for my room.

This is a little video I took, it might be jumpy in places because I was tripping over stuff!

One of the biggest problems for me is the stairs to the 2nd floor. They are very steep and don't have any handrails at all.  Even when I was younger, I found the stairs challenging; now they are almost impossible. I only go upstairs if there's someone to go with me. I can't carry anything down; the person who goes up with me has to help carry stuff down. Today it was Christopher.

Looking down the stairs, scary.

I took a little video of what was once the office. It needs cleaning out as well. The doors at the end of the video are from the original house, so about 70 years old!

Then there is the outside!

Oh bother!

Christopher moved the branches that were cut down ages ago; he hopes that it'll be dry enough to burn them next week. At least where the branches were looks a lot better.

The branches were dumped here; it looks a lot better.

Looks like my "to-do" list has gotten longer!

Just Sam

 I don't know why, but one of my ginger cats has taken to sleeping in my room.

He knows that he is only allowed on my bed or the windowsill. At the moment, there's a big box in my room that he has claimed. It's a set of drawers for Hannah, so it'll be gone soon!

When David isn't working at night, I ask him to take Sam to his room, but Sam won't settle at all. He has to be on my bed, on me!  

At first, I was annoyed with him; he sleeps in the middle of the bed, and I have to keep pushing him to one side so I can stretch my legs a bit. But somehow it's become comforting. In the evenings when I'm sitting on my bed reading or watching TV, Sam curls up on my lap and starts to purr. That sound actually calms me a lot! Even if I've had a hard day or am feeling a bit down because of the usual worries (too many bills and not enough money, how to get this house fixed, how to......whatever the latest crisis is), the sound of Sam purring, the feel of his soft fur is like a balm to my soul, I stop thinking, I breathe deeply and tell myself that in this moment nothing is bad. I think that is the beauty of cats, only now is important. They don't fuss about next month's bills, about the house being a constant mess because of dust and spider webs; they just are. I need to be more in the moment. I'm always regretting past decisions, things I can't change and worrying about the future and all the "what ifs" out there. My what-ifs get crazy if I let them. The latest one is what if there's a massive earthquake. Why am I wasting time and energy worrying about a natural phenomenon that I can't stop! I can prepare, have water and food on hand, a first aid kit (which I need to check), but other than that, what can I do?

My evening with Sam have really helped me. When he is looking for love and to be played with, I put my book down or turn off the TV and really focus on him; that's when the magic happens. It's just such a relaxing feeling; it has helped me to unwind at the end of the day.

Just a little video of Sam on the box.