Well I don’t have a whole lot to blog talk about based on this weekend. I caught a cold from the kids and was down with it since Thursday. At least it wasn’t the flu. There are a ton of kids at both elementary school and junior high who have had the Japanese Influenza strain. They are very worried about it here. I had as many as 10 kids missing from each class last week with it. Well, thankfully I am on the mend now. I was so happy that I brought Canadian cold medication with me here. Any medication that you get in Japan is a very low dosage compared to North America. I noticed that with pain killers from my various trips to the hospital this year as well. Japanese bodies are just much different from North American ones. That may sound obvious but there a lot of differences you wouldn’t think of. Blood types for example. In North America, O is the universal donor type but in Japan it is A. Strange eh? It takes away from the whole concept of a universal blood type. I wonder who started referring to it as universal, us or them? Well in case, we were both wrong.
Since I stayed home from Friday till Sunday, I got a chance to catch up on my sleep and the news. In Japan right now, they were about to change the laws to state that a woman could become Empress of Japan, since no male heir has been born since the 1960s. But in recent days, it has become known that the Princess Masako is carrying a male baby so they have stopped all government action to change the law in the favour of the princess and have begun campaigning to allowing ascension to the throne to skip a generation instead. The child has not yet been born and Princess Masako (the mom to be) is 40 years old. I think this is a bit of a gamble on the part of the Japanese government. Princess Masako gave birth to a little girl five years ago, the Princess Aiko, but apparently she is not in good health. She has some kind of toddler depression. Apparently the royal family is supposed to be descended from the sun goddess at the beginning of time or some such thing. Historians agree though, that the same family line without a break has been at the head of Japan for 1500 years. That’s quite impressive coming from a young country like Canada. The throne itself is called the Chrysanthemum Throne. The only daughter of the current reigning couple, Princess Nori, has chosen to marry a government official so she will be pronounced a commoner as soon as the marriage is official and is out of the running even if the laws are changed in her favour. Apparently, 80% of those surveyed by a Japanese newspaper are in favour of changing to a female monarch. I don’t know how reliable news paper polls can be but it wouldn’t surprise me if this were accurate. I think the Royal family here is a lot like the Royals in England. The decision making government is lead by Prime Minister Kozumi. They seem to be basically a figurehead but people like having them around for the pageantry of it all. I think it’s cool too. Even if I don’t agree with male centred power structure, I still like to see Japan observing yet another time honoured tradition.
That’s pretty much all the news. Gisela broke her foot last week at the gym and is now in the strangest cast I have ever seen. It has a heel so she can’t wear a sock with it. So she is off the snow boarding for a few weeks. I haven’t given it another shot yet. I need to get back on that before the season is over. I can’t fairly say I don’t like it after giving it only one try. I found out that I can drive to Nigata about two or three hours north of here and get on a ferry with the car. From there I can go to the far north of Japan, in Hokaido. It would be nice to drive around up there for a few days. And they have free onsens which I still have not tried.
Today's pictures are of the art made by grade three students at Seba elementary. They ahd to make pictures of themselves using texture, rubbings, and stamping. I thought these were great. I like the first one because of the huge fang the kid has. The last two are of a kid brushing his teeth which the do constantly at school and of a kid who is sick. When you are sick, you have to wear a mask. I should be wearing one today but I don't want to. I guess I think its a little weird. I'll think about it...