The day I got hit by a car...

Tuesday, April 8

Yes, I was literally run over by a car today. My life incredibly sucks. Read on for the full story...

This morning I emailed Mitch with my words about coffee hour. He later emailed me back and told me at school that they were wonderful and he really liked them! Here it is on Facebook! :)

After that, I went in to eat breakfast with everyone. Miyabi was all excited because today was her first day back at school. She's a ninensei (second year) now! She was wondering what class number she'd be in. She wanted 4 or 5, so she'd be close to the library and she wanted to be with her best friend, Tina.

Then I headed out on my bike to go to school. I noticed how pretty the shrine by our apartment looked last week with the sakura trees in front and it still looked gorgeous today, so I took a picture! All the Japanese people kept saying the sakura only last for a week, but it's been a week and three days now and they're still going strong! Everyone was freaking out, thinking the rain would wash them away, but we actually didn't get that much rain. :)

The entrance closer to our apartment

The entrance closer to the station

Then I continued on my way. I got to a crossing that I cross every day with no problem. I slowed down a bit, because I saw a red car approaching the crosswalk. There's no light telling me to walk or not here, so usually the cars slow to let bikers go. And this car did slow, so I charged ahead. But he must have been looking the opposite direction, because as I accelerated, so did he - a lot! And bam, he slammed right into my side!

Thankfully, I realized I was falling before I hit the ground, so I put my arm out to block my fall. But I landed on my wrist and sprained it badly. The force of the fall caused me to fly off my bike and slide across the road. Thank goodness I'd worn yoga pants instead of tights today! And man, Victoria's Secret makes excellent yoga pants, because they didn't rip at all!

But my knees got completely torn up underneath. I had really bad road rash.

The guy driving got out of the car and kept going "Daijoubu? Daijoubu?"

I just nodded and said "daijoubu" while trying not to cry. Then the crossing guard came over and was like, "daijoubu?" When I said yes, he left. 

There were also a bunch of people around who witnessed the crash, but they all continued on their way, not stopping to see how I was.

The driver had run over the front tire of my bike, so he backed up his car and then helped me pick up my bike. He watched to make sure I could walk and waited until I got on my bike and rode it a little to see if it still worked. It did, so then he left.

Damn, I was so freaked out that I wasn't thinking and couldn't speak Japanese or anything. I really wanted to yell at the guy or something, but I don't know enough Japanese. It was so hard. And the lack of people around doing anything really frustrated me. Like, if this had happened in America, I'm sure someone would have offered to call the police or something!

I kept going and a police officer type of guy who'd been standing at the next corner and saw everything was all like "ki o tsukute ne" when I passed.

The bike seemed a bit wonky, but I figured something was just stuck from the fall, and whatever it was would come out. And anyway, I was almost at the station and I was able to ride it just fine.

I was really freaked about the accident the entire way to school. I met up with Esteban at the subway and told him what happened. The subway was packed again, and the doors took several tries before they could finally close.

At school, Taylor and Minju were in the CJS office and I told them what had happened and they freaked out! Minju gave me a hug, which was just what I needed! Then I told the CJS office and Mitch told me to go to the clinic. I said I would, but I was going to take my quiz first because I didn't want to get a 0 on it. 

When I got to class, I told Kondo sensei I was going to the clinic after the quiz. Everyone freaked out when I told them what had happened. I took the quiz and it was super easy, and then I left to the clinic.

The lady at the clinic was so nice! She asked me all these questions about the accident, like where it had happened and stuff. I realized then that I hadn't gotten any information about the guy like his name or cell or license plate number or anything! I was so freaked out I didn't even think of it.

But the lady gave me one of those cold square sticky things the people in manga always have on their foreheads when they have fevers, to put over my wrist. And then she disinfected my knees and put bandages over them. Then she put these weird gauze sack things over my wrist and knees. I felt much better after that.

And then I was allowed to go back to class! The cold thing on my wrist was so nice. My wrist hurt a lot for a bit after, but by the end of the day it was feeling so much better!

All bandaged up!

For second period, we had class in K buidling. I freaked out because the room looked just like the classrooms in manga, haha. And I got there first, so I stole a seat by the windows! :)

See the protagonist's seat back there?

The erasers that look like sushi!

And the colored chalk!

Ah, it was beautiful! In class, after our kanji test (which was easy), we played a kanji game where we had cards with various kanji radicals and we had to put them together to make kanji from our chapter. It was fun!
I got second place!! First was the Taiwanese girl, of course!

Sakura out the window on the stairs

At lunchtime, I went to eat misokatsu at Dagane. I sat with Josephine and Jose and this other girl who I see a lot (she's in my calligraphy class), but who's name I don't know. There were so, so many people eating lunch!
There was a girl at the table next to us who's birthday was today, and a group of her friends came in and surprised her with a cake and a present of lip gloss! It was so cute! Then they all sang "Happy Birthday" in English. For some reason, "Happy Birthday" is always sung in English in Japan...?

After lunch, I walked outside and ran into Emma. I followed her to the green area where she'd eaten lunch and we sat there for a bit. Rana, Ben, and Devon found us there and sat with us and ate the bentos they'd gotten from Valor, a grocery store nearby. I told everyone the story of my accident and they were so surprised I was so upbeat and joking around about it! The scariness had worn off and it seemed kind of funny now. I'd been hit by a car! #shitthathappensinJapan

The beautiful sakura

In hanga class, I drew Totoro! I'm excited to carve him next week. :D

After class, I had a meeting with Fukutomi sensei, my project work sensei, to make up for the class I'd missed last Friday. I went to the CJS faculty office at 3, when we were supposed to meet, and finally got up the guts to use the microphone outside the office to ask for Fukutomi sensei. Another sensei came out to tell me she was still teaching class. So I went outside the office where I ran into Yukari! She asked what I was doing and when I told her, said she thought Fukutomi sensei's office was on the 7th floor. So we went up there, but it turned out those were all offices of English senseis. Yukari asked two people up there, but they didn't know who Fukutomi sensei was. So we went back downstairs, and as we entered the CJS office, Fukutomi sensei was coming out of the faculty room. Oh, good! I said goodbye to Yukari and then explained to Fukutomi sensei what had happened. She apoligized for being late.
Then she had me practice saying my interview questions and told me to interview at least two Japanese students by Friday. Ok, I can do that!

As I was leaving, I ran into Deanna who told me Minju had told her about my accident. She asked if I was okay and gave me a hug. People here are so nice! ^^ Also, Mitch let me know one of his colleagues had called my host family (whaaaat?? I hadn't wanted to worry them! I was waiting to tell them face to face so they could see I was fine!) and Yuko had said they could take me to the hospital if needed. Oh, gosh! I didn't want this to turn into such a big deal!
I went to the library to write my blog for a bit and then headed home. As I rode my bike home, I noticed something was definitely off. Every few seconds, the front wheel would catch on something and slow me down. It turned out the wheel was tilting one way and kept rubbing against the brake pad. It took me forever to get home.
I decided something was definitely wrong with it.

When I got home, Yuko made sure I was okay. I told her I definitely didn't need to go to the hospital because I could use my arm fine, so it wasn't broken. Then I told her that I didn't think the bike was okay, so she said she'd ask Ken to look at it tomorrow.

Argh, this is turning into such a hassle!

For dinner we had fried peppers with beef inside. They were good! We had salad, soup, and rice too! It was such a big, yummy dinner that filled me up! :) Miya told me she'd gotten into class #1. I was like, "aww, not by the library?" And she was unhappy about that. I asked her what class Tina had gotten and she said 4. That was the one she had wanted! Aw, man. I felt bad for her.

Tomorrow our class is during the CJS festa, so we'll just be talking to Japanese students during class! Yay!! I'm so excited! And that means we only have to be at school at 1:30! Whoooo!!
But I had the idea in hanga today to go for lunch at Sushiro, so Minju, Emma, and I are all going to meet at 11:30 tomorrow morning to eat there. Yay, I get to sleep in! 


Also, here are the links for the pep rally movies I uploaded to YouTube (because they weren't working on my blog). Please watch them!

Shirtless football players for the ladies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAa8McKyFNc

Cheerleaders for the guys:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUveIgohIOw

And cheerleaders singing what I think is our school song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0T3MHFh4cA