Rains, pours

It's Thursday evening and the day has only begun to get interesting! The raw power and awe of nature never fails to humble my thoughts. My expectations were to feel the storm this morning, and when it was only pouring I knew the weather report was slightly off. At work, sudden winds and rain would come and go, but nothing to keep us from heading outside and buying lunch as usual. Later, however, as I was about to head out to the city hall and pick up my alien registration card, things had become much more fierce as I approached the exit near my bike. There are two sets of doors, and as soon as the outer pair had been opened, a rush of wind immediately slammed the inner two shut. Attempts to open them from inside were met with failure until the outer doors had closed again.

Stepping out, I saw rain, but instead of falling down, it was being blown at an acute, near-horizontal angle. Every single person I saw with an umbrella (as is the fashion here, everyone will carry one for rain) was struggling to hold on to it, nevermind that the howling wind had already inverted and made it useless. At this sight, I quickly turned back inside wearing a giant grin on my face - already late to leave, my quest to make it halfway across town on a shit bike in this weather would not only be futile.. I'd be surely killed. My hand-me-down and personal death-trap is a testament to human stubbornness: boasting a rusted chain that has a habit of slipping off at intersections and a front brake that is outperformed by the Flintstonian method of hastily dragging my feet on the ground or nearby objects, it's a miracle I make it alive anywhere in optimal conditions. But hey, I can't complain about the price.

Deciding that tonight wouldn't be the most desirable for death, but not wanting to wake up under my desk tomorrow, I compromised to go home by foot. Always hoping to outdo the Japanese and simultaneously defy their wind-gods, I grabbed my loaner umbrella before heading outside. The trick to keeping an umbrella open in gale-force winds is to firstly remain unafraid of looking like a complete jackass. After all, you are doing something incredibly stupid and by no means trying to hide it - the fact you are a foreigner compounds the absurdity of your situation. Should you fail, it will be remembered by people who live to be 90 years old on average, and they will have a lot of time to tell everyone they know how much of an idiot gaijin you were. The next and final step is to simply walk home with the umbrella. Since you have already conquered yourself, this other task is trivial in comparison.

Friday has just arrived and brought the typhoon with it. According to the weather report I saw earlier, we only experienced the outer, yellow circle.. today will be the red. It's curious, the kanji used alongside the yellow meant "strong" but I've never seen the kanji used alongside the red. My guess is that since it wasn't a big skull, things will be alright. Then again, it could be one of those classical kanji that the Japanese know and foreigners are largely unaware of, ensuring our mass cleansing. Either way, I wonder whether or not my bike will be in the same spot I left it. All I can ask is that nothing freaky happens after crawling into bed - the last thing I want to experience is a sleepless night before going to work and later to Tokyo for another sleepless night. Then again, I'd settle for just waking up not covered in water or broken glass.

Update since I wrote this: I woke up alive (and without even a shard of glass in me). Just some strong wind today and that's all. Off to Tokyo~