Be thankful for chocolate oranges. Terry's delight always reminds me of Christingles at Watermoor Church in Cirencester. However, the chocolate is infinitately tastier than the Satsumas... though I do love a good Satsuma. Interesting, and unknown to many Japanese (their knowledge of their own history is amazingly sketchy considering its the only history they study), Satsuma is the old name of Kagoshima Prefecture. They are amazed when I tell them that Mikan are called Satsumas in English.
The morning at school was fairly normal today. No violence or idiocy that I know of. Though one student seemed to think that asking if I was cold was the funniest thing in the world. Another boy decided I was an unfair teacher after refusing to help him. Well, he says I am metabolic everytime I go near him so I asked him not to say it any more if he wanted some help. Tough luck really.
In the afternoon, after fried Katsu leftovers and cheesy-rice for lunch, we non-homeroom teachers and the Baseball club picked up our rakes, Japanese saws (one is like a sharp knife and the other type is a serrated meat cleaver... a real saw would have been nice but one must keep to Japanese traditions) and moved to the back of the school. There we found a mass of debris, dead trees and general muck. We then proceeded to rake, hack, pull, chop and chuck pieces of wood. After a few hours work we had not really got too far. As a Health and Safety indoctrinated Brit it was left to me to advise students not to walk backwards down as slipery slope with a big tree in their hands, not to jump from a roof onto a pile of debris, not to saw a piece of wood upwards so that if the branch broke the saw would hit them in the face.
With Natsumi getting home late, a dirty and tired blogger stumbled home and onto the couch for a while. This is where those lovely choco-orange slices come in. Scrumdidliumptious. Dinner was a nice selection of sliced tomatoes, mozarella cheese and focaccia. Before that however I turned my attentions to some short stories I wish to get published in 2008. One centres around the Egyptian curse idea. As well many history related issues i've looked into i'll see the conspiracy or idea and then find some coincidences and links missed by the authors... fascinating.