Hey my not-so-many peops!
Bikky here! It has been a few years since I last posted. So, what has changed? While I still have the same job- teaching English in public schools-, my schools have been changed around. And, well, last year was a doozy. But, let's start with a timeline of my last 3, almost 3.5 years here.
For my first 3 years here, I was teaching English at two elementary schools and a partner kindergarten to one of those schools. So that you know, kindergartens are not part of the elementary schools, but do share the same principal with their partner elementary school. Nursery school, on the other hand, refers to a pre-elementary school that is a mix of daycare and kindergarten. While they feed into local elementary schools, they are not partnered with one particular elementary school.
During my time at these two elementary schools and kindergarten, the elementary school, at whose partnered kindergarten I taught, acted as my "main school", where I would turn in and receive paperwork from my city's public school system. I was also given my first apartment from the city education program near that main school. It was fun to see my kids outside of school; however, it became uncomfortable to me partially because I am naturally an introvert. I tend to regulate how visible my private life is for others and will become more anti-social when there is too much visibility. So, for that reason and a few others, I quickly became overwhelmed with issues related to my apartment.
Being a "good employee", I tried to grit my teeth and bare with the problems...Ok, let's be honest. I blamed a lot of the issues on myself rather than acknowledging that they originated in areas outside of my control.
Yet, I have really, really loved all of my schools past and present. I still love the staff and kids at my former schools. As a result, a dilemma began to rise in me: I wanted to be a steady, hardworking teacher and coworker, but I was crumbling beneath my public and personal facade.
By June of last year, I was spent and broken-figuratively and literally. A failed dating relationship, a horribly messy apartment, constantly sick, sharp pain randomly shooting up my hand from an (misdiagnosed) injury sustained while snowboarding a few months prior, some irreparable banking issues at home. I was burnt black like a campfire marshmallow gone wrong. All I wanted to do was refocus on art while maintaining my residency here in Japan. I needed something and fast, because I was no longer in an emotional state where I could continue teaching.
Did I mention that my hand injury came a mere month after the pain from a previous hand injury- which was an oddly placed dog bite sustained during May of the year before - had finally disappeared? Yeah, my medical experience here is a whirlwind for another time.
I considered other employment options, none of which were feasible for my dream, yet, I really didn't want to leave my teaching position. SO, I was out of options...I thought. I prayed for guidance and realized that I needed companionship at home.
After my first day of summer work (since teachers in Japan get no summer vacation off), I was walking to my local train station to meet a great friend for dinner when I heard kitten mews. Mew, mew, mew! Figuring nothing would be wrong, I went investigating because, well, I can't leave cats stranded if they need help. Good thing I did because 2 little, barely walking kittens were alone under a tree. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to take them if Mama would come back, but it was too hot of a day to leave them be.
I called my friend, telling her what happened, and then contacted the one of my superiors in my English teaching program. I waited some time for the mama cat to show up. She never did. Once the kittens stopped mewing as often, I decided that it was time to take them and find food for them. I tucked them into my sheer cardigan and headed to the train station, where I met up with my friend and went two stops over on the train to find the nearest pet shop. (We bought an inexpensive plastic box to carry the kittens around prior to boarding the train-FYI)
After buying food for them and ourselves and other kitten necessities, my friend and I headed home and eventually split off from each other....at which point, I found a third kitten. Based on how quiet all three became as I placed the newly found kitten with the other two, it was obvious that they were siblings.
I got back home and immediately began to cry. I got my answer from God and didn't want to let go.
Welp, within two weeks of mass chaos and unknowingly ruffling A LOT of feathers, I signed off for a pet-friendly apartment all on my own. A week or so later, just a couple of day after my brother had flown in to visit me, he and my great friend helped me move into my new apartment with my 3 extremely cute kittens. I was now dirt poor, since I had no financial security nor planning for such a move, with a brother visiting. We couldn't do much for his vacation.
Eventually, he had to fly back home, my friend's sister moved here and their friend came to visit and went back home. I was dirt poor for the next...months.Then, medical stuff began between me, my friend, and her sister. This stuff has been a long process for all of us, since we are constantly supporting and helping each other. So, let me explain the medical on my front.
It was December now. Ever since the hand injury from February, I had shooting pain in my left thumb anywhere from a few hours or a few days after using that hand. The swarms of pain would last 5 to 15 minutes. The thumb itself wasn't horribly discolored, but it was swollen-looking and speckled purple down in my palm.
Between newly gained self-confidence and purely frustration from the pain, I decided to have my hand rechecked...at a different clinic than where I first gotten it examined just after injuring it.
Original February Diagnosis: possible hairline fracture (WITH NO CASTING)--->er,... just a sprain...
Correct diagnosis: sublaxation (a partial dislocation) of my carpometacarpal joint (a thumb joint in near the wrist).
I was giving a wrap to help it be popped back into alignment...and spent a week nearly collapsing every night on my way home from the pain. Eventually, after another trip to the doc, I wound up in the city's only emergency room with shock-like symptoms from severe hand pain. This is where my true healing began.
I was in various hand splints from just before Christmas til the last day of March, spent one month slowly incorporating my hand back into daily use, then wound up back at the doc's with increasing hand pains that originated from a different thumb joint. This injury was never fully figured out, but it was definitely sustained at the same time of my dislocation.
I was placed in another splint and have only just been removed from that splint within the last 3 weeks. The pain is slowly subsiding...but I also have had a summer with no classes to teach.
And there you have it...my last three or so years in Japan....Oh! And, with the new school year that started in April, I am now teaching at a different elementary school, its partner kindergarten, and a nursery school in that area....aaaaallllllll the way on the other side of town from me. Was it my decision to move schools? No. Did it come to a surprise that I was being moved? Heck, yeah. But, it's been a fairly simple adjustment to my new school. Everything that I have needed has fallen into place, just like God has intended it to be.
With renewed energy, I hope to pursue art and blogging as I continue teaching. Only God knows what path I will be taking in the years to come and I look forward to the craziness that it will bring- both the good and the bad.
Until then, later peops!
Bikky
