Today Chi went to tutor Ami again and I went to the library in Narimasu. It was raining. I was in the library for about an hour reading children's books. After the library closed at 8pm I went outside and was surprised to see snow piled up about half an inch deep.

Chi's mom picked us up from the train station so we wouldn't have to walk home. We saw a few cars slide in the snow. Our car slid a few times too. Dangerous. We stopped at a convenience store to buy some bentos for dinner.

After we ate dinner Chi and I left to return some videos to the video rental store. It's too dangerous to drive, so we walked. It took about an hour round trip. But it wasn't so bad with the beautiful snowy scenery around us. After we got home I made a snowman :). I haven't made a snowman in a long long time. I'll take some pictures of it tomorrow morning.

The snow is about 6 or 7 inches deep right now and it's still snowing. Unusual for Tokyo.

雪　yuki - snow
雪だるま　yukidaruma - snowman

Yesterday I stayed home all day again. Chi's mom gave me some Aloe yogurt to eat. Then she made us some Gyouza for dinner. The past few days I've also been nibbling on the candy I got at the setsubun festival last week. They were all cheetoh-like snacks, but with other flavors instead of cheese. My favorite ones were the chocolate one and the cabbage one. Cabbage flavored cheetohs, sounds kinda nasty right? But it was delicious! :)

Today we went to see Chi's grandpa at the hospital, then went to visit Chi's grandma's grave. Chi's grandpa has had two strokes and is in a vegetable-like state now. Poor guy :(

For dinner we went out to eat with Chi's stepdad. This time we ate sushi. He payed for everything again. ~$180.

Last night I couldn't fall asleep until about 7am, and then I woke up numerous times between 7am and 12pm. It's hard to sleep with my throat hurting so much. Drinking, eating, speaking, swallowing, it all hurts. The good news is that my headache is gone and my fever seems to be mostly gone.

Today Chi's mom went out to McDonalds and bought me four hamburgers. She also went to a pharmacy and bought me some Halls and Vicks. At the McDonald's in Japan, apparently there are no plain hamburgers. Only the default ones that you get when you ask for a hamburger. Also, Halls here is advertised and sold as a candy, not a medicine. I was pretty shocked by that. I looked it up and it seems that it's sold as a candy in many other countries too, like Brazil. However, Vicks is a medicine. I don't really understand why Vicks is a medicine and not Halls, but whatever :p.

Even staying shut up in the room all day I still learn new things. Yay :)

I took a Vicks cough drop and then ate my hamburgers. My throat completely stopped hurting for about two hours. I took some more of the cold medicine I had the other day too.

Chi hung out with her mom today and then went to work her ShabuShabu job. I played some Go, read a little bit more of a book, and spent most of my time trying to go to sleep. I haven't been able to sleep at all yet though. After that first one, the cough drops don't seem to have any effect anymore :(.

When Chi got home from her ShabuShabu job, she made me some Ojiya. Ojiya is a soup-and-rice-like food that people here make for sick people. It tastes kind of like grits, but better. Yummy :). I got sick back in August and Chi made me some Ojiya at that time too.

I got sick last night. A sore throat and a bad headache. Today I was planning on going with Chi to Fujimino to see her friend Ayano. But because I have a fever, Chi made me stay in bed :(.

I just finished eating ramen with lots of onions and curry rice. Chi's mom made it for me for dinner and brought it to me. There's a superstition here that eating onions can cure sicknesses. She gave me some medicine too. I brought some advil with me, but I used it all up last night and this morning to combat my headache.

熱　netsu - fever
薬　kusuri - medicine

Today I explored the area around Chi's house some more. I also went with Chi to a city called Narimasu. There, while Chi was tutoring, I explored Narimasu and read some books at a library.

Chi has a job tutoring a girl named Ami. She goes there twice a week.

Today Chi went to meet up with Natsumi and Natsumi's friend to talk about working at Natsumi's friend's workplace, a chocolate company. I went to see my friend Toshi near Roppongi.

Toshi let me ride his bike for awhile around Tokyo Tower. It's an electric bike. I didn't even know they existed. You peddle a little and the bike takes off like a motorcycle, except with no noise. I had fun. The view of Tokyo Tower tonight was also quite nice. The sky was cloudy, so the bright tower lit up a large amount of the sky.

After Toshi went home I went to Ikebukuro to explore and walk around while waiting for Chi. While I was walking down one particular sidewalk a rather cute girl approached me. I didn't think much of it at first because stores here often have people stand out in front of their stores to advertise and hand out flyers. But this particular girl didn't have any flyers in her hands. She approached me and then asked: "seksu?" (sex?). I was surprised! I've never been asked like that by a stranger before.

I met Chi at Ikebukuro station soon after so we could go back home together. She got some chocolates from Natsumi's friend. They were yummy :)

Today Chi's mom and I drove Chi to the train station so she could go to her tutoring job. After that we went to a clothing store and chi's mom bought me a new coat. It's cold here and my coat isn't warm enough. It was hard to find a coat that fit me. All of them were too small. In the states most clothes are too big for me. Here, most clothes are too small for me. We found a nice-looking black one. It costed about $70.

After we got home Chi's mom taught me how to make onigiri. I've tried making them before, but they never turn out quite right. She steamed the rice for it in the microwave. The microwave here has a water pan embedded in it that you can use to steam food. The microwave here is awesome. I wish I could take it home with me. You can set the wattage you want, how long you want it to cook, how you want it to cook, and what temperature you want the food to be when it's done.

Today I finally mustered up the courage to use the toilet's bidet. The toilet washed my butt for me with a jet of water. It was an interesting experience. I'm still a little nervous about pushing the other buttons, namely because I'm not sure what they do. I don't want an obituary read like this: "stupid foreigner eaten alive by out of control toilet"