Typhoon Adventures, Part 2

On Tuesday the typhoon came in in full force.
I knew it was supposed to rain all day and get worse in the afternoon, so I had my umbrella and everything, but I had no idea how much worse!
I was done with classes for the afternoon, but I stayed to eat lunch with some people.  As we were finishing up eating an announcement came over the loudspeaker.  I couldn`t understand all of it, but I got 二番目と三番目and 中止 Even if I hadn't known what that meant already, the meaning immediately became clear when a huge WOOO! sounded throughout the dining hall.  Second and third periods were cancelled because of the impending weather. 
After that my friends and I weren`t sure what was going on, if we needed to leave, or what.  We finally decided to as the Center for Japan Studies, our "home base" on campus here.  On our way we ran into some other international students who were also confused, but had heard that while the subways were running, the JR trains might not be, or perhaps fewer would be running.  Hearing that, I decided heading straight home was the best bet.
It was around 2:30 when I got to the subway station and took my normal subway route home to Ozone, where I transfer to the JR above ground train.
Sure enough, the JR trains weren't running. 
Luckily, on my platform I happened to run into three other people heading the same way as me: two other exhange students, and a Japanese Nanzan student who spoke excellent English.  She was able to call up her family and friends and try to figure out what was running.  The consensus? Nothing.  We might even have to stay at Ozone overnight!  Highways were even getting closed off!
There was one bus running, but only one bus was running per hour.  We decided not to even wait for that.  The line had become too ridiculous.  And the line for taxis was ridiculous too.  Our Japanese friend admitted that she hadn't had any lunch, so we braved the rain to dash over to a nearby supermarket and get her some food. 
We waited there for a couple hours until it seemed like the rain was stopping.  We decided to try to walk back to Ozone station. 
When we arrived there, there was a taxi waiting, and lo and behold, the person waiting with the taxi was our Japanese friend's dad!  He also worked in the area and was trying to get home so he wanted to pick her up.  He graciously allowed the three of us to squeeze into his cab, too.
Once we got into the cab we were able to start heading home, but that whole process took probably two hours in and of itself.  Traffic was slowed to a crawl because everyone else was trying to get home.
On the way we saw tons of flooding: the rivers all looked incredibly high. 
When we finally arrived at our destinations, which for me was Kozoji station, from which my host parents could come pick us up, we tried to figure how much to pay but the Japanese girl's dad said he would take care of it.  They were heading on even further, to Tajimi, a town a few more stops away.  We were incredibly grateful because if it'd been just us, there was no way we could have afforded that taxi: it was over ￥10,000 (more than $100 US)!

From there I thought I could just walk across the station to the exit where my host parents usually pick me up... but it was totally flooded!

Here you can see Mr. Donut and BellMart (a convenience store) by where I was waiting were totally flooded, too!

I couldn't get to where my host family was waiting, and because of a combination of the flooding and traffic, it took them about an hour to finally pull around and get me!
By the time I was home it was about 7:30, five hours from when I left.
Never have I been so thankful to be home.

Apparently that wasn`t even destined to be the worst of it.  On Wednesday the strong winds were supposed to come.  When I got home the house was in "typhoon mode", with shutters over all the windows and all the potted plants from our front porch brought inside. 
On Wednesday classes were cancelled.  I was so thankful just so that I didn`t have to risk getting caught out in the weather again! 

So Wednesday I just stayed inside all day, did reading for class, and got to knit and watch TV.  By 4:30 ish the weather cleared up, and my host parents started putting everything back outside and taking the shutters down and stuff.  I had been up in my room and was just about to come down and say "I can see the sun!" when my host mom said "Shannon! You can see the sun! Look!" It was exciting.

Turns out all of this adventure was a bit too much for me.
On Thursday I got sick.  I went to bed with my stomach feeling a little crummy, and then I was freezing! I thought it might be because it was a little cooler outside than it had been, and I went to bed with wet hair.  But I should have known it was worse than that.  I was so cold I put on a long sleeved shirt, and leggings under my long pajama pants! ;w;  i tried to find blankets in my room but I didn't know where to look and it was lllaaaate so I just wanted to go back to bed.
I threw up a couple times. D:
Turns out the flu is going around.  Or a cold? I figure it must be the flu but the Japanese use the word "kaze" for everything so I'm not sure what the heck I had.
Apparently my fever was over 38 degrees celsius, which is over 100 degrees fahrenheit.  I haven't had a fever that high in ages.  My host mom took me to a clinic to get me excused from school and they gave me an IV drip for fluids and a bunch of medicine: an antibiotic and something to help with digestion and some other fever reducer in case my fever got high again. D: 
It was all in Japanese so even with my host mom explaining everything to me it was still terrifying!  I'm still not sure what the deal with the IV drip was, because I don't think they do that in the US unless matters are seriously desperate, but hopefully they were just overreacting?
I did feel considerably better afterwards, though.  Able to at least attempt to eat something.
Let me tell you, health insurance in Japan is miraculous.  The whole thing only cost me ￥1340, about $15 US.That's with medicine and treatment and everything.
I asked for a slice of bread but apparently what you eat when you're sick in Japan is this special bread called Castera or something like that that apparently has a lot of nutrients in it. 
I slept the rest of the day, and at dinner my host mom tried to give me umeboshi (really sour pickled plum) and some kind of rice porridge, which I picked at, but with the exception of the umeboshi it was really flavorless so I couldn't finish it.  It was definitely easy to eat, though.  She gave me some more Castera instead.  The orders were eat a little and drink a little water, but do it slowly, and often. 
My host mom gave me an ice pack wrapped in a towel and some of these cool little cold sticker sheet things you can stick on your forehead, and I went back to sleep for most of the night.  By the time I woke up I felt much better!
I still feel mostly better, but I'm kind-of tired from classes.  I woke up early because I'd been sleeping the whole day.  I still have one more class to go, from 3:15 to 5:30.  Hopefully that'll be okay.  I think some of this medicine to help me digest might be making my stomach upset, or else I pushed a little too hard at lunch today trying to eat real food... It was only udon, but it was kitsune udon so maybe the abura age was a bad idea.  I'm cold right now but I think this computer lab might just be cold!! I think I'm right under a vent.

Well, we have a field trip to Kanazawa this weekend so I'm just glad I feel well enough that I can plan on going!  I'm definitely definitely going to sleep early tonight.

I'm worried this blog post will just make everyone worry about me, but don't, seriously! I'm fine now.