Experiencing Oz Again

I bought The Wizard of Oz over the weekend as the students have been watching the same English videos (yes, I mean VHS)over and over again. The Parents Club gifted a DVD player to each classroom at the end of the previous school year but not one DVD has been purchased so they are gathering dust. I decided to buy three - The Wizard of Oz, Enchanted and Hook.

Guess which one has gone down the best?

You guessed it...the eighty year old with more bounce in its step than Betty White.

Watched these kids watch this movie for the first time was amazing. It was like seeing it for the first time. I took many pictures and a little video of their reactions but privacy won't allow me to post them.

My class is a talkative bunch. They make noise doing everything and yet when Glinda floating down to Munchkinland, the room was silent. More interesting? The boys dug it more than the girls.

Their favourite?

Tinman.

Largely because of the dance where he pats his knees, then his chest and then toots his hat. I have been seeing their interpretation of this for days now and it never gets old.

Other observations:

• Black and white film did not phase them one bit.
• When the tornado swept up the Gale's house there were audible gasps and one 'wheeeeeeee'.
• The Wicked Witch of the West needs "...to go to the thinking chair".
• They tapped the beat for the Tinman's dance on their knees without realising they were doing it.
• They were terrified of the Lion until he came into a close shot and then they thought he was hysterical.
• The Lion's tears were discussion worthy.
• They love the red smoke.

What did I get out of this little exercise:

• It's much more preferable getting rained in when you have DVDs you can tolerate.
• The Tinman was more camp than a row of tents but I adore him.
• I keep forgetting that Judy Garland was sixteen when she made this movie.
• The Scarecrow's dance was funnier when I was a kid.
• Glinda's bubble kinda rocks.
• Teaching Japanese kids to say 'munchkin' and also introducing them to the Lollypop Guild (my fave part of the movie) is priceless.
• Flying monkeys rock my world.
• It's the music of The Wizard of Oz that initially pulls the kids in. I don't meant the songs, though they are fantastic. The compositions for this movie are so memorable and catchy that kids hug them with ferocity.

To the Doctor's Surgery I Go

The entire time I've been in Japan I've been getting cold after cold after cold and then some major hayfever to top it off. Last night I was on skype with my mother and sneezing every thirty seconds - a great Mother's Day conversation. Today I was like the walking dead at school. Completely zombified.

Time to see a doctor. With my trusty Japanese speaking colleague in tow we went to the local doctor where you just show up. Since I've met so many hypochondriac's here I assumed the wait would be long. Not the case. I got seen immediately.

At home, doctor's have offices with a little gurney and things in the corner. The back of this doctor's surgery was very emergency room-like. I was lead to a chair, pretty much a dentist's chair with so many silver implements next to it that I briefly wondering if he might do surgery on me there.

Anyway. I had a silver metal thing shoved up my nostrils which wasn't great by tolerable. Then another thing was shoved back further than my nostrils to check my mucus (lovely I know). This hurt. A lot. In fact I think I left indentations on the arm of the chair...or torturers ensnarement. I am also finding that my sinus' or something are bleeding now...probably why it hurt. Ugh.

Turns out I have sinusitis. This doesn't surprise me. But here are some things that do - I have been prescribed 4 different medications which came to the grand total of sixteen dollars. That also included the consultancy fee. I nearly fell over.

The doctor said that a blood test wasn't necessary but if I felt one should be done I could. He apologised that it was very expensive at $50. I laughed. Which is rude but that's less that the consultancy fee in Australia.

So here's what my money got me - two sets of month long antihistamines and antibiotics and two sets of nasal sprays.
Then they made me do this before I left by sticking these weird rubber things in my nose.
Inhale medicine. It's weird. Very weird. But weirdly works in clearly out your nasal cavities.