Ga-SHAN! Or, A Quick Lesson in Japanese Onomatopoeia

One can speak entirely in onomatopoeia in Japanese. Maybe that's why I don't understand the kids my own age (or younger) sometimes; it's because they use "Onomatope." Almost all the time.

Well, tonight I lived out the word "Gashan" which means "crash."

I crashed on my bike.

I drew blood in two places, my basket (which is metal) on my bike has a HOLE in it and looks like it suffered a fender bender. I am lucky for a few things:

1) I was wearing my Citizens jeans and although I had a minor scraping in the knees (but no blood) there were no holes. Another reason why spending $150 on jeans is totally legitimate.

2) Only my basket is totaled. That can be replaced, or repaired.

3) It happened right by my apartment so I was able to walk the rest of the way.

4) My mom made my buy a small first aid kit when I left for Japan. Now it has come into use, though the Neosporin that I have is expired by a year. Bah. I saw that after I slathered it on, but that means it is not as effective right?

5) I was wearing long sleeves so although I drew blood on my upper arm and my inner elbow, I did have some protection which prevented more dirt from the street to go in.

6) The area around my wounds is not pink or red. It just stings a bit.

7) I had orange juice in the fridge. The dancing lights in front of my eyes were promptly taken care of.

8) I can go to the pharmacy in the Kyodai co-op tomorrow and ask for some ointment, because a person is actually there to help. God bless the Japanese uni co-op system.

9) Nothing is broken. It's just mostly shock.

10) The guy that I crashed with made sure that I was ok (because I took the brunt of the crash) and even tried to fix my basket.

What happened was what happens most of the time when you ride bikes and try to avoid people: you see the person, the person sees you and you try to go in the other direction to avoid crashing. However, what happens most of the time and in my case especially, was that I went left, and he went right. Since we were facing one another, it was the same direction.

The shock didn't hit me till I got back to my place; however, one morbid thing that I am grateful for is that I KNOW when I am going to pass out because I have "almost" passed out on about 5 or 6 separate occasions (standing in line at Disney World - 2 or 3 times, getting cartilage pierced when I was about 15, getting tragus in London at 19, oh, when they drew blood at the emergency room when I had the abscess on my tonsil: I wasn't able to swallow hence I didn't eat so down to the floor I almost went, then promptly put on a sodium drip). So, I know exactly what to do: OJ, head between knees, breathe deeply and lie down. When I got my tragus pierced, I even brought OJ with me because I knew that was going to happen, and it did.

It's not that I am squeamish at the sight of blood (bah, I used to watch open heart surgeries when I was 5 on PBS with my dad) it was the shock, coupled with the fact that I had not eaten dinner yet, because Thursday is my 9-6 day and I was coming home. It was a good thing that I did have that can of apple juice while I was waiting for the bus; my stomach was growling and I wanted something to hold me over till I got home.

Maybe it is time to get a new Shinto charm for my bike - you ARE supposed to get new ones every year. That or it still protected me, since I have no bruises, no bumps, no broken bones, no broken bike (sans basket) and my sanity still somewhat intact. Although it is a little hard to do things because of the Band-Aids; my scrapes were on my left arm, and I am a lefty.