Shaaaaaaaa
Today I ventured into the wilderness of Palo Alto, forced to brave entire neighborhoods of 4000 square feet houses and streets full of cars that cost more than I make in a year. Nevertheless, I managed to navigate to the Palo Alto Kendo Dojo in order to watch my first Kendo lesson. This, of course, being the prerequisite for actually taking a Kendo lesson. The bitter cold of the gym was broken up by shouts of many, many people hitting each other with sticks, the intense shuffling of feet, and the very palpable feeling weirdness that I experience when being submersed in an only partial Japanese culture. One or the other, please. I just get confused.
I managed to annoy Alex (not really that hard when you're trying, to be fair) by waiting until he raised his hand to ask the teacher a question (Alex was facing me and the teacher was facing Alex). Then I waved (back) at Alex. Alex gave me a quick frown and a dismissive hand gesture. Sorry Alex, I couldn't resist :)
There was some unexpected comic relief, though, as one of the small kids somehow managed to pee all over the dojo floor. And man, there was a lot of it.
Looks like next week I'll be getting hit with sticks. Cool. Gotta remember not to step in the pee, though.
As for the title - that's the Japanese sound for a nice pee. Shaaaaaaaa. Yep.