Week 45: Hurry Hard!!

This week I had an exciting weekend!

On Saturday morning, I spilled a cup of coffee in my bed!! That was an exciting start to the day! Then I went to school and exploded some tubes in the centrifuge!! That was also very exciting!! Luckily, things got better from there. I went to the post office to mail my friend a birthday card, and I got VERY lucky because they closed right after they served me: I had totally forgotten, but Saturday was actually a holiday for the Spring Equinox and so the post office closed early! Apparently Japanese people are supposed to visit their family grave on this day, which makes the advertisement that I saw at the post office for some sort of memorial stone (surrounded by candles and pictures of dead grandma) somewhat less morbid and creepy.

Anyway, after I noodled around a bit, I finally checked out the World Women's Curling competition, which is being held basically in my backyard!! I saw Canada play Russia in the semi-finals. There were lots of foreigners there (although I later realized that most of them were actually the other teams from the competition!!) and I ended up sitting with a nice Canadian who has lived in Sapporo for more than 20 years! We talked about how much the Leafs suck and we laughed and we laughed. Even better, Canada won easily! 

I don't know much about curling, and I don't think I ever even watched a whole game on tv before, but it was surprisingly fun to watch in person. It's pretty speedy, and it's fun to try to guess what each team is going to do. 

On Sunday I went back to watch the gold medal game between Canada and Switzerland. My friend's husband came with me. He likes taking photos, and I guess curling is an ideal game to photograph because there isn't a ton of fast action :p Anyway, Canada almost made an amazing comeback to at least force an extra end, but the Swiss made an unbelievable shot on their last stone and won the game. It's hard to be angry with them because that shot was truly amazing. But I thought it was a little funny when they were presented with their prize: Swiss watches :p

The other good news is that enough snow has melted that it's possible to ride bicycles again!!! My bike survived the winter quite well (though riding a bike is a bit painful with a bruised tailbone), and I also had fun riding my friend's kid's bike home from the subway station where it had gotten left behind. I also saw a few motorcycles around! Spring is really here :)