Like A Snow Day...Except With Typhoons Instead of Snow

I’m writing this at 2:30 PM on weekday. Do you know why?

Typhoon Day!! Classes are cancelled!

And justifiably so. I usually have no respect for the weather, but this typhoon definitely has my attention, and Chaba is not to be fucked with. I’m not sure Japan uses any sort of scale, but for those of you from the U.S. Chaba is the equivalent of a category 4 Hurricane.

Look at her (him?), it definitely warrants respect:



Like anything else, the anticipation is better than the act itself, and the anticipation surrounding a typhoon has the same sort of magic as the anticipation surrounding a possible snow day. Maybe it’s even better than a snow day because the anticipation for a typhoon can be dragged out for days as it spins and meanders across the ocean.

I, like most others, was hoping for the typhoon’s fury on Friday, thereby creating a 3 day weekend, but when I woke up to what sounded like my hood over the stove being annoyingly and non-rhythmically hammered on, I knew the day had arrived.

I was immediately wide awake as a million typhoon-related thoughts and plans raced through my mind, severely complicated by the fact that I don’t have a cell phone. First was, ‘OK, is this bad enough for them to cancel school (Yes)?’ then, ‘OK how do I make sure it’s cancelled before I just don’t show up?’ This was a little complicated due to the lack of cell phone, so I decided it was safest if I just got ready and went to work.

I had no idea what I was up against. It took exactly 2 and a half seconds for my umbrella to not only be turned inside out, but completely destroyed. So I wasn’t fucking around when I went to catch a cab. Having arrived at school I was shocked when I was told that there would be classes, as the ‘Official’ warning from the Prefecture had not been given. So Japanese. So I got through one class and 5 minutes into another when it became ‘Official’.

A major typhoon doesn’t just spring up out of nowhere, I’m pretty sure we all had plenty of warning, why not save everyone the trouble and cancel school before it begins, as we all know damn well when the typhoon will be making landfall? Because this is Japan and that wouldn’t be the ‘Right’ way to do it. That’s why.

So I was driven home by a teacher, and while I won’t say I was scared, it was one of maybe two times I’ve been nervous while in a car. Just because the wind was incredible and driving down tree-lined streets seemed like we were begging for a ‘Final Destination’ type ending to our lives.

By the time we got to my apartment it was an honest struggle to not fall over because of the wind.

Then I discovered I conveniently have nothing to eat. So I’ve spent the time cleaning and waiting for the wind to die down to levels where the odds of getting impaled by flying objects are less than 95%.