It Was Snowing Chickens And Ducks

That is how I would describe how much it snowed for the last couple of days.

It started on Friday evening, when the snow didn't seem to bother to take a break and slowly accumulating on almost everywhere which are exposed - the rooftop, bicycle shade, cars, roads, trees and etc. When I got up the next morning, it was still snowing and I thought that wouldn't do me any favours since I was planning to go out yesterday for some snow festival in my place.

The water in the pond frozed due to the extreme cold temperature.

But then, it will surely be nicer for it to be snowing while they are having the snow festival, wouldn't it be? I thought so, which made me decided not to take my transparent umbrella along. How wrong it proved me to be as the snow didn't get any lesser throughout the day; instead it got heavier.

I ignored that and just made myself walk in the heavy snow to get to the town centre. Of course I didn't walk all the way there; that would be nuts. What I meant walking in the heavy snow is when I walked from my college to the bus stand to hop onto the bus which is heading to the town.

Just forget about using bicyycle in snowy days.

This is my first winter in Japan and for all this while, I had not seen such a huge snow fall to date yet; excluding the one at the ski resort, of course. It accumulated so much that it was as high as one meter at most places, which made it hard for me to walk on the pedestrian walk.

It is actually slippery even when walking on the road as it is covered with a layer of frozen snow.

When I was at the snow festival, I made a mistake by taking tawrong route and I end up at a dead-end. I tried my luck to continue walking ahead although there was a mountain of snow in front of me. When I took my first step, my whole foot was buried all the way inside the snow and it caught me to a total surprise. There was no turning back and I just continued walking for about 20 meters and managed to escape from the snow maze eventually.

The visibly range is at a minimal rate in such weather.

The feeling of walking on snow is almost similar to walking on sandy beaches. The only thing diffference is that it is slippery if you don't walk properly. I have had countless times when I almost slipped when walking on the snow.

The mountain range in the background could not be seen anymore.

That is why there was a headline where thousands of people in Tokyo were injured and admitted to the hospital because of the slippery walking surface when it snowed several weeks ago. Then came a few slots in between the news which taught the viewers on how to walk the right way on slippery surface. The two basic rules are quite simple - make sure your whole foot-step makes contact completely with the floor; and to try take as small steps as possible. I tried out the method and it worked.

The pedestrian walk is invisible as it is covered with snow.

However, the problem doesn't lie only on the walkway for pedestrian as the roadway was covered with frozen snow as well. It is certainly a nightmare for drivers who like to speed. Try driving a little bit faster and you will end up in the emergency ward.

Even the road (right) looks white.

One thing that I hate about snowy days is that they will turn on small fountains along the road to melt the snow and make sure it doesn't accumulate on the road. Those small fountains are like those found on the ceilings which will turned on automatically whenever a fire breaks out. That will make our shoe and pants got wet unless we equip ourselves with a pair of boots. The feeling of water trapped in our shoes and socks is not a pleasant thing at all.

Fortunately, it has got better today. No more snow, but a sunny day.

Red Chicken’s Knife

You can go on and try figuring out what does the title above means, but I would suggest you just to forget about it, unless you speak Hokkien. See, I have given you an obvious clue there.

Still blur?

Well, translating the three words directly into Hokkien will be "Ang Kei Toe". I am quite sure that this doesn't make you any clearer either, does it? Since it is never my intention to make you go confused in this entry, I will go straight to the point. I was actually referring to アンケート(Ankeeto) or surveys in Japanese that are being carried out at the end of each semester in my college. This time being the end of the schooling year has made the numbers of surveys that are carried out doubled the normal rate. They will carry out surveys in almost every aspect that is related to the school here; they even went one step too far by asking you how often you pang sai in a day. Pretty amazing, isn't it? But at the same time, it shows you how KPC the Japanese can be at times.

Okay, I was bluffing on that pang sai thing.

However, I wasn't lying about the frequency of the survey they gave us. Normal ones will be from the lecturer of each subject, regarding the effectiveness of their lecture, their teaching method, and how do we students find the subject. Since there are so many similar surveys for every single subject, I opted for the simplest escape route at times – ticking the same points for every criterion. That makes my MCQ answer sheet looks like a straight line of ants queuing up for the toilet. At the same time, I will make sure I of course will not make myself look like a dumb-ass by ticking more boxes than what is required. When they asked you ten questions, you don't give eleven answers, do you? There was a time when that survey had only four questions and one of my classmates tried to be funny by ticking in no less than thirty options.

The survey form looks like an examination answer sheet.

It doesn't stop there. The surveys spread over some other aspects as well, ranging from the service in the canteen, to the facilities in the hostel. That aside, they also try to know how suitable we find the holiday period come every summer. It won't take a genius to decide on how long we like our holiday to be. Common sense will tell us that the longer is always the better, isn't it?

The last survey I did was yesterday, during my Japanese language class. Since our Japanese lecturer is rather lenient during every small kanji tests and examinations, most of us gave high rating to her. I saw someone who ticked a five for every criterion in the survey form. One of us even requested the submitted survey forms of the other students from the lecturer and copied exactly what they have written. Imagine this happening during the upcoming general election.

Random Chinese grandma: Eh, mintak ini kotak punya kunci sikit jam. Wa mau tengok itu olang lain taruh apa undi.
Election officer: Soli aunty, undi itu lahsia.
Random Chinese grandma: Apa lahsia? Lu mau wa mia ang kei toe (red chicken’s knife) sikalang kar?

I am quite sure that officer would prefer to do an ankeeto anytime, instead of receiving ang kei toe from that grandma.