Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Injuries and Opening Night!

Last weekend was a very long and extensive rehearsal for the charity show, and it was also the day I realized that there was something seriously wrong with my back. By the end of the night on my way home I could barely walk. This kind of pain has happened once before and it only lasted two days or so. To my continuing misfortunate that has not been the case. Sunday the 16th of May through the 20th I stayed home and didn’t go to work. I was taken to the hospital by one of my fellow Board of Education employees. I didn’t find out much except that I should lose 80kilos. If you are wondering, 80kilos is 176 pounds. So if I lost that much weight I’d be the size of a vanilla wafer. This experience has only strengthened my belief that Japanese closed mindedness to anything that isn’t Japanese and their medicine is quite useless if you are foreign. They simply just don’t know what to do or say to you. So I paid about 2man that visit and have a bunch of medicines that might as well be sugar pills for all they help. The two pluses about this week of none work and little to no movement is one; the fact that I don’t have to go into work and two; I managed to get a lot of art related projects done. I totally beefed up my DeviantArt page and am in the process of doing more art work soon.

On the 20th I did make it to our first dress rehearsal practice at the venue. I went down with Dee since he decided to drive. It saved me the hassle of getting there myself, money and the company was nice. Once there we all got dressed and didn’t manage to do anything but sit there in out costumes while we did a tech run. The most we had to do was stand in out respective spots during each scene then move when the next scene was ready to be plotted out. Since I am only in one scene for a decent length of time I didn’t have to do much standing which was nice. However I was far from being comfortable. Having a bad back and in a semi-corset and dress for four hours is not what I call fun. After the tech rehearsal a group of us went to a small Isakaiya and had dinner. It was yummy and it’s always nice to hang out with Toyama-ites. Finally when it was time to go home I managed to mess up my foot because there was a dip in the pavement and I tripped over it. Unlucky for me I had flip-flops on so there was nothing to block the impact of my foot from the pavement. There was a lot of blood. I tended it when I reached Alexis house (where I was to crash for the night) and then laid down. We talked for a good bit, and it was nice because I got to get to know her better and then we both passed the hell out.

Saturday the 22nd and the Big Day! Alexis and I woke up and what seemed like the crack of dawn, scrambled over to the konbini to grab some food and taxied over to the venue. This day was a LONG day. In costumes by nine-thirty and three runs of the play. Let’s say for the most part ALL the actors while in the dressing rooms had a wonderful time. We were all pissed when we were around sets. There was just too much tension going on. Our producer and Set leader were basically ready to slit each others throats so the Actors got the backlash from it. T’was not cool. However before the show the cast sang a medley of Disney songs together and we were all much happier for it. Alexis who is allergic to a lot of things ended up having a small asthma attack because I sprayed a bit of perfume on myself. I had no idea it would make her react. Thankfully we had about twenty minutes before the show for her to breathe in some fresh air outside. She managed to compose herself and beasted in her parts during the play. I was back stage watching it and we were all so excited for each other. We all did a magnificent job. When it was my scene I was bit nervous and I think I might have even messed up one of my lines slightly. Thankfully though I pulled out my song and received the most applause for their song/scene than any other actor. It was incredible and I am truly honored to have been thought in such high standings. When the play ended we took our bows and we were all so happy. Dee and I were asked to hold donation buckets outside as the crowd was leaving. The other actors came out to greet the crowd as well. We managed some donations as well and we were asked to take pictures by the audience and other ALTs that came to see the show.

Around 9:00 I returned to the dressing room and changed back into street clothes. I had had my costume on for around twelve hours. A group of us went to grab some tasty milkshakes at Esqe-Café and then Dee and I made our way over to Banana Pop. There was supposed to be a gathering for people who all had a birthday recently. The main person was Michael our Charity Show advertisement leader. There were tons of people in the bar and I was there for two hours or so just mingling with people. Bryan and Rie were there as well to my surprise and I was happy to see them. I don’t see them too often these days but hopefully that will change in the near future. At least it was time to leave. I hopped into Dee’s car and off we went back to Kurobe. It was a overall good day but I was truly ready to go home.

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