An Old Chain for a New Towel

One morning, on my way to school, the old chain of my newly purchased bicycle lost grip of the cog’s teeth and slipped off its orbit. In the change up of pace, I lost my balance and was catapulted forward, flying awkwardly through the air. Crashing shoulder first into a flower-bed partition wall, I ended up in a crumpled mess on the ground, seriously short of air. I instantly felt pain in my back like I had been snapped in two by a professional wrestler.

While I was lying on the ground, several groups of school kids rode past, occasionally stopping to ask if I was alright. After I waved them on with a style of English not even I could recognize, eventually I saw a lady of 50 or so standing over me. I saw that she had stopped her car on the side of the road, right in the middle of rush hour. She asked if I was okay, or if I needed her to take me to the hospital.

I slowly stood up, as my back seized again, and I politely declined her very nice offer. She then pointed to the ground, at the spot where a wax model of a fried shrimp was lying. A month prior, I had received the key chain as a souvenir from my girlfriend as a token of her trip to Gujo-Hachiman. As I wore it hanging out of my pocket everyday at school, it had proved to be quite popular with my students who would all point at it, saying “Oh look, it’s a fried shrimp”. With a grimacing smile, I thought of the simplicity of all those kids’ responses, as I groggily said to the old woman, “Hora, ebi furai da!”. I　guess her not knowing the back story, it would’ve seemed like I was suffering from a pretty bad case of post-accident trauma.

Nevertheless, she saw that I was partially able-bodied and keen to make it to my school before my starting time, so she went back to her car and returned with what looked like a brand new towel straight out of the packet. She said I could use it to put the chain back on so my hands didn’t get too dirty. I looked at my hands, brushing off the flecks of gravel and blood.

I thanked her many times, trying my best to deliver a proper 90 degree bow, so as to express the extent of my sincere gratitude. To her testament, I could read in her eyes that she was fine settling with a stifled nod.

I waited till she had left to get back on my bike, and on the rest of the journey to school I was then able to locate the different epicenters of pain I had endured. My back, my arm, my hand and my knee were all ringing out as fresh reminders of the mishap.

But as I started to feel really sorry for myself, I noticed the grease stained new towel in my basket. Then I thought of just how lucky I was, to have had a complete stranger come to my aid as the elderly lady did. The Japanese peoples’ reputation as being a hospitable race was truly upheld in the kindness of the woman’s selfless actions.

Despite the excruciating pain that had crippled my body every time I moved, I eventually made it to school. Trying to tough it out, I managed to make prints of the worksheets for the day, but before too long I was whisked off to the hospital by one of my JTEs at the request of my Head Teacher.

As it turned out, a fractured rib was responsible for the nauseating pain. X-rays, ice packs, and packets of pain killers later, I started to feel a little less sorry for myself. As the drugs began to work, a warm, fuzzy feeling rushed through my body and I was reminded of the towel lady who went out of her way to ensure my safety, well-being and cleanliness.