Clicky
March 19, 2005
The week after we bought Ham, I started thinking she was feeling pretty lonely. I’m sure a part of it was just me projecting my feelings upon it but nonetheless, last Saturday we went back to the place to pick out another hamster. I wanted one from the same litter to reduce the chances of them fighting. There was a new batch of very young ones available in a different cage that day. The woman spotted a white colored one. We got her.
She was named “Star” at first because “Ham” ãƒ?ムand “Star” スターput together is ãƒ?ムスター, or “Hamster”. Star was a very young baby, I would guess only 2-3 weeks old. Even so, she seemed very small for a hamster - compare it to the size of this bottle cap:
We brought Star home and put the two of them together in a small cage we bought. They seemed to be OK together. We then washed the bigger cage to get rid of the smells and then put them in there, together. Unfortunately. Ham bit Star. We separated them right away. Star looked really messed up. She was bleeding and for the rest of the day, she didn’t eat or move much. The woman was fairly upset over this - this being her first pets. As for me, I took a pretty objective view - you know, it’s a hamster, if it dies, oh well. The funny thing though was that it kept making clicking noises - really loud clicking noises for an animal that small. I named it Clicky but the woman felt it was too mean to be making fun of its condition.
For the next few days, I nursed it back to health. Everyday it recovered a bit - it started eating and moving and climbing around! I had to wet some of its food so that it could eat - I was literally hand feeding the little thing. She was quite cute, I’ll have to admit - she grew on me because she was a lot friendlier and not as shy as Ham. I would take her out of the cage and let it eat in my hand. Often, she would fall asleep in my hand! (By far the cutest thing I’ve ever seen) By now, I had been calling her Clicky all week - even the woman was using that name. I felt it more appropriate and much cuter than Star.
Clicky was a bit of a dumbass. I put her in the big cage alone (Ham was in Clicky’s cage) so that it could play in a bigger place. She would climb up to the top of the cage, drop down on her ass and give this look of pain… then get right back up and do it again. One time, she fell, gave that pain face, and then turned over and fell asleep. This kept me laughing for a good five minutes.
Although she was on the mend, she still didn’t look great. Maybe it was the woman’s worrying and my getting used to her, but on Thursday we took it to the vet! An x-ray showed no broken bones but she did have some sort of viral infection in her lung and something went in her eye. We were supposed to give it medicine everyday. So, on top of handfeeding, now I’m administering medicine to her. Yet, the more time we spend on her, the more she grew on us. She really was so cute!
This morning, Eri woke up and wanted to give it the morning dose of medicine. She noticed Clicky was barely moving. I was still half asleep but I jumped out of bed and examined Clicky. She was only breathing in gasps and wasn’t moving. We rushed to the vet to see if he could do anything. He gave it some medicine and oxygen.
At 11:12 this morning, Clicky passed away. She was about 1 month old. While we are certainly quite sad, we’ll remember all the time spent with her. I’ll remember giving it some rice from my bento which she quickly gobbled up and also her lying against my t-shirt sleeping while I was watching TV. We only knew her for one week but she’ll remind us that life can be precious even in such a tiny tiny animal. We buried her in this flower bed beside my apartment so that everytime we walk by, we can say hello.
Thank you for everything, Clicky. We’ll miss you.
Teaching in Japan
March 09, 2005
I’ve been getting some more emails from readers off the internet asking about Japan, teaching in Japan, or traveling in Japan. I’d be more than happy to answer questions if you’ll kindly ask specific questions. Please, no more “I’m going to Japan. Any advice?” messages. Here are some things on my website that may answer some questions too:
- My email exchange with another person who was coming to teach in Japan.
- My writings in the Japan category - it’s a big mix of stuff. Sorry, at this time there are no subcategories yet.
Alright. Nihon de mimashou!
Our pet
March 07, 2005
The woman and I have advanced to the next level in relationships. We done and got ourselves a pet last Sunday. On a spur, we bought a baby Russian dwarf hamster. She’s currently residing in a green cage with a loft. The woman has named it “Ham” because it’s short of “hamster” and also it sounds like when we call each other “hun”. She’s a bit shy - I guess she’s getting used to the new surroundings.
Today I woke up and noticed most of the lettuce was eaten and the grape was half eaten too. I’m still a bit worried she doesn’t know how to use thost stupid water bottle things. Plus, she’s a damn picky eater - she’ll eat the sunflower seeds but not the mashed up corn kernel thingies. She thinks we’re still food because she’s still trying to nibble on my skin with increasing bite intensity. Bitch.
