Yuki Ga Sen [The Snowball Fight]

A couple of days ago it snowed big, soft flakes of snow all day. It was perfect packing snow, with lots of moisture. Coming home from school, I saw many of the foreign teachers outside the apartment that most of us share - the Highlife Morii. Monjun and Myles were there, and I winged the first snowball at Myles. It soon developed into a battle royal when T.R. (Theodore Royce, of all names!) and Colin joined, and then Jennifer took the cowards position on the second floor balcony above the fray. As punishment for this cowardly act and unfair tactical advantage, Myles took the top half of her stunted, two-ball snowman and hurled it at Colin. Fortunately the weight of the snowboulder was too much for a proper throw, or it would have instantly killed Colin instead of smashing upon his back of fearful defiance. Ha ha!

My main strategy of attack was the multiple scoop, rapid winging of snowballs, in which I stoop close to the ammunition and try to keep up a barrage of snowballs so that my opponent doesn't have the chance to aim properly. This works best at medium range and if you're too tired to aim carefully, which I was. It was quite effective against Myles and I felt no qualms about pelting him, because he knows Judo and he likes to make mother jokes from SNL. Myles then came after me and I ran to avoid the inevitable fury of his judo, but we ran out of driveway (the driveway in front of the Highlife was our staging ground, and it is about 40 metres long) so I slowed up, and he tackled me. I was unharmed.

Once we were too exhausted to throw snow at each other we all gave up and went inside. My pants were soaked, as were my shoes, my jacket, and my backpack, which I had been wearing all the while. I stripped and turned on the kerosene heater, even though I was radiating heat myself. I turned to getting a snack and checking my email, but I didn't have my glasses on. I looked in the usual spots and they weren't there, and immediately thought I had lost them in the snowball fight. You see I had taken them off and hung them one arm over the neck of my sweater so that I could see, because they were covered in ice from a head shot. Maybe they had fallen into the snow... I looked through my apartment carefully just in case. Twenty minutes later I went out into the snow with a flashlight to work against the dying light. But the flashlight was a cheap one I had picked up in Chiang Mai, and the batteries were dying.

To be continued...