Funky Skin Rashes and Ancient Languages

Funky Skin Rashes and Ancient Languages

I think I did upload it, or at least I did do other pics like when I had a purple toe and black eye.

While in Japan I got some funky skin rashes. It’s called athlete’s foot in English, but in Japan they called it “mizu mushi”, which basically means water bug / insect. WTF? I have a water bug in my skin. Then I looked it up and the other word in English is ringworm. I guess the Japanese word is true. Its basically bacteria on the skin that starts doing the funky chicken or perhaps  in our case the funky worm.

I wasn’t sure how I got it, but I was rolling around doing judo groundwork with a lot of questionable people. I hoped it was from me wearing sweaty socks all the time including in winter, where I wore 3 pairs at once to stay warm.

According to Wikipedia athlete’s foot is a fungus and will grow more rapidly in the following conditions
1) Crowded or Humid conditions. That's me!
2) Sweat excessively. That's me!
3) Participate in close sports like wrestling and soccer. That's me!
4) Wear tight constrictive clothing with poor aeration. That's me!
5) Have a weakened immune system. Hope not!

I think I met 4 of the 5 best conditions for it to grow. Number 5 nope, at least I hope anyways.

Summer seemed to be the worst though, that damn humidity never lets up. I saw all the teachers wore socks inside, but sometimes I was so sweaty, I took them off. I’m sure they were horrified.
But what else is new? I did wear underwear (despite what you may have heard through the rumour mill).

I finally decided it was getting progressively worse so I went to the doctor. The Japanese doctor looked at it and said you need to go to the skin doctor.
So, off on my jolly way I went.
It was my first time to a skin doctor. I had never been to one in Canada either so I wasn’t sure what to expect.
I envisioned a room full of people with goiters on their necks (big huge weird balls of skin).
When I arrived I found a room full of people waiting. It had a very “countryside” feel to it.
A girl looked at me, “Mama there is a gaijin (foreigner) here”. I contemplated responding “Ya and I understand you.” But, alas I decided against it.
My name was called from the front “Mr.Gaijin”. I was like ummm that’s not really my name but OK. I entered the room where a chipper older Japanese doctor sat. He had a big smile on his face, like he was happy to see me.
“Konnichi wa Mr.Gaijin. Do you understand Japanese?” he pondered. “Well, yes a little”, I answered. He looked even more happy. “You are the first gaijin to my office. I am happy to meet you. Are you American?”. “No”, I answered. “Oh, where are you from, perhaps a Brit?”. “Ahem, no, I’m Canadian”. He seemed to think about that for a minute like it didn’t register. Finally “Good. That’s good, let’s have a look at your hairy gorilla like skin”. No! He didn’t say that, but I think it would have been funny if he had.
He started inspecting my skin with a magnifying glass. He then grabbed a knife and my foot and locked it between his legs. I had a feeling he was about to filet my toes. Instead he grabbed my foot and scrapped a bunch of skin from my foot. It was pretty painful, but I tried to keep my mouth shut..
He took the skin fragments and looked at them with his high powered microscope.
“Ah HA!” he yelled. “Just as I expected, its Tinea pedis”. I was like “Sorry, what? Tina who?”. As far as I recall I don’t remembering doing judo with anyone named Tina. He seemed surprised I didn’t understand and handed me a book of skin conditions, it had Japanese on one side and some weird language on the other. He pointed to it, “Here it's written in English”. I was like ummmm….. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it sure wasn’t English, maybe Polish or Russian I thought. After a minute I realized it must be Latin cause it had roots of things that never made sense to me like “magnus” “corporis” , “malus”, “Ginormous”. That last one I added in myself, I was just trying to go with the flow. In-case you didn’t know ginormous was recently added into English dictionaries due to its popular usage on the pop culture scene.
I finally told the doctor “Actually its called Latin. English does have some roots in it, but I don’t speak or understand it.”. He looked baffled. “Do you mean you don’t speak your own language?”, he asked. “No, I do. Its just that this is not my language. I mean it did add words and stuff to my language but its not my language”, I answered.
As always I don’t think I did a great job of explaining it to him. He seemed baffled.
Being the smart alleck I am, I thought I would give him a great metaphor. “So you speak Japanese right? Japanese characters came from Chinese, so if someone shows you something in Chinese they might think you speak Chinese, but probably you can’t read it, well to a degree you can, cause the base of the character meaning would be the same”. Blank stare on his face. Then, “ I don’t speak Chinese”, he answered. I didn’t know how to answer him, I had done a piss poor job of explaining it to him, what else is new.
He started writing something down and told me I would need to take oral medicine five times a day. That’s annoying I thought. In Japan they always give low dosages of medicine, and most foreigners find it quite weak. Most books for foreigners coming to Japan recommend bringing your own medicine, half of our medicine is banned though, be careful.
He looked at me and said “If you don’t take care of the tinea pedis it will become tinea cruris”. 
Crap! He definitely did not comprehend I didn’t speak Latin.
I asked him to write the words down so I could perhaps look through a Latin dictionary later (if I could find one, maybe in the Vatican?) to decipher his dead archaic language.

I looked up the word later, it said it meant jock itch.
NO THANKS I'LL PASS!

I started bathing my feet in vinegar everyday cause I read on the internet, it helps cure it.
My girlfriend commented a few times it smelled like “sushi rice”. Ha!
I don't think anyone wants to eat rice that has touched my feet.

If I ever go to a make your own wine place, I'm not drinking the wine I crush with my bare-feet.

Let's see. Doesn't look that hard to understand. Latin is the same as English right?

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Other funny stories from this blog 
http://memoirsgaijin.blogspot.ca/

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http://eyethroughtheglass.blogspot.ca/


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