There are people...

First there was THIS.......

Then, there was THIS......

...and in between a whole lot of other stuff......Mammoth BBQ 2012 a happy success. Actually, this year - not so mammoth, because only 20 people came and so I could relax more and sit down and talk to people and eat and drink....and rescue the young guest who fainted after mixing medications with alcohol (stupid and cute girlfriend of a bike taxi driver). My friend who is a nurse leapt into action, we called an ambulance and stretched out the girl on Okaasan's carpet...but she started coming round luckily and 30 mins later she returned to the party and stuck to soft drinks.

And Okaasan? She realized at her lunchtime that there WAS a BBQ about to happen, and as expected - about 2 pm off she went to escape it all (including passed out girl on the carpet :-))

At 7 pm some guests were leaving and a friend telephoned me to say they'd come across Okaasan down the road under the subway line...hovering...and saying: "I can't go back yet, because there are people at the house"....and I walked out to meet her and bring her back home.

She was very tired, said she'd been downtown, her shopping bag weighed a ton with a big, glossy magazine inside. She was staggering a bit as she walked.

When we got to the corner near the house she could see BBQ guests in the garden still and she stopped and looked ready to run. She stopped in the middle of the road and looked uncertain and clutched her handbag.

I had to turn on the reassurance to overdrive: "let's go home, dinner is waiting, this is your home too you know, you go and come anytime YOU want, you don't have to worry about the guests. They are Yujiro's friends, they are Japanese. Just say a brief 'Hello' and then come in for dinner etc etc"

And I escorted her home. I really don't understand her reaction to   guests. She isn't a shy person at all, all she has to do is walk through the group and say "Hello, are you having a nice time?" and go inside.

Is this some return to a child's attitude to guests in the house? But she grew up in a home which was a business, so I imagine there were always visitors coming to see her father about his truck driving business. Which makes this people avoidance all the stranger. Is she embarrassed about her appearance?

I brought her inside and helped her with the heavy bag. Then cooked dinner and served her quietly at the kitchen table. One drunk guest suddenly burst mistakenly through the kitchen door, but apart from that the ending-party was well away outside.

She ate dinner and then slept by the TV.

And, still no hula mention. Wonderful. Some people have asked me whether it is possible to get her to the old people's hula class - and hope she doesn't notice what type of class it is. I think that IS possible in fact - same building, maybe same room and she won't remember the people from the other group.

But next week I go to the UK for 3 weeks, so I can only take her to that class this week. After that Yujiro would have to rearrange his work to do it....take her there...and he isn't motivated enough to bother. So, no....at the moment we'll just let the topic slip.

She hasn't asked, she hasn't been looking at her hula dance skirts in her room at all. It seems to have drifted away from her memory.

Which is goooood.

Finally. I mentioned a while back about dementia sufferers in the evacuation zones near Fukushima. How it must be SO hard to have dementia and have your whole world thrown into confusion.

There was a story about that in The Japan Times this week.

here is the link Dementia Dire among elderly in quake zone.