Rice Cakes and Teeth

I was talking to one of my students about the new braces she was sporting, which she seemed uncomfortable to have. Her mom is a dentist’s assistant so the conversation further went on about how, according to this child, getting your wisdom teeth pulled does not hurt. Umm, come again?? 

AND on top of that, according to her story which I’m not sure how much leg pulling she was doing, her wisdom tooth hadn’t even come out yet! So I had her literally draw this picture for me until  I could see that yes her tooth had still been inside but had the potential to grow underneath the next tooth over, and thus the decision to extract it. She said she was able to eat solid food after two days. 

Is something wrong with the dentists back home??? Well I will have to further explore this when I have to go get ALL 4 wisdom teeth pulled. Sigh, it will be a terrible time – - the wisdom tooth diet. 

Anyways, as we were chatting, I decided to pull out the rice cakes my school had given all the teachers. As I offered it to her, she bursts out in this giggly naive voice, “Teeth!”. I stared at her flabbergasted for a while and then burst into laughter as I realized how appropriate these rice cakes were for the occasion. 

(Interesting fact for the day: These rice cakes are wrapped in persimmon leaves to keep them fresh and from sticking to one another.)

Rice Cakes aka Teeth