Blue-Eyed Geisha

蝶々　I just had to throw this out here. This is the vintage Japanese poster of the American movie "My Geisha" (the Japanese title is Blue-Eyed Chocho-san, which is what they call Madame Butterfly in Japanese minus the eye colour part). It was shamelessly copied off of some random site that was selling it.

If you want to see Shirley MacLaine pretending to be a geisha so as to fool her husband and with some nice 1960s touches, go out and rent this immediately. I don't remember the details as it has been a very long time since I saw it, but I would assume there is a lot of un-PC talk and cringe-inducing dialogue.

Two somewhat legitimizing factors are that the cinematographer was Japanese and make-up god Shu Uemura transformed Shirley, which I think was how he broke into Hollywood. I was reminded of the movie when I went to see a Shu Uemura retrospective thing at the Mori Art Museum a while back and judging by his letters and photographs with people like Clark Gable, I gather he was quite the man about town in L.A. at that time.

I would also like to ask...

Further to my fruit love post, I also meant to question how people here know to peel their fruit? What are parents doing to turn their children into Peelers? Is it simply that they follow the examples of those who came before or do they verbalize it to little Michiko and Hiroshi?

This brings to mind a few other learned habits that I have been thinking about as of late. They mostly relate to women but gentlemen, I would appreciate any Y chromosome input as well. First, how is it that any Japanese woman worth knowing knows to carry a hand towel, folding umbrella, oil-blotting papers and small stationery store in her purse? If you're away from home and need something, chances are its in the purse of the woman standing next to you. Now maybe I'm of the simple-purse-contents camp, which is regardless of culture, but damn these women are prepared!

Another example: the toilet paper triangles. I doubt men have experienced this in public washrooms but if they've had a Japanese lady friend over, they may have witnessed the elusive TPT. The purse stuff I can see coming from one's mother, maybe. But the TPT? Here's where it gets a little more tricky. For the uninitiated, I have been in more toilet stalls in Japan in which the end of the TP roll is folded into a neat, polite little triangle. We are not talking about hotels where the last person in the washroom was the attentive maid, this is in toilets across the nation. It's like the Japanese secret handshake for women, folding our TP ends into triangles for the next woman down the line. I usually skip the TPT, not being accustomed to doing origami while using the toilet, but I have added it to my ever-growing list of Japan paranoia. For example, if I am at a small bar and I use the washroom, the TP is getting folded. Who knows who will use the washroom next, discover a non-origamid TP end, and come to the conclusion that I am unfit to be a lady, having grown up in a non-TPT environment. I know I'm crazy, but what would you do if you had to contend with TPT everyday?

To peel or not to peel

I don't know if you have to have lived with a Peeler to realize this, but when eating fruit, most Japanese people remove anything vaguely resembling skin. We are not talking bananas or kiwifruit, but peaches, grapes, apples, pears and plums. They would probably peel the individual sections of raspberries if they could find an efficient way to do it.

I first discovered this shocking local custom when I noticed the beau's brother's ex-girlfriend popping her grapes, every single one, out of their skins before they saw the inside of her mouth. Now I thought a great number of things were strange about this cute little girl who looked like she was in grade school (yes, the idea that his brother has a loli-con, or Lolita complex, has crossed our minds) so I thought this was a custom in the realm of cute girls and fruit. Until the beau peeled an apple before slicing it up for me. When I mentioned that I was hardly ill-equipped to handle foreign objects in my mouth and could probably eat an apple without choking on the skin, he replied that he was merely protecting me from all those nameless toxins. The skin of an apple is the best part! How do you know you're eating an apple and not some sweet starchy mess if there is no Crunch?! And grapes! This whole nation is missing out on the feeling of puncturing a tight grape skin with one's teeth.

So that I am not thought completely Euro centric I will mention that there are several Japanese blog entries about how strange we are for eating fruit with skin intact. Some people mention the toxins, others are of the opinion that a peach tastes better without its skin, but most of these bloggers only discovered our strange non-Peeler customs when living across the Pacific. It's time to spread the fruit skin love! I have failed in my personal attempts and now fruit at Chez Geisha is half-peeled and distributed according to whether you are a Peeler or a non-Peeler.

For those of you who are corporate bitches in Japan, if you really want to start a revolution try eating an unpeeled apple WHOLE at your desk. Or a raw carrot. From people's reactions you would think you had just pulled out a raw chicken drumstick and started gnawing on it. Very caveman 2008.

Go ahead, bait me

I had a glimmer of hope yesterday at the Kaisha. I had just returned from dinner to see that I had missed an email from one of the Professionals in my area. After I apologized and explained that I had been at dinner, he asked me how it was. Now keep in mind this is a guy who has always been really nice via email but when I see him in person he doesn't say hi or if he does, it's like he's embarrassed to have run into me. Mr. Email Personality. After my apology email, he should have just said "don't worry" or not sent anything in return. Instead, he had to go and lengthen our exchange by way of a question and put my hopes up. I thought the guy was leading into asking me to dinner some time (not in a romantic way). Like, hey Geisha you've been working here a while and I know absolutely nothing about you and everything about all the secretaries in our area, so how about it? But no, he was just asking how my dinner was. Great.

That didn't top my physical run in yesterday afternoon though. I was going back up to the office and was heading parallel to the wall where the doors to the elevators are. A skizzy oyaji was heading right towards me, and I could see we were going to collide right in front of the doors, and also that he was not going through the doors while it was very clear that I was. So the million dollar question is of course, what did he do? As we come face to face in front of the doors and I start to try to head through them, that old fucking bastard decides that instead of stepping out of the way he is going to jab his elbow into me as I walk by because I am intruding on approximately one inch of his space. NO ONE walks so close to those doors unless they are going in and there is constant heavy traffic in and out of them. Had I not been going through them I would have stayed far from the wall, thus not obstructing anyone like fucking asshole illustrated for me in full colour. I need to do some hooping or some kimono kitsuke and fast or I am going to lose it one of these days. I also feel the need to ask Japan, What is your fucking collective attitude problem? There are bastard old men everywhere (by old I mean before they are called geriatrics but after 40) but I have never been treated as poorly as I have been here. Most old men ex-Japan would graciously move to the side if a younger woman who was not totally minging was trying to go through some doors.

As a consolation prize, the old man who runs the Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki place in Roppongi was more than a gracious host last night and totally made my day.

Hoop it up

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of taking a hooping workshop here in Tokyo. That's right, I took a class on how to hula hoop. Apparently hooping is very hot right now, maybe even the new pole-dancing? I figured the class would be easy but an experience last month should have forewarned me. I was shopping at one of those mega electronic stores that happened to also sell hula hoops for children. Look! I told the beau, did you ever do this when you were younger? (No) Then, while remembering how easy it used to be, I proceeded to make a total fool out of myself in the toy aisle trying to get this damn ring of plastic to swing around me. Fall to the floor at my feet was more like it.

Fast forward to the hooping class. The class began and everyone picked up their adult-sized hoops and started hooping like it wasn't no thang. Who the hell are these bitches I wondered?! Didn't I sign up for the beginners class?! You are probably laughing at me by this point, I don't blame you, I mean how hard can hula hooping be? Quite hard, I discovered. By the end of the class I finally managed to get the hang of it but not without feeling like a total dunce! And I used to think I knew how to use my hips! I have now been schooled. Luckily the teacher was absolutely fantastic and could even make a dunce like me feel like doing it again. Just in case you're wondering, it's not just about the hip hooping, so don't imagine a room full of people spinning hoops around their waists for hours and hours. These hoop pros have really thought out of the box on this one and it's basically turned into a new dance form. There are even performances at "hot spots" around town.

Lucky for me the class wasn't too new agey or let's embrace the inner goddess because quite honestly, being a corporate bitch has sucked every ounce of spirituality out of me and I just don't have the patience. How sad does that sound? Well I am getting a hoop very soon I hope and despite what the locals think I will soon be spinning around the park by my apartment embracing my inner something and letting out all those Kaisha toxins. More than the hoop tricks I really need to learn how not to bruise myself as after that class, I had a mother of a bruise that looked a bit like Papua New Guinea snaking around my left hip, which concerned some people in the changing room despite my reassuring smiles that it was all in the name of hoop love.

Loud teeth-brushin secretaries

Either I have a secret admirer, someone is trying to poison me or one of the people in my "area" have come back from a trip. I went with the last scenario and promptly popped the two pieces of candy that were sitting on my desk when I arrived today into my mouth. Unaccompanied by a courtesy note, I probably should have more carefully considered my social standing within the Kaisha before devouring the unidentified but probably harmless candy. Probably. If I suddenly stop blogging for more than a week with no word, you'll know it was actually the second scenario. In the interest of having a more positive outlook on my working life however, I am going to continue with the assumption that my Coffee Crisp mission has just been anonymously rewarded and may even allow me to receive omiyage from others until at least December. Oh joyous day! It will certainly take me until at least December to recover my voice and my pride, at least sufficiently enough to go another round with some new omiyage.

As I mentioned last week, the secretaries were recently scolded via group email and told to get in line. Lunch time at the Kaisha begins at noon on the dot and must be finished by 1. During lunch time at the Kaisha, secretaries position themselves in little cliquey groups in empty offices, conference rooms, photocopying areas and kitchenettes. Apparently they have not been using these spaces in moderation as of late, and have now had to be reminded twice that aside from cleaning up after themselves, brushing their teeth and finishing their bathroom routines by 1, they must be back in their seats by that time. And at the same time, keeping the noise at a reasonable level as there are always some unfortunate secretaries who have to work through lunch. Frankly I don't know how they manage to eat lunch and spend 30 minutes in the bathroom reapplying their make-up and ensuring their hair and teeth are free from any evidence that they had been eating. Although I will concede that no one finds a Professional husband with less-than-perfect hair and food residue-free teeth!

I'm actually a bit scared of the secretaries at lunch. Luckily I don't have to encounter them much at the moment but from October I am going to be at the Kaisha during lunch time every day. It gives me anxiety just imagining it. I'll walk up to a group of secretaries clutching my pink bento from home and it will be like a scene in some bad high school movie where the lonely girl opens her mouth to ask the popular girls if she can join them and is promptly ignored or shunned. Inevitably it will be accompanied by shrieks of laughter at something one of the popular girls has just said. Luckily for me the secretaries around here never say anything vaguely funny so at least I won't have to walk away with laughter at my back. Just cold silence.

Being a geisha and not a secretary, I don't have to take lunch at the same time as them so I think I will be able to avoid shame most days by taking lunch after they are all safely seated at their desks by 1. Eating is as much a social thing as it is a necessity to me. Eating at home by yourself doesn't count and eating out alone as long as it isn't during work or school is fine by me, but somehow eating alone during lunch at work or school seems tragic. Not that I haven't experienced both many times. I suppose the general idea is that you are surrounded by comrades at both school and work, so you should have people to eat with. We know it's not like that at the Kaisha, where I hardly have any lunch comrades. When I think back to my lonely days of ostracization at Japanese school when I practically hid myself from others at lunch time so they wouldn't catch on that I was always eating by myself, I try to remember my resolve that after graduation, no matter how uncomfortable I may feel in certain social situations, I would always make an embarrassingly concerted effort to eat with others at lunch. That resolve went right out the window my first week at the Kaisha. It's not just that the secretaries ignore me, there are a couple nice ones, but lunch with them on the rare occasion I've had it, has been excruciatingly boring. There is usually a lot of giggling and conversation revolving around hobbies and pets. I have neither.

I could just eat desk at my lunch but that would conjure up a whole new breed of paranoia. There is glass in front of my desk so I can check out the reflection of people walking behind me on the down low. After discovering this nifty feature I soon learned that an alarming number of people slow down when passing behind my desk, I imagine to either see what I'm eating, or to see what is on my computer screen. Whatever the reason I don't appreciate being inspected like a geisha in a zoo. Even after I decided not to eat anything at my desk, my fears were further confirmed by a Professional who always brings me chocolate. At first it was OK but now I feel it's a ploy to make me suffer through a conversation in English with the guy. Because he gives me chocolate, I can't cut him off. It's very calculating and sinister on his part. On one of his recent chocolate deliveries he asked if I was embarrassed to eat chocolate in front of other people. I replied No, and he said he was happy to hear that because most of the secretaries are embarrassed to be seen eating sweets or chocolate in public. I'd hardly call the Kaisha public but his comment validated my strict no-eating policy.

Looking over some of these senseless thoughts of mine, I start to get a picture of how crazy the Kaisha is making me. Things I would never think twice about have become huge issues in need of dissection and discussion and my only consolation is that I have until October to figure out my bento attack game plan.

Please do it on the mountain

These manner posters are on a fast downward spiral if you ask me. What seemed innovative and full of possibility at the outset has now turned into a play-it-safe campaign that does nothing to shock or stun.

I mean please, do it on the mountain?! Now maybe I'm taking the phrase too literally when all the Metro people mean to say is the phrase printed below ("Please be considerate of others when holding bulky belongings"), but I'd like to see some relevance people! The only train carrying people with "bulky belongings" or hiking gear is the Chuo line out to Mt. Takao. And frankly, if we were to accept this hiking scenario, the woman should be in heels because really, what's a little mountain climbing if you can't look good doing it?

If we are going to look beyond the mountain analogy and consider all "bulky belongings", I think we should start with foreigners because I for one, never see Japanese people struggling like idiots with large items on the train. They know what's up and when travelling with large suitcases they use a luggage delivery service. The lack of elevators and wheel-friendly features at train stations is not welcoming to the carrier of bulky belongings. Many foreigners of course don't know this and think dragging their suitcases from train to train will be a piece of cake. Perhaps a piece of shit cake. I've said it before and I'll say it again-the postal delivery system of this fair nation is incredible. You can send anything anywhere in the country and usually in less than 24 hours. Want to send your golf clubs ahead so that you don't need to schlep them on the train? No problem. Want to send some frozen meat to your relatives down South? Sure. Bought some furniture at Muji and need it sent to your home? Right this way. Yes yes yes.

So it is that I've come to the conclusion that this month's manner poster is just not realistic or representative of city life in Tokyo. Sure creepy sweepy is on board pretending to read a book when he is really looking for some ass to grab, but even he is being prevented from doing his job by this fictitious Tanaka-san with his many backpacks and flat-heeled woman. I for one want to see some action. I want to see the nitty gritty of what people really experience on the subway. Leering stares, vomit and sharp elbows. This is a plea to the people at the Metro to get back their edge!! Who's with me?