Geisha, Interrupted

Perverted Pun Peddling Personnel to be Punished Profusely

I may be the only foreign blogger in Japan who is this happy see Mainichi`s WaiWai get cancelled. I Never thought I`d say this but, Hurray for Censorship!!

No longer will I have to pass by headlines the likes of:  Fast food Sends Schoolgirls into Sexual Feeding Frenzy, Grotesque Gropers Gang up to Form Online Orgy Teams and Gummy Grannies Groping for a Good Time, whilst reading the local news in English.

If you don`t know what Waiwai was all about, let`s just say that in America it would be tantamount to a Japanese expat leafing through Globe and The National Enquirer to find the most outrageous, stereotypically American non-stories and translating them into Japanese news.  Think: "Fat Cowboy with Fifty Guns Feeds on the Fingers of Frightened Japanese Tourists; also hates natto, friends say." 

So yeah, WaiWai is offensive as hell.  But that pales in comparison to the real issue here: those puns in the headlines are hideous!!!  

I mean come on: Weighty Woman's Wickedness Strips Punters to the Bone?  Brainiac Bath Brothel Savior Blowing more than Bubbles? Hooker Housewives Redefine a Hard Day's Work?  Porno Prima Ballerina Stretches More than the Imagination?

Assonance and alliteration can only get you so far, Ryan Connell, and now you will have to pay for what you`ve done to us!

Huhahaha....

WaiWai`s death is a great victory in the battle against bad puns everywhere.

Monkey Bridge Has Fallen Down

So the notorious Nozomu Sahashi, former CEO of NOVA, finally got his ass arrested last week. 

This is certainly a cause for celebration.  I neglected to mention last October, as I was writing The Nova Bunny Suicides, that the primary purpose of that cutting and pasting extravaganza was to try my hand at  cheering up a certain former NOVA instructor.  An instructor to whom I happen to be married.  

Naturally, said former instructor likens Sahashi "a bonafide first-class wanker" whose arrest for embezzlement "is overdue and probably insufficiently brutal".

For old times sake, here are two internal memos we saved from last fall. They date two weeks apart from each other:

On a happier note...

At least this reviewer in Hong Kong seemed to like my book.  Even though I can`t add the piece to my list of "shameless self-promotion" links because you need a used name and password for the site... 

Non-fiction: Bar Flower Steve Cray  Jun 15, 2008

Written by: Lea Jacobson
St Martin's Press, HK$200 ****

In Japan, where formality and rigid social mores rule everyday life, everyone has their place, especially when it comes to commercial affairs of the heart and flesh. There are geisha, hostesses and whores and they are not to be confused.

The white-faced geisha are career professionals, often starting their training after secondary school or university. They study poise and delicacy, practise traditional arts and play instruments such as the three-stringed shamisen. They don't do sex. Prostitution, at the other end of the scale, also has its hierarchies, with soap houses, sexual play-acting and image bars aplenty. Nightclub hostesses fall somewhere between geisha and whores. Although nowhere near as mysterious and traditional as geisha, they don't sell sex either. They tease.

It was in this world that American, 20-something East Asian studies student Lea Jacobson, fluent in Japanese, landed in 2003 to teach English. With a history of depression, eating disorders and self-harm, she was unprepared for the straitjacketing imposed by the rigid culture. Bar Flower: My Decadently Destructive Days and Nights as a Tokyo Nightclub Hostess, shows her coming unstuck almost from the beginning.

From a background of safely confiding in shrinks, she doesn't think twice about telling a Japanese doctor she is scared of flying and needs medication to overcome it. Bad mistake. The doctor tells her employer she was on drugs in the US and is "abnormal" in a society where normality is more important than sushi, and she is fired.

Incensed at the lack of confidentiality but stubborn and courageous in equal proportion, Jacobson decides to work as a hostess, landing a job at The Palace on Tokyo's Ginza strip. Although hostessing doesn't involve sex in the coitus sense, its aim is to keep men "panting", as Jacobson puts it, with rituals a few rungs down from those of the geisha. "We had to attract regular customers by pretending to have relationships with them, to be in love with them," she writes. The game involves satisfying whims, from flirting and flattery to hot towels and plenty of alcohol.

Teaming up with Russians, Belarusians, Ukrainians, Filipinas and at least one Japanese hostess, Jacobson learns the ropes under the guidance of a mamasan who rules with military ruthlessness: "It was a most terrifying scene on nights when Mama Destiny would pace back and forth in front of the waiting table ... as if she was a drill sergeant or a prison guard," Jacobson writes of her early hostessing experience. "At times, when she ordered us to change our dresses, shoes, or headpieces, her criticisms were immensely lacking in compassion or tact, employing phrases like, `Those shoes are ugly,' `Your dress is dirty' or `Your hair looks like a prostitute's."

Jacobson finds herself a hit with the men who visit to "relax" expensively because there are few Americans working as hostesses. And it is in the explanation of why there are so few that we receive the best insight into the east-west cultural divide. Jacobson explains that not only would most Americans find it "hard to believe that there is no sex or touching involved in this kind of work", but that "ours is not a culture of obedience ... most American women are not used to playing such subservient roles".

But, sex or not, sinking into a world of fantasy and alcohol is not without its risks and Jacobson, who, we learn quickly, is ever the rebel, breaks the house rules and goes out of the city on a dohan - an arranged date - with a man clearly besotted by her, home-made pepper spray in her handbag just in case. "Looking back, my self-preservation instincts could have been more intact," she writes, the dangers of hostessing brought home by the murder of British hostess Lucie Blackman, who in 2000 had been working in a Tokyo bar.

Part travel book, part memoir, this is an entertaining, well-written book with a streak of dark humour. Witness Jacobson describing the automated room-key machines in Tokyo love hotels: "Some say that one day the machine might display pictures of potential sex partners as well. This is not science fiction, my readers; mechanical sex is the logical result when the human condition mates with advanced capitalism."

Sad

I`ve usually been the one to run off and leave everyone else in the dust.  All around our apartment my husband and I have pictures hanging up of family members whom we get to see about once a year, if we`re lucky.  I know from experience that in time, people can adapt surprisingly well to circumstances of distance.  But...I argue with myself... I don`t want to get used to her being gone!

As I write this my best friend, whose name isn`t really Jade, is on a plane over the Pacific somewhere, heading for LAX.  She needs to spend some time with her family. It`s probably something she`s been needing to do for 7 years, since she left the US for Japan straight out of college and hardly ever looked back.  She`ll be in LA for four months, and there`s no guarantee she`s coming back to Japan after everything is all sorted out.

Jade`s consistent support has been an immense factor in my getting sober.  Soon after realizing that I`d be needing to do something with all the free time I would not be spending drunk, we bought roller blades and juggling sticks together, sang hours upon hours of dry Karaoke, and became closer than we`ve ever been (even in our most drunkenest of drunken girl talk sessions!)  She is not an alcoholic, so I always told her to go ahead and have a drink on our frequent dinner outings, but she never did.

You know, if I were still drinking right now, and Jade were still leaving, I could have gotten through this far more easily by just picking a fight with her.  We used to fight al the time.  Alas, in sobriety it is far less practical to start arguments with people in order to hide from how much you love them and need them around.  So it hurts all the more when they can`t be around.  Which she can`t.  Because she needs to do this.

So...good luck Jadie!!!  

Even though that`s not really your name!

You know you need a break from translating when...

Is it me, or does the scene description for frame #225 bear an uncanny resemblance to an approaching elephant...

Not really?  Ok, how about now??

Heh.  If you need me I`ll be napping.

Seven

The number has been in my head all week.  If you take the Tokyo metro, you know that the seating arrangement is laid out so that seven commuters can sit down on a main row of seats, on each side of any car.  (Well, unless there is an abnormally obese commuter or a sleeping salaryman who`s sprawled out over 2 seats, in which case there fit six.)  I spend a lot of time on trains in this city, and this week I`ve found myself counting to seven over and over again, studying the random groups of Tokyoites getting up and sitting down, forming and reforming groups of seven strangers.

Seven is a lot of people.

I went to Akihabara today, one week after seven people were brutally murdered on the street here, completely at random.

 

It is customary in Japan to leave gifts of food, drinks or other items at altars for the deceased.  Making such an offering can be a very therapeutic thing to do, even when the deceased are complete strangers.  That can of *extra strong* lemon chu-hi (between the two cokes) was mine.

call for resumes!

So I may as well break the news.  The awful truth is that, in just two weeks time, Jade is getting on a plane to Los Angeles, where she will live with her dad for four months. Through my grief I have to admit that this is an excellent move on her part, because she`ll have the opportunity take care of many issues during her time there.  If all goes well, she could be back in Tokyo this fall, hanging out with me in the evenings instead of entertaining dirty old men.

Yet in the meantime,  it is with a heavy heart  that I am currently accepting applications for a new best friend. 

Like most opportunities for foreigners in Japan, this is a CONTRACT position.  In other words, after four months I will not need you anymore and you will likely need to go away.  But don`t be dissuaded. Applicants who fit the following criteria are strongly urged to apply!

BASIC REQUIREMENTS:

- a MacBook, 2007 or later 

- roller-blades

- a cellphone whose bill you only pay after it stops working

-An ipod library containing music by one or more of the following artists:

Jero

Justin Timberlake (so I can make fun of you)

Tori Amos

浜崎あゆみ

ウルフルズ

SUCCESSFUL CANDIDATES WILL BE EXPECTED TO:

- speak better Japanese than me, so i can call you with translation questions...constantly.

- give me shit about wearing the same shoes every day.

- try to improve my style by buying me bright orange handbags, which i will never use.

- have a "secret" blog, which I will pretend not to know about.  In return, you can pretend not to know about mine. 

REQUIRED DOCUMENTS:

-A writing sample, please note that PREFERENCE will be given to PUBLISHED pieces about how much you enjoyed reading my book.

-EITHER a professional psychiatric evaluation (of at least one page in length-- anything too short is just boring), OR a copy of your parents` divorce papers  

-TWO letters of recommendation, ONE good and ONE bad, from mama-sans you have worked under at hostess bars.

-ONE personal essay; you may choose from the following list of titles: 

THE RISE AND FALL OF CHARISMA MAN  

JERO RULES: A SCHOLARLY DISCUSSION

WHY I AM OR AM NOT EATING BEEF THIS WEEK

NIGEL IS DISGUSTING: AND YOU KNOW IT TOO

THOUGHTS ON MY EX-BOSS: THE DEVIL INCARNATE

JAPANESE WOMEN WHO SPEAK WITH HIGH SQUEAKY BABY VOICES SHOULD ALL BE THROWN INTO A WELL: A CALL TO ARMS

~~~

  

Ok then, that`s all you need to become my new temporary best friend..... I look forward to hearing from all of you!!!

Take Back the Bar

First of all, I have to say that this was all Jero`s doing.

If Jade and I hadn`t gotten to bickering about which one of us was Jero`s biggest fan and who was more suited to become his groupie, we would have never gotten the idea to go to karaoke and sing that Jero song.  And Jade would not have stopped in her tracks as she remembered that she had the keys to the hostess bar where she works.  The establishment is closed on Saturdays, which essentially meant that we could sneak into the club and use the karaoke machine for free.

Sweeeet.

First we sang some Enka, which got old pretty quickly, leaving me with a new appreciation for how hard that genre is to sing.  So Enka turned to a J-pop theme, which eventually gave way to a nostalgic festival of 90`s music.  Then, at some point between Metallica and Aerosmith, Jade took one of my old hostess dresses out of the closet.  We`ve always called it "the mermaid dress," because it looks like something that a mermaid would wear.  First it belonged to Jade, then I wore it so often that she gave it to me, but it eventually bounced back to her when I quit the bars for good.  Since I often complain about not having any occasions to dress up anymore (seeing as I`m not the party girl I used to be), she suggested I put it on again- with a pair of her friend`s heels, for old times sake.  Needless to say, I am always game for playing dress-up.

If all this weren`t enough, Jade felt the sudden need a photo shoot as well.  At risk of coming across as even more self-absorbed than usual, here some highlights:

 

  

 

And they say drunks have all the fun.  Like my socks?

 

Meanwhile, at the other end of the club, Jade was studying up on how it feels to sing Karaoke in Japanese while lying down across the seats of an empty hostess bar, reading the monitor upside down.  

 

In a notable contrast to her regular role at the club, she seemed quite relaxed.

We ended up losing track of time and staying for hours later than we`d intended.  Let it be known that your average Roppongi hostess bar, when you take away all of the customers, is actually quite an idyllic place.

Thanks Jero!

Moving Right Along

In my recent efforts to hightail it the hell out of the `self-absorbed-memoir genre,` I`ve been starting to do some preliminary research for a possible historical fiction project. Lately, I`ve been really drawn to reading about the lives of some high ranking courtesans (well-dressed prostitutes) inside the gated Yoshiwara pleasure quarters during the Edo period and onward.

In the 1720 Yoshiwara Marukagami, a book that has been likened, by a scholars to a "Who`s Who Among Courtesans," one can actually find critical reviews of Yoshiwara prostitutes (written in a critical spirit comparable to one that still exists today with respect to more contemporary forms of entertainment!)  Since the "Who`s Who" is obviously written by a patron, this gives a severely limited glimpse of the women themselves.  Still, check out the common element I`ve noticed in the description of each five star whore.

Name: Takao

Rating: supreme very best

Critical excerpt: "Her luminous eyes look like pear blossoms touched by raindrops..."

Name: Usugumo

Rating: supreme very best

Critical excerpt: "She is not yet sixteen and has the aura of a budding cherry blossom in early spring..."

Name: Otowa

Rating: supreme very best

Critical excerpt: "She resembles a large white peony on a sunny day..."

Name: Hatsugiku

Rating: supreme very best

Critical excerpt: "She stands out like a magnificent chrysanthemum in a field of autumn grass..."

Name: Shiraito

Rating: peerless very best

Critical excerpt:  "This spring, at eighteen, she is like a walking flower..."

The comparison to a woman of pleasure to a transient flower blossom feels more apt in this particular context than it has in anything I`ve ever seen or known, because the average Yoshiwara courtesan lived to be only twenty-two years old.

Twenty-two!

But enough about flowers.  For the same story, I am consequently researching to the activities of secret Christian missionaries, whose presence was outlawed by the shogun during the Edo period. Or maybe I`m more interested in the American missionary families who arrived en masse to convert the heathens during early Meiji.  Then again, I tend to get convinced that whatever history I`m reading at the moment is the best context for my characters.

Preliminary research, that part of the creative process where the finished product is still a blur of indistinct characters and contexts, has got to be the most exciting stage of writing there is.  The more research I do, the more characters come running through my head. And the ones who stay for a while begin to feel so much like real people.  They chase after each other playfully in circles, slipping and falling, laughing at themselves and wanting to grow.

On days that I am not with you here, I am with them.

Well I`m either with them or with a shojo manga turned anime series, of which I recently agreed to translate 25 full episodes.  The episodes are long and the project will take months, yet the cartoon itself is cool and fun enough that I probably won`t be making fun of the scripts on here (like I`ve done with with some other translation work), in the interest of keeping my job secure.

Life is good.  Friggin` busy as hell, but good.

Let`s Enjoy Angerful Islam

There is an unwritten rule in Japanese media, fashion and advertising which states that if a text isn`t written in the Japanese language, then it is rendered meaningless. In fact, Japan is well known for it`s creative use of foreign countries` languages for decoration rather than communication, thus providing an endless source of amusement for the foreigners whose languages and cultures get playfully butchered. 

All this is fine, as long as we remember never to publish anything in Arabic.  Not everyone thinks it`s funny when the Japanese mess up.

Muslims Complain Japanese Cartoon Insulted Koran, Kyodo Reports 

May 22 (Bloomberg) -- A Japanese cartoon depicting a character reading the Koran while ordering the execution of the animation's hero and friends sparked protests on Islamic Web sites, Kyodo News reported today.

The scene from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, adapted from a comic strip published from 1987 to 2003, generated angry responses on more than 300 Arab and Islamic Internet forums, with many accusing Japan of insulting the Koran, Kyodo said.

The scene depicts Muslims as terrorists, Kyodo cited Sheikh Abdul Hamid Attrash, chairman of the Fatwa Committee at Cairo's Al-Azhar University, as saying. An unidentified official at Shueisha Inc., a Japanese publisher involved in the cartoon's movie version, told Kyodo the Koran's use was ``a simple mistake'' stemming from employees' inability to read Arabic.

Cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb in his turban were published in 2005 in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, prompting protests in Muslim communities worldwide and consumer boycotts of Danish products.