Hola. I spent an hour writing this post earlier. Then the browser crashed. Lousy Firefox. Giita’s mac is a temperamental thing. One thing I’m looking forward to when I get home is being back to a PC. I know where things stand with those. So, having wasted most of the last of the sunlight on a lovely clear 30 degree day in the midst of a rainy season that has caused us to be very wet several times this week, I’m going to waste the last bit of sunlight on re-writing the bugger.

The most exciting thing to happen this week was the visit of a 17 year-old Maiko (literally Dancing Girl, an apprentice Geisha) to Ritsumeikan as part of our Japanese Research class. She performed 2 dances (clip here), before a few of us (me included) were picked to answer prepared questions. This is fairly unusual, considering that fairly few Japanese people have seen a Geisha or Maiko and very few of those have actually spoken to one.

So this is what we learned: She became a Maiko after seeing a TV programme about them. Her parents were dead-set against it, thinking it outdated and overly traditional, but they (sort of) came ’round. She did a bit of investigation of the (very restrictive) lifestyle before becoming a Maiko, so none of it came as a surprise to her. She can’t go into convenience stores or have a mobile phone and only gets 2 days off per month, during which she usually goes shopping in Osaka or does karaoke. Her make-up used to take over an hour but she has it down to about 45 minutes and she gets her hair set once a week, then has to make sure it doesn’t get ruffled for the rest of the week, making sleeping awkward. She sometimes has to work as late as 1am, then has to get up early the next day for the usual round of practicing (dance, shamisen, singing, elocution). There are only 70 Maiko, all in Kyoto, so she sometimes gets to travel around Japan or even abroad for her work. Most of her customers are middle-aged men, although the number of female clients is increasing. They never deal with her directly, booking via a teahouse. Her payment goes towards her rent, food, clothes etc, after which she’s given a small amount of spending money. She’ll become a Geisha at the age of 20. Many Geisha leave after a while to get married or open a shop. The oldest current Geisha is 92. She seemed reasonably happy with life, even with a hundred odd gaijin taking photos of and with her, examples of which are below.

While I was hanging out with Maiko, Giita was off taking pictures of buildings in Osaka.

I went from the Maiko to Hito Genome practice. Hito Genome is 15 minutes of screaming over grinding noise. We’ll be playing the next Rock Commune gig at the end of the month, along with Rune and Kujira (whale) - the new hardcore guitar band I’m drumming with. I’m also starting to play with a prospective emo band with my pal Atsutoshi on Wednesday of next week. Other than that, we’d a big test in school on Monday, which was fine, went to see Mice Parade in Metro on Thursday - about half of which was really good despite the cramped conditions. I don’t know that I’ve seen a band with less stage presence, other than Doug Scharin who is a good enough drummer to more or less carry the thing on his own. My bandmates Saeko and Miki found the whole thing terribly exciting. Saeko applauded the vibraphonist as he he walked by, then was about to go tell Kristin from Múm that she loved her when I pointed out that the lady singer wasn’t actually Kristin. She was so crestfallen that I was sorry I’d said anything. One soaking later, we were back home watching the third episode of David O’Doherty’s programme (Tuesday night on RTE2!) It’s getting better every week.

Anyway, I’d best post this before everything goes horribly wrong. Giita is just back from the riverside where she sunbathed away the effects of last night’s karaoke until 4am. with our friendly and amenable course coordinator Jason and Chika, his other half. We’re off to a 70’s party tonight so I need to find something suitable. I’m recording with Rune tomorrow and want to be home early, since I’m told time will be short. Maximum 2 takes of each song! Erk! Cheerio!

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 16th, 2007 at 6:38 am and was written when Joss was feeling jumblings, music.