"Culture"

The belated story of the kimono, and my adventures in yuzen-style dyeing.

I was able to try a kimono for the first time at a fair at the Hiroshima International House, near Hiroshima station. You didn't need a reservation to try on a kimono, so I was worried about it being really crowded. To be safe, I got there at the opening time, but luckily there was only one person ahead of me! So I didn't have to wait, and there was a wide selection of prints to choose from. (Though to be fair all the prints were pretty cool.)

It took four Obasans about forty minutes to get me into the kimono. (Though getting me out of it is a much easier process. Hehehe...) First I had to take off all my outer clothes, though not my underwear. No guys to be seen in that room. And there was a screen in front of the door. Then they gave me a white slip and arranged the robe on top of that. In between the slip and robe they put two towels, one on my waist and one over my breasts. Because I was too skinny. Bleh. Also I was tall enough so they didn't have to shorten the hem, which they did for some other girls.

Next was my makeup and hair (they told me not to eat anything because of the lipstick) and finally the obi. While the process was going on, the ladies kept chattering in Japanese. I was mostly in the dark, but I could hear phrases like "So tall!" "Doll face!" "Skinny!"

With the final result, I felt a little goofy as a tall redhead in a kimono, but also pretty freakin' cool.




I didn't actually get very far because it's not easy to walk in those things. and I was scared of ruining it. But I met up with my friend Diana and we did tea ceremony. And posed for a lot of pictures. One guy even directed me how to pose to "look more Japanese."

This Sunday I also went to a fair, but unfortunately wasn't able to make a kimono reservation. But I did do some cool dyeing.

I did have a lot of help with it. Though I wish I could have done more shading. I don't have enough Japanese to say "If the light source is in this direction, the leaves on the far side  should be a darker shade of red."

It was just me and some high school girls. Two of them tried to talk to me and help me out, although they didn't speak much English. So cute!