Our world is no more permanent than a wave rising on the ocean. Whatever our struggles and triumphs, however we may suffer them, all too soon they bleed into a wash, just like watery ink on paper.
After reading MOAG yet again, it revived my novice knowledge of Japanese culture during my 'study Japanese' days, which seemed decades ago.
Japan is indeed a place steep in culture; there's a ceremony for all occassion:
- when a geisha 'adopts' an apprentice geisha (tea ceremony)
- when a geisha offers her mizuage (serve ekubo to the selected men)
- when the victor of the mizuage bidding is announced (tea ceremony)
- when an apprentice geisha accepts a danna/sugar daddy (tea ceremony)
Do you know that there are many layers to a kimono? It includes koshimaki (hip wrap), undershirt (camisole), paddings, underrobe (ro during hot weather, hitoe during cold weather), silk collar sewn on to the kimono, kimono, obi (sash), tabi (socks)
Also, you can spot an apprentice geisha easily. She has a momoware hairstyle (its suggestive: split peach with red in the middle??!), a red silk collar (vs white by a geisha) with a colourful kimono, a dangling obi (sash) in darari knot at the back (vs drum knot by a geisha). A virgin apprentice geisha, after mizuage (offering virginity) changes her hairstyle by placing a red silk hairband (versus a patterned one) at the base of her bun - interesting visuals!
I did not realise that Japanese men find the neck and throat of a woman erotic, similar to westerners' view of a woman's legs (and I thought the eyes is the windows to your soul, no?)
I end this blog with an interesting quote from the book (can you believe it, I still have not seen the movie!):
I never seek to defeat the man I'm fighting; I seek to defeat his confidence. A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on the course of victory.
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