by Ioana Lee
In that moment, all the math and physics classes seemed easy; at least they had logic to them. The speed vector, the friction laws, the isosceles triangle and second order equations have formulas and rules that are valid for everyone and are unchangeable regardless of the circumstances. Even philosophy and brain surgery seem to be more accessible to my understanding than all the twists and turns of Japanese language and culture. I found myself in several situations thinking of how I could just tell those people or how I could simply answer, “Yes indeed. I’m beautiful.” How come no one told me that I’m intelligent? I know the answer to this. In Japan youth and beauty are far more important than intelligence and wisdom, regardless of how many people would try to deny my statement.
“One more thing, says Ken, awaking me from myself reflection. Don’t tell any other woman that she is beautiful, because it means that you have a big head and thus that you ridicule her.”
That was way too much, I thought to myself. It goes beyond any logic.
“Ken, please help me understand. If I ever see a Japanese woman who is more beautiful that I am and I want to give her a compliment, I can’t say anything to her? Even though esthetically she’s superior to me?”
“Ioana you don’t seem to understand, do you? In Japan, there is no other woman more beautiful than you are. You are the ideal of woman beauty for the Japanese. There are many women who are nice, beautiful, cute or interesting, but you are inconceivable. Therefore, regardless of the person that you are talking to, esthetically you are far superior.”
In case I had any drop of modesty, humbleness and uncertainty left within me, it disappeared right in that moment. Everyone around us confirmed Ken’s sayings; therefore I had to be careful with what I’d say so that I wouldn’t offend anyone. In one instant, my ego inflated 100 times and became ball shaped just like the Fugu fish, which was well known for being poisonous and also for being an emphatic show-off.
I rushed in front of the mirror, thinking to myself that perhaps I became perfect overnight and didn’t realize it. I stared at myself and could no longer see my thin and pale lips, black eyes that I would have actually preferred to be green, my big nose that looked small and impertinent, my long and thin arms that made me look like a spider and my big ears that were helping me to “hear better.” I had a certain disbelief about me, thinking of all the well-known beauties like Liz Taylor, Marilyn Monroe, Sophia Loren, and many others. What would they do in my situation? How lucky they were that they didn’t have to live in Japan.
I tried to understand the aesthetic preferences of the Japanese. Obviously they were highly developed. They paid attention to a lot of things in their life: behavior, gestures, attitudes, gardens, floral arrangements, the tea ceremony, nature’s beauty, evanescence, death and cherry blossoms… I understood the intensified emphasis on the aesthetics of the things that surrounded them, with the exception of human beauty. They have exactly the opposite perception of beauty than the rest of us.
For example, there was an American woman who appeared on television. She had been a resident of Japan for many years, was a former model, 36 years old, fluent in Japanese and a mother of two. Many Japanese thought of her as being “too old.” This American woman, whose name was Kelly, was superb: tall, beautiful body, natural blond hair, green eyes, teeth like pearls, porcelain face and a Hollywood like profile. She didn’t look like she was more than 22. She was extremely cute, dressed nicely, made great jokes and entertained the viewers and also cooked Japanese food. She had a strong and invigorating presence that made people want to follow her. In any country in the world she’d be considered beautiful, talented and intelligent. The expats in Japan were totally in love with her and her style, yet the Japanese thought that she was unattractive and that the only reason she made herself noticed was because she talked a lot and argued with all her guests on the television set. It was a sad place to be I thought; often times they made fun of her hair, body weight and age. Every time I heard those things I thought to myself that if I was in her shoes I would have left a long time ago, yet every person has their own reason to stay or leave. One of her children, half Japanese and half American, showed up during one of her shows and said that she was embarrassed by her mom because she was weird and loud and that as a result of this, her fellow students made fun of her at the daycare.
One of the producers even thought of having me on her show as a contrast piece, to somehow show the audience that “she is good” and the other one “is not”… I told the producer that it would simply be unfair to treat Kelly that way. I also told them that it was obvious that they intentionally triggered her to get nervous during the show to get high ratings and publicity. I told the producer that I would actually like to meet her in person but not under those circumstances. I couldn’t accept their invitation because of two reasons: because it wouldn’t have been nice from my part to treat another human being like that and also because I couldn’t have my last name, Kurosawa, be part of such tasteless entertainment. The producer’s answer to my denying their invitation was “You’re not ready to be on television anyway. You still have to polish your Japanese.”
I thought that I’d lose my mind when I heard his reply. I shot back at him: “Polish my Japanese? What language did we just speak before my declining your invitation? Swahili? Or perhaps my elevated and well-mannered vocabulary made you feel inferior, considering the fact that you are a native and I’m not? I feel sorry for you. Try to find an insult that would come closer to reality.” And I left.
I never had the chance to meet Kelly in person, although I would have liked to see how she was in real life. She became really famous in Japan and hopefully she’s more content with where she is now. She seemed intelligent and very confident to me. What the Japanese thought of her had no relevance as long as she had her show and made lots of money. After all, she was American.
One day, I went to audition for a role I was selected to play in a Japanese soap opera, as an extra. It was rare for a foreigner to be featured in a Japanese soap opera. An Australian guy and I were selected for that specific film. We knew each other prior to that audition from a television advertisement we had worked on together. I was happy to see him again. The scene that I was supposed to appear in was in a club. There were a lot of Japanese guys and girls. After I changed my clothes, I showed up at the filming scene thinking to myself “I’m too sexy for this place.” All the people stared at me and said all at once “What a beauty!” I smiled at them arrogantly and went next to my Australian filming partner who told me:
“Wow. You are gorgeous!”
“Thanks!” I replied to him, knowing that he said nothing but the truth.
When the camera people and the rest of the crew showed up, they started to run a test on everyone. Once they saw me, they lowered their cameras and said:
“What an exquisite beauty. We can’t believe our eyes!”
I simply answered them: “Isn’t that so?”
I am embarrassed for a lot of things that I had done in my life, but that moment horrifies me. I can’t find any piece of mind thinking that I was capable of saying something like that in Japanese, so off-handedly and vainly. I can’t find the right words to express how grotesque it was. I would have preferred to have someone around me give me a good shake and say, “Hey, come back to earth.” I’m so embarrassed that my hands are shaking on the keyboard as I’m typing this. Later on I realized how bad my behavior was and I learned from it. Unfortunately, I went through a long time in which I was out of touch with reality. I totally lost my common sense and didn’t respect my own basic values and morals. I regained all these things later in life. Much later.
Thus, I was a monster and wasn’t aware of it. I was so proud of myself, of my looks and my luxurious clothes. I was thrilled with my catwalk, my height and all the glances that were following me. I was so absorbed by my own narcissism that I could hardly talk and walk like a normal person, without playing with my hair and smiling at all the mundane peo
ple around me.
My friend Adrian
While in Tokyo, I went clubbing with Adrian often. Ken couldn’t stand going clubbing, yet he wasn’t allowing me to hang out with any of my girlfriends either. He only trusted Adrian. I was allowed to get out of the house without him only if I was in Adrian’s company. I asked him many times to join us, yet he always refused. Truth be told, I never quite understood why. I believe that his shyness had something to do with it. Adrian and I were frequenting a club where only expats would go, most of them being models. We were all just a bunch boys and girls from all over the world, all young and restless. I didn’t even like clubs that much, yet I liked to dance a lot. At that time in my life I also enjoyed being seen and admired.
On Saturday nights, Ken and his friends would usually go out. They’d dine at restaurants, eating sushi, drinking sake and talking about how their wives should stay at home, have children, and clean up the house, while they, fathers and beloved husbands, were having fun. When they’d finally return home at the crack of dawn, their wives wouldn’t be allowed to ask them anything, but on the contrary, would be happy that that their husbands behaved like real men do.
Since I had moved to Japan I realized that this mindset wasn’t going to serve me very well. I decided to borrow all the privileges of the men. Therefore, unlike other wives, most weekends I went clubbing and once I was done I usually called Ken to set up a time for him to pick me up so that we could go home together. Every Friday night the two of us were part of what Ken used to call, Saturday Night Fever, because the atmosphere on most Friday nights was more feverish than on Saturdays.
Whenever I went out with Adrian I met him in Roppongi, the area that he lived in. And just like all the other party people, we’d meet in front of the famous pastry shop, Almond, which had bright pink and white lights. In Tokyo the evenings are absolutely wonderful, colorful and lively. During the day the city looks very different than during the nighttime. At night one could see all the colorful advertisements, millions of people milling around, shops, restaurants, clubs, bars, cars, etc. Everyone is restless and electric.
I remember vividly one Saturday night when I went to meet Adrian. On my way to Roppongi, I called him five minutes in advance to zero in our exact meeting place. In all that weekend craziness it could have taken us up to one hour to find one another. We finally met that night…
“Hey, how are you feeling tonight? It’s a beautiful evening, isn’t it?” I asked him.
“Yes, it’s really nice but I’m so tired of this crowd. We can hardly slide by all these people.” “Indeed, yet I like the craziness and the variety. It makes me feel alive!”
“You look awesome tonight. I’m surprised that Ken allowed you to get out of the house dressed like this. I’m sure he keeps a close eye on you…”
“He doesn’t have a choice but to let me go out. He cut down on most of my activities, but let’s stop talking about this. You’re too young to be listening to marriage issues. How was school today?”
“It was ok, just a bit boring. Let’s decide where we want to go this evening.”
“Let’s do what we always do, drink tea and do some people watching. We can do this for the next two hours and afterwards when the clubs open, we could go to Club Lex. How does that sound?”
“Perfect!”
We went to Starbucks, which was very close to Almond. We found seats upstairs, next to the big windows. We were in for some serious fun watching the hustle and bustle created by all the foreigners who were trying to forget that they lived in Japan by creating a linguistic and social environment similar to the one in their own countries. Next to our couch there were a lot of couples made up of foreigner men and Japanese women. The foreigners spoke a rapid Anglo-Japanese that was easy for Adrian and me to understand. Even though we didn’t all know each other, we, the millions of foreigners “wandering” in Japan, felt close to one another. We were all looking for that something, despite coming from all over the world: Europe, North America, Latin America, and Africa. We all tried to adapt to their standards and rules, to speak Japanese and to get used to their food and customs. Some of us had certain angst towards those foreigners who were working for their national companies with branches in Japan, because they were making it there through English. For some reason they seemed to have a much easier and happier life in Japan, being left out of the linguistic struggles and social assimilation that the rest of us were part of. They didn’t seem to be challenged to learn and speak Japanese.
During our people watching time together, Adrian and I were usually having juice, tea and desert. We didn’t smoke, nor drank alcohol. I didn’t do it because I didn’t like it and because this was one of my life’s major decisions: to not smoke or drink coffee or alcohol. I made an exception to this rule with a very special occasion when I had a few sips of alcohol. Overall I’m very proud of this decision. I remember attempting to smoke when I was in 12th grade and getting a little tipsy. I had such bizarre behavior. All I was trying to do was to prove myself. Adrian wasn’t drinking nor smoking because he was underage. I don’t believe he would have dared to tell me that he wanted to do any of this out of respect. I tested him a couple of times when I realized that we were both adamant about these dangerous vices. We both remembered how shocking it was to see everyone smoke and drink during our vacations in Romania. I even remember asking him:
“Adrian, you’re so much younger than I am. What do you think about the modern generation of Romanians, which you are a part of?”
“I don’t know exactly what to think about it. I don’t understand them. Most of them are spoiled and ignorant, wanting to be “cool” just like abroad. They still don’t understand that smoking, having long hair for men and looking grimy is old fashion. You’ve asked me if I have a girlfriend and I told you I don’t. This past summer, when I went back home on vacation, I really liked this girl who was a model. Besides being very beautiful she was also very smart too. I couldn’t be anywhere near her because her skin and hair always smelled like tobacco. She was smoking to show that she was cool. The same thing happened with my classmates. They thought of me as being a looser, for not being “cool” just like they were.”
“Didn’t you tell them that they are the ones who are not cool? Didn’t you tell them that in most civilized countries you can’t find a job if you smoke and have greasy hair? (Some of the older Japanese smoke. Poor people, they lead such miserable lives).
“Do you still miss Romania?” he asked me unexpectedly.
“No, I don’t, at least not now. I don’t have time to think about it. It doesn’t make me feel good thinking about how much I miss my family. I have to stay focused on all the things that are happening in my career, at the television station. I’ve wanted this all my life. I also had people tell me that I have most of the qualities for this. I prepare a lot for it, alone at home, in front of the mirror, with Tanaka-san. He told me to be ready any moment now. He’s thinking of two shows that I could be a part of. We’re talking about it a lot. He wants 30% of the profits. It feels like a lot, but at least I’ll succeed in my endeavor. Anyway, I’ve heard that at Hollywood the agents only make 10%. Oh well, God knows what’s better. He’s my agent as well as my manager. Truth be told, he wants to make money and he wants to make it on me. Taniguchi is the same. He already took pictures of me. Oh God, it would be like a dream come true if they’d accept me. They are the most well-known talent agency in Japan. Actually they are the most famous in Asia. I don’t know how everything will turn out. I hope that everything will go well.”
“What is Ken saying about all this?”
“Why are you asking me this? You know very well that he’s against it all, yet he doesn’t say it to me directly. He says that all of them are pricks and that I should… please let’s not talk about this. You remember very well how big of a scandal he started that time when I arrived home later than expected because of the representative from the talent agency who stopped me on the street to ask me to c
ollaborate with them. Do you remember? You were there. After that horrific scene he called and told them that I’m a Kurosawa and that I’m also married. I get angry only when I think of it. I don’t think it’s worth ruining this evening with these things.”
“I apologize. I don’t want you to get mad.”
“What bothers me the most is that he knew well before we got married that I wanted to do this, that this was my dream. I want a fulfilled and diverse life. I want to be a writer, an actress, producer, talk show host and fashion designer. I have tons of projects to work on in my life. He doesn’t want me to do any of these, because it would mean getting out of the house and mingling into the world, being seen. The most recent fallacy is that he can’t stand having people look at me. Fairly soon he’ll probably ask me to walk with a paper bag over my head so that no one sees me.”
