The past few days have offered great chances at Japanese immersion. We have been hanging out with our new friend Reika who we met through David's Kengekitai group. She works as a liaison between the Yokosuka business community and the navy base, trying to connect the American customers with local Japanese restaurants, stores etc. We have offered ourselves up as her gaijin guinea pigs, so that she can test things out on us first.
Tuesday she took us to a local restaurant and wanted to get our opinion on how the experience seemed to us as Americans-if it was welcoming, easy to understand and if it was a venue in which other navy personnel might be interested. We are going to write about our experience for her gaijin circular.
We ate Shabu-Shabu, which is sort of like a fondue or hotpot style of eating. A big pot is placed on the table filled with vegetables and a mixture of dashi (Japanese broth) and soy milk. A tray of paper thin slices of beef are served to each person. The beef is dipped into the liquid with your chopsticks (hashi) and swished back and forth. "Shabu Shabu" is what the Japanese call the sound of washing clothes back and forth in water, so the beef is being "washed" with the broth. We were given ponzu and sesame sauce. It was really very good. Also we had some very interesting Japanese black pepper. It came out of a regular pepper grinder, but was much spicier. Yum!
Another of Reika's ventures is to have a professional photographer with whom she works to offer traditional Japanese family portraits to the navy families in the area, complete with traditional clothing. She asked if David and I would pose as the models for the advertisement. We didn't realize just what we were getting ourselves into when we agreed.
We went to see a Kimono wearing expert who is licenced by the Japanese government to teach other instructors in the art of the kimono. Her house was down a little back alley next to a Buddhist graveyard and up a steep flight of stairs. The house was crowded with boxes of fabric and accessories for the traditional wear. Reika told us the woman and her helper are in their 70s, but they were incredibly energetic. They had a lovely dinner set for us when we arrived, which we were not expecting. It was our first time being invited into a Japanese home and we felt completely unprepared. David and I were both trying to recall everything we had read about Japanese etiquette and quickly folded into the seiza style-sitting on your heels with the tops of your feet on the floor. The ladies laughed and urged us to sit comfortably.
After dinner, the fun began. David was dressed in two outfits, a men's kimono and then a traditional wedding kimono and hakama. The ladies dressed me in several different kimonos-they were beautiful. I had no idea there were so many layers-it took at least 20 minutes to put on each one. The final kimono I wore was the women's wedding kimono. They also dressed me in a geisha type wig-it was much better than the plastic one I have on in the photo earlier in the blog. I can't wait to see the pictures, we will post them here as soon as we receive them from the photographer. The photo posted here is after the photo shoot-Dave and I are bright red- we were so warm from all the clothes changing. It was definitely one of the best experiences we have had since we have been in Japan.
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