Beginning to learn Japanese

This is a journal of a Japanese woman, Coco M. Saito who grew up in Canada. It’s fully absorbing, like a good girle novel. Besides the fact that it is fun to read, it contains all kinds of very insightful cultural points. (So I have a good excuse for perusing it!)

The writer discusses potential problems with lovers, and also shows that certain foods are not potentially not popular: “If my boyfriend loves Natto, sashimi and fishegg so much but hate icecream, cake, pizza, KFC or Popeyes or any other western food, it would be very difficult to pick a place to eat.” I knew that about natto, but not about sashimi or fisheggs.

Also! Interesting perceptions about women who wear uniforms at work, and the author’s perspective on the sameness and lack of individuality. I’m clipping much of this entire entry to my journal because it’s very good.

“Female workers in own clothes are prone to look down female workers in uniform. Uniform means entry level job or non-professional…
We have to wear uniform in junior highschool & highschool. Many schools have non-sense strict prescripts for uniform and all about fashion. Braid long hair in one, no hair colored, no perm, no earring hole, no make up, no colored nail, white short socks always etc etc. Sometimes crazy teacher tries to dye student’s natural brown hair black.
After starting job, companys also have stupid rules. No red nails, no highheels, no red lipstick, no hair dye et al. However she doesn’t need to wear uniform, boss or people at office will be upset if she wear no sleeve shirts. If she has a tatoo, she has to hide it.
In my highschool time, I got confused occasionally. Teachers/society kept telling us to be unique in own way. On the other hand, they kept trying to diminish our individuality.
I wear what I want to wear. I am not trying to defeat something or hate recent fashion everybody loves. But I don’t know what to say, just it makes me feel funny when I come across a group of ladies in uniform. Does their company count on theit ability to choose the right clothes for work?”

SO! I learned a new word, because the author refers to a movie of the same name: Shumoni.

In a big corporation, there is a “department of errands”, so-called “Shomuni”, which is the worst nightmare of the company employees. If you do something wrong, as a punishment, you can get demoted to Shomuni. (from here)

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 30th, 2005 at 7:44 pm and is filed under History & Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.