Three beautiful womenA few days ago I accidentally found the Beautiful Women Clock (美人時計： bijin-tokei). The site does not indicate what its objective is or why it was created. The only thing one knows is that every minute a different woman gives you the time.
The site belongs to a Public Relations firm. I sent them an e-mail asking what their goal is, but they replied with a generic message indicating they had received my message and that they might reply via e-mail.
Curiosity drove me to do some searching, but all I have been able to find, as of this writing, is that the Beautiful Women’s Clock is a joint project among several artists who supposedly want highlight the beauty of ordinary Japanese people. It remains to be seen if this is true; whenever I check the clock, I always see young women whose ages range between 18 and 28 years. Allegedly, there will also be a site that will highlight the handsomeness of ordinary men.
Regardless of whether the objective truly is to just appreciate the beauty of ordinary Japanese, I find this to be a very interesting idea, especially because large media conglomerates nowadays promote a global standardization of beauty that decidedly follows western ideals.
***
I harbor no doubts that this is so for (mainly) two reasons. First, a few months ago I read an interesting report on the recent successes of Japanese contestants in the Miss Universe pageant, as evidenced by the 2007 winner and the previous year’s first runner-up. According to the article, for a few years work has been ongoing to gain domestic prestige for Miss Universe Japan. In addition, the contest searches for women who are not only tall, but also of an appearance that would appeal to the West. That may be why the Japanese media, besides mentioning the 2007 win, paid little attention to the outcome of the event. As a side note, I still recall vividly how several Japanese friends, both male and female, told me at the time that they did not think the Miss Universe winner was especially pretty or interesting.
The second reason I owe to a friend who works in company that deals with the cosmetic and pharmaceutical sectors. This person told me, not long ago, that one of his struggles was to convince Japanese women that bigger breasts are better because women with a larger bosom are more beautiful and attractive. In this country, my friend has run into to obstacles. One of them (at least according to my friend), is the “god-damned legacy of Buddhism”, which discourages Japanese from having surgeries that are not absolutely essential. The other obstacle is harder to overcome. Because most Japanese women are small-breasted, the ones that are flat chested generally do not have any complexes about their “condition” since Japanese society still does not consider it as something that makes women unattractive.
***
Three beautiful women
Given the difficulty in convincing Japanese women to change their notions of beauty, my friend’s company and others are working on other fronts as well. The most important is perhaps convincing men that large-breasted women are not only better looking, but also hotter in bed. A corollary to this is that man who has by his side or seduces a buxom beauty is more of a man. It goes without saying that the idea is that if a big change in men’s taste is effected, then women will spend significant amounts of money in implants and related artifices. According to my friend, Japan is an embarrassing market in his business area because the sale of implants is simply laughable if you account for the purchasing power of Japanese women.
We live in a world in which too many women are afflicted with anorexia and bulimia. Because my friend has three small daughters, I asked him if he could sleep well a night and if he ever worried that any or all of his girls, upon becoming teenagers, would join what sometimes seems to be an ever larger number of young females who suffer from those ailments and others due to the pressure to have perfect bodies. My friend shrugged his shoulders and answered that parents are responsible for raising children who can survive in world that is not only tough, but sometimes cruel as well.
In view of the foregoing, and despite the fact that still I do not know the real motive behind the Beautiful Women Clock, today and for the time being, I applaud that site for highlighting the beauty of ordinary women. Rather than referring to ordinary women, the site administrator’s should perhaps address them as natural women.
My daughter’s pet goldfish got sick a few days ago. Even though my wife did all she could to make sure the fish got its health back, we prepared our kid for the possibility her pet might die, which eventually came to pass.
A few days before the fish passed away, my daughter had visited the home of her surrogate grandparents, a childless senior couple that have enthusiastically taken her as their granddaughter. While there, she told them she was sad because her pet was going to die. Ojiichan (お祖父ちゃん –grandpa) told her that he would make a grave in his vegetable plot; that way Kinta (the goldfish) would be surrounded by plants and flowers and my daughter would be able to visit whenever she wanted. My kid liked the idea, so they went to the plot to pick the spot where the fish would eventually be buried.
My daughter did not cry when her pet finally died. She was saddened by the event, but she took solace in knowing that Kinta would not only be close by, but also quite happy to be in ojiichan’s veggie garden. We called our neighbor, who came immediately and solemnly received the goldfish’s mortal remains. We all went with “grandpa” to bear witness to Kinta’s funeral. Together, my daughter and ojiichan laid Kinta to rest.
My kid became very quiet after the burial and did no want to speak. She simply thanked her surrogate grandpa for his kindness and asked to go back home. Once in our apartment, my wife and I told our daughter that we understood her feelings and that while it was normal to be sad for the loss of her pet, it would be healthy for her to talk about her feelings. Our girl replied that she was not sad for her fish because it had been well taken care of and we simply could not save its life. In addition, she noted a nice funeral had been done (grandpa had given a speech about how Kinta was a good fish). Her response made it necessary to ask an obvious question, why so quiet? She answered that she was upset with ojiichan but had not said anything when we were outside because he had conducted the funeral and had provided the space for Kinta’s grave.
Obviously surprised and disconcerted we asked what reason could she have to be upset with ojiichan. With a grave but reflexive tone, our daughter told us she could not understand how a man as nice and kind as ojiichan could insult Kinta’s grave. She continued her exposition noting that her gold fish had never bothered anybody and that fish never hurt humans. These were the reasons she could not understand why grandpa could dig a grave, give a nice speech during the funeral ceremony and still manage to affront the memory of her goldfish.
Even more perplexed than before, we had to ask about the manner in which Kinta’s memory had been trampled over. Noticeably vexed by our question, our daughter fired back: “how can you not know? Did you not see the grave? It says my goldfish was bad!” As parents, we were seriously confused. I cannot recall whether it was my wife or I who apologized for not having paid enough attention when we were outside; then we asked our girl to explain exactly what the offense was so that we could go to talk to ojiichan about he matter since we were absolutely sure he would apologize for any mistake he may have made.
My daughter told us she could not understand why grandpa had marked Kinta’s grave with “batsu.” At that moment, a superhuman effort was necessary to contain the parental wish to burst into laughter. In Japanese batsu means “bad” or “wrong” and is often represented with an “X”. Ojiichan had put a cross to mark the grave, but my daughter understood it to mean “batsu”. Still struggling not to laugh, we explained that grandpa had put that marker as a sign of respect, but my daughter interjected to remind us of the meaning of “X”. We asked to be allowed to explain and proceeded to tell our kid that, because she was born in Costa Rica and her father was from there, ojiichan had probably assumed that she was a christian. Thus, it had been as a show of respect for what he thought were our beliefs that grandpa put an “X” on Kinta’s grave.
Unconvinced by our explanation, our daughter asked what a Christian was. We tried, as best as we could, to tell her what christianity holds as its main tenets. I do not know if our explanation was good or bad, but my daughter told us that it was a story that made no sense, especially in relation to Kinta’s death. She noted that she could not understand how grandpa could have assumed that an adult would believe a story like that (i.e., Christianity) could be real.
I did not wish to extend the discussion any further, for it is too complex a subject to explain logically and in brevity. Besides, my kid has never received any kind of religious teaching that might predispose her to believe in such a cosmology. Therefore I chose the easiest path that came to mind. I told her that christians are very much like her kindergarden friends, i.e., they believe in an invisible imaginary friend to whom they talk to once in a while. My daughter, appearing to understand, said: “oh, so they talk to their friend to feel better, even though they know it is a game and that their friend does not exist, right?” I thought that was a perfect corollary to our discussion; so I expressed my agreement with her, noting that christians, deep inside, know that their invisible is just a fiction that helps them feel better. This explanation sufficed to put my daughter’s spinning little head at rest.
The following day my kid went to visit her grandparents. On her own she decided to tell ojiichan why she had been so quiet the day before and apologized for having been upset with him without telling him. Ojiichan told her it was no big deal and that the fault was his for having assumed that our family had some religious affiliation. Both were happy and at peace with each other.
Lighthearted overall, my daughter asked ojiichan to grant her one very small favor. She wanted him to remove the “batsu” sign from Kinta’s grave.
