Blog #11

1.Geishas practice dancing, flower arrangement, calligraphy, and other traditional art forms.  Their lifestyle is rich with traditions and ritual.

2. I think that the experience of leaving one place, like a job or a school, could be considered a form of aware. While we are sad one part of our lives is ending, we are also excited about the opportunities ahead.  This bittersweet feeling can be similar to aware in that we appreciate both the good that is past and the good that is to come.

3. I think that a lot of the film felt very “western”, and the English language added to this.  It didn’t help that background dialogue, considered “unimportant” to plot, was still in Japanese, highlighting the fact that the main characters were speaking a language that was not native to the setting.  I think it would have been more effective to have Japanese used throughout the film, and have the American soldiers at the end speak English; it would highlight the change from the traditional Japanese world to the modern, westernized world.

4. Most of our holidays are tied to specific calendar dates, and not necessarily tied to the season.  We do have our own ways to celebrate the weather associated with each season: we build snowmen and snow forts in the winter, go for hikes in the spring, have picnics in the summer, and clam bakes in the fall.  Japanese might appreciate the beauty of each seasons more than we do; we tend to focus on what activities we can enjoy in each season’s  

5. I felt the image of the women washing their kimono in the river, while Sayuri described the death that had passed because of the war, was particularly stunning.  The red ribbons of silk, flowing like blood, really gave the feeling of extreme sorrow and long-suffering, both in waiting for the war to be over, and in the hard work of washing those strips of silk.

6. Although the book claimed that the Japanese have a less defined ideal of beauty than Western cultures do, I disagree: I think that the notion of Wabi-Sabi, the ideal that both subtlety and exquisiteness paradoxically work in tandem to create aesthetic beauty as well as a guideline to living well, is very constraining.  In Western culture, it is said that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”; we are free to choose what we think is beautiful.  A painting hanging in a museum, for instance, does not necessarily fit a set of guidelines that makes it a thing of beauty, but rather, it is viewers that decide whether they think the painting is beautiful.

7. Much of the geisha’s life was hung around the balance of wabi and sabi.  For instance, although their kimono had elegant and extravagant patters, geishas makeup was full of simple, direct contrasts: white on red, black on white.  Although geishas attended the wealthiest, extravagant parties, they were expected to live a life of simple, ritualistic traditions.  Their very nature was shrouded in shadow and mystery, full of subtle signals such as the flick of a wrist.

8.Hatsumomo’s fate is never clearly spelled out, however, Sayuri calls her a woman who has lost everything, even hope.  Audiences are left with the feeling that she simply fades out of existence, because she is no longer part of the only world she has ever known; this is accented by the fact that she is never spoken of again.

In a very Western-style ending, it is indicated that Sayuri and the Chairman live happily ever after as lovers; Sayuri calls this story the “Memoirs of a Geisha” because her life as a geisha is now over and her life with the Chairman has begun. 

I think Sayuri is neither happy nor unhappy with her life; at the beginning of the movie, she calls her story one of sorrow, but she never mentions regret, or wishing for a different life.  I think she accepts that her life has been the way it has, and wishing for something different would not change the truth.  I think she also appreciates that her experiences shape who she is, and that, without them, she would be an entirely different person.

9. I’m not sure I understand this question.

11. As I’ve mentioned before, I think that the movie, while historically accurate and visually beautiful, was very Westernized.  The ending in particular struck me as a common one from Western culture: despite the terrible things the heroine has gone through, she is happy now that she has attained the love of a (much much older) man, who will rescue her from her terrible life, somehow making the whole awful experience worth it.

Blog #10

“Kisetsu” is the Japanese sense of the seasons.  Because of the importance of the weather in a once agriculturally dependent island, focus on the seasons is deeply ingrained in Japanese consciousness.   Even though modern agriculture allows for independence from the seasons, they still affect many aspects of Japanese life, such as architecture, fashion, and writing.  There are also many annual events that are tied to the changing seasons.

Japanese houses are built above the (often wet) ground, to keep them dry and stable in the rainy season and the monsoons; they are also built to be open, with paper walls that slide open, for maximum air flow in the hot and humid summer.  Yukata, the coolest and most comfortable of kimono, are popular in summer time, not only because of its traditional roots, but because of its practicality in the summer heat.  Japanese cuisine also changes to reflect the fruits of the season, as do greetings and letter openings: “most letters in Japan start with some form of seasonal greeting – in the spring, ‘it’s the time when fresh grass sprouts’…and in winter… ‘in this time of piercing cold’” (154). 

Annual events that celebrate the seasons include hanami, or flower viewing, in the spring, tanabata festival in the summer, which is tied to a celestial occurrence, and omisoka, or New Years, in the winter.

“Otogibanashi” are Japanese folk-tales.  These stories span centuries, but focus on the same recurring themes, such as the seasons, the relationship between man and nature, and praising the “ideal human”.  The idealized human is one who is brave, wise, and generous, and it is this kind of person that normally emerges happy from Japanese tales. 

“Wabi” and “Sabi” were hard for me to understand, and I hope to understand them better after class. Basically (or at least, how I understood it), “wabi” is simplicity, in regards to aesthetics and even living, and “sabi”, its opposite, is elegance.  The two combine in a paradoxical relationship between finding beauty in both, and finding each in the other.