This post may seem a little crass so for those not into such kind of talk, please move on.
I had a few girlfriends over two weeks ago for a visit (the official statement being that it was to see me, but we all knew they were there to play with the cute cat) and the conversation suddenly veered south off into the realms of the gutter.
Not that I minded.
Not in the least. My mind lives there a good part of the time anyways.
Not that that surprises most of you, but for those precious few who might still think otherwise, I wanted to clear that up.
Anyways, what kind of shocked me were the people who brought up the topic. These two lovely ladies and I have never had the kind of friendship (until now) that turned to such vulgar conversation, so I was surprised our relationship was heading into those waters.
Not that it bothered me, mind you.
Not in the least. I could talk about such things forever. Well, not forever. Eventually even I would get tired of it. I think.
I answered any questions they asked, but was surprised when it seemed that as the person with the most experience (no, I am not that kind of girl. The other two girls led a very sheltered life), somehow I was becoming the sexpert of the group. WHAT?!? Suddenly I had a flash of Sue Johanson and the Sunday Night Sex Show (Okay, I need to go on a small tangent here to talk about Sue Johanson for a second. Sue Johanson is a very popular sex educator with shows in the states, Canada, Brazil, Israel and 20 european countries. I thought she was the coolest little old granny to ever pick up a dildo until I had the misfortune of covering her talk at a community college back when I was doing the journalism thing. She smashed my idealistic image of her when she turned out to be a total cunt. She freaked on a fellow journalist about something and totally deserved the title of Queen Bitch. My world was shattered and I will never trust another granny peddling sex advice).
Anyfameturnspeopleintotyrants, having been the only girl out of the three of us to have slept with a Japanese man, I was brought to the witness stand to give a statement clearing up the many myths surrounding ...Japanese equipment.
Now, while I may have seen a few in my day, I haven't sampled a broad enough cross section of the population to have a rock hard argument (pun intended) on what's true for the group as a whole. All I could offer was an educated guess as to the accuracy of some claims.
While all the speculation and theory was flying around the room, we somehow got onto the topic of bushes. Namely that Japanese people as a whole seem to prefer it out and proud. This of course, goes against the grain of anyone who was raised or spent a significant amount of time in North America. We do not like it out and proud. We seem to prefer it beaten, on the run, or better yet, non-existent (thanks to some brilliant techniques imported from Brazil).
This bush effect goes both ways in the gender stakes and during my many, many hot springs visits I have witnessed some bushes that could be nominated for the guinness book of world records. You'd think the girls were wearing furry "t-backs" as they call thongs here. (Am I the only one who has misread "T-backs" in katakana as tea bags and then got all weird because they were advertising men's thongs? Only me? Okay, where was I? Ah, yes, the bushing.) Now, these furry ladies weren't limited to your typical onsen grannies, but also included young women. Fashionable young women who might be the toast of the town in Shibuya or Omotesando. I was shocked to the core. Surely these girls had seen enough episodes of Sex and the City to know that it is verboten to be running around with the equivalent of hairy DIY underwear?
A few muttered conversations with foreign male coworkers under cover in crowded Japanese pubs let me know that things weren't much better on the other side of the partition. "It was like a walnut, no a hazelnut, sticking out of a huge bush." said one shell-shocked Canadian. "The bush was so big I couldn't see anything at all. From the waist down it could have been a girl with John Cleese legs," said an amazed American.
I consulted my Japanese girlfriends to get the lowdown. They were all shocked that I wanted to bushwhack nature's nether garden. "Why would you do that?" asked my friend A aghast. The ex also had similar views on messing with what God gave me. "Why would you wax or trim? When it grows back it's more coarse and prickles. Soft and natural is best."
While I have slowly been adapting over the years to Japan's different culture, I don't think there will ever be a time when my protests to the bushes majoricus of Japan will roll over and die. While I think every woman should be in charge of her own garden, there are certain aesthetic standards that should be the norm (just as there is an acceptable length for the grass on your front lawn).
Maybe Japan should do public service announcements about it on the trains. It would certainly be more greatly appreciated and enrich more lives than this does:

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