Remarkable appearance(s)

Is there any other place in the world where women are so well dressed as in Tokyo? A majority of the female around are extremely well dressed and have perfect make-up, manicures, coiffures and are wearing exclusive brand’s hand bag. Not to mention their shoes, which in general are remarkably fancy and trendy (and high-heeled). In other words; the overall appearance is just amazing! I bet these beauties spend a whole lot of money and time to manage to look and dress so well. Being a western women in Japan can be quite challenging. Not only are you always the biggest but your style is most probably (especially coming from Sweden) coloured by a wish to dress in a way that is very comfortable and well functioning. Only at rare occasions you dress up in a way that is used as “everyday dress code” here. The special occasions in Sweden would be for Christmas, weddings and some other very special occasions.

Let me tell you a quickie about someone close to me. She has been in Japan for roughly 10 months. My good friend was brought up in Sweden during the 70’s. That was when the mainstream of the teenager’s ideals was to be natural, the “Love, Peace & Understanding”-era. We are talking about 'earth' shoes and natural material. After arriving to Tokyo my good friend began to feel extremely big and old-fashioned after a while. Some bad days she felt as if she had some kind of kinship to ogress's.

So by now almost every morning, she tries to build up her confidence and spends long time to fix the hair, apply some make up and tries different kind of clothes (over and over again). Finally she feels at ease with the result and gets out, ready to conquer the world. However, during her way, she becomes weaker (and here I must tell you that she lives in the most fashionable area, with all the famous fashion houses around the corner) so by the time she arrives to the office she has transformed back to the big, old fashioned troll again.

But hey, no ache in her feet’s due to high heeled shoes and her comfortable clothes will make her feel convenient the rest of the day. And anyway, there is nothing but sour grapes in the tree!