Geisha Dress Up

Kimono dressing is pretty popular her in Japan for both locals and tourists.  You typically go to a rental shop and they properly dress you in a kimono.  Then people usually walk around the town and take pictures while all dressed up.  We see people doing it at almost every major shrine we go to.  I've never done it before so while with friends in Kyoto we decided to get dressed up like Geisha.  

It was a little bit different than just a kimono dressing because we were dressed as full authentic geisha, or maiko.  Maiko are geisha in training.  It was a little frustrating because, like typical Japanese, the place would not bend at all on their arbitrary set "rules".  They would not let me mix both geisha and maiko things.  For example I preferred the Geisha style.  Geisha had more muted colors, less bows in their hair, and a different way to tie the belt.  But the geisha had a fuller wig, which I did not want to wear.  I told them multiple times, to the point where they thought I was being difficult and had to consult their manager, that I wanted the maiko wig but Geisha kimono.  They straight up refused.  And honestly the wigs looked very similar.  The maiko wig was only a partial wig and used some of my real hair and the geisha wig did not.  Resulting in a weird line around the edge of the geisha wig that looked pretty fake.  I gave in and went with maiko just so I didn't have to wear the geisha wig.  But then they wouldn't let me wear the geisha kimono etc. They eventually said I could wear it the maiko wig without the hair pins, but I couldn't go outside like that.  I was frustrated because we were definitely going outside to take pictures.  I also was considering not dying my hair black, so the front would be blonde, but was told that wasn't allowed.  I'm surprised they didn't force black contacts into my eyes.

In America when you pay for a service or go to a business the establishment tries to make the customer happy.  The popular mottos, "The customer is always right" or "Have it your way" do not stand in Japan.  In Japan, you go along to get along, whether it is what you wanted or not.

 

While this is something I did want to try, I really don't like the idea of geisha at all.  Women who spent so much time on their looks for their sole job to "entertain" men.  No thank you.  I think if I ever do something like this again it will be the regular kimono dressing, and not dressing up like geisha/maiko.

This next picture shows the wig set up.  They put that black wig on and then took my front hair, dyed it black, and the pined it on top of the wig.

Lots of people outside were taking our picture.  We were only outside for like 20 minutes, but tons of strangers now have pictures of us on their phones.   I'm not sure if they thought we were real geisha or not.  There are still a few in existence, and we were walking around in the area one might be, so I could see some people thinking they saw geisha and wanted to take pictures.  On the other hand, even with all that hair and make up I don't really look Asian.

In the next picture you can see I am missing one of the hair pins, I took it off the second I got outside.  I wish I took the other one off too.

Taking pictures with friends was the best part!

I don't think I would make a very good geisha.  Besides the fact that I'm personally against it, my blue eyes look super creepy.  I felt like I looked weird the whole time.

One more Japanese experience done.