kimono

Today I had a traditional day with kimono wearing and tea ceremony. Both were stupendously beautiful and also rather painful. I'm not going to go into detail - safe to say I simply couldn't do either event justice without expending thousands of words trying to capture every intricacy and minutiae. Both felt very formal and I mean formal as in 'concerned with form'. It was fascinating. Overwhelming. Beautiful, so so beautiful. Those kimonos? God, to die for. Look at some pics here.
On me though...eh, let's just say they do not um, celebrate bodies like mine. I had to take off my bra (the first time I have been braless in public since, like, I was 15) and a woman (who, no kidding, came up to my waste) strapped them down with meters of cloth till I was not so much flat chested, that could never happen, but barrel chested. I didn't have breasts, I had chest. Like an opera singer man or a chuffed bird. It was sore (and not very flattering) but totally worth it because I wore something so beautiful and I had the experience of being dressed by two women - it feels totally regal. They way their warm, rough hands snaked and tweaked about was wondrous to witness. Wearing a kimono is not a single garment affair you see, I was wearing at least twenty items of clothing - seriously! And their hands belied an intimate knowledge of the ancient technology of the clothes. The dressing is a necessary accompanying master-craft to the making of kimono themselves, if they are ever to be more than elaborate wall hangings. Being inside that kimono and inside that activity felt very luxuriant and comforting. Sitting in Seiza (the traditional sitting position expected of you at tea ceremony - see here) is the opposite - it is mean and desperately uncomfortable. I thought I would pass out at one point during the ceremony which is only half an hour : 27 minutes too much Seiza. Man, it sucks! Apparently you get better with practice. I'm sure eating forks also improves, with practice.