12 posts tagged “best friend”

Just when I feel like mama's not too bad, she goes and acts like a queen bitch again.

She's stopped drinking so hard, and that has really made her much more pleasant to be around. But she still drinks quite a bit, and sometimes I'm almost certain she's had a few before coming to work. Tonight started out alright, but it wasn't long before she was being exceptionally unpleasant. Almost back to the hard drinking days.

One of my most favorite customers of all time is undergoing tons of tests right now. His doctors think he has cancer of the throat or something. He's a hard drinking, hard partying salaryman. He works hard and definitely plays even harder. So on the one hand it's just time to pay the piper. You can't live a life so selfish and so reckless and expect not to have any consequences on your health. But I'm still worried about him. I can't write him a get-well-soon letter though, because that would get him in all kinds of trouble with his long-suffering wife. There's a famous song by the Taiwanese pop princess Teresa Teng called "Aijin" which means "mistress." Customers love this song, and the song talks about how she's not able to walk with her man in public but she still loves him. I always think "shut the f*** up!" when I hear that song, but I guess that's kind of what I feel like at the moment with this customer. I'm not his mistress or anything, but I do care about him, and I wish I could tell him I care and I'm praying for his health.

I feel kind of sick because a customer took me out after work and fed me tons of sea urchin. I LOVE sea urchin, it's just so delicious. It's like delicious butter. But you're not supposed to eat so much of it. I feel like puking.

Best Friend came to the club to pick up some stuff I had, and she met Dancer Girl. It was weird, because I feel like they know each other, but in fact they had never met before. They both said "oh, I've heard so much about you." Best Friend was acting kind of awkward. She used to thrive in hostess club environments, but I guess they trigger more than a few unpleasant memories now.

おやすみ

I feel a little bad about saying this, but Dancer Girl is just annoying the hell out of me right now. She gets really obnoxious and loud and crazy when she's drunk, and she's always drunk. How come drunks always need to be the center of attention?

And she does this annoying thing my mother used to always do, where she just doesn't have a filter between her brain and her mouth. Like when she told me the Handsome Dentist was an Aquarius, I quietly said "oh that's not so good, my last two Aquarius boyfriends ended up hitting me." Before I knew what was happening, she turns around and shouts so everyone can hear, "You don't hit your girlfriends, do you!?" Making it look like I said he looks like someone who did.

She does this type of thing ALL THE TIME. I'm almost scared to open my mouth.

I forgot to drink my ukon no chikara (liver-wringing ginseng drink that really keeps me from getting a hangover) yesterday, and I've been feeling kind of crappy all day today. Not least because I was woken up at 8AM by the land lord manager guy to pay rent. I knew he was coming, but I guess I kind of thought he was joking.

My friend Shia has a wide lens and he wants to come over and get a proper picture of my room. Which should be cool. I'll post it if he ever comes around.

I wonder if all the people in taxis that stop outside my building know that I can see them really clearly staring into space or picking their nose and stuff.

Hey look at this review that some red head in Tokyo wrote!

It's about that really really good book Bar Flower by that awesome ex-hostess Lea Jacobson. You should check it out!

Bar Flower: My Decadently Destructive Days and Nights as a Tokyo Nightclub Hostess

Lea Jacobson

This book FINALLY came out!!!

Bar Flower: My Decadently Destructive Days and Nights as a Tokyo Nightclub Hostess

Lea Jacobson

And it's really good. Really really really good. A wide-eyed, intelligent young American chick comes to Japan, only to have her soul crushed by uptight "we Japanese" traditionalists. She then throws herself into the world of hostessing, and learns a whole lot about herself and the country, realizes it's messed up, then leaves.

Then she falls in love with her life and Japan again. But that's all in post-production.

And it's just insanely entertaining. I command all of you to read it!

It's over.

My best friend is now a married woman.

Other then that, nothing's really changed.

At long last, the big day is tomorrow. Best Friend's wedding is at 11:30am (yes, you heard me), and we have to be looking good, smelling good, and feeling good. Major hair, makeup and undergarment adjusting will commence from about 5am.

Amazingly enough I have absolutely no jet-lag, whereas Best Friend and her betrothed have incredibly bad cases. And I figured out why I'm so lucky. Because I work at night! I didn't need to adjust my schedule!

I think I suffer from the delusion that I can blend in with white people and white bread America. But these are the questions and comments I've been getting from Best Friend's white American extended family:

"Your English is very good."
"What kind of name is [my Eastern European last name]? Is that Japanese?"
"So...(awkward pause) um...where are you from?" (this is probably the most popular question).

and so on and so forth. And to be honest, their culture kind of confuses me. I have to read a weird quote from their bible tomorrow, and that makes me feel a little uncomfortable. I looked over it. I swear part of it literally says "love is not puffed up." That's from the bible! I feel like adding "like a rice crispy."

In Japan you're called a Christmas Cake after 25 (because nobody wants you after the 25th), but I thought I could get away from jokes about my spinsterhood in America. I guess 28 and single is ripe and ready for spinster jokes in any country.

Good thing I'm used to it. My skin's pretty thick.

What is wrong with America? I swear people keep getting fatter and fatter and fatter, and it's not their fault if this is what's sold to them. It's cruel, it's inhumane, it's sick! And it needs to stop, please. It's just not right.

So I'm off tomorrow morning for New York. Have an annoying three hour stopover at Detroit, and god-willing, without any delays, I should be in JFK right around midnight.

I'm trying not to think about the sore back and neck I'm going to get.

My best friend's getting married!!!!

See you guys in two weeks.

Best Friend's getting married in less than two weeks! I'm going to New York in less than a week!!!!! I'm hyperventilating, so I can't even imagine what Best Friend's going through.

Even though Best Friend and I have a somewhat similar family situation background, she seems to have somehow gotten over her commitment/marriage-phobia. When she found an amazing guy that was perfect for her, she recognized how awesome they were for each other, and asked him to marry her. He said of course.

Wow.

I feel like I'm gonna cry already. I think I'm going to be one big puddle of tears for the next two weeks.

I'm nervous and panicked, and I'm not even sure why. SHE's the one getting married, but I feel like I'm the one that's gonna need a brown paper bag to breath into.

I feel a little too comfortable in my life at the moment. Whenever this happens I try to think about where I was a year ago.

I had just started working as a hostess again. I was VERY conflicted about it, because when I quit last time, I was so sure I'd never come back. I also started an office job. And I had some big projects going on. I might have been at one of my workaholic high points (or low points, depending on your point of view).

I had also just moved into an all girl's dorm, and no boys were allowed inside. For the first time in years and years and years, I was living on my own.

Best Friend was just getting into the swing of being sober, and we spent a lot of time roller blading everywhere to replace the drinking (she used to be a professional figure skater, so she was attempting to transfer those skills to roller blading).

TODAY, I've moved into a closet and boys are allowed into my house now. For the first time in years, I've interacted romantically with men who aren't paying me -- and it's fun, and a little scary.

I quit the office job and have stopped actively pursuing other work, so I'm basically a full time hostess that lazes around all day then hangs out at the ghetto club at night.

I'm 28 years old, living in a closet, working as a hostess, with no savings in my bank.

Has my life deteriorated, or am I nesting and getting ready to BREAK OUT into my future?

I was really really hoping and praying that Totoro was joking when he said he wanted to go to hanami with me. But he wasn't. When I told him that I had to fill in someone's shift and work last night (and so not go to hanami with him) he actually snapped at me. I was kind of shocked, and he went back to talking politely. But note to self -- don't cross the comfort line with Totoro.

He wants to take me to Okinawa too. The rule is I have to get more from him than I give. And I haven't really gotten a whole lot of much. Crappy bonuses from paid dates don't really count, and I could give two craps about a nice meal (I can feed myself fine).

So that's kind of causing me stress. I don't want this job to stress me. I like to think that I'm too smart, educated, independent and awesome for that. I'm such an idiot. I'm acting like I'm better than a hostess, when that's exactly what I am!

I'm not really though. I'm just doing this job for fun (^-^)