Home » Japan » Deafened by the Roar of Pachinko ... or how to embarrass lesbians without really trying

I was always under what was probably a poorly uninformed impression that Japan was a quiet, understated country. In my few (wasted) years in high school Japanese class I learnt about the culture of a quiet people, who respected tradition and weren’t amenable to the loud, disrespectful ways of us Westerners (hence the trainee Japanese teacher who came on exchange to Maclean High School for a few months and after one period of our Year Nine elective Japanese class she was so shaken by our loud and outrageous behaviour she took off the remainder of the week and steeled herself against any further aural assaults by refusing to come to any more of our classes).

Deafened by the Roar of Pachinko ... or how to embarrass lesbians without really trying

Patrick Gatland
2007-01-23 12:54:33

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disrespectful” after every comment or action I produced. Apparently Boring Lesbian Number One (BL1) thought that my bopping along to the tunes on the train (see below) was “disrespectful”. My saying that I thought Japan was “crazy” was “disrespectful”. My saying that I was going to eat so much Okinomiyaki that I was going to puke was “disrespectful”. My taking a photo of some excellent “Engrish” example was “disrespectful. Soon there was so much “disrespecting” going on that it was like I had just called some black woman a ho during a live taping of the Rikki Lake show.

Even more annoyingly, all the while this was going on Boring Lesbian Number 2 (BL2) stood meekly by as her partner stamped her authority on all things disrespectful to the Japanese. It was clear that BL2 thought that BL1’s stern warnings were over the top but was obviously too afraid to mention anything to BL1 - I’m guessing she thought that would be “disrespectful”. By the time we reached the restaurant - an amazing Okinomiyaki bar located on the 38th floor of a tower block named Ebisu Palace that has been set up by people from Osaka, the home of Okinomiyaki, I was fed up and needing an Asahi “SUPER DRY!” to calm me.

However things started spiraling for the worse when it came to eat. After making the Okinomiyaki it was time to put the sauce on top. Usually this is done by squirting the sauce from a bottle on to the Okinomiyaki base while it is still cooking on the BBQ hotplate. On the first Okinomiyaki our waitress came and applied the tasty mayo and delicious brown sauce. By the time Okinomiyaki number two and beer number four were served I was ready to have a go at putting the sauce on.

As soon as I reached for the sauce bottles - poised to take one in each hand, cowboy style, ready for my shoot out with this tasty Japanese dish - I saw BL1’s lips curling, ready to again lay claim that what I was doing was affronting to ...