Buggirl's Increasingly Strange Tokyo Tales...

Renee has updated about Kyoto, my last day there..which takes the pressure ff me...but I will need to write about the movie we saw.

She also has things uploaded on flickr...but due to the fact neither of us are big on haviong our pictures taken, we miss out on getting a picture together of the creepy similar clothing we were rocking.

But we do have the ugly leather boots!

And...I am totally gonna cut you.

We have tickets in progress, I'll transfer the money soon.
And, ouch, even non-peak travel is costing me me aorund 1,300$USD. About 600$ of that is airport taxes due to increases in gas.

I just paid my yearly taxes in a lump sum intsead of over 6 months...and I think it was the right thing to do, but if my wallet had balls it would be clutching them and rolling about on the floor.

My travel dates to Seattle are:
I arrive September 12th (after having left Tokyo on, yes, the 12th) and will depart on the 22nd (arriving back on the 23rd) The Milkman's Sister has assured me that if I have an extra day or so of leave come September and if flights back to Japan are full and offering a sizable travel voucher to be bumped to the next day...to take that voucher! They'll understand.

The Milkman's Sister also tells me that, as far as our boss knows, ya'll who live in Seattle are my extended family. This is my 帰郷, trip HOME to see FAMILY.  I am NOT a BAD DAUGHTER who hasn't been to my home state for over 3 years....I am visiting my family.

Sometime in that 10 day span I will take the train to Portland, maybe midweek.

Henna...I am so bad at tracking bumps...to the best of your knowledge, am I arriving in country prior to birth, after the birth, or possibly in that OMG when the FUCK is this thing going to LEAVE my BODY?!?" stage?

Belly dance related has been fun thus far!

The first two days, as they relate to bellydance...sort of.

As soon as Gus dropped me off at Casa De Besh I started trying on the dance items that had been shipped here for me. Halfway back to his car, Gus remembered that he needed to get a machine out of the basement and came back, only to find me in my new Melodias.

I'd purchased the black pinstripe specialty Melodias. I had not realized that the ribbons used for the pin striping were actually ruffly...I thought they'd be flat and flush to the fabric. One thing that I dislike about Melodia products is that the photos always look nice and all but it is very hard to determine textures/colors because everything looks a little over-lit and there are never any close-ups of the fabrics. The pants make that corduroy "swish swish" when you walk and because of the way the waistband is made the ruffles itch my belly. But they fit well and are pretty fucking snazzy. I may wear them tomorrow.

My burgundy costume is pretty damned sexy as well. I needed to re-enforce about 50% of the fringes because the knots had come undone and they were shedding beads or about to shed. I wish that had been mentioned in the listing, there is no way she couldn't have noticed. Today, I removed half of the padding, stitched hooks, adjusted straps, and it is ready to wear. When I get back home I'll take photos, until then you'll just have to find someone else's headless torso to look at.

Thursday I met Renee of InFusion for brunch. We'd met last year and enjoyed martinis and conversation after an InFusion show. since then we've been reading each other's lj blogs for a year, but other than that we had no clue if we'd really hit it off one on one. I walked to Hi-Light and arrived in time to sit and order a cup of coffee and chat animatedly with the waiter. Renee saw me immediately when she entered, but the waiter I was conversing with was outside her line of sight. Was I practicing what I wanted to say to her? Was I simply hallucinating due to lack of sleep due to jet-lag? Was she about to have brunch with a crazy lady?

And then she'd moved forward enough to see the waiter: the fears dissolved.

Her husband also joined us for brunch. I'd also met him last year. After we stumbled through the menu (well, I did most of the stumbling. I am still unaccustomed to being in a location where there are an array of options for me on menus) we talked for about an hour and a half. I can confidently say that we all enjoyed ourselves. It helps that they both have an interest in traveling and Japan...and (of course) bellydance because, well, these are dominant topics in my life. Whenever I first arrive in America I endure a fair amount of, if not culture shock, mental culture-reorganization. I find myself trying to catalogue what it is about rooms/ streets/ communication styles that feels so slightly strange to me. Verbalizing helps this process...but no one wants to be the "all conversation roads lead to this foreign country I live/lived in" person. We hate that person. She's a bore. People a few years younger than I refer to her as "One time, at band camp..."

Languages interest me, so her husband (who has a more than average interest in linguistics) also had a dominant topic which could be appreciated.

After brunch Renee's husband went for a hair cut and we, enjoying each other's company, went to the mall. Renee was at first reluctant to suggest the mall, as she is not the mall type, and I was probably not one either, but it was serendipity. She needed some stuff for her upcoming trip to Germany and I needed Victoria's Secret.

Usually VS is the last essential stop made when I am Seattle because no one I know wants to go to the mall, and I am so reluctant about visiting mall-land that I don't push until the day prior to flying out arrives. I now have 3 more bras, and am debating returning and buying more. I've written extensively about my bra-life in Japan and returned, once more, to find myself smaller. I've gone from DD to D to somewhere between C and D, requiring all bras to be tried on to figure out which style landed me in which cup. I also found a supper-low cut bra...which I always need because of the number of black low-cut dresses I own...and now need more than ever because a smaller cup creates a lower cut V on said dresses.

Score.

We also went to Target. I won't talk about the joy of being in a Target, it makes me feel a little unclean, but Renee shares the joy. We were filthy together. Target panties are reasonably priced, unlike VS.

And then the fabric store, for which I both cursed and thanked her. I believed that I needed to stop in at a fabric store to pick up a few hook and eyes and snaps with which to make alterations and final fittings on my new burgundy costume...Renee knew that I needed to be taken to the fabric store with the cases of specialty beaded fringes. I dropped 70$ on fringes for future tribaret projects. Sexy fringes. And I enjoyed sarcastic but informative sales help. I miss that sort of help.


And then she dropped be back at Casa De Besh (which, as of Wednesday night, was occupied by all Bechtas: Matt, Angie, and Emma...the last of which has asked very nicely when I will play with her again. She's been very good about playing quietly with her new charcoal pencils while I type so I should probably wrap this up.)

Generaly thinking Seattle, 2007 August 16-27. That should be a large enough window for some folks to see me and for me to get over some reverse culture shocks.

Will book tickets in the next two days.

After that comes booking private lessons, getting workshop info, getting show info and so on.