“Before I begin this entry, allow me to preach the glory that is “”Tony Takitani.”" I saw this movie about three weeks ago. My friend, who is a big fan of Japanese cinema and literature lent me the DVD. It was stunning. Nearly every frame throughout the film was shot beautifully. Moreover, the tone of the movie was extremely unique, with a distinct palette and musical score. I’m currently listening to the amazing soundtrack. If you get a chance, find and watch this film.

Time to switch gears. Before coming to Japan I had a set of clothes I believed to express a certain style I hoped others to would see. In general, I wore bright colors such as white, orange, and red, along with a pair of dark jeans and white shoes. The clothes for the torso took shape in hoodies, long sleeves, and t-shirts, usually with some kind of busy, dirty art (take the current banner of my website for example). A couple months prior to Japan I spent precisely $100 dollars on a clean, white north face jacket, which am still in love with. More often than not I’d be keeping my ears warm with a beanie.

This is what I called my style. I’d like to think it’s a mix of breakdancer, snowboarder, and chill. It all adds up to make tricking. In America, I believed people saw me in these clothes, and at least somewhat, understood I was an alternative athlete. I was wary about not buying overly expensive clothes. This, I thought, lead me to me pay more attention to the way I looked instead of how I acted. Generally, my friends back home had styles of their own with a similar mind set: No intricate sweaters, scarfs, or accessories necesssary. A critique I had of Japanese culture since visiting last year was that everyone seemed to wear overly expensive clothes and put perhaps too much time into the way they appeared. However, since being in Japan for 3 months, I’ve changed my mind.

People dress nice here.

I ride the packed train each morning to school, often surrounded by business men and students. For the first few months, I was almost always unknowingly singled out on the train due to my attire. I was wearing the same clothes I’d been used to for so long in America. Yet, this style was unique and yes, very foreign compared to ‘normal Japanese style.’ That being said, the same visual cues I was hoping to share were lost in translation. Wearing white hoodies, dark stained jeans, and gray beanies don’t make you look like a breakdancer in Japan. It just makes you look cheap. I hadn’t noticed this until about a month ago.

Culture shock 101: I was getting on the train home one day after school and immediately spotted a hakujin similar to myself across the car. He wasn’t standing out because of his ethnicity, it was his clothes. To his left was a sharp, clean cut young businessman in a jet back suit and tie – to his right, a well polished young woman with a brilliant coat, an exotic pair of shoes, and a stylish scarf to tie things together. The foreigner stood in the middle with a pair of jeans, a t-shirt and baseball cap.

“”Wow,”" I laughed to myself. “”That guy looks SO bad in between those two.”" My laughter was cut short after noticing my identical predicament.

Maybe it’s a way to stand out in the homogeneous culture. Maybe it’s because they’d rather spend their money here than there. Either way, the fact is Japanese people do dress nicer than their American counterparts, regardless of the style their trying to follow. And yes, it works. It requires a control variable to fully grasp how much difference a couple simple style changes can make. When I first came here, all the girls seemed so much more attractive than what I was used to back home. I couldn’t figure out. “”There are tons of Asians, Japanese included, at UW. Why are these girls so much more appealing?”" Yes, it was the way the presented themselves. It might take a bit more time each morning, but it makes a huge difference. Lisa has a unique natural beauty to begin with but takes that allure one step further with the way she prepares herself. It’s something that I’ve come to appreciate.

Thus, a few weeks ago I decided I needed to clean up my style. Yesterday we went to the outlet malls and I found a slick, stylish dress shirt and a sophisticated coat, on sale for 9500 YEN (exactly $83.86). I wore the coat to school today and immediately noticed a positive change in the way people were looking and talking to me. It was conclusive evidence to the hypothesis I had developed.

Here’s the interesting part. In the past, I saw it as “”if you dress nice, you care too much about your appearance and not enough about your actions,”" or “”you’re spending money on something you don’t need.”" I still believe this holds true to some degree in America. I came to Japan with that mindset and was initially surprised at what I saw. But, as proved by my experience yesterday and today, you can in fact dress nicely in Japan without burning Benjamins, or should I say Yukichis? Not only that, but the Japanese standard of beauty is simply different, no less or no better, than it’s American complement. However, the extra preparation people take before going out is an priceless element absent in American culture. And no, it has nothing to do with vanity. This is yet another cross cultural revelation I’ve had after being for a mere 3 months.”