I have a secret. I belong to a club. You can see its members everywhere, in Ginza, in Marunouchi, in Aoyama and Omotesando – all the very best addresses in town. It is a very big club, easily the biggest in Tokyo, in Japan, maybe in all the world. But it is not a famous club. You don’t have to fill any forms to join it. It doesn’t have a dress code or a rule book. Not even a name. It also has no entrance or membership fees, though the expenses you might incur to remain a member would dwarf the fees of the most exclusive Chiba golf club. And there is no age limit for joining. It just takes some time to get accepted.
Actually, it is the club that is secret. It is secret in the sense that its members do not know each other. We see each other. We grow to recognise each other. On occasion, we even smile at each other. But we do not try to know each other. That is one of the unwritten rules.
Belonging to a club is different from belonging to a group. Everyone is born into a group. You are a man and I am a woman. You are American and I am Japanese. We did not decide this. It was decided for us. We were not given a choice.
Joining a club, however, is like entering a love marriage, for here we get to choose. That is why we all want to belong to a club. Until we find our club, our spirit is without anchor and so we feel anxious. The longer it takes for us to find our club, the more anxious we get. Then one day we find the club to which we must belong. No longer do we wander aimlessly through life. We have a purpose. And though the line in front of the entrance may be long, we wait patiently, full of that special energy called gaman, forbearance. When the doors of the club open and our name is finally called, we enter it with pride.
There is, however, one restriction on membership to my club: only women may belong. Men say ladies cannot keep a secret. But it is the men who cannot. My club is the biggest, best-kept secret among all of Tokyo’s secrets. Many of its own members don’t know that they have joined it.
And my club may not be the oldest of Tokyo’s clubs but it is certainly the largest. None of us knows how many members it has. But I see us everywhere – in the metro, in the streets, in the banks and government offices, and in the hospitals. How then, you might ask, do we recognise each other? I cannot speak for the others but I have a gift. I can recognise my sister members at a glance. And they acknowledge me sometimes with a small knowing smile or just a raised eyebrow.
Had I been someone else, I might have tried to make money with this knowledge. Banks or credit card companies would have paid me millions for what I know. But I do nothing with it, for my club’s members are my sisters. I know their habits. I know what they are thinking at six on a Sunday evening as they prepare the family dinner. Or at eleven on a Monday morning when they are strolling down the main avenue of Ginza, waiting for the shopgirls to welcome them inside. And I know what they feel when at three on a Tuesday afternoon in Marunouchi, they walk with bowed heads and hurried, guilty steps towards the metro. My heart fills with pride when I see the pretty ones – so tall and slim and beautiful, their silhouettes ageless. But it is the bravery of those who are tired and old but continue to want to remain young that moves me to tears. What humiliations must they have suffered to remain so long in the club!
Like all clubs, mine has its factions, and its politics. There are two main opposing groups in my club—the housewives and the office ladies. The former have time but little money to spend. They go to the shops and they look and look and look before they buy. They bribe the sales staff to get invited to the family sales. They are so imaginative, so creative and the results of their hard work so elegant that I cannot help feeling proud of them.
The office ladies have money but no time. They work alongside men in their offices from nine in the morning till eight or nine at night, only going shopping on weekends and during lunch breaks or after work sometimes if they are lucky enough to finish before the shops close. They complain a lot, the way younger sisters do. They say that we wives are lucky, we get the best buys while they, coming later, must content themselves with what remains. That is why they claim they aren’t as well-dressed as we are. The truth, however, lies somewhere else. Actually, these women are little girls. They don’t want to grow up, they cannot cook. They buy a lot of rubbish – frilly dresses and flowery blouses. Flowers decorate their bags and scarves too. And they love to accessorise. Computers and mobile telephones glitter, keys jangle and even their nails are encrusted with jewels. They like to think that they can steal the love of our men. But they are wrong. Our men are already sold. The company has their love. The only place they have left for an office lady is in their ego. If she knows how to look after it well, she will hold on to him. If not, she will lose him.
There is also a third group of members – those who belong to neither group and are despised by both – the housewives who dress like office ladies. The women of this group are such skilled actresses and their desire burns so strongly within them that even their bodies look young and virginal. But it is an illusion. The fact that they are in the shops at times when real office girls are working betrays them. The men know it too, and their eyes quicken when they see them. And indeed they deserve to be admired. For nothing in their look is left to chance – from their long shiny nails and carefully set, glistening hair, to their Hermès scarves and Louis Vuitton bags. And what combinations of colour – purple and orange, lilac and brown, grey and ice blue. These are not invented between the pages of a fashion magazine. They are conjured up by my sisters and worn bravely on the streets of Tokyo. When I stroll around Ginza or Minami Aoyama, I never feel alone, for I am surrounded by my sisters and can walk with pride.
Excerpted with permission from My Beautiful Shadow, Radhika Jha, Tranquebar/Westland.
