A few weeks ago I began Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden. It is the story of a young girl named Chiyo, who is sold to an okiya-where geisha live-as a maid because her mother is almost dead and her father cannot support Chiyo and her older sister. She begins training to become a geisha; although she can only think of her family and her sister, whom she had been separated from. She tries to run a way, but does not succeed and is no longer allowed to learn to be a geisha and is forced to be a maid. As she grows older, however, she became recognized by her rare, blue-grey eyes and a very well-known and successful geisha, Mameha, and she is soon on the road to becoming a geisha once again.
What amazes me about this book is how different the culture is in Gion, a district in Kyoto, Japan. Young girls are taken away from their families and sold to a geisha house in order to become a geisha. Now, one may wonder, what is a geisha? A geisha is a Japanese girl who is trained all her life specifically to entertain men. They start training at a young age and learn how to pour tea or sake properly for men, dance, tell stories and even how to play an instrument called a shamisen. As girls grow older, they find an older, successful geisha to be their “older sister” who will help them become successful, and share their knowledge with the young or “novice geisha”. The most successful geisha of Gion are extremely respected by the women in Kyoto, many give very deep bows to the geisha as they walk through town-and all they do is entertain men.
I find it so interesting how different to cultures can be so different. If this occurred here, in the United States, people would be appalled. Women have so many more rights here, and have so much respect for themselves. Besides that, children here would not be sold at a young age to do what the geisha do. Right now, I am at a point in the book where Chiyo is exactly my age and I could not imagine having to do all that she does to be successful.