Attempted Girl's Day Out

On Saturday I had a Girl's Day Out with Yoko.  We started at 11:30 am and headed to downtown Sendai.  This weekend was Aoba Matsuri, where people perform a sparrow dance using fans down the covered street area.  This was Yoko's first time seeing the festival despite living in Sendai for most of her life.  This was my second.  It was very colorful and festive.  Several groups had little kids performing with them and it was very cute.

 

Once in Sendai, Yoko and I went to get some lunch.  Because of the festival it was really crowded.  We waited for some time before getting seated at a soba restaurant.  It had a nice feel and the soba was pretty good.  Although, lately I've had so much soba that I'm starting to lose the taste for it.

After soba, Yoko and I went shopping.  I probably shoulda told her in advance that I hate shopping.  But I thought it was a good opportunity since I had to get some girly essentials: shoes, make-up, and bras.  The shoes were the easiest to find.  I bought a pair of bright blue crocs.  The selection was very limited (Made me miss the croc stores in America) and the color isn't really me, but I'm glad to get a pair of really comfy shoes.  It'll serve me well when Aaron and I head to Bali for the summer.

Not far from the shoe store was a lingerie store.  This was a very unenjoyable experience.  I didn't know my size since the sizes in Japan are very different from American sizes.  So I headed to a fitting room where one of the store clerks measured me.  After telling me my size, I noticed a conversion chart on the wall that converted American sizes into Japanese sizes.  Well, the size the lady told me was different from what the chart said.  When I told the sales lady what size I should have been, she brushed me off saying that her measurement was correct.  She then handed me several bras in her suggested size  that didn't fit.  Everything was all wrong.  Band was too loose, cups too small.  Worst of all, they push and squeeze everything together in order to create the illusion of cleavage.  It's incredibly uncomfortable, puts all the stress on the straps which digs into the shoulders, and creates a ridiculous-looking profile.  Literally like what you see in an anime.  Gravity defying, pointy, and desperately fake.  It was just embarrassing.  I tried several times to tell the woman that she was giving me the wrong size and she kept telling me that it was the correct size.  Finally, Yoko came to my rescue and I showed her the chart.  She then told the sales lady what I had been telling her the whole time, and what do you know?  She listens to her.  Racist!  She finally gives me the right size and hey, it fits!  Well, sorta.  It still feels like it's trying to remove my breasts from the rest of my body.  And it still has that horrible fake and obvious profile that makes me look like a cartoon character.  But all the other options were far worse.  I settled for the best one I could find.  The one that created the smoothest profile and without the bowties, fuzzies, lace, ruffles, etc.  (No wonder all the shirts in Japan are so flowy.)  But the one I got still has some sorta dangly sheer cloth and rhinestones on the straps.  I really didn't wanna spend my money on that, but I felt so bad since Yoko was being so patient and helpful.  $40 down the drain and I'm not sure how often I'll wear that.  Next time I'm in America, I'm heading straight to Victoria's Secret.  I'm thinking of ordering online...

My Plan B is to check out the H&M over here.  Praying to God that it's still American style...

After buying that torture device, Yoko and I headed to Daiei.  There we got ourselves some manicures. It was very cheap, under $10.  And I got what I paid for.  The girl didn't do much.  She didn't wash or massage my hands.  Didn't push back my cuticles, which I'm actually ok with since that's very painful.  But she filed them into a round shape, painted them and stuck some decals onto them.  Unfortunately, they don't paint on the flowers and rhinestones like the little Vietnamese ladies do in America.  They just stick on stickers.  It didn't come out as great as I would have liked.  The sticker messed up the polish.  And it took a very long time to fully dry (almost 3 hours).  Most of my nails got ruined throughout the day as I had to keep reaching into my purse to pull out my wallet.

That's what they look like.  That's the hand that didn't get too messed up.

Yoko got a similar manicure with the same kind of flowers, but with pink polish.  Hers turned out very cute.  I think she's much more used to getting manicures than I am since hers were undamaged.  During the middle of our manicures, there was a pretty good sized earthquake.  Everything shook for quite a long time.  But nothing fell over.  It was a nice bit of excitement with no danger.

After manicures, we headed to a drug store where I bought a few things.  Mascara and eyelash curler refills.  I tried on some new lipstick shades but nothing looked right.  So we just headed out the door.

We spent the next hour looking for a place to have dessert.  But everywhere we went was either closed or too busy or too far away.  Yoko also had a dentist appointment that she had to make.  We ended up scratching dessert, much to my disappointment.  And that was the end of our girl time.  That wasn't really my idea of fun or getting to know her.  Mainly because I hate shopping.  But I don't know.  Maybe she likes shopping.  Maybe she enjoyed it and had a good time.  Let's hope.

But overall, it was a nice girly day that I needed and it was a good chance to hang out with Yoko.