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What Are You Going to Wear Tomorrow?

Ishimoto Maho (Kure National College of Technology)

Hello everyone. First of all, I would like to ask you a question. Are you interested in clothes and shoes? If you are not, it might bother you to choose what to wear every morning. If you are interested, you are happy to choose your clothes every morning. Actually I'm very interested in fashion, and I love going to shopping malls to buy some new clothes and shoes. In shopping malls, I often see many girls who wear beautiful dresses and high-heels. Probably some of them have a date with their boyfriends there. However, others just go there with their friends. That makes me wonder: is it necessary to wear such pretty dresses? Isn't it hard to walk around a big mall in high-heels? In addition, they look very similar. I can't tell the difference between each girl's style.

Today, I would like to talk about fashion. Especially, I will focus on women's clothes and shoes. In fact, I used to be one of those girls who wear a dress and high-heels anytime and anywhere. An experience in the Netherlands changed my ideas. Four years ago, I stayed with a Dutch family as an exchange student. During my stay, I found cultural differences between the Netherlands and Japan. The biggest difference I found is in women's fashion. A lot of women in the Netherlands seemed to like simple styles. They wear T-shirts, jeans and sneakers almost every day. However, my style is different. I didn't do as a famous proverb says, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do." I liked a more elegant style such as short dress and high-heels. Most towns in the Netherlands are made of bricks, so it was hard to walk on brick pavements in high heels. But I didn't change my style. I didn't want to wear sneakers there. My host family thought it was very strange. They asked me, “Why are you such a gorgeous girl every day? We only wear such clothes for some special occasions like parties." I found that for them the most important thing in clothes and shoes is function. Wearing high-heels every day is nonsense for them. On the other hand, for me the most important thing is fashion. I think many Japanese women agree with me. We love high-heels. With regard to women's clothes and shoes, there is a big difference between Europeans and Japanese.

In my opinion, it is concerned with the distinction between formal and informal, and different ideas of beauty. Westerners prefer to emphasize a woman's bodyline and prefer a sexy style. On the other hand, Japanese prefer a pretty fluffy style to a sexy one. There is one further factor. I think for Japanese people, outside of house is always a formal situation. When I was a child, my mother taught me, “Making yourself up is preparation and good manners for going out." That leads us to consider the outside as a formal situation and we like to wear beautiful things outside. This leads Japanese women to wear high heels every day regardless of practicality.

In a TV program I watched the other day, a research has indicated an interesting paradox. Many Japanese women wear high-heels to go to their offices. When they get there, some of them change their high-heels to sneakers or pumps because it is hard to wear them all day long. In America, however, the opposite happens. They wear sneakers to their offices and change their shoes to formal ones there. In this case, Japanese make a point of function while Americans make a point of fashion in formal situations. This helps us to think of fashion not only in point of function and appearance but also in point of formal situation. Just now I told you that Japanese people think outside is formal. Japanese working women spend most of the day in the office, so the office is sometimes like a home for them. That makes people change their shoes. Of course they wear high-heels when visitors come.

After I returned to Japan from the Netherlands, my clothes and shoes were changed. I started to think afresh about what clothes suited me. Last spring I had some job interviews. At one interview, I met more than 40 students in formal suits who were looking for jobs for the new year. But only a few students could be employees there. Fortunately I could be one of them. I believe I could show my style in my favorite suit in the interview. I wore a black striped suit while other students wore typical plain dark suits. Usually people choose to wear plain dark suits for job interviews, but I didn't. Instead, I chose my favorite striped suit. I believe the interviewers understood my individuality through my suit. It is only appearance, but it is important. I would like you to see many kinds of clothes all over the world, and find what suits you and your style! Then you would be happy to choose your clothes in the morning.