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- AYASHII ENGLISH
- By: Terri Nii
- The UMJ Volume 2.1 (Editorial)
- By: Terri Nii
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It's a small women's clothing store, settled between a "mansion" on one side and a flower shop on the other. While undeniably located on Fujisawa's "Ginza" street, it should be noted that down the block from the shop is a public bath. That tells you something about the scale of both the town and this shop. The colors caught my eye as I walked down the street. Neon yellow, green, hot pink, and purple windbreaker jackets jumped out at me against the background of gray concrete. But then I noticed something even more shocking: the backs of the jackets had a derogatory word debasing women written in large black letters. I remember reading letters of protest caused by similar shirts a few months ago in a Tokyo English language newspaper, but had not seen them myself and did not expect to, as I thought the issue had been resolved and the offending garments eliminated. But here were these jackets, screaming at me from their hangers. I hadn't been in the shop before, but decided it was a good time to step in and have a chat. The owner listened attentively to my explanation about the problems with the word and said that he would call the company with a complaint about its unacceptability. The next day I walked past the shop and did not see the jackets in question, but as I was in a hurry I did not stop to check or to talk. Maybe I was also a little bit afraid of what I would find. When I walked by a few days later, I observed that the shop wasn't busy, so I decided to drop in. To my remark that I did not see the jackets for sale anymore, the owner said that he had made a trip to the distributing company representative's office to return them. After he and I had spoken for the first time, he did some research on his own and found out more about the meaning and offensive usage of this word. He notified the distributor of his preference that his customers not purchase and wear garments that were clearly insulting and demeaning. It's a step in the right direction and I'd like to salute Mr. Takeda for his courage, decisiveness and honor.
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