71 soundbox; played with a plectrum. This music instrument could be dissolved
and taken a part, so it can be put in box or bag if the owner did not want to play it. We can see from the following quotation:
If you ‘ve never met shamisen, you might find its peculiar-looking
instrument. Some people call it Japanese guitar, but it ‘s a good deal
smaller than a guitar, with a thin wooden neck that has three large tuning pegs at the end. Golden: 1997, 55
Since shamisen was basic and important music instrument for geisha, Sayuri along with Pumpkin, and the other apprentice geisha gave a lot of
effort to mastering this music instrument.
4.4.6.2 Kimono
Kimono is a kind of loose robe or gown tied with a sash, worn as a traditional outer garment by Japanese women and men. Women may weared
it with a broad sash called an obi, having a large bow in the back. Kimono was the main cloth that geisha uses. There were variety kind
of design, color, and the silk quality. Only successful geisha could afforded for having several dozens of high-quality kimono, which was each of the
high-quality kimono cost had been more than the monthly fees from middle- worker around that time.
Kimono that geisha wear was different with the one that ordinary housewife usually wears. Housewives usually tried to adjust her kimono so
they looked pretty on it. For geisha, they did not need to do that because
72 kimono would fits them perfectly without any additional adjustment. We can
see from the following quotation: When a housewife dresses in kimono, she uses all sorts of padding to
keep the robe from bunching unattractively at the waist, with the result that she ends up looking perfectly cylindrical, like a wood
column in a temple hall. But a geisha wears kimono so frequently she hardly needs any padding, and bunching never seems to be a
problem. Golden, 1997:64
Kimono could be also the way to make differences between apprentice geisha and also full-fledged geisha. We can see from the following
quotation: Young girls dress much more ornately than the older women, you
see, which mean brighter colors and showier fabric, but longer obi A mature woman, will wear tied in back in a manner we call the
―Drum Knot‖, because it makes a tidy little box shape: this doesn‘t require very much fabric
… Golden, 1997, 165 When an apprentice geisha walks down the street in front of you,
you notice not her kimono but rather her brilliantly colored, dangling obi
—with just a margin of kimono showing at the shoulders and on the sides. Golden: 1997: 165
The differences could be seen from the obi that they wear. The
apprentice geisha obi ‘s much longer than full-fledged geisha, and it was also
more eye-catching when we looked at it.
4.4.6.3. Cosmetic
