Turning Japanese

I watched a TV program called “Kelly Osbourne : Turning Japanese”; even though I didn’t believe she would actually be turning Japanese, the title interested me.
Kelly Osbourne is the daughter of a legend in heavy metal music: Ozzy Osbourne, she is a singer, actress, television personality, radio presenter and fashion designer. It’s challenging for her because she doesn’t know much about Japan and it’s a whole other world. The purpose of this program is for her to stay in the so called “the politest place in the world” for five weeks to learn something. This introduction sounded interesting however the first place she went as a part of her working holiday was a “Maid Cafe”! The poor girl, she wore a classic French style maid costume, adopted a servants persona and served coffee to a table. She asked whether a customer would like to have some sugar and milk and according to his desire she added sugar and milk and stirred his coffee with a spoon for him. Kelly was complaining about having to give this service, despite this however she managed and passed the first step. The second step was “hand massaging”; a customer sat on a chair and a maid knelt down next to the chair and massaged his hands. She was politely refusing to do it, then the manager of the Maid Cafe said, “what about shoulder massages?”
“Punch him!” I shouted in front of the TV.
After the work, she asked one of her Japanese colleagues “Do you like this job?” The Japanese girl answered, “Well....yes...” whilst smiling. This is a typical Japanese vague answer but Kelly understood it clearly and said “I’m sure she definitely dislikes her work.” It’s interesting to see our culture from a different perspective. Her trial continued and the second place of work was a “Love Hotel”, but I’ll stop describing her work experience at this point.
This program doesn’t just focus on the wired aspects of Japanese culture; she went on to learn the skills of Japanese sword play. This was now more serious and on the first day the master was mad at Kelly because she left the Dojo (training hall) before him without cleaning up. Showing manners and respect to your master is very important in martial arts and no exception will be made for any VIP person. Kelly was complaining about the strict manner and hard training however after two days of this, she showed her work in front of an audience and she had achieved a lot. I look forward to seeing how her experiences affect her personality over the five weeks.