MORE PICS IN MEDIA SECTION
So I am now living in a town called Yotsukaido, near Chiba city, and I am staying in the “guesthouse” for my new job’s company with a couple of other teachers until training is over. Training starts in 2 weeks on August 16th and I have until then to transform my wardrobe from funky rogue wanderer to professional teacher. Happily, I have the funds to do so through some serendipitous and generous combination of events. So the main quest is twofold: clothes, and hair.
Clothes are hard to talk about, because I am having real difficulty finding them because of my size. I wear between a 16 and a 20, and the largest easy to find size in Japan is like an 8 or 10 US. So I am taunted by the amazing amount of cute and stylish wears that will not be in my reach for a while, and trying to find stores that sell “queen” clothes is really starting to drive me bonkers. first of all, I found places suggested online, but even if I can find addresses on their website, finding the building is near impossible. I have spent several days just wandering around trying to figure out how the addresses work (or rather, I know how they work conceptually, but in practice I don’t seem to get it. I’m sure it has to do with not thinking vertically enough). Then, when I finally find a store, it is the most matronly outfits possible. I think I would feel a thousand times fatter when wearing those clothes. So after the USPS successfully delivered a box from my sister (thank you, KM!) in only 4 days, I decided to just order a bunch of stuff online, ship it to my sister’s and then have her ship it to me. And since large size clothes are so over priced here (like Nordstroms even for low quality) I think i may be saving money. But at least I don’t have to deal with the sting of not being able to get their “XL” shirts over my head. So that has been hard to deal with, but I think this is the best solution. I also ordered shoes for my big feet this way, too. So hopefully next week or so I will be all set (and stylish!).
Now on to the hair. When I interviewed for this job, they asked me to dye my hair a natural color. It doesn’t have to be my natural color, but it shouldn’t look obviously fake, either. So, as everythign from my rainbow washed out except for the pink, I figured I would go with red hair since it would cover up the pink. I would consider being a bleach blond, too, but then I would have to keep bleaching my roots, which is not healthy, and I was not convinced the pink would come out. And I was right!
Before bleaching:
After bleaching:
So the pink was actually brighter! Actually, I was really enjoying my hair like this, but as I was going to meet my boss on Saturday, I dyed it red. Now, Prettia dye had recieved good reviews, but after using 2 boxes and leaving it on for hours my hair was only slightly redish:
Plus the pink was still completely obvious! So i scoured all drugstores for a better red dye, and finally found one called “Red Hair” or something, and this is what my hair looks like now:
So it’s red, I guess, but A) the pink still shows some, and B) I don’t like how it looks. Maybe because it is so orange, but I feel really washed out. Prior times that I have dyed my hair red it has looked great, but the red color was much more, you know, RED.
So I am seriously considering dying my hair black. I know, I know… black doesn’t wash out, and to bleach it enough to get rid of it would destroy my hair. So most people just hack it off when they are tired of black hair. Well, I have to have the same hair color for at least a year, and I have to keep it colored so it looks natural. Someday, when I can be unprofessional again, I plan to go right back to my rainbow ‘do because it made me so happy. And at that time, wouldn’t it look cool to have the bottom half of my hair black? It could represent my perky goth nature… rainbow with black ends. So I don’t think it would be a tragedy. Also, black is the easiest color to find in Japan, and I refuse to do brown because it isn’t dramatic enough. I think that all my rainbow gear will look better with black hair. As it is, my rainbows seem unbalanced because of the added red-orange. But black is all colors. And when I had dark brown hair it looked really good.
The main problem is that I have never had black hair and once I try it, I’m stuck for good. I know I am a warm tone person, though my skin looks fairer with cool colors. If I put black on top of this whimpy “red”, it may make it warmer than the blue base it is. Tomorrow I am going to go to a wig shop I saw and try on some black wigs to see. I think with my green eyes that it could look pretty awesome. Any ideas?