More Geisha secrets revealed

More Geisha secrets revealed

In the 2005-made movie Memoirs of a Geisha, based on Arthur Golden's best-selling fictional novel, Sayuri (played by Zhang Ziyi) flees from slavery to be trained as an apprentice geisha under the wing of a veteran geisha (Michelle Yeoh).

With her beauty and talent, Sayuri quickly rises to outshine another prominent geisha (Gong Li). But before she is declared a full-fledged geisha, she has to go through an initiation ceremony called mizuage - which is sponsored by a male patron who has also won the bidding war to her virginity.

This practice was outlawed in 1959 and no longer applies to modern day geishas. A real life geisha from Miyagawa-chou in Kyoto who flew to Singapore for a special performance recently confirmed it's a past tradition that is best forgotten.

Geiko Kosen, 27, who has been trained as an apprentice geisha since she was 16, said she was not required to sell her virginity to a client when she had her mizuage at the age of 20.

"We don't do that now. Geikos (Geishas from Kyoto) are purely entertainers," Geiko Kosen told The Straits Times in Singapore.

Together wih her mentor, Okasan Koito, and two young apprentice geishas, they were recently in the Lion City to perform to the local media at an event organised by Japanese skincare label Biore.

The young geishas are merely in their teens, but they can easily transport you back to pre-war Japan with their refined dance moves, subtle smiles, and the haunting melody that comes from the traditional Japanese musical instrument Shamisen.

Source: The Straits Times/ANN
Published Feb 15 2011