Intimacies

I want to mention something that has been throwing my subconscious off for as long as I've been in Japan but which I have just brought to my conscious mind today: after lunch tooth-brushing. I'm not sure whether all Japanese do this or just teachers, but everday after lunch brushes emerge from hello-kitty cases and I become ever so slightly perturbed. Today, like I said, I realized this and have deduced the reason why. Brushing one's teeth in another's presence, to me, seems an intimate act; something done with family, girlfriends, and friends whom accompany you on poorly funded vacations. Watching my co-workers brush their teeth is just a few steps below brushing the sleep from their eyes. We're not that close. Plus, if this is general practice in Japan we have to conclude that it is largely ineffective.