a young geisha or maiko

If you’ve been following my Twitter as of late, you’ll know that I’ve been working on a manga.

Manga is simply a Japanese comic. Some people confuse the word manga with anime, but they are different in the fact that manga is on paper and anime, as the name suggests, is animated.

The fantastic tale behind the first manga to be turned into an anime series, Astroboy, is currently making the rounds in the US.

In doing some research for my manga I am researching different aspects of Japanese culture like geisha, and in my research I’ve seen innumerable photos and videos of geisha, or more properly if you’re in Tokyo, geiko.

I’ve come to appreciate several aspects of geisha culture, and admire the beauty and grace of several of the women I’ve seen perform, but yesterday as I was doing my research I found who I believe may be my very favorite geisha of all so far: Toshiteru!

She is cute cute cute!! She is so doll-like it’s unbelievable. Cuteness is not a requisite for becoming geisha, but in her case I know it really must get her noticed. The more noticed you are as a geisha, for whatever positive attributes you are noticed for, whether it’s your skill as a dancer, party host, etc., the more in demand you will be for appearances just like any other entertainer.

There is a video of her dancing with another geisha below. I believe she was sixteen when this video was made.

Toshiteru and her dance partner are not actually geisha, they are maiko, or apprentice geisha which you can tell by their hairstyle (I think it is called the wareshinobu or “split peach” hairstyle), their obi are not floor length and they both have red collars on their kimono.

In the video below the maiko are dancing to traditional Japanese music, which is the norm. I know Japanese traditional music is not for everyone, and I cannot tell you how many times I’ve wished I could see geisha dance to just instrumental music, lol.

But that may be because I do not speak Japanese (yet) and therefore cannot appreciate the lyrics to the songs. But anyway I think Toshiteru is the cutest little maiko and I hope to be entertained by her if I ever travel to Japan. Which, if my manga takes off could be a distinct possibility.

And now…without further ado…Toshiteru! Photographer Peter Macintosh has a great photo of her here with two other maiko. She’s in the center.