Brutal Polka

We take our time getting dressed. Put on some music to loosen up a little while we scrutinize every blemish on our face. We have a blank slate and a full plate that we hope is first class and paid for. Dating is exciting. It's a chance to meet new people and feel like the possibilities are endless.

Dates can be daunting as well. You might go blindly into it, set up by your friend who's friend of a friend is also single. You might find yourself sitting sadly while you wait for a not-so-charming prince to arrive as you belly up to the bar for a second margarita salted with tears. You might sit passively, nodding to your drone of a date while your inner self is devising a stealthy escape through the bathroom window.

Whether you're reveling in dessert that's as decadent as the man across from you, or swearing off the opposite sex all together because you just can't seem to find the right one, there's always one thing you can count on: the rules of the game.

The dating game is different in every country and with it comes a set of prescribed steps to take before strapping into the roller coaster we call a relationship. In Japan, they call this roller coaster a jet coaster, which refers to the same mechanism, but in just a slight change of the word, the ride can be completely different.

Japanese dating can best be described as a brutal polka. The traditionally Czech dance is a series of small half-steps with a partner. The Japanese method to this "dance" is in a start-stop rhythm. They move toward each other, but then awkwardly pull back--and this back and forth continues until it looks like a convoluted seizure.

Men and women play a spying game on each others minds. Men side step softly, making only a subtle cameo in the corner of the woman's mind, and then retreat back to their denizens of the deep, cerebral unknown. In Japanese culture, the burden is on the listener to understand what the speaker is saying. Therefore, the man treads lightly with his pitter-patter half steps until he is certain that the woman shares mutual feelings. He does so in order to not make the other person feel awkward or uncomfortable in case she doesn't want to join in for couple's dance.

For foreign women attempting to date in Japan, we are otherwise unaccustomed to this brutal polka. And because we don't understand, we assume the worst, because as women, we internalize everything. Most of us don't fit into Japanese clothing, so we must be too big for the men as well. We haven't mastered the reflexive giggle and aren't able to maintain an inherent submissiveness, so we're about as appealing as animals. But, in truth, the men are feeling the pressure to relate. If only we knew that is was just shyness that was keeping them at bay, not our large, American asses.

Once the initial steps are taken, the accordion pumps, the tuba blows and the polka is in full swing. In order to get to this step, there is what I call "the naming." Japanese people must label themselves as a couple before proceeding to do relationship things, like even kissing. The sanction of this naming is important because it honors the relationship between the two. In this respect, Americans could benefit from trying this method before they jump into the horizontal polka. Japanese don't have any moral hangups about premarital sex because there isn't religious attachment to the right way to lay. Perhaps honoring every woman in a one night stand as "you're my girlfriend...for the next 2 hours" might assuage any guilt she has on her walk of shame the morning after.

It seems like the polka is done in quick bursts of short movement. But, the brutal polka encompasses these fast twitches into months and months of dress rehearsal. It wears on your feet and your mind, leaving you confused, but at the same time hopeful. Foreign females beware. You are no longer preyed upon by the same men you met back in the states. They don't come after you, dick in hand, requesting some sort of sexual favor. They half-step forward and half-step back, leaving you dizzier than when you began. We American women are used to the two second, free-falling drop of a roller coaster; these jet coasters are sometimes too slow to ride.