A Close Call

I was out for a night on the town last weekend with two friends, a Canadian and fellow English teacher, and a Japanese girl who agreed to join us for our night of bar hopping.

Japanese nightlife, like everything else in a Japanese city, is vertical. A given building may have a different club or bar on each floor. We were up on the top floor enjoying a drink and a bit of karaoke, when we decided to check out the disco club on the 7th floor.

Space is always a bit cramped in these places. We made our way down the small stairs, with myself watching very carefully to make sure I didn’t whack my head for the umpteenth time since I’ve been in Japan. We came down onto the seventh floor, and there was a very small walkway between the entrance to the club, and the elevator. Several people were standing around waiting by the entrance. They had mostly South East Asian faces, but we could tell they weren’t Japanese.

They were very friendly and started talking to us. One girl introduced herself as Ayumi and said she was from the Philippines. “The club doesn’t open till midnight,” she said. “We’re waiting for the doors to open.” She looked at the Japanese girl with us, and asked me, “Is that your girlfriend?” Both I and the girl in question quickly denied it.

Ayumi grabbed my arm and playfully pulled me towards her. “Great. He’s all mine then,” she said.

I like to think that I’ve outgrown most of my adolescent shyness, but these sudden moves still catch me a bit off guard. I stayed frozen where I was in a shocked sort of way. My hand slipped out of her grip as she tried to pull me towards her. I could think of nothing more to do than smile in an embarrassed way. Having a feeling I had blown it, I tried to change the subject. “So this place doesn’t open till 12, right? What time is it now?”

It was 11:30. My friends and I debated whether to wait or go. We decided to hit another bar and then come back later in the night. Just as we were about to go we turned and saw that the elevator was already going down, so we had to wait until it came back up again. We stayed and made small talk in the cramped walkway for another 3 minutes or so until the elevator came back. My two friends got in. I embarrassed myself by having the doors shut on arm as I was saying good-bye to Ayumi, but we all got in eventually.

No sooner had the elevator door closed, then my Canadian friend said to me, “Ayumi is a man.”

The Japanese girl nodded her head in agreement. “I thought maybe.”

“No maybe about it,” said the Canadian. “Definitely.”

“What?” I was in disbelief. The disco club, or more specifically the bar above it that we had just come from, was rumored to be a gay hang out, but Ayumi didn’t look anything like a man. She looked like a girl; an attractive girl at that. But the other two were in firm agreement on it.

“How could she be a man?” I asked. “Her face looked just like a girl.”

“That’s because she’s got herself all dolled up,” my friend replied. “Didn’t you notice she had no breasts?” I confessed that this had escaped my notice. “She had a bra on, but no breasts,” my friend continued. “And what about her voice?”

“Some girls have husky voices,” I said, but even as I spoke I was beginning to realize my friend was right. “But Ayumi is a girls’ name,” I said in a last effort.

“That doesn’t mean anything. It’s a Japanese girls’ name, but she’s Filipino. That’s not even her real name.”

“Wow, I can’t believe I’m the only one who couldn’t tell,” I said. “That’s pretty disturbing, isn’t it?” A new thought filled me with horror. I turned to my friend, “What would have happened if you hadn’t been there?” I said.

“I’m sure you would have had an interesting night.”

“Man, from now on I’m never going near another girl unless she gets your approval first,” I remarked.