mokudekiru

I hereby promise not to make a habit of telling stories about my body on my blog. But this one just needs to be told.

One of the reasons I came to Japan in such a rush was to make it to the concert of the group μ(ミュー）or I guess “myu” in English. They’re a singing group made up of 8 girls from the chorus club from my high school, including Noriko (my host sister) and Yuka (the friend who I’m staying with). More about μ and their concert later.

The 6 μ members who would be in the concert that night came over to Yuka’s house in the afternoon to practice. First three of the girls (Noriko, Mayu, and perhaps Kana) showed up. We were sitting at Yuka’s kitchen table, and squealing hisashiburi (long time no see) over and over.

Things quieted down for a bit, and then Mayu-chan, who was sitting next to me, blurted out, “Your boobs got so big!!” and before I could respond, she reached over and started touching my left breast.

“Umm, I guess so…” I responded, not really acknowledging the groping that was going on.

But Mayu-chan suddenly noticed what she was doing, and suddenly started apologizing, “Oh, sorry, I shouldn’t touch them!! That’s rude!!” as if someone had once long ago told her you shouldn’t touch other people’s boobs without their consent, and she had just now remembered that rule.

I told her it was cool and things ended there. Or so it would seem.

The rest of the band showed up (Akino and Ayaka) and rehearsal began. After they rehearsed, everyone was chilling out on the couch, taking pictures, touching up their makeup, snacking, etc. At this point, Akino was sitting arm’s reach away in front of me on the other couch. She took a look at me, and suddenly shouted “Your boobs are huge!!” sounding way too happy about this. Then she reached out and touched them with both hands.

But unlike Mayu-chan, Aki did not stop.

“Whoa, they’re so soft (ふわふわ）!! Feel these, you guys! This is crazy!” (Squeeze squeeze) “No, seriously, have you felt them?!”

To which of course, everyone was like, “Mayu-chan already did.”

“WHAAAAAT!? Really?!”

“It was before you got here, Aki.”

The touching & squeezing lasted a good 30 seconds. Unlike Mayu-chan, Aki never appeared the least bit ashamed or awkward about feeling me up.

So Japan, what’s up with the girl-on-girl boob grabbing?? This must be within some realm of normal here (since something similar happened to another girl on our school trip to Okinawa in 2006), but does anyone else find it surprising that in a culture where there’s so little affectionate touching (hugging, kissing, etc.) that boob grabbing is pretty chill?

Also, to all you other gaijin ladies out there, do you have similar boob-grabbing stories? Please share.