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Illustration by Marco Mancini

Okay, so there have been a few earthquakes recently in and around the islands off Tokyo. I even felt the one recently in the middle of the night. My television started to move before my eyes. I thought that my apartment was being possessed by a poltergeist. But a strange thing happened the other day. For no reason whatsoever--there was no force beneath my feet that I could feel--a girl walking in front of me fell to the floor! Was it some new, strange sort of tremor that you could not feel but was capable of throwing you off your feet? No, of course not. The girl was simply another cadet in the Big Shoe Brigade.

She was obviously a novice at wearing the Big Girls shoes and had yet to master even the most rudimentary of obstacles confronted by this group of "fashion failures" - walking in a straight line. Had she headed to Takeshita dori, where the Big Shoe troops shuffle along at a snail's pace, lesson number one would have surely been behind her. Furthermore, she had not learned the most basic of rules that most panda girls learn when indoctrinated into the society of beauty school drop-outs: Always have another cadet to hold on to when going out.

I learned of this unspoken law in Matsudo. Two girls, who were obviously professionals in the art of walking like clowns at a circus on their stilts, tackled the most complex obstacle that ganguro (Amuro Namie look-alikes) face: The dreaded stairs. Obviously high in the pecking order of Sad Sandys, clutching each other they managed to clear the obstacle in a matter of minutes. Teetering to and fro, painstakingly lowering each foot down to the next step while trying not to topple over in the process, they made their way down.

Yes I have to admit it. I was in awe of them. For thousands of years mankind has evolved from knuckle-dragging monkeys to upright, walking human beings. Perhaps, right here in Tokyo, I am witnessing the next step in the evolution of man, or should I say womankind. Rather than being satisfied with simply strolling along, these girls have lifted themselves to a higher plane, balancing on their atsuzoku sandoru (platform shoes). Sugoi ne!

Many thanks to Peter Cook for this Rave.