Memoirs of a Geisha

I have been looking forward to the Cherry Blossom Festival for a few weeks now, particularly excited for the Parade and the Sakura Matsuri, also known as a Japanese Street Festival.  The weather outside my window looked incredible, so I opted out of wearing a jacket.  That was the second mistake. While the weather looked incredible, it felt tempestuous with a chance of tornado. Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.

My roommates and I proceeded to Constitution Avenue, which was lined by hordes of Washington DC tourists.  We had to push our way through the crowd to get a glimpse of the parade.  What we didn’t see: The parade website boasted of Broadway performances and character balloons; What we did see: I saw the local street sweeping and cleaning crew, (Some government employee was using his noggin here...”Let’s invite the street sweepers to participate in the parade, and while they are enjoying the spotlight, we’ll get a free street cleaning out of it!”).  I also saw the girl who had the distinction of horse excrement removal.

After admiring the pristine, manure-free parade route, we left and headed to Sakura Matsuri for a taste of the Japanese culture.  For weeks I had been anticipating what was advertised as the nation’s largest Japanese street festival, hoping it would offer sushi to origami, sumo to sake.  That was my first mistake.  I was underwhelmed.  The only cultural element free of charge was a promotional coffee courtesy of McCafe, also known as McDonald’s coffee.  Trying to play McDonald’s off as Japanese.  Smells fishy to me (like American cod fish to be specific …not glazed with teriyaki sauce). I had been anticipating geishas but instead found myself surrounded by elderly women sporting the timeless visor.

A final observations causing consternation:  The Statue of Liberty was presented by France in 1886, representing the friendship that was established during the American Revolution.  Similarly, Japan gave 3,020 Sakura trees to the United States for our then-growing friendship in 1912, hence the Cherry Blossoms festival.  Isn’t it about time countries returned to the practice of gift giving?  Or maybe we have continued the gift giving in the form of a financial crisis. If so, I think I’d like a refund.