I’ve never been a fan of shopping, unless it’s for electronics or the occasional thrift store foray, so you can imagine how happy I am that the three pairs of pants I brought to Japan are falling apart. Falling apart is an understatement - the hems are gone and the fabric is wearing thin - I carry around scissors and safety pins just in case of further impromptu degradation. I usually enjoy flipping through racks of thrifty threads if I’m in the right mood, but I *hate* shopping for pants about as much as I hate pretzles and elbows. To say that I possess a megaton of hate would not be an exaggeration. And shopping for pants in Japan effectively doubles, if not triples, my pants-shopping hateration.
It’s always been difficult for me to find pants that fit properly, and in the past I’ve generally stuck to wearing men’s suit pants. Occasionally I will find the odd pair of jeans that happen to fit, but in a world that loves low-riders and skinny jeans, they are few and far between. In Japan, the task of locating pants that can sustain my trunk’s junk is nigh impossible, and I’m a size six back in the States. In a country that boasts size 00 (yes, that’s double zero), a girl who usually doesn’t have body issues suddenly begins to plan her upcoming crash-course diet of seaweed and tofu (and beer, natch). After two hours of fitting-room devastation I found one pair that fit, but made me look incomprehensibly short, like I had been squished in a fun-house mirror. The next size up was in the plus-size section. Needless to say, I’m still sporting the same threadbare leggings I was last year.