The Private Papers of Eastern Jewel Read Online Free PDF

weather. I was rewarded with news of the outside world that never failed to thrill me. The fate of emperors and the progress of revolutions informed me that, despite my adventurous nature and my escapes into the city, I lived in a small confined world.
    The war in Europe had ended with Japan claiming the German concessions in China for themselves. I heard that China was weak and stood by too helpless to do anything about it. I felt proud when I heard Kawashima say that Japan would continue to bite chunks of China to fatten its own empire. I had developed feelings of shame about my Chinese origins and I once bit Hideo's hand, drawing blood, when he referred to me as his Chinese sister.
    My distant cousin Pu Yi had been restored to his rightful place as Emperor of China, but I had no wish to claim kinship with him. Kawashima called him the Son of Heaven, and laughed. I envied Pu Yi's wealth and power and wondered how he spent his days in the delightful Forbidden City that I remembered from my childhood. I did not know then that his power was limited to his immediate surroundings and his wealth was finite.
    I discovered in myself a passion for knowledge of the world. I wanted to understand its history, and to understand too the emotions that powered revolutions and wars. Battles excited me, and I longed for the freedom men had to pursue their ambitions and to claim what they wanted from life. I never wanted to be a man, only to have the privileges of men.
    Kawashima and his cohorts would talk late into the night and sometimes I would fall asleep between the screens and wake stiff and cold, urgently needing to relieve myself. I would be so frustrated at having missed the conversation that I taught myself to stay awake by keeping hungry and pinching my cheeks so hard that they bruised. As the men talked, they drank bowls of tea and shots of sake served to them by the geishas who came to the house with the men who had 'adopted' them. It was called adoption, but in my eyes it amounted to a master-slave relationship. Most of the Japanese men I have known tend to disguise their ownership of women in a form of language that speaks paternally of care and guardianship, but however they choose to term it, it is the woman who is on her knees. I have never understood how any woman can bear to be owned by a man, which in effect they were, like a horse or an ornament. The geishas heard much but said nothing. Although mostly young, they could be relied upon to be discreet, as they prided themselves on the trustworthiness of their profession. Of course, they knew that the slightest betrayal of confidence would see them thrown onto the streets to end up as common prostitutes.
    Personally, I would have preferred the freedom of a prostitute to the rule-bound life of a geisha, but in general geishas, particularly young ones, are a timid lot who take refuge in the customs and protections of their trade. Like western nuns, geishas are pumped with the idea of service, of sacrifice to a master who they hope will act benignly towards them. Still, at least they have sex, while nuns, ecstatic with the denial of it, save themselves for the God to whom they are impotently married.
    Kawashima often overindulged in drink, but at those meetings he liked to keep his wits about him and would sip his sake frugally. He took pleasure in observing the weaknesses and subsequent indiscretions of his colleagues. I admired him greatly for his cunning and his intellect. Sometimes, one of the men would seal a daughter's fate by arranging a marriage to another's son. They disposed of their womenfolk more casually than they did of their stocks and shares. I was sick at the thought that one day I might hear of my own destiny decided in this way; I knew that despite the indulgences shown to me by Kawashima, he would never allow me to choose my own path in life. Notwithstanding his flirtation with western ideas, he believed, like Confucius, that women, although human, were