Fluff

No matter where you go, there inevitably comes a time when a traveller - at least the average, poor traveller - has to choose between eating and culture; between affording basic bodily requirements, and the need for something that represents the deeper psyche of the country they are attempting to absorb. In Australia, it was a sausage on a boat and swimming with dolphins. In Russia, it was buying a large bottle of vodka and then passing out in a toilet (even though I was 17). In Jamaica it was a carved wooden giraffe and dancing to a kettle drum, and in America it was having a large family domestic in the middle of DisneyLand, just outside Space Mountain, and then purchasing a 12 pack of doughnuts. It's all about choosing an experience or item that personifies the very soul of the place you're in, and you can't put a price on that.

Except that you can, actually: it's about 4,000 yen. For 4,000 yen, I am now the proud owner of a giant, bright pink, fluffy, all-in-one Hello Kitty babygro. A babygro, I hasten to add, that I will have to wear solidly for almost two weeks, because it's Halloween, I teach children, and you can't teach children at Halloween in Japan without dressing up like a massive Hello Kitty. Or you can, but it means faffing around every morning with green make up and various witchy accessories, and then not really impressing any of the kids anyway because... well, you're not Hello Kitty.

In a land where the key religion appears to be that of Cuteness - where crisps have faces and books are comics and grown men have furry toys hanging from their briefcases - I have been baptised in a blaze of glory, and will arise - pink, fluffy and ridiculous - on Wednesday morning, knowing that I am now truly a resident of Japan. Further: when Halloween is up and I no longer have to wear an outfit that I have to unbutton from the neck in order to go to the toilet, I am going to take my pink fluffy self and my remaining food money and spend the Halloween weekend in a pink, fluffy bar somewhere in Tokyo, drinking pink things, pouting, and generally being as adorable as I can.

Because you can't put a price on culture: especially the kind of culture that doubles up as incredibly comfortable pyjamas when it gets a bit nippy inside.