 Chiyo-chan, there's an answer to this riddle. My danna is a generous man and 
bought me most of these robes. That's why I'm more successful than Hatsumomo. I have a 
wealthy danna. She hasn't had one in years." 

I'd already been in Gion long enough to know something of what Mameha meant by a danna. 
It's the term a wife uses for her husband-or rather, it was in my day. But a geisha who refers 
to her danna isn't talking about a husband. Geisha never marry. Or at least those who do no 
longer continue as geisha. 

You see, sometimes after a party with geisha, certain men don't feel satisfied with all the 
flirting and begin to long for something a bit more. Some of these men are content to make 
their way to places like Miyagawa-cho, where they'll add the odor of their own sweat to the 
unpleasant houses I saw on the night I found my sister. Other men work up their courage to 
lean in bleary-eyed and whisper to the geisha beside them a question about what her "fees" 
might be. A lower-class geisha may be perfectly agreeable to such an arrangement; probably 
she's happy to take whatever income is offered her. A woman like this may call herself a 
geisha and be listed at the registry office; but I think you should take a look at how she 
dances, and how well she plays shamisen, and what she knows about tea ceremony before 
you decide whether or not she really is a proper geisha. A true geisha will never soil her 
reputation by making herself available to men on a nightly basis. 

I won't pretend a geisha never gives in casually to a man she finds attractive. But whether 
she does or not is her private affair. Geisha have passions like everyone else, and they make 
the same mistakes. A geisha who takes such a risk can only hope she isn't found out. Her 
reputation is certainly at stake; but more important, so is her standing with her danna, if she 
has one. What's more, she invites the wrath of the woman who runs her okiya. A geisha 
determined to follow her passions might take this risk; but she certainly won't do it for 
spending mone^ she might just as easily earn in some legitimate way. 

So you see, a geisha of the first or second tier in Gion can't be bought for a single night, not 
by anyone. But if the right sort of man is interested in something else-not a night together, 
but a much longer time-and if he's willing to offer suitable terms, well, in that case geisha will 
be happy to accept such an arrangement. Parties and so onj are all very nice; but the real 
money in Gion comes from having a| danna, and a geisha without one-such as Hatsumomois like a stray cat on the street without a master to feed it. 

You might expect that in the case of a beautiful woman like Ha-| tsumomo, any number of 
men would have been eager to propose them-1 selves as her danna; and I'm sure there 
were many who did. She had ir fact had a danna at one time. But somehow or other she'd so 
angerec the mistress of the Mizuki, which was her principal teahouse, that mer who made 
inquiries forever afterward were told she wasn't available-which they probably took to mean 
she already had a danna, even thougf it wasn't true. In damaging her relationship with the 
mistress, Ha-1 tsumomo had hurt no one so much as herself. As a very popular geisha I she 
made enough money to keep Mother happy; but as a geisha with-| out a danna, she didn't 
make enough to gain her independence anc move out of the okiya once and for all. Nor 
could she simply change her! registration to another teahouse whose mistress might be more 
accom-| modating in helping her find a danna; none of the other mistresses would want to 
damage their relationships with the Mizuki. 

Of course, the average geisha isn't trapped in this way. Instead she spends her time 
charming men in the hopes that one of them will even-! tually make an inquiry with the 
mistress of the teahouse about herl Many of these inquiries lead nowhere; the man, when 


he's investigated,! may be found to have too little money; or he may balk when someone 
suggests he give a gift of an expensive kimono as a gesture of goodwill! But if the weeks of 
negotiations come to a successful conclusion, the geisha and her new danna conduct a 
ceremony just like when two geisha become sisters. In most cases this bond will probably 
last six months orj so, perhaps longer-because of course, men tire so quickly of the same 
thing. The terms of the arrangement will probably oblige the danna to 1| pay off a portion of 
the geisha's debts and cover many of her living expenses every month-such as the cost of 
her makeup and perhaps a portion of her lesson fees, and maybe her medical expenses as 
well. Things of that sort. Despite all these extravagant expenses, he'll still continue to pay her 
usual hourly fee whenever he spends time with her, just as her other customers do. But he's 
also entitled to certain "privileges." 

These would be the arrangements for an average geisha. But a very top geisha, of which 
there were probably thirty or forty in Gion, would expect much more. To begin with, she 
wouldn't even consider tarnishing her reputation with a string of danna, but might instead 
have only one or two in her entire life. Not only will her danna cover all of her living 
expenses, such as her registration fee, her lesson fees, and her meals; what's more, he'll 
provide her with spending money, sponsor dance recitals for her, and buy her gifts of kimono 
and jewelry. And when he spends time with her, he won't pay her usual hourly fee; he'll 
probably pay more, as a gesture of goodwill. 

Mameha was certainly one of these top geisha; in fact, as I came to learn, she was probably 
one of the two or three best-known geisha in all of Japan. You may have heard something 
about the famous geisha Mametsuki, who had an affair with the prime minister of Japan 
shortly before World War I and caused something of a scandal. She was Mameha's older 
sister-which is why they both had "Mame" in their names. It's common for a young geisha to 
derive her name from the name of her older sister. 

Having an older sister like Mametsuki was already enough to ensure Mameha a successful 
career. But in the early 19205, the Japan Travel Bureau began its first international 
advertising campaign. The posters showed a lovely photograph of the pagoda from the Toji 
Temple in southeastern Kyoto, with a cherry tree to one side and a lovely young apprentice 
geisha on the other side looking very shy and graceful, and exquisitely delicate. That 
apprentice geisha was Mameha. 

It would be an understatement to say that Mameha became famous. The poster was 
displayed in big cities all over the world, with the words "Come and Visit the Land of the 
Rising Sun" in all sorts of foreign languages-not only English, but German, French, Russian, 
and . . . oh, other languages I've never even heard of. Mameha was only sixteen at the time, 
but suddenly she found herself being summoned to meet every head of state who came to 
Japan, and every aristocrat from England or Germany, and every millionaire from the United 
States. She poured sake for the great German writer Thomas Mann, who afterward told her a 
long, dull story through an interpreter that went on and on for nearly an hour; as well as 
Charlie Chaplin, and Sun Yat-sen, and later Ernest Hemingway, who got very drunk and said 
the beautiful red lips on her white face made him think of blood in the snow. In the years 
since then, Mameha had grown only more famous by putting on a number of widely 
publicized dance recitals at the Kabukiza Theater in Tokyo, usually attended by the prime 
minister and a great many other luminaries. 

When Mameha had announced her intention of taking me on as her younger sister, I hadn't 
known any of these things about her, and it's just as well. Probably I would have felt so 
intimidated, I couldn't have done much more than tremble in her presence. 

Mameha was kind enough to sit me down and explain much of this on that day in her 
apartment. When she was satisfied that I understood her, she said: 


"Following your debut, you'll be an apprentice geisha until the age of eighteen. After that 
you'll need a danna if you're to pay back your debts. A very substantial danna. My job will be 
to make sure you're well known in Gion by then, but it's up to you to work hard at becoming 
an accomplished dancer. If you can't make it at least to the fifth rank by the age of sixteen, 
nothing I can do will help you, and Mrs. Nitta will be delighted to win her bet with me." 

"But, Mameha-san," I said, "I don't understand what dance has to do with it." 

"Dance has everything to do with it," she told me. "If you look around at the most successful 
geisha in Gion, every one of them is a dancer." 

Dance is the most revered of the geisha's arts. Only the most promising and beautiful geisha 
are encouraged to specialize in it, and nothing except perhaps tea ceremony can compare to 
the richness of its tradition. The Inoue School of dance, practiced by the geisha of Gion, 
derives from Noh theater. Because Noh is a very ancient art that has always been patronized 
by the Imperial court, dancers in Gion consider their art superior to the school of dance 
practiced in the Ponto-cho district across the river, which derives from Kabuki. Now, I'm a 
great admirer of Kabuki, and in fact I've been lucky enough to have as my friends a number 
of the most famous Kabuki actors of this century. But Kabuki is a relatively young art form; it 
didn't exist before the 17005. And it has always been enjoyed by ordinary people rather than 
patronized by the Imperial court. There is simply no comparing the dance in Pontocho to the 
Inoue School of Gion. 

All apprentice geisha must study dance, but, as I say, only the promising and attractive ones 
will be encoura