22 September 2009

With trepidation I took Emily for her modelling job. The first hurdle was a half hour ride on the train, but she was very good and stayed in her buggy the whole way (admittedly with liberal snacks to keep her occupied). After the awful little hole where the auditions were held I was nervous about the studio, but again I needn't have been: it was a light, airy building in the suburbs, almost like a massive greenhouse. The inside had been decorated in what I'll decribe as American beachhouse style, with minimal wooden furniture, a floor to ceiling bookshelf, cushions scattered on the floor.

Emily soon started playing with a box of toys provided. She coped very well with the attentions of some women who helped dress her in some pyjamas, cleaned her face and hands, brushed her hair and put in some hairslides. After a while they called us over for the first set of photos, which were to be taken with a little American boy with beautiful long curly blond locks. Emily was very worried and would not stay where they wanted her to stand at first. The boy was very confident and seemed unfazed. After a few tears and calls for Goki she calmed down and more or less managed to do what they wanted. There must have been about 5 or 6 other people involved, beside the photographer and us mums. One guy was playing the fool and trying to make the children smile with limited success; they don't seem to realise that a strange man waving soft toys at a child is not necessarily going to make them laugh.

We were released back to the play area, where she was dressed in a pair of trousers, a T-shirt and an apron. After some time, she was summoned again, this time to pose alone. She did a little better and there were probably some reasonable shots as she looked up at some balloons the joker was throwing around. The third set of clothes was a pair of Bambi-print pyjamas, and she posed in them with another, slightly older girl, even holding hands with her when asked.


The final set of clothes was another outfit, which I hope was PJs as I wouldn't consider taking her out in it. This time we ended up waiting over an hour, and I started to worry as she was obviously flagging a bit and probably getting hungry too. This set of pictures was with a different girl, who just would not sit down on the chair next to Emily, as requested. Emily got fed up and there were a few tears as we waited for the other kid to stop messing around. At last, she condescended to sit briefly, and then we were free! Not a bad way to make a couple of hundred pounds, though I still feel guilty even though it wasn't too traumatic for Emily.

After wolfing her lunch at the studio I wasted no time in getting Emily out of there and took her off to Rikugien garden,a few stops along the line. She was asleep before we went in and I sat in the busy park while she napped for half an hour, trying unsuccessfully to fight off the unwelcome attentions of many mosquitos. Once awake, she was keen to explore. We met a couple of boys with their families and the three kids had great fun grabbing handfuls of dusty shingle and putting it on some large leaves. Further on we crossed the bridge of stone slabs, where we saw dozens of turtles and some monstrously large carp (not surprising since there were several visitors feeding them all sorts of unsuitable snacks).

Despite continuing to fall victim to the army of mozzies we strolled under the trees around the lake, with Emily running along a path of stepping stones shouting 'haiai' (fast). Approaching the exit she stopped and I was aware she was doing a poo. Once I got her to the changing table, yet again she made a fuss and struggled to get up as I wiped her. She always seems to be in denial about doing a number two, so maybe she doesn't want me to clean her up because it means that I have found her out. All I can do is to keep telling her that there's nothing to worry about, we all do it.