I am walking in a crowded street and all of a sudden Santa Claus appears and starts handing out gifts to everyone except me. A terrible nightmare from my childhood ? No, this really happened to me the other day in Tokyo."Santa Claus" was actually a salesclerk from some store distrbuting fliers that were made more appealing by the attachment of gifts. I think the gifts were hard candies.In the streets of Tokyo people are handing out all sorts of freebees. I have myself received golfballs, cans of beer, a necktie, hard candies, candybars, bottles of softdrinks, and tons of tissuepaper. However because I am a foreigner here and because many people take it for granted that I cannot read Japanese, I often do not receive gifts that other pedestrians here receive.

It was once considered fashinable to carry a miniature portrait of a lover's eye; the trend dates to the 1820's.