How Office Attire is Beyond My Understanding

A brief note on Cool Biz…

Cool Biz is the term coined for the more casual attire allowed in the workplace during the Japanese summer, due to increasing temperatures and decreasing use of air con in an attempt to conserve resources. This means teachers ditch the suit jackets and don the shirt sleeves. Generally speaking, women get away with wearing more casual attire than men, so I’ll admit that I have worn basic tee shirts to work before. Because no one cared.

Cue autumn break.

Upon my return to the office yesterday, suddenly everyone, including the women, have suit jackets on. And ties. And pencils skirts. And all of those formal clothes we have been avoiding all summer. In their defense, the office and classrooms do get quite cold, because on the flip side of not turning on the air con is also not turning on the heat, so more layers is actually beneficial during those many hours where I sit at my desk at the end of the row of ninensei teachers, contemplating life and occasionally team teaching when I’m lucky. So it’s not actually the switch from tee shirts to business suits that I’m barraging here.
It’s the fact that no one mentions the switch out loud and that everyone just seems to know intuitively when it’s going to happen.

I was not warned. I was not given the inside scope into the apparently inbred cultural knowledge of when it becomes time to take that jacket off the hanger in the back of my closet and wear it to work. Because God knows I brought enough of them, and I am actually excited to wear all those clothes it’s been too warm and too casual in the office to wear. I desire nothing more than also to put my pencil skirt and pinstripe jacket to good use. But I cannot do that in a timely manner when no one tells when it’s going to happen.

It’s also a fact that this knowledge is apparently school-specific.

I was not going to be duped twice. The next day, today, I was going to be prepared and not show up to work two notches below the formality of the rest of the teaching staff. I wore that pinstripe jacket with pride.

But then I got the office at one of my other schools only to discover that Cool Biz had apparently not ended there. The air was less formal in this office, as though casual dress eased its way out more gently and with less abruptness. Some wore jackets. Some wore the same cardigans they wore before autumn break.

I just don’t know what to think anymore.