Trading Trust for Slippers

Japanese dental offices (the two that I’ve been in anyway) are quite cozy. You remove your shoes when you step into the treatment area and put on a pair of slippers, which is reassuring. Who’s going to give you slippers then hurt you, right?

For an American receiving dental care in Japan, it helps to believe that, as I learned when I recently spent two long hours in a dentist’s chair. I understood and appreciated that the dentist and his assistant were busily working to save one of my teeth, but was a little sketchy on the details of precisely what they were doing. So it goes in a country where the best dentists don’t necessarily speak a lot of English.

Did I mention the blindfold? Once you’re settled in the dental chair, they cover your eyes with a small towel. The downside to that, of course, is that you’re in the dark literally as well as figuratively. You can sneak peeks through the bottom edge of the towel to look for clues as to what’s going on, but after seeing blood-soaked gauze and other unsettling sights, I decided that “cover the patient’s eyes during dental care” is an excellent Japanese idea, on par with sushi and Pokemon.

Part of the barrier is cultural, too. In the States, we’re used to being kept abreast of almost every move a dentist makes: “I’m just going to numb your cheek. Then I’m going to give you some novacaine. I’ll have to leave the needle in for a minute. Now I’m placing a suction wand....” In Japan they don’t feel that kind of hand-holding is necessary. (They give you slippers – what more could you need?) For two hours, I sat wondering exactly when they were going to make the incision in my gum they’d told me was coming. It wasn’t until I felt suturing thread dance lightly across my cheek that I realized they must have done it a while back. Chalk one up for the blindfold.

Eventually, I found myself back in my shoes and out on the sidewalk. Although feeling slightly woozy, I walked a block to an international grocery store to get a little shot of home. It’s amazing the trauma you can erase with the purchase of a few familiar luxuries, like all-purpose flour, pepper-jack cheese and, although it might be a while before I can eat them, salt & vinegar potato chips.