My mother has never had a sip of sake in her life. She’s never felt curious about the taste of the Japanese rice wine, not when we head out to a local izakaya, not even when a ostentatious bottle is placed on our kitchen counter top. Her interest was only finally, and eventually, piqued, when a travel host on the telly mentioned that Japanese women take a small glass of sake every morning to “keep looking young”. The beverage, the voice quipped, warms the body from the inside, stimulating blood circulation, which is what gives the ladies rosy, radiant skin.
“We still have that bottle of sake, yes?” Mum asked, eyes glued to the screen. “These Japanese women always look beautiful and never seem to age, I need to be like them,” she said, preening before a small handheld mirror, as she prodded her fine lines. “I’m not young like you anymore, I’ve got to stop the wrinkles from getting worse.”
This story is from the January 2021 edition of ELLE Singapore.
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This story is from the January 2021 edition of ELLE Singapore.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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