The night before the recital, the incidental musician came from Tokyo, and we did a dress rehearsal. We painted our bodies white and wore the white outfits we'd made on our own. The music for my performance included not just tunes recorded by Gavin Bryars but also a live guitar, which served as my cue to crouch down during my performance. That night was the first time I danced to his guitar. I grew confident.

I'd always considered myself someone who struggled to perform well in real situations. I learned to play the piano when I was young and participated in several recitals, but I never felt like I truly delivered a good performance. This time, however, I had no doubt that I would perform at my best. I recall the advice that one of the instructors gave a friend of mine when she got nervous. She said, "First of all, there's no failure in dance."

By showtime, the large main hall of the temple was full, and we each gave our all. I guess some of the audience found my performance boring, but I got some enthusiastic responses. Among them, the musician gave me the greatest compliment afterwards. At the year-end party, he said it was his most memorable performance of the year.

After that, for various reasons, the butoh dance company broke up and the class ended as well. It was a long and complicated story, but the biggest reason was that the instructor couple divorced and we were involved in a mess. It's beyond my current English ability to describe how terrible the mess was. I was exhausted at the time and had already broken off communication with half of them, including the ex-couple. However, despite the fact that it ended so horribly, it was a wonderful memory for me, and I occasionally still talk about it and get nostalgic with the other half, who I'm still friends with.