Opinion How High Can You Go? By JULIET HINDELL	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
どれだけ高くなれる？ どれだけ高くなれる？ この夏、大流行した厚底サンダル。 それを履いて街を歩く女性の 危なっかしいようすに 筆者はいつも、はらはらしていた。 はやりの物を身に付けるときの わくわくした気持ちはよくわかるのだが…。

I was walking along Omotesando the other day, as usual looking at all the amazing outfits people wear. But it made me realize that the craze for platform shoes, which dominated the feet of trendy girls this summer, isn't going to go away as autumn arrives.

I saw the highest pair of platforms yet. A girl in a micromini was struggling along in boots with solid platform soles that must have been 30 centimeters high. I stopped and stared as she made her slow progress along the street. It seemed to require an effort to lift the enormous shoes off the pavement at each step. I noticed that I wasn't the only person looking, many other people turned to stare too.

This autumn, as far as I can see, the platform sandals of the summer are being replaced by black platform boots, which, if possible, are even higher. I'm starting to wonder: Just how high can you go?

In case you think I'm a square fuddy-duddy, I should point out that when I was about 10 years old I wanted nothing more than platform shoes. It was the early 1970s, when platforms first came into fashion. They were often rainbow-colored, and one famous pair even had live goldfish swimming in the transparent soles.

But my fashion instincts were stymied by my mother, who categorically refused to allow me or my sister to wear platforms. Secretly, I borrowed a pair from a friend and exulted in my one evening of platform-shod trendiness, only to return to flat shoes the next day. So believe me I understand the urge to follow the latest trend.

Shoes seem to be getting higher all the time. I keep doing double takes when I see very tall women. Nearly all of them, it turns out, are wearing a dozen centimeters or more of platform to increase their height.

It's all very well to want to be taller and trendy, but when I read recently that platforms were suspected in the death of a young woman who died from injuries to her head, I thought perhaps things were going too far.

So many times I've seen girls wobble dangerously on their towering shoes. Some grab on to their friends for support, others do in fact take a tumble.

The fashion's potential for causing injury could even affect the stock market. An investment advice columnist thinks buying stocks in companies that make elastic ankle bandages is a good idea because so many women must be hurting themselves wearing platforms.

At the risk of sounding like an old fogey let me give you another fashion history lesson. My mother's generation wore extremely pointed shoes that squeezed their toes together. They were truly fashion victims, suffering immense pain to look fashionable. Many are now old ladies and their feet are still molded into the shape of those trendy pointed shoes. While the fashion may last just one year, the side effects can last a lifetime.

Shukan ST: Oct. 15, 1999

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