Japan’s cunning bottakuri bars con compliant customers

Last month’s incident in the Minami district of Osaka in which comedian Tamotsu Kuroda of the group Messenger was arrested for assaulting a bar manager following a dispute over a 250,000-yen bill highlights the increasingly common practice of bottakuri, or to rip off, that is ongoing in Japan’s entertainment areas, reports Spa! (Jan. 26)

“Those rip-off joints in Osaka scrutinize their targets beforehand,” says the owner of a near where Kuroda’s altercation took place. “There’s a possibility that the bar was assuming Kuroda could afford a certain level of tab just because he is a popular comedian. There have been an increasing number of bottakuri cases here in the Minami area.” Read more

Ex-dog’s AV bark worse than her overbite

As any television viewer knows well, there’s pulchritude a-plenty on the Japanese airwaves. The possible exception would be a show broadcast on Fuji TV and affiliates called “Beauty Colosseum,” hosted by beanpole entertainer Akiko Wada.

The show features a stream of weepy women who pour out their woes, while hostess Wada — certainly no great beauty herself — nods sympathetically and occasionally brushes away a tear.

The show’s homely subjects have been dealt a losing hand by nature, so to speak, causing them to suffer torment at the hands of their peers. In addition to their being verbally slanged, they suffer other forms of discrimination in education and employment, and needless to say romantic relations with the opposite sex typically run from little to none.

Did we say sex? Well, kindly remain calm until we can provide a few more details from Shukan Jitsuwa (Feb. 11). Read more

Ouch! Fetishists at love hotels leave behind bloody, malodorous messes

“I was really surprised. When I went in to clean up, the room was a bloody mess,” relates the meeku-san — as chambermaids at love hotels are referred to in the trade.

The reason for the speaker’s astonishment is evident in her ensuing remarks.

“I could tell it wasn’t just some woman having her period,” she says. “The bed sheets were covered with bloodstains that had soaked through all the way to the mattress cover. There were bloody tracks in the bath too.” Read more

‘Super copy’ brand goods help guys to bag girls

Offering a kyaba-jo, or hostess, a “super copy” of a brand name bag is becoming a better way for playboys to play the field, reports Nikkan Gendai (Jan. 25).

A super copy is a counterfeit article so carefully crafted that it is impossible for an amateur to determine the difference from an original.

According to freelance writer Taizo Ebina, such duplicates started started emerging around four years ago and replicate items by such popular brands as Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Hermes. “The bags use the same leather as the original and have product numbers imprinted,” says Ebina. “The color of the bag’s skin changes the way an authentic version changes. It takes a well-trained person to detect the authenticity of these fake products. Packages, both boxes and labels, are also dutifully printed at factories. Once, I saw the parts of a fake Rolex and they had been sourced from quality makers in Japan.” Read more

Erotic dancers in Tokyo

(Photo by Tokyo Reporter, January 24, 2010) Read more

Ozawa’s gals appearing anxious as party ponders path

“Ozawa girls” is a title that refers to the group of attractive female candidates dispatched to minor constituencies under the guidance of the Democratic Party of Japan’s scandal-plagued Secretary General, Ichiro Ozawa, for last August’s lower house election.

At the party’s annual convention inside the Hibiya Kokaido on January 16, three of these ladies, who wound up winning seats in their districts, seemed a bit on edge, reports Shukan Shincho (Jan. 28). Read more

Yamaguchi-gumi increasing operations prior to release of boss from prison

A number of luxury cars began to line up near Kobe’s Gokoku Shrine just after the clock struck midnight to welcome the new year. Their arrival was for the well-known first shrine visit of the year (or hatsumode) by senior-level members of the Yamaguchi-gumi crime syndicate.

A male figure emerging at the center of the subsequent gathering, wearing traditional Japanese clothes and being guarded by men in black, was Kiyoshi Takayama, age 62 and the number-two boss in the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan’s largest yakuza mob. He was followed by other leaders of the family, including the senior director, 65-year-old Tadashi Irie. Following his prayer session, Takayama explained: “I was praying for the safety of our old man.”

The “old man” refers to Shinobu Tsukasa, the sixth and current leader of the gang, which weekly tabloid Friday (Jan. 22) reports will be moving to boost its power in the run-up to his release from prison next year. He is currently serving a six-year sentence at Fuchu Prison in Tokyo for illegal possession of weapons. Read more

Drink-spikers return to old hunting grounds in Ueno

While the U.S. embassy in Tokyo has mounted a campaign to discourage Americans from enjoying a tipple in Roppongi, among the natives the practice of drink-spiking followed by robbery seems to be much more prevalent in Ueno. It was there, reports Shukan Jitsuwa (Jan. 28), that foreigners of Asian descent first began to slip mickey finns into customers’ drinks in order to relieve them of their cash and other valuables.

Following efforts to expel them from Ueno, the gangs shifted their operations to Ginza and Kabukicho. But police crackdowns have once again sent them slinking back to Ueno.

“It’s like a game of hide-and-seek,” says the manager of a local cabaret club. “Just when we thought that Ueno was safe at last, the crocks returned to their old haunts.”

“Up to November last year, the number of victims around Ueno came to about 90,” a reporter based in Tokyo Metropolitan Police headquarters tells the magazine. “There were something like 40 more cases in the neighboring Yushima area in Bunkyo Ward. Total losses are estimated at around 70 million yen. Previously the police undertook a sweep and went after the touts and the shops that had teamed up with the crooks, but the thieves just high-tailed it to Kabukicho and Ginza. Now they’re back in Ueno, an area that tends to be overlooked by the MPD.” Read more

Woman gets helping hands to overcome hardships of overseas assignment

“Right after I married my husband he got posted to a two-year assignment to Europe, and I accompanied him,” the anonymous female narrator relates in the December issue of the women’s soft porn magazine Ai no Taiken Special Deluxe, as reported in Shukan Bunshun (Jan. 21).

“At first I was thrilled to be able to live abroad, but it was hard to acclimatize to an unfamiliar country and before long I was in the dumps with a bad case of culture shock.

“I poured out my woes to the wife of my husband’s boss, who had already been living there for three years. She told me, ‘Let me introduce you to a few friends of mine.’ She escorted me to a room in a gorgeous condo where three local men were waiting for us.

“Without hesitating, she walked up to one of them and embraced him in a deep kiss. I found myself sandwiched between the other two. At first I was frightened, but I was soon enjoying their passionate yet gentle caresses. Soon one pushed me down on my hands and knees and penetrated me from behind. The sensation was indescribable. Read more

Medieval Japan’s prolific predators weren’t plagued by Tiger traps

Eiyu iro wo konomu (heroic men like sex), goes a famous old Japanese saying. University of Tokyo historian Hirofumi Yamamoto uses the phrase in the context of medieval warlord Oda Nobunaga (1534 – 1582), who fathered 22 children before being cut down in the prime of life.

“Even before Nobunaga wed Kicho at the age of 15, he’d engaged in any number of clandestine affairs with women,” Hitoshi Ejima, a researcher into sexual practices, tells Sunday Mainichi (Jan. 24). He adds that Tokugawa Ieyasu, founder of the Tokugawa shogunate, went from preferring older widows in his salad days to a preference for Lolitas in later life, still managing to romp with a 13-year-old at the ripe old age of 68.

This impressive data about Japan’s cocksmen of yore is slipped in as a sidebar to the main story, titled “Golf and Sex: The 19th Hole Where Sexual Athlete Tiger Woods Became Entrapped.”

Another 16th century warlord, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, was less prolific. Despite a wife and some 16 concubines, Hideyoshi produced few offspring. “But he certainly liked the ladies, and used to go prowling for them in the towns,” says Ejima. Read more

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