Hello, dearest readers.
As you might not know, I don't receive any form of financial help from the Japanese Government (nor from the German, French or Zimbawean ones). Luckily my parents bless me with a monthly transfer on my bank account which allows me to eat enough rice and sometimes, beer. Times are hard in a country where you have to pay 35€ for a melon. Ok, life is not that expensive if you go by bike all the time and couchsurf when you travel. Vegetables are ok, fruits are not. You just have to adapt. Anyway, since I am a disgusting cheapo, I would do anything to save money - and also to make some. Especially if it involves working few hours and earning a lot - even if it means working as a sexy hostess in a shady bar.
Let me tell you about one evening I spent in Osaka 2 or 3 weeks ago. I had seen a small add in a local English newspaper about this job: being hostess in bar. Don't know if you ever heard about the concept: it's not a strip club, it's not a brothel. It's basically a bar where businessmen go after work with collegues or friends, and talk to charming young girls wearing slightly revealing clothes: the hostesses. Their job is to talk to the customers, to charm them, to pour them drinks and make them spend a lot of money. They earn a lot of money for just talking, about 30€ per hour. But it's not just about talking: hostesses are supposed to exchange contact details with the clients and to meet them outside working hours, for dinner or theater or whatever. Sexual activities during working hours are not meant to be, but you can do what you want the rest of the time...
This I didn't know when I read the add. It was formulated in a positive way, like 'friendly, and outgoing girls wanted, 25€ per hour, flexible schedule, Japanese and foreigners welcome'. So I thought, why not? Getting paid to get the chance to work on my Japanese? I'm already flirting the whole time so why not receive money for it? Hanna, my Dutch partner in crime, also wanted to try the experience and we got an interview on a Friday night in the bar located in Osaka.
We dressed up as classy sluts and went. We walked through Umeda, the 'amusement' neighboorhood of Osaka, where you can find the worse of the Japanese society. We were to enter the wonderful world of adultery, lust, greed of money, faked feelings and superficiality. On our way we saw many women, young and mature, with faces covered with 50 layers of makeup, wearing fancy but sexy clothes - accompanied by mostly older men. It hit us after some time that they were hostesses with their clients on their way to the bar they work in. They looked really beautiful and sexy, they looked like real women, not like cute and young baby dolls like Japanese women usually look like. Which symbolises the huge massive dichotomy of the machist Japanese society. But I will come to that later.
We entered the bar and it felt normal, not weird, at least at the beginning. It was empty, as it was only 8pm. We talked to the manager and didn't understand much, but a waitress or something could translate us. We learned that we were supposed to wear colorfull dresses, have our haid properly done (I can't find suitable words to describe the look the manager gave to my current hairstyle - it was raining that day and I looked like a hobo). We were supposed to look sexy and perfect. They told us what I wrote earlier: that we were supposed to meet the clients quite often. They asked us when we could work and when we could start. As the interview ended, some clients entered the bar. Two girls rushed to them and started being all sexy, laughing at their jokes and entertaining them, and more important, pouring them drinks. Could I picture myself doing that? Pretending I'm having a good time when I'm not? Letting some guys spend time with me in exchange for money? Letting them fantasize about me?
We left with a bad impression about the job, and thought we would never get it anyway. We walked through the neighboorhood and noticed the environment that we were currently in: full of modern times geishas, who were not the rafinated and delightful ladies geishas are. Of course, geishas always fake their feelings towards their clients, and are also doing it in exchange for money... But at least they look pure, are pleasant company because of their rhetorical skills and their general culture, and master singing, playing a music instrument and dancing. Completely the opposite of those cheap modern sex fantasies who just laugh, talk a bit and wait for the guy to pay them expensive clothes.
How weird it is that everybody knows that the businessman is paying the girl to spend time with him -yet it is well considered to walk around with a younger sexy girl. How disturbing is that! If a man is seen in good company in restaurants or elsewhere, it is a good sign concerning his social status and his wealth. Other values or characteristics such as intelligence, humor or charm that are normal reasons to want to spend time with somebody seem to have disappeared, to be replaced by the lust for money.
I guess it's like that everywhere on Earth, so I'll just complain about something else. Those guys are mostly married. THEY ARE MARRIED. They wifes know about it but don't do much. They are housewives and are quite happy with the idea of living a decent life without having to work too much, and if they happen to complain about the after hour activities of their husbands, they might loose everything - so they just pretend they don't know about it.
Why would a guy 'cheat' on his wife? Why? Seriously? WHY? Apparently it's because Japanese guys, who are nothing else but d***heads, separate their inner desires from their pragmatism: for everyday life, they don't want women who resist them: they want an easy life, like to have cute puppies that are happy when they come home after work, waitresses who prepare food and cleaning ladies who keep the house clean and neat. And if they can have everything in a single person, they will marry it. Yes, it. We are talking about robots here, not about human beings. Once in a while, they give in to their fantasies: young, sexy, daring girls who lure them for an evening or more. They enjoy this forbidden life, knowing they can't have it - they enjoy the time they spend with the girls, knowing they don't want to be with them, secretly despising them for being sluts.
So Hanna and I didn't know what to think, or what to do if they were giving us the job. The cultural experience would be really interesting, but how disgusting would it be to talk to old married assholes for money. Could we be part of the system? Would we want to?
A few days later, I got a message from the manager. The job was mine if it wanted it. I answered yes, telling myself I would at least try once, saying I could work the following week. They never answered this message - which, I guess, is for the best. I could never pretend I'm another person, be all dressed up, and pretend I'm having fun. I'm a hobo, I have bruises from karate or from falling on the ground while being drunk and I hate makeup. I have few principles but I stick to them!
