The Untold Story of Japan’s Rise to Economic Prominence
As a trade journalist based in Tokyo during the most critical years of Japan’s climb up from the destruction of World War II, I found that the majority of the American and European importers who began trooping to the country from 1948 on—and thereafter made multiple annual trips—did not do so because they had so many problems with their suppliers—which were routinely formidable, to say the least— or to place additional orders!
No! They did so because they were able to consort with large numbers of beautiful young Japanese women in the mizu shobai (me-zoo show-by), or “water business”— the traditional Japanese euphemism for the night-time entertainment trades, especially the hostess-stocked cabarets!
The scale of this “side” industry can be imagined from the fact that during their heyday some of the larger cabarets like the Mikado in Tokyo and the Universe in Osaka had close to a thousand hostesses on their staffs. [Sukarno, the president of Indonesia, married a hostess from a Ginza cabaret who came to his Imperial Hotel room during one of his official visits to Japan.]
In addition to cavorting with hostesses in the mizu shobai, many of the foreign buyers set up mistresses (sometimes provided by their suppliers) in such well-known places as Central Apartments in the Harajuku district of Tokyo, which was a short walk from my office.
My editorial duties took me to Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines on a regular basis, where I “took note” of the charms of the young women in each of these countries, and eventually wrote a book called “Women of the Orient — Intimate Profiles of the World’s Most Feminine Women.”
In that book I listed and discussed the primary physical and intangible attractions of Asian women, devoting the first one-quarter of the book to Japanese girls because there were far more of them in an economic and social position to meet and get involved with foreign men. Another factor that is of special interest was that Japanese women had historically been intrigued by and attracted to foreign men, and it was therefore much easier to develop a relationship with them.
Among the attributes of Japanese girls that foreign men generally find attractive is their petite size. (Why most men like women who are smaller than them is apparently a world-wide male thing — maybe based on nature’s plan that males could overpower females in order to propagate the species.) This size factor alone expands the ego and libido of the average foreign male as if by some dark magic. Like little boys, foreign men like to show off this size difference by comparing their hands with the hands of their Japanese girl friends.
The olive-like (not yellow!) complexion of most Japanese girls and their black hair is another turn-on for foreign men. Dark is more sexually potent that white, and when Japanese girls wear their glossy black hair long—as many do—it acts as a powerful aphrodisiac on most men. A girl who has scented her long black hair with a hint of jasmine or some other exotic aroma is even harder to resist.
Some Japanese girls, especially those who come from the northern Tohoku district of Honshu Island, have creamy white complexions. When this is combined with long, straight black hair, petite size, and an attractive face, their effect on most men is a foregone conclusion.
While the eyes of most Japanese girls have the epicanthic fold that gives them a squinty look if the fold is extreme, the eyes of many of them are almond-shaped, and this, according to face-reading theory, is the most sensual of all eye-shapes.
Many girls from the Tohoku area are especially distinguished by their eyes as a result of racial mixing between the Japanese and the Ainu inhabitants (who lived there long before the Japanese arrived). One of the racial characteristics of the Ainu, who are Caucasoid instead of Mongoloid, is extraordinarily large, deep, expressive eyes. When the eyes of Japanese-Ainu girls get just the right combination of genes, they are so entrancing that they virtually hypnotize people.
Over the years many of the girls in this category have come to Tokyo in the hopes of becoming models or movie stars; others joined the mizu shobai, where they were treated like stars by foreign patrons.
Many foreign men, especially Americans, are attracted to women with big bosoms (the movie and television industries having made a fetish out of big breasts). Obviously, most Japanese girls are not genetically programmed to have big breasts (although they are getting bigger as the diet changes and the girls get bigger). So why do the girls still rate high on the sex appeal chart of most foreign men? Because the breasts the girls do have are usually in proportion to their overall body size. More importantly, however, is that the overall feminine image and behavior of Japanese girls makes the size of their breasts a secondary matter.
Many Japanese girls have short legs in proportion to the length of their body trunks (although this, too, is changing rapidly among the young), giving them low-slung butts. This may not sound like a sexual turn-on to someone who has no experience with Japanese girls. And girls in this category are certainly not going to win any beauty pageants. But history shows that short legs and a low butt can be very sexy when packaged in just the right proportions, and especially when the girls are wearing the casual yukata robe or more formal kimono.
While the sex appeal of good-looking Japanese girls may be physical first, it is their behavior that puts the icing on their sexual image. Despite dramatic changes in Japanese culture since the 1960s, Japanese girls are still culturally conditioned, consciously and subconsciously, to think and behave in very feminine ways.
These ways include physical grace, an air of mystery, coquettishness, softness, vulnerability, an air of innocence, expertise in overt as well as covert flirting, and skill in making men feel masculine and masterful.
Historically, the air of utter innocence and vulnerability that Japanese girls were conditioned to exhibit was one of their most powerful assets in attracting men. Even women who had worked for years as geisha or prostitutes continued to play the role of innocents who were paragons of virtue. Still today most Japanese girls have absorbed enough of the traditional culture that they are able to project this virgin-like image at will.
Also traditionally, Japanese girls and young women who were on the vamp did not always stop with acting like innocent virgins. They often went even further and acted infantile, knowing that this sort of behavior as well was sexually stimulating to many men, especially those who were unsure of their virility. This ploy, too, remains a part of the sensual arsenal of young Japanese women.
Said a very experienced woman in the mizu shobai world: “Nothing turns men on faster and harder than a young woman who combines acting like a baby with performing like a professional.”
Another reason why Japanese girls have long been popular among foreign men is that the girls were conditioned by their society to consort with older men. Throughout most of Japan’s history, in fact, it was only older, more successful men who had the means to enjoy themselves with younger women. This also has changed dramatically since the 1960s, but still today middle-aged and older men of means have access to large numbers of willing high school and college-age girls.
Over and above the sex appeal of Japanese girls, foreign men have been especially attracted to Japan because attractive young women were readily available to them and were able and willing to satisfy their male egos and sexual fantasies. This availability stemmed in part from the fact that in Japan premarital and extra-marital sex was not regarded as a sin or as immoral in the Western sense of these terms, and there were few restraints on what could be done, or inhibitions about doing them. Most foreign men in Japan took to this environment like frogs to water.
Young Japanese girls today are far more individualistic and assertive than they were just a few decades ago, and they are often more aggressive than young men in expressing their sensual natures. A significant percentage of them continue to have a special interest in foreign men for the same reason foreign men are attracted to them: their cultural and physical differences.
These girls, unless they are members of the mizu shobai and it’s just business, are discriminating, however. They will not consort with just any foreigner. Foreign men who connect today must themselves be attractive to some degree, and have interests and manners that the girls approve of…. not to mention the kind of money it takes to court a girl in today’s Japan.
___________________________
Boyé Lafayette De Mente has been involved with Japan and East Asia since the late 1940s as a member of a U.S. intelligence agency, student, business journalist, and editor. He is the author of more than 50 books on Japan, Korea and China. For synopses of his titles go to: www.cultural-guide-books-on-china-japan-korea-mexico.com. His book, Bachelor’s Japan, originally published in 1960 and the first inside look at the mizu shobai in English, became a hot television and weekly magazine topic, and subsequently an international bestseller.
Didn’t we already have this story?
http://japundit.com/archives/2007/01/02/4583/
Mr. De Mente is clearly an accomplished journalist and all-round interesting guy, but I just can’t resist saying that there is a certain age after which it’s wise to avoid writing about sex. Unless it’s sex with the elderly, which should probably be avoided for a separate set of reasons.
This stuff sounds like it comes from the 50s, which is apparently does. It can’t be updated by a few words at the end, and women haven’t “consorted” for decades, as far as I know.
Nothing dates faster than sex.
Dash it! ghoti, I believe you’ve got something there _ as my old math tutor once quipped..”remora, 20 goes into 80 a helluva lot more times than 80 into 20 and you do well to remember that lad!!!”
rem
It may sound dated but I can relate to it as much of it applies to my relationship with my wife, who is Japanese and myself, who is not.
Maybe I am reading too much into your comment, rem - but I do believe your math tutor had it wrong. 80 is only very rarely gone into.
“My boyfriend Ernie tells me ‘Soph’ - ya know what I’m gonna do when I’m 80 years old? I’m gonna marry me a 20 year old woman - whattaya think o’ that?’ An’ I tells him ‘Oh yeah? Well guess what, Ernie? When I’m 80 years old, I’m gonna marry me a 20 year old man! And let me tell ya one thing, Ernie: 20 - goes into 80 - a hell of a lot more - than - 80 - goes into 20!’”
Ah….I stand corrected.
actually Arden my wife was online and she read that comment of mine and rang me where I am and said “Stop putting ideas in my head”… so the egg is all over my face.
remora
remora’s a naughty boy…. now no more remku for you (that should stop putting ideas in your head).
robin
Boye..my wife has a functional working understanding of English and wishes to take issue with you on a few minor points regarding Japanese Women…Arden being a Gunma Women (Kakaa Denka) i’ve had to clean it up a bit for the purposes of conducting a civilised discussion but after I get done this evening with my work commitments I’ll try and knock out some questions that hopefully you can answer for her.
thanks
remora
Funny story….My first trip to Tokyo and I was staying at the New Sanno hotel close to Hiro station. I was walking down to the station from the hotel and as I turned a corner I find spray painted on the side of a wall the engrish warning,”Stay away from our Woman!!!”
With all this talk of the popularity of Japanese women with foriegn men, it is still very much a taboo subject in Japanese society.
One deranged graffiti on an obscure wall convinces you of this? The subject is not taboo in the least, and it’s slightly offensive for you to suggest it.
It should be noted that the New Sanno Hotel is a large facility in Tokyo that is operated solely for use by U.S. Military personnel and their guests.
..it should also be noted that the X-hoteru in Gunma-ken caters for lost and beneath the radar souls who are struggling to make sense of this quaker-jack palace known as Zipang.
http://www.quaker.jp/
remora
In regards to the comment about Japanese women with foreign men being taboo? Forget about it. My wife’s family treats me like a celebrity when we visit. Her family and friends think its a great thing that my wife married an American. I must admit, I do enjoy it and they are family and being treated well by family is always a treasure.
Boye,
to the Victor the Spoils - or in remoraspeak - to the Victor the Goyls..
* The Fall of Berlin (Russians)
* The Occupation of Paris (Nazis)
* The Fall of Rome
..my wifes Grandmother (90 and still sane) put up with being firebombed and then raped ..
I wont go on except to say this.
This post will ultimately hang like an Albatross around your neck.
remora (for Arden)
remora
“The Girls” that’s a no brainer. I fall in love about 20 times, just on a 5 minute walk to Fami-Mart, for my evening beer.
An hour in the gym is insane
It was not my intent to offend nor was my observation formed from that one instance.
Thanks, Zak, for the clarification. But, like many posters here, I have family and kids and a fairly long experience in Japan as a single guy before that. Why I felt offended, I’m not quite sure- but it might have something to do with people putting some kind of spin on things that would suggest my family can’t live a normal life in Japan. There are problems being a foreigner, but a taboo about international relationships is not one of them - it just doesn’t exist in any significant way, any more than it does in the US. In fact, Japan is notoriously light in sexual taboos.
does that include extra-marital affairs ghoti?..cos I’m thinking of joining riki’s gym class.
rem.
Boyé Lafayette De Mente was a Japanese girls lover in early years after WWII. Today he would be described as Otaku.
As a matter of fact, those Otaku are mostly Asians (primarily Japanese). Japanese girls are popular among Chinese, Koreans and other Asians too. Westerners or Caucasians are actually in the third group.
two questions TU?
1. Why are they popular amongst Chinese and Koreans and rest of what you said….because they are cheap and available?.
2. Who makes up the second group?
..the floor is yours.
remora
also TU, the term Otaku hardly seems applickable to someone who was sexually active during years that you are banging on about (1946+) the term didn’t cum into usage until the early 1980’s.
remora
” While the sex appeal of good-looking Japanese girls may be physical first, it is their behavior that puts the icing on their sexual image. … Japanese girls are still culturally conditioned, consciously and subconsciously, to think and behave in very feminine ways.
These ways include physical grace, an air of mystery, coquettishness, softness, vulnerability, an air of innocence, expertise in overt as well as covert flirting, and skill in making men feel masculine and masterful. ”
Those utterances of describing Japanese girls are exactly what today’s Japanese geeks are feeling their fondness of attractive Japanese girls with the expression of ” Moe “, and what many Chinese and other Asian men are yearning for Japanese girls.
The first geek group is Japanese men (logical), the second group is then Asian.
..are you taking all this in Arden?..coquettish,air of innocence - and making men feel masculine and masterful
Phwoah!
remora
Every time I try to broach the subject of coquettish and innocent females with Mrs. JP, she tells me that I arrived here about 100 years too late. . .
True, in China their variation of the standard joke about a perfect life was a Chinese chef, a German car, and a Japanese wife.
remora…I’d stay away from gyms if I was you. Too sober and too sweaty. Give me poorly lit bar any night of the week.
and what would perfect Hell be like (pray tell?).
I suggest it would be an English cook,a Korean car and a Japanese mother-in-law.
remora.
why do men write articles on how foreign men like japan because of the girls?
because its safer than describing why men like jailbait.
Perfect Hell = English cook,a Korean car and a Japanese mother-in-law
Brilliant!
Hey, Korean cars are pretty good - and I am not a big fan of Korea in general… My hell:
A Canadian cook, a Chinese car and a wife named Dave.
Postwar Japan was in economic ruins. Prostitution and consorting with foreign males was a way to get hard, cold cash.
Perhaps I’m unusual, but I went to Japan without even thinking about the women (or the anime). I mostly found them to be like women everywhere else. Some nice, some not so nice. The differences are less about them being women than in them growing up in a different culture.
Articles like this say more about Western male sexual fantasies than it does about the women themselves.
ahh gross. i find this attitude really disgusting!
What? Get with the groove, baby.
With that Latin numeral as your moniker, you must be one hot little number!
23 skiddoo, doll…
haha, been hanging out with boye lately?
:)
(for the record, i’m a guy.)
A guy? Boye to boys. The “gross” and “disgusting” comments threw me (if that doesn’t give away too much).
Sorry, guy!
I hate it when I waste my best lines on guys.
” Articles like this say more about Western male sexual fantasies than it does about the women themselves.”
Well, fantasies sometimes play a big roll in love affaire and sex. Those Japanese women knew it too well in their culture.
yes TU,..and there are fairies at the bottom of my garden and my pet pig Arnold has just hopped the last freight to Petticoat Junction..plus Jethro BoDean has just been elected Head of Neurosurgery at Cedars….
basically the old coot’s got a terminal case of Yella Fever and just can’t let go of his.. “Mammarie’s how I luv’ya, how i luv’ya..my dear ole Mammries”
*a sad old monkey gland transplant victim*
thanks
remora
well said remora.
Someone who might agree with our fair author?
http://tinyurl.com/6cdntn
I tried connecting directly to the picture w/o the commentary of Flickr, but the website wouldn’t cooperate. The look on the face of the older woman is priceless!
my wife Arden,my Mother and (sadly) my Mamagon read Boyes post - howls of outrage ensued..the giri factor kicked in and ..what else could I do?
as a writer I admire him - but I find his current posts questionable (a bit whiffy).
Me?…I like the quiet life far away from sleazy hostess bars and the water-world that Boye glorifies.
but then… “As you like It”..whatever gets you thru the nite.
remora
Not all western men have fantasies about Asian women. I think the large majority ignore them completely. I’ve seen guys back home that turn their heads every time a semi-okay western girl walks past, yet ignore asian girls completely, as if they’re not human or invisible. It’s not only men that do this, my Japanese wife, found western women to be extremely cold and disinterested.
..well,how about Asian Women who have fantasies about Western Men? or..
* Western Men who have fantasies about (young) Asian bouyes?
* Asian Women who have fantasies about (young) Western Women?
* Western Women who have fantasies about (young) Asian Women?…
I’m lost!! - but my next poem is about to arrive..this one is a goodie - it’s based on a mamachari race beside Tataranuma that Arden and I had 9 months before my youngest son Tsutomu-Victor was born..
*at Church this morning the visiting Rev.Hardon Heat gave a very inspiring sermon..my feat are still tapping..*
thanks
remora
remora,
are you telling me Jethro chose neurosurgery over being a fry cook? Finally putting that 6th grade education to good use…
search me ghoti..the last word ah heard, he an Miss Jane got hitched an went back to Malibu..
where they lived happily ever after just like me and Arden…..
rem.
Actually, I think Jethro just bought a casino in Las Vegas: http://www.jethroscasino.com/
This is why we don’t need TV anymore.
“It’s not only men that do this, my Japanese wife, found western women to be extremely cold and disinterested.”
Based strictly on non-scientific observations and guesswork, I would venture to suggest that this may in part be due to the assumption that an Oriental (read: East Asian) woman at first glance is Chinese, and thus less socially approachable.
well,I can really only state what I know to be true
Gunma Woman: Approach with Caution! - Handle with Care!
(*_*)
rem