Hostess Bar

This post is rated PG.

I was always curious about hostess bars and made up my mind that I wanted to see the inside of one before I left Japan. Two days again I got my chance. It was not what I expected.

The best thing about working in Shinsaibashi is the demographic. It's a pretty cool area, full of restaurants, bars and clubs, and the students are similarly cool, and include an aromatherapist, a professional dancer, several hostesses and a two hostess bar managers, or mama-sans. One is the kind of older, slight eccentric past-her-shelf-life type of madame that I can imagine heading up one of those hostess bars where all of the women are wearing kimonos and you pay top dollar to talk to them and buy them drinks. She has this scary wig and buys me green tea soft-serve icecream cones when I have her in my class, which is great but has the regrettable side effect of turning your teeth lime-green. The other is a young, trendy mama-san with fur jackets, a fake tan and a hot body.

I was lucky to have a one-on-one class with both of the mama-sans last year. The older one has recently sold her business and is retired. The younger one is mid-career and we got to talking about her business: how it all works, how she got to where she is today. When she learned that I was leaving soon she said, "Come to my bar. We can go together." And she gave me her number. Don't tell my boss.

Last night I met her at a cafe on the way to work. It was 5000 yen an hour with free drinks. I could buy the hostesses drinks if I wanted - it was on her.

I didn't know what to expect but I had an idea. I imagined I would be able to meet all of the available hostesses, then choose one to sit down with at a table and I could talk to her for an hour about whatever I wanted. I've heard a lot of customers talk about politics or the economy. They wouldn't be my topics of choice if left to my own devices with a beautiful woman, but then, I'm not a salaryman. I had my own set of questions. Do hostesses have special training? How do you get recruited? Are hostesses usually prostitutes, or are they more like geisha? Are geisha usually prostitutes? Is it a fun job? Do you have regulars? When you go golfing with your regulars and their wives, is it weird (one of the hostess students at work ran into this situation)?

But on the way, mama-san told me that "This isn't a normal hostess club. I think you'll be surprised." She was right.

We took the elevator up to "Members VIP" and stepped inside. I took my seat at one of two which counters, with 4 groups of about 3 salarymen each, like some kind of sexed-up last supper, if the apostles were salarymen and I was Jesus. Between the benches I saw a holy vision: four Japanese angels serving drinks and entertaining the guests. I said G'day to the nearest salarymen, who were enjoying something called an Omego-beer. This is a drink that is surely only found in Japan, probably only in this one bar, and even shouted me an Oppai-cream, which was very nice.

I can't really say much more about the place in case my baby cousins are reading. Suffice it to say that Japanese men are weird guys, with weird tastes. I might add that it's always strange when you incidently see a student outside of the school - especially when she is topless.