Ah, April. The glorious month of the cherry blossom (depending on where you are in Japan) and new starts, because both the academic and fiscal years begin. During April, youngsters up and down the land enter school or college. It is also the time of year when the fresh intake of corporate hires kick off their careers at the company they chose. These people are typically in their early twenties and straight out of college. Many corporations hold an entrance ceremony of some sorts to welcome the newbies, who sit in formal suits looking forward to becoming corporate drones. In the adult ...

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Police in Tokyo have arrested a 40-year-old man for employing a 17-year-old high school student. Takeshi Shikano runs a sex industry business in Ikebukuro. He has been arrested on suspicion of violating the child welfare law for employing the high schooler and either making her or allowing her to engage in sex work. Media reports about the arrest do not specify what kind of sex work, which took place in a rented room in the neighborhood in November last year. The police, though, termed it JK rifure -- or high female high school student reflexology -- service, where cuddles and so on are ...

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In March, we wrote about the former Self-Defense Force nurse and sex worker running for election for a local assembly in Tokyo this month. Hasumin Yoshikawa has promised to debut in porn after the poll, whether she wins a seat or not. Well, her party, the anti-NHK fringe right-wing populist Politician Girls 48 Party (aka Political Party Girls 48), has become mired in in-fighting among its leadership and accusations about misappropriate use of party funds, but Yoshikawa continues to campaign in Setagaya. In fact, we even received one of her pamphlets through our letterbox at the Tokyo ...

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The media narratives about Japan typically conform to a handful of familiar tropes: Japan is a sexless, childless hellscape, or Japan is a kinky, weird land of bountiful sexual fetishes. Of course, neither is true. Japan is just Japan, with all shades and colors. But it is a fact that the population is declining and people are having fewer children. The number of babies born in Japan dropped below 800,000 last year, the first time this has happened since records began in 1899. The reasons for this are manifold -- and we think they are primarily economic -- don't rush to assume it's because ...

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Easter doesn't have much name recognition in Japan -- certainly compared to other Western holidays like Christmas and Halloween -- but that hasn't stopped our friends at Kanojo Toys from holding a generous sale over the period. You can get 20% off any adult toy in-store during the sale. Use the promo code EGG at the online checkout. The campaign started earlier this week and runs through April 11, which should give you plenty of time to find something you like in between munching on those Easter eggs or chasing after Easter bunnies. Talking of bunnies, we are particularly smitten with ...

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One of the most popular members of NMB48, Yuzuha Hongo made the surprise announcement on April 4 that she would be graduating the Osaka group. Alongside her singing, Hongo pursues a burgeoning career in gravure (as reported before), having released her first photo book from Kodansha in 2022. A second photo book is set for release at the end of May, shortly before she will graduate from NMB48. Known as Yuzu to her fans, the idol is still just 20 years old and seems very young to graduate (though she joined way back in 2015, so has devoted eight years of her life to the Namba-based group). ...

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Japanese television is a strange place: a world of shoddily acted dramas and asinine variety shows, where the aim seems to be seeing how many minor celebrities can be squeezed into a single broadcast, and where everything seems to come down to food and guests extolling how delicious a dish is. And then there are the shows about breasts. Tamori Club, the late-night TV Asahi show whose decades-long run recently ended, aired an episode in March in which the male guests ogled a woman naked from the waist up except for two carefully positioned leaves over her breasts. Of course, they tried to ...

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Ayame Misaki is one of those Japanese models and actresses who seem to have been a part of our life forever. We were a little surprised to learn that she is still only 33, but if you make your debut at the young age of 16, you can have a long career before your thirties. The Kobe native carved out a gravure career in the late 2000s as a "Heisei-born F-cup" beauty. We first wrote about her on these digital pages back in 2012, when she was our "idol of the week." In 2013, she did a nude sex scene in the film Judas that showed off her beautiful breasts. Her acting career was mostly roles in ...

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One of the most sensational stories that has gripped the Japanese media over the past few weeks has involved the arrests and deportations in the Philippines of several young Japanese citizens, who were allegedly part of the "Luffy group" responsible robbery and fraud since 2021 (including from behind bars). The name of the gang is a reference to the manga and anime franchise One Piece. One of the most recently detained citizens was 25-year-old Hitomi Kumai. Japanese police issued a warrant for her arrest last September on fraud charges. She is accused of making phone calls tricking people ...

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One of the lesser-known effects of the coronavirus pandemic (or at least, the recent economic situation caused by multiple factors) is that it has led to an influx of Japanese sex workers in Kabukicho going abroad to earn better money. According to recent articles in the magazine Friday (March 31 and April 7 issues), the United States used to be a popular destination among Japanese prostitutes, but increased checks at immigration control -- including apparently checking smartphone pics to see if they contain lingerie-clad selfies -- have prompted sex workers to seek out alternative ...

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