Gaijin & Hookers Welcome!!

[Samurai_Jerk]

I've been doing some online apartment hunting the last couple of weeks. I found this written in one of the ads:

外国人・水商売可

[DrP]

Haha! That's great! But - there's alot more to this than you might think.. stay tuned...

[Samurai_Jerk]

You know, maybe I should follow up on that ad. The place is probably full of Filipina and Russian bar girls. Sounds like a sitcom in the making.

[Doctor Stop]

What about foreign hookers? Or is that pushing it, do you think?

[DrP]

Its basically related to the new apartment health craze going on. Shakedowns and such driving the gaijin (read chinese, korean, brazilians) out of their normal strolls and into the apartments. Alot like NE LA and Mission District in SF. Though - in Tokyo it seems that the yaks are so bloody stupid, they have to read the ads too to find out which apts are <ok>. Hey , that seat on the UN Security Console is expensive!

[Samurai_Jerk]

Its basically related to the new apartment health craze going on. Shakedowns and such driving the gaijin (read chinese, korean, brazilians) out of their normal strolls and into the apartments.

I think in this case it's more about desperation for tenants That one room has about 20 different ads with different contents. There's no key money, deposit, or guarantor required. Plus it's in East Central Tokyo, 40 sq meters, close to the station, and only 120,000 yen a month. Something must be wrong.

[Greji]

Something must be wrong.

Not at all SJ. They'll probably slip in a small clause to the lease that you'll have to take on four or five johns a night, but nothing out of the way!

[DrP]

Maybe someone died in it. That's a sure reason for allowing gaijin and fuzoku. We should investigate - like tomorrow. Or maybe the slit mouth woman lives there.

[JAPUNDIT]

Actually.... The ad says "gaijin and mizu-shobai."

[DrP]

Yeah --- and when does mizushobai NOT mean fuzoku??? Like in a galaxy far far away ,tabun ne?

[Samurai_Jerk]

Actually.... The ad says "gaijin and mizu-shobai."

Thanks for clearing that up

[Doctor Stop]

Actually.... The ad says "gaijin and mizu-shobai."

It says gaikokujin, not gaijin, so give them that.

Whether foreign members of the water trade are allowed would depend on what logical operator the "・" signifies in this case.

In my experience, most real estate ads lie. The good places advertised aren't and never were available for rent, and the advertised floor area of the apartments differ somewhat from the truth. It gets worse with low or no key money places. I've had the unavailability been explained as the ad being just a sample of what they might have. I recall a lawsuit on the floor area issue, but can't recall exactly what the outcome was. I seem to remember that the buyer or renter, I can't remember which, lost and the judgement was basically buyer beware.

The classic apartment ad I saw a few years ago said 外国人・ペット可.

[IkemenTommy]

[quote="Doctor Stop"]It says gaikokujin, not gaijin, so give them that.

Whether foreign members of the water trade are allowed would depend on what logical operator the "・]
Is that like when they say gaijins are OK.. but you still need to find your Hoshonin (guarantor - sp.) and a Hosho Kaisha, as in my case. I was so pissed at them for going through all that but oh well.. TIJ

[JAPUNDIT]

Yeah --- and when does mizushobai NOT mean fuzoku???

Well, quite often.

Fuzoku is a segment of mizushobai, which also includes businesses like restaurants, bars, clubs, and others. A bartender, waiter, doorman, cook, and others serving in non-prostitute capacities also are considered to be working in mizushobai

If the ad said something like 外国人・売春婦可, it would indeed have been as hilarious as your English title suggests. However, since gaikokujin (because of their odd ways) and people who work at nightspots (because of their odd hours) often are rejected as tenants in Japan, informing prospective clients of 外国人・水商売可 for this this particular location is pretty considerate, and, in the Japan context, actually makes the ad kind of ho-hum.

[Greji]

Well, quite often.

Fuzoku is a segment of mizushobai, which also includes businesses like restaurants, bars, clubs, and others. A bartender, waiter, doorman, cook, and others serving in non-prostitute capacities also are considered to be working in mizushobai

You pretty well right on. The name mizushobai stems from the old custom of giving the girls watered down drinks (if not just tea) at exorbitant prices and as you say, the word now can apply to almost anyone who works therein. However, where not considered the highest rung of the social ladder in businesses, it is about a peg higher on the social scale than fuzoku.

Fuzoku is reserved for those quaint shops within the mizushobai field where a guy can go to get his crank turned down for the appropriate (or in most cases, not so appropriate) compensation.

[Samurai_Jerk]

[kamome]

Wow, you seem like a barrel of laughs. All of the Japanese people in my office were laughing out loud when they saw it. They read it exactly the same way the rest of us on here did. I and most of the other people on here know what the ad literally says, so stop trying to teach us the finer point of the language.

Mr. Japundit has been dropping in to this forum since 2005 trying to bestow upon us FGs his pearls of infinite wisdom.

[FG Lurker]

Mr. Japundit has been dropping in to this forum since 2005 trying to bestow upon us FGs his pearls of infinite wisdom.

He sounds just like Chuck. Sock puppet maybe?

[omae mona]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I thought Japundit's post was informative and to the point. I'm confused about why people are taking offense.

[Adhesive]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I thought Japundit's post was informative and to the point. I'm confused about why people are taking offense.

Probably because he is off the mark? I showed it to my wife and she laughed, instantly taking it to mean that both gaijin and skanky snack hostess are welcome. The word has a very negative connotation, and is not typically posted in apartment listings. After looking it up in my e-jisho, the translation is a "woman who works in a bar or night club."

[Doctor Stop]

I'd check a better dictionary Adhesive, perhaps a J-J one. Mizushobai to me means the bar business or the underground casino business, anything similar that serves drinks and especially those that have a certain unsavoury feel about them. Of course snacks and soaplands also fit into that category for me. I'm thinking late night adult entertainment, but not necessarily that of a sexual nature.

That said, our differences in the interpretation of the word might be generational.

Why landlords exclude people working in this industry, I don't know, but it might have something to do with the unstable nature of the business and whether the tenants will be able to pay their rent on time every month. Some bars are highly popular for a while, then they close up. If they worked for a famous chain, I guess it appears to be more stable to landlords. I suppose that people working at night are potentially quieter tenants, because they are at work when others are trying to sleep, but as we know the rental system and landlord attitudes in this country could use "an adjustment".

If the landlord subscribes to the prostitute interpretation, yeah, they probably don't want their tenants' pinkyless pimps showing up in the middle of the night banging on the door, yelling out the Japanese equivalent of "Yo, bitch. Gimme my money."

I've seen many similar messages in apartment ads, more actually allowing mizushobai than foreigners, pets or pianos. Foreigners, pet owners, piano players and prostitutes should join arms and lobby government to pass laws outlawing all forms of tenant discrimination, as well as key money and the new tatami mat deposit scam for apartments that don't even have tatami, but I think that would have to wait until after democracy is established in Japan.

[kamome]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I thought Japundit's post was informative and to the point. I'm confused about why people are taking offense.

It's his tone. Condescending and maybe a bit patronizing. FGL is right, he sounds like Chuck. It's also part of a pattern if you look back at Japundit's posts. I also recall that Japundit had an affiliation with Mutantfrog, a site that at one time blatantly ripped off FG's material (but may have since improved in the originality department).

[Greji]

I'd check a better dictionary Adhesive, perhaps a J-J one. Mizushobai to me means the bar business or the underground casino business, anything similar that serves drinks and especially those that have a certain unsavoury feel about them.

I posted it before. It has it's roots in the old bar hooker at the elbow trade after WWII. The hostesses in the bars worked anywhere from 12-18 hour shifts in the joints that delt with the occupation forces. There is no way that they could begin to drink with all the customers for an entire shift. They would be pickled for good inside a week. They began this new phenomenom by drinking watered down drinks, which with the advent of a better economy and especially the Tokyo Olympics which brought tons of FGs into Japan other than the GIs. The bar owners found out they still could sustain this type of business (polite way to say "they could get away with it"). They had first thought only the GIs were that gullible, but soon found they could skin anybody.

It then wasn't long till the clip joints were giving the hooks straight tea in a Zombie class for a 1,000 yen or more, a pop. Every heard of the term "back doored"?

The girl's drinks became widely known as Tachikawa Tea owing to the main US base at Tachikawa. It also became more widely know with the advent of Vietnam, where some crafty innovative slug re-named it Saigon Tea.
Mizu equals water and Shobai equals business. It's that simple.

I'm sure the meaning has branched to wider and more educational functions, but when the hookers of old used to sit down beside you and say "Hey GI I love you, no fucking shit! You buy me drink now?" She would suggestively pump your crank a couple of times and you were required to immediately respond by pouring numerous jolts of colored Evian down her muzzle to identify her as one of the oriental's finest. When your poke got bare and she could see the bottom of the glass, she was then required to follow the next step in the Hookers' Operational Manual, which was to insert tongue A into ear B and whisper "wait for me outside. I can't be seen leaving with anyone!". She would then promise a night that would make roto-rotor green with jealousy. Generally speaking, that was the last time you ever saw her again. As soon as you hit the front door, she hit the back.

One could normally get a hint at some of the more useful applications of the term "mizushobai" from such experiences.

There may even be some skeletons outside the front doors of a few of those old gin mills that CSI could probably identify as chumps waiting for their hook to show!

I have been told by some (allegedly) scholarly J-friends that it was a term coined by Occupation troops and picked up by the Japanese to identify the trade. The reason was no history of hookers schilling or mooching drinks in Japanese nightlife existed as a job prior to that time and so the Japanese really did not have a slang term for it. Don't know if this is totally true, but it makes sense.

[Captain Japan]

Probably because he is off the mark? I showed it to my wife and she laughed, instantly taking it to mean that both gaijin and skanky snack hostess are welcome. The word has a very negative connotation, and is not typically posted in apartment listings. After looking it up in my e-jisho, the translation is a "woman who works in a bar or night club."

Printing such information is not unusual. Creators Company Connection routinely prints real estate ads in their publications that mention that fuzoku, mizushobai, one-armed dwarfs, whatever are allowed in the various properties. I think the basis is that such people, like foreigners, have dubious reputations.

I'm with Omae Mona on this one; I think Japundit gave helpful information.

[Charles]

I'd check a better dictionary Adhesive, perhaps a J-J one. Mizushobai to me means the bar business or the underground casino business, anything similar that serves drinks and especially those that have a certain unsavoury feel about them.

Yes, I once read an essay by Murakami Haruki where he explained how he had a difficult time renting an apartment in Tokyo because he ran a jazz club, and they wouldn't rent to him because he was in the mizushobai. Unfortunately, he then proceeded to use this as a justification for discrimination against gaijin, he said that if it was customary to discriminate against nihonjin, then it must similarly be OK to discriminate against gaijin. That's when I decided Murakami had lost his mind.

[JAPUNDIT]

After looking it up in my e-jisho, the translation is a "woman who works in a bar or night club."

Oh? It didn't say "hooker"? How then was I off the mark?

[JAPUNDIT]

It's his tone. Condescending and maybe a bit patronizing.

And since you are the sole judge of a person's "tone," I should strive to find a way to write that is more pleasing to you? What do you suggest? Less accuracy and more vulgarity? Perhaps a bit of poor grammar might be more to your liking?

I also recall that Japundit had an affiliation with Mutantfrog

This is either another error or a lie. Neither I nor my site have ever had any affiliation or any other relationship with Mutantfrog.

[Charles]

This is either another error or a lie. Neither I nor my site have ever had any affiliation or any other relationship with Mutantfrog.

Maybe you should admit your hidden relationship with FG. Many stories on your site appeared here first. You use FG as a free source of content, without attribution.

[omae mona]

Maybe you should admit your hidden relationship with FG. Many stories on your site appeared here first. You use FG as a free source of content, without attribution.

As I've increased my use of RSS feed aggregators over the last year, I've noticed that FG is very rarely the "breaking news" site. Somebody else usually has interesting/funny stories first (except for posts from Mulboyne).

Now that doesn't mean Japundit wasn't grabbing stuff from FG. But it seems possible that both sites got the info from the same 3rd web site, with both authors not attributing the source. I don't read Japundit so I haven't seen any of the cases Charles is referring to, though. I also wonder: if there is a newspaper article and somebody posts about it on FG, is it proper etiquette for other sites to credit FG for "finding" the article? Or is it enough to credit the original article's source?

For what it's worth, I just looked at Japundit's page for the first time, and right in the middle of it is a story that credits "Mulboyne at FG".

[hundefar]

I keep checking this thread but not a single soul has posted any pics of hookers. WTF is up with that?