U.S. Embassy warns Americans to avoid Roppongi bars due to drink-spiking increase
The U.S. Embassy in Japan on Tuesday issued an alert to the American community that Americans in Tokyo avoid frequenting Roppongi bars and clubs in Tokyo due to a significant increase in reported drink-spiking incidents.
The number of reports of U.S. citizens being drugged in bars has increased significantly in recent weeks. Typically, the victim unknowingly drinks a beverage that has been secretly mixed with a drug that renders the victim unconscious for several hours, during which time large sums of money are charged to the victim’s credit card or the card is stolen outright. Victims sometimes regain consciousness in the bar or club, while at other times the victim awakens on the street.
Because this type of crime is already widespread in Roppongi bars and is on the rise, the U.S. Embassy has recommended that members of the embassy community avoid frequenting drinking establishments in this area. American citizens may consider this recommendation as it applies to their own behavior.
According to the embassy, establishments in the area of Roppongi Intersection (Roppongi Dori and Gaienhigashi-dori) have had the highest level of reported incidents.
I bet this applies to the “girlie bars”. And I bet the stories have been made up as ways for girlie bar attending Americans to explain the large credit card bills to their wives.
I’ve been to a Japanese “girlie bar” once – it was a surreal experience.
Entrance fee gets you 2 hours of free drink (for you) and your own (clothed) girl. You sit and talk together.
On the stage there’s a stripper. The stripper changes every few minutes, each girl in the room getting her short burst of fame. This is the surreal bit. You see guys sitting talking to a girl, mentally undressing her, then part of the way through the conversation she’ll say “It’s my turn to go on stage”, go up on the stage, strip naked and do a pole dance, then she’ll return fully clothed and continue the conversation. Where’s the joy in that? Now that you’ve seen her naked and you’re not going to do anything sexual with her (unless you’re sad enough to be looking for a prostitute), all the fun has gone. You can’t mentally undress her anymore because you’ve seen the whole package, and you surely can’t be interested in the conversation?
Inside the girls were all Russian and east European, not a cute Asian in sight.
Before going into the bar, there was one thing all the guys agreed on: “I wont be buying the girls drinks!” they all proudly chanted.
My girl was a Russian who smoked. We talked for a few minutes and then she hinted that she was thirsty. I ignored it. We talked some more. The answers were so fake they could be on ebay. “How do you feel about talking with fat blokes that you’re not attracted to?” I asked. “It’s the guy’s personality that is important, not what he looks like.” Yeah right. Substitute personality for “wallet”.
Finally she came on strong: “Look, if you’re not going to buy me a drink, I need to leave. It’s bar rules.”
“Fair enough,” I said. And she left. I wouldn’t buy a drink for a shallow chain smoking Russian that I didn’t fancy in a normal bar – why would I do so here? And what’s the point anyway, you know that you’re going to see everything whether you buy a drink or not; you know that it isn’t going to lead to anything (for me anyway); and the conversation is painful.
And that was my experience. I sat there girl-less watching the other guys buy drink after drink for their girlies, none of whom were attractive (to me).
This bar was pretty run of the mill. According to one guy I know, there are so called “underwear” bars, where you and the girl strip down to your underwear. I seem to remember him saying that touching through underwear was allowed (probably highly encouraged) but no going inside the underwear or “shooting your load”.
In my opinion, it’s a pretty sad dude that goes to strip bars. And in Japan? Geeze, what’s the point of going to a Japanese strip bar for East European tottie? Just walk down the street in Shibuya and you’ll see 100s of girls that make much better eye candy, and that’s fully clothed.
The US has never been so unpopular, so derided, and so dismissed by the outside world as it has in the latter stages of George W Bush’s presidency.
For eight years the word that people around the world have used again and again to describe the approach of George W Bush’s presidency is “arrogance”.
Last summer a poll for the BBC World Service, conducted in 22 countries, indicated that people preferred Barack Obama to John McCain by four to one. Almost half said that if Senator Obama were elected, it would change their view of the United States completely.
I personally am looking at America differently today. Finally the “joke” of the world has left and the stuffiness of old men running the country has gone. It remains to be seen what difference Obama will make, but at least there is hope.
Here is one from the creep-ware department. Japanese tech reporter Nobuyuki Hayashi reports that Apple is equipping the new iPhone 3G models for the Japan market with a country-specific feature to stop local perverts from snapping so-called “up-skirt” or “down-blouse” photos of unsuspecting women.
Evidently, this form of “gotcha!” amateur photography is becoming an increasing problem in some public places in Japan, like on the escalators of Tokyo subway stops, Cult of Mac reports. As a result, camera phone manufacturers have been selling handsets that make a distinctive shutter sound to warn women (or, anyone nearby for that matter) that someone is taking a photo with their mobile. The first generation iPhones, however, had a silence mode that disabled this warning function. The new models, now on sale in Japan, however, “do make a sound if you take picture even when it is set to silent mode,” Hayashi writes.
In the UK and USA no sound is required because the iPhone doesn’t have a wide angle lens – the arses are just TOO GOD DAMN FAT to be captured with an iPhone.
But this is not new. In Korea and Japan all cell phones need to make a noise when taking photos. It has not been possible to up-skirt or down-blouse in Japan or Korea for a long time… not that you need to in Japan, the skirts are so damn short that no “upping” is required.
The iPhone is not available in Korea, so that is probably why it is country specific to Japan – the only country where the arses are small and sexy enough for people to WANT to photograph them secretly.
By the way, “hayashi” is “chopsticks” in Japan – so this man is called Mr Chopsticks. Lovely.
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Nikon D700
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Nikon D90
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Panasonic DMC-G1
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Panasonic DMC-GH1/G1HD (check availability)
