I remember when I first touched down in Japan, I was armed with a phrase book, a back pack and a serious lack of preparation. I found my self wandering around Tokyo, I was tired and confused and it was getting late. "Time to find a place to pull up for the night" I thought to myself. So I whipped out my phrase book, found the section on accommodation and memorized three strange symbols which meant hotel ホテル. About 30 minutes later my search was rewarded, there right in front of me in flashing neon was the japanese symbols for hotel! I went inside, found a desk with dark glass that came down so far that it only allowed for the exchange of money and said "Room Kudasai" (Room please). This was to be my first introduction to a long standing relationship with the Japanese Love Hotel! This was around 10 years ago mind you and now 90% of hotels advertise with HOTEL in english!
Sure, Zen gardens, sushi and the Sony Walkman are great, but the greatest Japanese invention of all time has to be the love hotel. In the concrete wasteland of the modern Japanese city, the love hotel stands out as a refreshingly off-the-wall escape from conformity, a monument to hedonism, and a libertine's paradise. It's also a godsend when you're tired of taking your girlfriend back to your gaijin apartment with its half-inch plywood walls and nosy neighbours. Nearly every foreigner in Japan has a love hotel story to tell and number of Japanese people who were conceived in one must be enormous.
The love hotel is changing though, and the news isn't all good. They've gone upscale, lost some of their sleazy associations and the decors have become more tasteful but the bad news is that in an effort to clean up their image, they got rid of a lot of the exciting theme rooms. Although they still exist, its getting harder and harder to find places with bumper cars and disco lights.
The image of love hotels has changed so much that, according to Mitsuru Sugaoka, the friendly clerk from Gang Snowman who gave us a tour, a lot of times it’s the woman who invites the man to the hotel. Fashion hotels are getting written up in magazines like Kansai Weekly, and Date Pia, respectable publications that cater to young office workers, especially women. Visit a Kinokuniya and you will see a selection of “Fashion Hotel” and “Boutique Hotel” guidebooks obviously designed to appeal to the sensibilities of the Japanese female. The highly popular “Love Hotel Lovers” website (
http://www2g.biglobe.ne.jp/~miyu/lhl/ in Japanese only) is a homepage that “women can access from their office without having to be embarrassed”. Even in the men’s magazines about love hotels, hotel listings are categorized by whether they will appeal to OL’s, female college students or high school girls. We were repeatedly told that people had stopped pulling their hats down over their head or staring at the ground when they walked into the lobby.
A lot of the gaudy designs, ceiling mirrors, and cheesy cupid paintings that made a visit to a love hotel so memorable have also disappeared since Japan has introduced a “New Public Morals Act” intended to regulate love hotels and the sex trade. Hotels which have “facilities not required for the basic purposes of guest lodging” are now categorized as “sex-related businesses” and can only operate in specially designated red light districts such as Shinjuku’s Kabuki-cho or the Susukino area of Sapporo. For hotels in the suburbs, that generally means no more revolving beds, vibrating chairs, or mirrors larger than one square meter. The hotels have kept up their gaudy facades, but except for the red light districts, the insides are much plainer now. The “New Public Morals Act” came about in large part because the Japanese government was embarrassed by the amount of foreign media coverage that Japan’s sex trade and child pornography were receiving so they cracked down on both. Unfortunately, they didn’t realise we liked the love hotels.
People who visited a love hotel just five years ago will be surprised how different the experience of today is. Karaoke, DVD libraries that are not just porn (but mostly porn), video game consoles and big screen TV’s are now standard equipment. The word ‘fukeiki’ (recession) was on the lips of every love hotel manager that we visited while writing this story, and they are all trying to outdo each other in terms of providing services and free gifts to the customers. Gang Snowman in Minami Osaka serves complimentary soft ice cream cones to every guest and if you stay the night at nearby Belles Des Belles, you’ll get a free breakfast the next day. Many hotels have slot machines and tanning beds, and other hotels give out Hello Kitty bedside clocks or cute pajamas as souvenirs to repeat customers. Bathrooms are fully stocked with a selection of makeup and toiletries that far surpasses what you’ll find in a regular hotel, and there are even a small number of love hotels that take reservations now. Most hotels also have member’s cards that let frequent users get a discount
Love hotels have also become much cleaner. The obaasan (elderly lady) we saw cleaning the spanking horse in one hotel’s S&M room used enough disinfectant and elbow grease to make a mama-chari (push bike) from the bottom of the Dotonbori River shine.
If you’ve never been to a love hotel before, there are three prices. The first is for a “rest”. In Osaka, the ‘rest’ price is usually for one hour. In Tokyo, it’s usually for two or three. (Obviously, the sexual stamina of Osakans is inferior to that of Tokyoites). The more expensive price is for an overnight “stay”. Unfortunately, you can’t usually check in until nine or ten pm. If you want to check in before that, you will have to pay for an extension, usually 1000-2000 yen per half-hour, which can really add up. The third price is “Service Time” or “Free Time”. Service time is offered during the day, and the price of a rest is deeply discounted. Free time is a sort of “Sex hoo dai” (All you can screw) where you can stay as long as you want for a fixed price. Your “staying power” will determine whether this is worth the price or not.
Love hotels always seem to end up costing more than you expect. There is usually a mysterious 10% ‘service charge’ and also 10% surcharges if you are staying on a Friday or Saturday night or national holiday as well as 5% sales tax. Count on the final price being about 25% more than what is listed on the room board if you are staying on a weekend and be careful to check whether you're paying by the hour or not. You can save a lot of money by getting a member’s card (just make sure you have a different one for each of your girlfriends or boyfriends) or by staying on weekdays or in the afternoon. If you pick up a magazine like Date Pia, it will have a lot of information and pictures of various hotels and they also offer a selection of discount coupons (usually about 10%).
There are still a few hotels where a grey, liver-spotted hand reaches out through the curtains to take your money when you enter, but most hotels have gone high-tech and have automated the payment system. After you choose your room at the display board in the lobby (just push the button of the room you want) you’ll be given a paper card with the room number on it. When you’re ready to leave, you put this card in the slot of the control panel near the door and push the “会計” (total) button. Your room charges will be automatically added up and you put your money into another slot in the panel. At hotels using this system, you are often locked into your room until you pay.
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