A News Escort For Tokyo Escorts.

That is, until they moved on to unsettling art of their own. The final two rooms of “Edo Pop” consists of contemporary art that directly or indirectly references these Japanese woodblock prints. An exhibit like this is rather overwhelming, and so one must choose where one wishes to focus one’s attention; I chose the contemporary pieces. There is, as an example, a series of images by Yoshitomo Nara, who produces cartoonish, childlike images of big-eyed waif and smiling white dogs; he has a series of images here that seem to slyly parody ukuyo-e prints — his Mt. Fuji, for example, has a child skiing down it. He also offers a picture of a courtesan with a breast exposed, and she reveals all sorts of piercings. She carries a towel that reads “No fun,” which the curators opine might be a commentary on prostitution. I sincerely doubt it. Nara is at least as much influenced by punk rock as he is by anything else, and “No Fun” is the name of a Stooges song that just about every British punk band covered.

See the full article from “MinnPost.com (blog)”

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Tokyo man busted for employing teen in hooker service, customer list 1,500
TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police arrested three men responsible for a prostitution service after a teenage girl was revealed to be an employee, a violation of child welfare statutes, reports the Sankei Shimbun (Nov. 9).
Atsuo Yoshinari, 27, a resident of Nishi Shinjuku, Tokyo, and two others were taken into custody by officers from the youth affairs department for employing a 17-year-old girl to supply sexual services to a 41-year-old office worker in a hotel in Kita Ward in June.
According to police, between September and October last year, Yoshinori recruited more than 1,500 men via encounter Web sites to be customers for women under the age of 25. The rates were set at 20,000 yen per session. Revenues totaled 30 million yen.

See the full article from “The Tokyo Reporter”

The first is Paul Church, who documents his daily life in his adopted home city of Tokyo. The 32-year-old moved to Japan eight years ago to join a Senshusei course, the notoriously tough 11-month aikido martial arts programme, originally created to train Tokyo riot police. Church is clearly a man who throws himself into things with admirable dedication; when he graduated from the aikido course he received an award for never missing a day through sickness or injury – participants train almost every day for eight hours, and many drop out after only a few days. He still lives in Tokyo, working as a scientific copy editor and transcriber by day, but in his spare time he channels his energies into his photo journal.
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Most of his images are black and white, an interesting choice in a city that is usually portrayed lit up in vibrant, multicoloured neon. He cites various famous photographers as inspiration, from the street photography of Bruce Gilden, known for his work in …

See the full article from “The Guardian”

It’s all about location, location, location, as they say in real estate. Protests, too. There were more obvious places for Tokyo’s Occupy Wall Street protest to converge last Saturday than the nightlife district of Roppongi. It could have begun in Nihonbashi, home to the Tokyo Stock Exchange; Nagatacho, Japan’s Capitol Hill; or Ueno, where droves of Tokyo’s homeless congregate.
Instead, activists chose the city’s hedonistic melting pot of hipsters, strippers, gangsters, expatriates and bankers. Not just any bankers – Goldman Sachs ones who work in the swanky Roppongi Hills complex. Amid the hundreds of activists, I saw signs saying ”No Greed”, ”Taxiderm the Rich” and my favourite, held by a 20-something woman: ”Stop Vampire Squids”.
It was a reference to Goldman Sachs, which was labelled a ”great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity” in a 2009 article in Rolling Stone magazine. For better or worse, Asians see Goldman Sachs both as the gold standard of investment banks and a byword for how incestuous ties between banks and government concentrate wealth in the hands of a few.

See the full article from “WA today”

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Tokyo hostess club busted for employing high school girls
TOKYO (TR) – The manager and another employee at a Tokyo hostess club were among those arrested for employing minors, reports the Sankei Shimbun (Oct. 25).
Officers from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police took manager Koji Nakakarumai, 31, staff member Ichiro Goto, 28, and two others into custody for employing high school girls at hostess club Apricot in Sumida Ward in violation of the adult-entertainment law.
Nakakarumai and Goto have denied the allegations, while the two others have admitted involvement.
According to officers familiar with the investigation, the club employed 11 girls aged 16 or 17 with three on the premises at any given time during operating hours. The club typically handled between 30 and 50 customers and since April of this year had collected 50 million yen in revenue.

See the full article from “The Tokyo Reporter”

It’s all about location, location, location, as they say in real estate. Protests, too. There were more obvious places for Tokyo’s Occupy Wall Street protest to converge last Saturday than the nightlife district of Roppongi. It could have begun in Nihonbashi, home to the Tokyo Stock Exchange; Nagatacho, Japan’s Capitol Hill; or Ueno, where droves of Tokyo’s homeless congregate.
Instead, activists chose the city’s hedonistic melting pot of hipsters, strippers, gangsters, expatriates and bankers. Not just any bankers – Goldman Sachs ones who work in the swanky Roppongi Hills complex. Amid the hundreds of activists, I saw signs saying ”No Greed”, ”Taxiderm the Rich” and my favourite, held by a 20-something woman: ”Stop Vampire Squids”.
It was a reference to Goldman Sachs, which was labelled a ”great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity” in a 2009 article in Rolling Stone magazine. For better or worse, Asians see Goldman Sachs both as the gold standard of investment banks and a byword for how incestuous ties between banks and government concentrate wealth in the hands of a few.

See the full article from “The Age”

Fresh DNA tests conducted in connection with the 1997 slaying of a 39-year-old Tokyo Electric Power Co. employee offer further evidence exonerating the Nepalese man serving life in prison for her death, his counsel said.
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The new tests, conducted by the Tokyo High Public Prosecutor’s Office, offer further evidence that the victim had been in contact with another man at the time of the crime, they said.
Similar evidence was presented at Mainali’s original trial, but the possibility the victim could have been with another man at the time of her slaying was rejected, even though she was allegedly moonlighting as a prostitute.
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The Tokyo District Court acquitted Mainali of robbery-murder charges in April 2004, citing a lack of evidence and the possibility that a third party could have been at the murder site. It also reportedly ruled that the sperm found in the condom was too old to have been left on the day of the slaying.

See the full article from “The Japan Times”

It’s all about location, location, location, as they say in real estate. Protests, too. There were more obvious places for Tokyo’s Occupy Wall Street protest to converge last Saturday than the nightlife district of Roppongi. It could have begun in Nihonbashi, home to the Tokyo Stock Exchange; Nagatacho, Japan’s Capitol Hill; or Ueno, where droves of Tokyo’s homeless congregate.
Instead, activists chose the city’s hedonistic melting pot of hipsters, strippers, gangsters, expatriates and bankers. Not just any bankers – Goldman Sachs ones who work in the swanky Roppongi Hills complex. Amid the hundreds of activists, I saw signs saying ”No Greed”, ”Taxiderm the Rich” and my favourite, held by a 20-something woman: ”Stop Vampire Squids”.
It was a reference to Goldman Sachs, which was labelled a ”great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity” in a 2009 article in Rolling Stone magazine. For better or worse, Asians see Goldman Sachs both as the gold standard of investment banks and a byword for how incestuous ties between banks and government concentrate wealth in the hands of a few.

See the full article from “Sydney Morning Herald”

Oct. 19 (Bloomberg) — It’s all about location, location, location, as they say in real estate. Protests, too.
There were more obvious places for Tokyo’s Occupy Wall Street protest to converge on Saturday than the nightlife district of Roppongi. It could have begun in Nihonbashi, home to the Tokyo Stock Exchange; Nagatacho, Japan’s Capitol Hill; or Ueno, where droves of Tokyo’s homeless congregate.
Instead, activists chose the city’s hedonistic melting pot of hipsters, strippers, gangsters, expatriates and bankers. Not just any bankers — Goldman Sachs ones who work in the swanky Roppongi Hills complex. Amid the hundreds of activists, I saw signs saying “No Greed,” “Taxiderm the Rich” and my favorite, held by a 20-something woman: “Stop Vampire Squids.”
It was a reference to Goldman Sachs Group Inc., which was labeled a “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity” in a 2009 article in Rolling Stone magazine. For better or worse, Asians see Goldman Sachs both as the gold standard of investment banks and a byword for how incestuous ties between banks and government concentrate wealth in the hands of a few.

See the full article from “San Francisco Chronicle”

There were more obvious places for Tokyo’s Occupy Wall Street protest to converge on Saturday than the nightlife district of Roppongi. It could have begun in Nihonbashi, home to the Tokyo Stock Exchange; Nagatacho, Japan’s Capitol Hill; or Ueno, where droves of Tokyo’s homeless congregate.
Instead, activists chose the city’s hedonistic melting pot of hipsters, strippers, gangsters, expatriates and bankers. Not just any bankers — Goldman Sachs ones who work in the swanky Roppongi Hills complex. Amid the hundreds of activists, I saw signs saying “No Greed,” “Taxiderm the Rich” and my favorite, held by a 20-something woman: “Stop Vampire Squids.”
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In Japan, the media portrayed Saturday’s demonstrations as anti-nuclear in nature. With the Fukushima plant still leaking radiation and Tokyo Electric Power Co. as incompetent as ever, anti-nuke protesters were in the mix. Yet the real story was the so-called 99 percent calling for more equality.
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To contact the writer of this article: William Pesek in Tokyo at wpesek@bloomberg.net

See the full article from “BusinessWeek”