Tokyo’s Kabuki-cho, The World’s Most Confusing Red-Light District

 

No, I know you wouldn’t really go all the way.  I wouldn’t either, and many have asked.  I’m glad we’re straight about that.  Regardless, you should indeed at least walk through the famous (and mostly safe) red light districts in places like Amsterdam, Bangkok, and Tokyo.  You should walk through there because you’re traveling to see the world and that is damn sure part of the world.  You should see what’s going on here.  You don’t have to partake.  You should also walk through because many “red light districts” are really that in quotes, as it’s difficult to tell exactly what’s going on there.

Kabuki-cho is a neighborhood in the north part of Tokyo’s Shinjuku district, an area destroyed during WWII and rebuilt to be a theater district, named after an idea that Kabuki theater would be promoted here (it never happened).  It’s near Piss Alley, another haunt of mine.  Kabuki-cho (or Kabukicho) is often described as a red-light district and I guess it is, but it resembles famous ones like Amsterdam almost not at all.  Kabuki-cho is better described as an entertainment district, with the options often skewing towards, but not always reaching, the base instincts.

 

 

 

 

Shinjuku is where I stay when in Tokyo.  It’s not a neighborhood having an internationally-recognized name, but it’s got it all, including several great drinking spots like Piss Alley and Golden Gai, lots of shopping, and any restaurant you want.  The airport express train stops at the massive Shinjuku station, and business hotels surround it.  “Business hotels” here don’t mean seven-pillow beds and the executive lounge stuff; it means cheap (for Tokyo) and soulless places that a harried mid-level salaryman can crash in before attending the meeting that next day, one that won’t cost the company (or you, the traveler) much money.  I crashed at the Hotel Sunroute Shinjuku, and all that can be said for it is that you get a very small, generic room with only the stuff you need, but the location rocks.

Kabuki-cho is to the north, perhaps ten minutes from the train station/subway stop.  Walk along until you see a lit, red archway, and go through.  Here’s where you should take some photos.  This is one image of Tokyo everyone images, not the grimy Blade Runner type, but more like Ginza, a crowded street with massive amounts of lit signs, running high up the buildings and stretching on and on.  Check it:

 

 

I passed dozens of hostess (or host) bars, lounges where you just drink and pay dearly for the company of a cute drinking companion, male or female.  They just sit with you and be your temporary date for a bit.  Many bars had large signs outside with the girls’ or guys’ faces in a montage.  The girls always looked like beauty queens dressed up for a cocktail party; the guys looked like Rod Steward back in the 70s, or like some bad 90s boy-band.  The guys always had long hair with many of them dyed, were tall and thin, and dressed like David Cassidy in his prime.  They were all in their low to mid-twenties, and always seemed to be pouting.  I didn’t see any places offering older, distinguished gentlemen, nor any suave James Bond types.

 

 

Choose your girl

 

They’re not just on signs.  I saw many of the hosts, the guys, the boy-band types, walking through the streets, going to or from work.  I’ve heard that many of them take their earnings and go blow it on the girls from the hostess bars.

Another phenomenon here: the “girl’s bar”, which apparently is different from a hostess club but certainly related, in the strange concept that one should pay for the mere privilege of being in a woman’s company, even when she’s just behind the bar and no other services are offered.  I ducked into one to take a look, upon an offer from a female tout (they often are female for a girl’s bar) standing outside, encouraging me in.  She put me in a tiny elevator for the second floor and them ran up the steps so as to meet me when the elevator arrived, almost making me think she was a different girl.  Inside, I found three or four girls behind the bar and four or five Japanese men sitting in front of the bar on stools.  In other words, it looked like a normal bar.  But the woman tout explained to me that it was ¥5000 charge ($50 US) for an hour or two, plus drinks.  One could go to a bar at home and talk to bartenders for free, but I suppose these three women would pay you more attention.  I would find it rather hard to pay just to talk to a girl.  You’d probably have to buy them drinks as well.  Perhaps I should try it once before dismissing it, but I didn’t.

 

 

These cardboard cut-out massage girls are waiting for you

 

Massage places, spas, were everywhere, many of them purporting to be Thai style.  Several signs looked very legit, listing spa-like services that most men probably wouldn’t go for.  Some just had a photo of a glamorous woman, some left little doubt what’s going on, and a few specified “massage only” under a photo of a sexy girl, giving out mixed signals.  They would have names like “Relaxation Lounge” and have four girls’ photos there.  A few were open 24H, and some specifically said that foreigners are welcome, a rare phrase here.  The prices were mostly along the dollar-a-minute rule, so an hour massage was ¥6000 ($60 USD).

Kabuki-cho is home to the Robot Restaurant, one of the most fabulous shows in Tokyo.  The food there is dismissible, but that’s not at all the reason people go.  While you eat, giant robots and other creatures perform a show straight out of some anime.  There are girls, lots of them, dancing around.  They are cute, they are in front of you, and they are not wearing very much clothing.  I cannot describe how over-the-top this performance is.

 

 

 

One of the many acts you’ll see in the Robot Restaurant

 

Many DVD places were scattered about, something I don’t get.  I don’t know if you just go to watch, or if something else happens.  Perhaps you have access to lots of titles and it’s worth it.  I suspect people without places of their own (or who don’t want to be seen there) use it as a date place, where they can be alone in the dark.

Only a few places advertised themselves outright as strip clubs, and they had no touts outside.  I’ve been told that Japanese don’t go for the Western type strip clubs, as they’re too vanilla.  They need a theme, a fantasy to go along with it.

There were restaurants and such, but few of what were identifiable as straight-out bars.  Lots of places advertising themselves as “Club Something”, usually on the upper floors, and I have no clue what goes on there.  Perhaps a Western-style watering hole is also too vanilla.  One fantasy place I saw was unmistakable, advertising a large depiction of a guy looking at a subway car full of skirted schoolgirls, one of whom was flicking her skirt up.  Another establishment had drawings detailing how their system works, labeled as steps.  Step 1 was choosing a girl from a lineup.  Steps 2 and 3 involved talking to her and doing something else (not sure), dancing or drinking perhaps.  Step 4 showed the two of them walking down the street together.  A take-out service?

For perhaps half the places I saw, I had no idea what they were.  Japan is often like that; you spend much of your time not understanding the place.  What to make of an aquarium-like painting below a sign, with fish swimming through seaweed, below it advertising 60 something and 200 something, then below that two pictures of bikini girls?  Another sign has a red heart with writing in it, 40 minutes for ¥10000 ($100), on the second floor.  It can’t be good.

 

 

 

Your average street in Kabuki-cho, and your average choices

 

The worst was the Africans.  They act as touts here, roaming the streets, speaking excellent English, and approaching any tourist.  “Tell me what you want.  I can help you,” they will say, glamming on to you.  I dreaded those guys, and in two nights walking around I got to know several of them.  Oh, there’s John from Cape Town, or James from Ghana.  Most were Nigerians, and I impressed several of them by having been to Lagos.  “Tough town,” I would declare, and they would agree.  I got rid of all but a couple of them quickly.  One thing you learn from traveling is to not do any hesitation or vague answer to wankers like this.  Don’t tell them “maybe”, or even pretend to consider.  I tell them no, and they believe it.  But like street hustlers everywhere, they’ll remember your name and every detail about you, should you meet again.

Again, this is not a dangerous, or even principally seedy, destination.  Much of it is probably just places to hang.  Solo travelers, male and female, can and do walk through here at all hours with no problems whatsoever.  It is not, however, a trendy area.  The youngsters and hipsters don’t go here, and with the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, which brought crackdowns on nightlife all over the city, its future will be a bit dimmer.  Gods know what the Covid pandemic did to it.

Like many places encountered while traveling, you’re likely to leaving thinking, “That was certainly different.  But I don’t quite understand it.”

 

 

Location:  Just northeast of the Shinjuku train station,  Look for the red-lit arch.

Hours:  Always open, but better after dark.

Prices:  Expensive.  Oh, yeah.  If you do anything, ask the price, but really, you’ll never know what the bill will be until the end, and it might be quite the surprise.  Bring cash, not cards.

If you’re interested in Tokyo, see how my re-visits, years later, to Piss Alley and Golden Gai made me think about the effects of tourism and travel bloggers.  Also go to the Robot Restaurant and hit some standing bars.