Sex & Nightlife
Soaplands Explained: Are They Legal, and Can Foreigners Actually Go?
Soaplands are one of Japan's most euphemistic open secrets: “special bathhouses” where sex is sold under a legal fiction the country has…
Articles by Jay Allen
1,164 articles
Sex & Nightlife
Insider
The World Gives Japan’s Konbini Five Stars. Why Japan Only Gives Them Three
Why konbini are especially low rated plus the highest-rated chain in Japan (it's not who you think).
Society
“The Meal-Skipping Crowd”: Cute Japanese Gen Z Slang, or a Sign of Japan’s Poverty?
Are young people skipping meals because they don't want to eat? Or are they just too broke? The data paints a complex…
Sex & Nightlife
Hihōkan: Japan’s Vanishing Roadside Sex Museums, and the Tokyo Bar Keeping Them Alive
Learn more about the hihōkan, the erotic museums where drunken salarymen used to while away their time before dinner.
Insider
Takaichi Wants Japan to “Coexist” With Foreigners. Japan’s Hard Right HATES Her for It
Takaichi Sanae's pledge for "coexistence" with Japan's immigrant population has Japan's online right on the warpath.
Travel
A “Carried Water” Onsen in Tokyo Offers Private Mixed Bathing (Tattoos Welcome)
Want a private, mixed onsen experience in the heart of Tokyo that won't sweat your tattoos? Welcome to KUDOCHI.
Japanese Language
Ikezu-Ishi: Are Kyoto’s “Rude Rocks” an Insult, or a Kindness?
Some domestic tourists point to one local custom, the "rude rock," as proof of Kyoto spite. But it isn't even specific to…
Japanese Language
How Higashino Keigo Improved My Japanese
In the wake of the beloved author's death, our author shares how Higashino Keigo's accessible writing made his own Japanese better.