Mizu Shobai and the culture in Seattle?, possible setting and plot hooks Options

[Daddy's Litt...]

I was recently reading a study on Japanese sexual anthopology and realized this is a major part of the J-corp culture that has never appeared in the SR books but would provide settings and plot hooks.

Some of this stuff a Japan-o-phile might be familiar with but I will try to give a little more structure.

Japan's culture is very buttoned up. To prevent the whole society from popping a cork one day, there is accepted times of release, drunkeness that is forgotten the next day. You could call the boss a pig molesting goat and throw up on his armani suit but the next day, if you felt truly bad, you would just bow and say "It was the sake" and all would be forgiven. This is not something we could do in the west.

J-corp often require ridiculous amounts of unpaid over time. You are expected to do this because you are grateful for your job and want to express the desire to advance. To keep the workers happy, especially in white collar jobs the boss will often take workers out drinking as a group function. You are expected to go, to drink heavily and interact with coworkers. If someone sings kareoke, then you all take a turn. To do so is to insult everyonein the party. They go either to a bar, kareoke or Mizu Shobai. This last is the often misunderstood. The high point is the "hostess club." Done up to the nines as a place for men to meet and be entertained by attractive talented women this is NOT a brothel or a strip club. It is the modern development of the geisha.

The boss has a table and the corp have bottles already under their account that the party is served from and men relax in the company of co-workers. the rules of society are relaxed. the rules of the office are gone and it lacks the stress of 'home' where they are expected to be father/husband/provider. Conversations should not be about work, unless very brief, or home life. When all is said and done the boss signs the check and all the good little salery men roll out the door.

The hostess are to provide entertainment, flirt and keep the party going. They encourage the men to boast and flirt and joke and hope for a chance of sexual contact, but never come across. The prostitutes who do that are a lower class. if you want that you go to a different sort of place AFTER the hostess club. A club is noted by its location and the quality of its fixtures. The hostess should be attractive, intelligent, well read, up on current events. able to sing or play and intument and be subservient to the party. She can dress in anything from a kimono to a gown to tres chic depending on the club theme. Although you go to a club for the quality of the hostess she is not a part of the party anymore than the table or glassware or the room fixtures are.

In the world of AAA corps these places would be corp controlled and places might even vie for elegance and which one you could get into. All this would be in Japan, but in SR with major facilities of J corps in Seattle and other places outside of Nippon these might well translate over. In such a place corpers are more relaxed. They might let slip secrets or might be willing to meet contacts there. It is a place where indiscreet actions are forgiven or over looked.