What is Marimokkori anyway?

hokkaido-mascot1

Japanese mascot characters

Ok so you might be thinking to yourself right now. What is this green character and why is there some type of huge ball thing where his package should be? Better yet, why is he reaching out to a child and trying to touch his hand? I can tell you right now, something like this in America would never fly. There would be protesting and riots in the streets if this were going on. Again however, this is the kind of thing the American mentality would never fully embrace or understand. Which, I understand. My first reaction was one of shock for the reason alone that Americans have been taught certain things about sexuality that traverses through our adults years as being “bad” or not “normal”. I am not saying there isn’t problems in Japan with sexuality or behaviors but from what have experienced, it’s just not the same. There is a lot of sexual connotations in Japanese culture which I have yet to fully understand though it seems a lot of it comes from the Edo period as well as other cultural values and ideas. Though don’t quote me on that.

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Soapland

soap-land-neon-dean-harte

What is Soapland?

While in Japan last year we hit up two large cities, Tokyo and Sapporo. While in these cities I brought back many fond memories of the land in which my wife was born. However I saw some other things that were quite a shock to me being an American. One of which was Soapland. I noticed a building in a section of Sapporo called Susukino which is where most of if not all the hostess bars are located in the city. I asked my wife what the particular place was and she told me about the deal with Soapland. Of course I had to look it up for myself later to find more about what it was. Basically Soapland is a generalized term for a type of establishment in Japan where a man would go to get soaped up by a lovely lady in the nude. From what I understand in reading some forums with mens descriptions and experiences, yes they are out there just do a Google search, is that you have a private room and bath with a woman and anything goes. Sounds like one hell of an experience however I get to have Soapland with my Japanese wife whenever I want for free, well almost free. Oh and the costs at these places seems to vary on the quality of girls and duration and I am guessing what ever else is agreed upon.

In Japan prostitution is illegal. However from what I understand that law is very vague in it’s wording. Basically if you go into an establishment be it a strip club, hostess bar, Soapland (I keep capitalizing the S for some reason) or whatever else and you have an agreement with the hostess for sexual intercourse in some manner, it’s completely acceptable and left go as that. As long as it’s behind closed doors, don’t ask and don’t tell. I can see the benefit in that on one side of it but it also has it’s drawbacks. In America of course prostitution is completely illegal and almost all of the states. Nevada is the only place where it is legal. However not all of the counties in Nevada have legal prostitution, however that works. I know I’ve seen some news in the past about ranches in certain parts of Nevada where this is the norm.

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The Fat Cat

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My big tabby cat

We have a cat. She’s a beautiful Tabby cat that we found and rescued from a local shelter. I am all about saving the planet all the time so why not start out small and save some cats? We live in the hills among the trees and there are cats all over the place. I don’t think I’ve seen a neighborhood with so many cats running around honestly. I’m surprised there are still other animals left that all that cats didn’t get around to killing yet. Oh now I remember there is an island in Japan that has nothing but cats. The place is called Tashirojima. Anyway I think when she was born, and into her young kitten weeks she must have had a problem finding food. Not exactly sure how she came into this world but it must have been hard. I can only imagine she must have had her mom run off or just something awful terrible happened. There’s never much of a back story when you recuse an animal. Ever since we got her she’s been a hungry kitty. I have an early video of her which I’ll dig up from YouTube. She’s now 4 and there is no sign of her stopping getting bigger. She begs for food all the time and sleeps the rest of the time. What a life right? Right now she’s around 14 pounds. I can hear her now in the background begging my wife for some late night snacks or something. Every night she comes to me when I am getting ready for bed for her last meal of the day. If it’s not enough, she’ll surely tell you about it. Oh what a life it must be to be a cat and get fat. I wish I was nothing but the fat cat. Come here kitty kitty I have some treats for ya.