Manager has had enough of people using the sento for casual hookups.

In Japan, public bathhouses, known as “sento“, are used by people of all ages, from very young children, accompanied by a parent, to the elderly. While some people simply like the ease and convenience of using a public bathhouse, which can save on water bills and cleaning at home, others like to visit the sento for the purported health benefits of their waters, which are sometimes sourced from natural hot springs, while others have no choice but to use the local bathhouse, given that some apartments in Japan don’t come with baths or showers.

▼ Sento often include both indoor and outdoor bathing areas.

Then there are others who appear to confuse the bathhouse as a place for sexual activity, which is not its intended purpose. That’s what’s been happening at one particular sento in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward, where two men were caught engaging in sexual acts last November. The two men, both in their thirties, were subsequently charged with public obscenity and admitted to the charges, saying they were aware that they would be causing trouble for the establishment, due to signage on the premises, but they “succumbed to temptation”.

The men say they had no previous acquaintance with each other, and met at the public bath on the day of the incident. The sexual activity was said to have taken course over about 20 minutes in the open-air bathing area, while the door to the area was unlocked and about 15 guests were using the inside baths.

▼ This TBS News report shows the facility where the incident took place.

The manager says he has reported around 40 such incidents of sexual …continue reading

    

Conductor flips the bird on snowy night in Tokyo.

Japanese companies pride themselves on customer service, and that attitude carries over to public transportation providers too. Japan’s largest rail provider, Japan Railways Group (also known as JR) is particularly committed to presenting an image of its staff as courteous and capable, so many were shocked to learn that one of JR’s conductors recently flipped off a station-goer.

The incident took place last Saturday at Hakonegasaki Station, located on the Hachiko Line in western Tokyo, and can be seen in the images below.

めざましテレビで八高線で中指立てた車掌やってたしw#めざましテレビ pic.twitter.com/5y53fNqCmh

— TJライナー (@donanbus2809) January 24, 2021

As snow fell on the evening of January 23, word got out that the Hachiko Line would be running its 209-series carriages. This older model has been largely phased out of service, but issues with the weather that day prompted a temporary comeback, and a pair of train enthusiasts had come to Hakonegasaki Station to take photos from the platform. At around 8:30, though, the JR conductor at the rear of one train bird-bombed the photo by extending both his arm and his middle finger as the train pulled away.

One of the rail fans posted a video of the incident on Twitter, and some wondered if he may have been exhibiting the less-than-polite behavior that train enthusiasts are sometimes known for. He explained, though, that he had been properly standing behind the yellow safety lines marked on the platform, and that he hadn’t been using a flash, using an umbrella, or doing anything else that he felt would pose a safety risk or impeded the staff from doing their job and other passengers from getting on or of the train.

Eventually the video caught JR’s attention, and the company was able to determine who the conductor …continue reading

    

Only surviving example of the sheath that protected Japan from “plum poison.”

Osaka-based company Morishita Jintan has been around for a long time. Founded way back in Japan’s Meiji period, next month will mark the pharmaceutical and medical device maker’s 130th year in business.

Obviously, advances in medical science mean that Morishita Jintan’s product lineup is now very different compared to the wares it offered in its early days. So it was a discovery of historical significance recently when someone in rural Japan found one of Morishita Jintan’s very first products: a condom that’s approximately 120 years old.

１２０年前のコンドーム発見　森下仁丹が販売、展示を検討：中日新聞Web

見つかったのは、フランスから輸入販売していたコンドームの草分けとされる「やまと衣」。石川県志賀町で古民家宿泊施設を営む経営者が蔵の中で発見した。https://t.co/ChqRbbZ5Hd

— 中日新聞 (@chunichi_denhen) January 21, 2021

The condom was found by the owner of a kominka, or classical Japanese folk house, in the town of Shikamachi, Ishikawa Prefecture. The house has now been converted into an inn for travelers, and the owner found the condom in the adjacent storehouse, which makes one wonder if the storehouse was used for amorous rendezvous by its original owners.

Specifically, it was a Yamato Kinu-model condom that was found. One of the first mass-marketed condoms in Japan, the Yamato Kinu earned its popularity by being billed as a line of protection against infections of syphilis, which saw major outbreaks around the turn of the 20th century in Japan, where it’s known as baidoku (literally “plum poison”). This is believed to be the only Yamato Kinu condom still in existence, and while its exact age hasn’t been determined, newspaper ads for the product from 1896 have survived, so it’s estimated that the condom was sold sometime around then.

Although Yamato Kinu translates as “Japanese clothing” or “Japanese silk,” the condom was actually made in France and imported to Japan by Morishita Jintan, as manufacturing technology at the time in Japan was insufficient to …continue reading