http://youtube.com/watch?v=_34QIvHKD_U
http://youtube.com/watch?v=ltZDIo3az5w
Love Hotels ラブホテル -
Let's say you're a typical Japanese salaryman. You live with your wife, 3 kids, mom, dad and grandma out in a little house in Nishinomiya. It's been a rough week and your looking for an evening (or, in some cases, 2 minutes) of romance with your wife. Problem is that every time you two start knocking boots, oba-san starts calling out asking where you put her miso paste, and the kids need some money for a new fami-con. What are you to do?? Thus were invented Love Hotels. But enough about history. If you have never been to a love hotel, and your at least 18, you need to go.
How they work You and your wife (girl friend, boy friend, co-worker, English student, sister........um, no, not that) find the love hotel section of your town. This part of town was most likely a cemetery a long time ago. No one wanted to live on top of an old cemetery, so the area became full of love hotels. But enough about history. You walk into a hotel and you will see the board with lots of pictures of rooms. Some are lit up, some are not. From the rooms that are lit-up, choose the room that you want and either press the button or pull the key out or whatever. The light will go off and another light somewhere, (by the elevator or something) will help you find your room. It should be pretty obvious. Go to your room. Inside you should find, typically, a nice double bed with clean sheets, the high-tech lighting and sound system, a TV with at least 2 channels of pornographic movies playing at all times, a video game system, a nice shower and bath area, and a small fridge full of expensive food and drinks. There will also be a coffee service set. But don't use the coffee cups! One of my friends used to work at a love hotel and said that they never wash the cups. Anyway, when you're done, you pay at the front desk.
How much do love hotels cost? - There are usually three basic rates. All night, which is from 11pm about 10am, costs between 8000 yen and 11000 yen per couple. The evening rate, usually between 5pm and 11pm is hourly and costs about 2500 an hour or so. The bargain rate, from 10am to 5pm is as low as 2500 yen for all 7 hours. The signs outside each place show the prices. Generally, you get what you pay for. Expensive room - nice, new stuff inside. Cheap room - old, basic stuff inside. If you stay all night, you usually pay when you go in. If you stay in the afternoon, or evening, you usually pay when you leave.
Can I have multiple partners? I've heard two stories about this. Three foreigners went into a love hotel and said they just wanted to sleep. They were turned away. In another case a guy had no problem getting a room with two girls, but had to pay 1 and a half times the posted rate. It really depends on what kind of attitude you have when you go in.
Bumper Car Sex- OK, a friend of mine says that he found the love hotel with the theme rooms. It is called U's. It is pronounced "use". It is in on the main corner across from Namba OCAT. They have, at last count, the following: a bumper car room, a room with a player piano, a room with an outdoor bath on the roof, a room with a pool table, a room with a simulated planetarium, and, for the slightly less adventurous, a room with a large rattan chair that just kind of spins around. The rooms cost more than the average love hotels, but facilitate pick up lines like "I know this great place to look at the stars", or "Do you like to ride bumper cars?" Again, I haven't been to U's and I am relying on my friend's memory for most of this, but you might want to check it out.
More Rumors Another friend said there is one love hotel somewhere, where each room has a video camera in it, and all the cameras are connected and each room has controls so you can watch what is happening in the other rooms. He also said he heard of a place where you just go and, like, swap partners (what a 70's thing). Like I said, these are just rumors and I've never been to either of these places.
Finding a Love Hotel Near You
Namba Start at the Nankai train station and walk north along Mido-suji, on the left hand side of the street. After you cross under the expressway, turn left and walk for three blocks. There will be a ton of love hotels. OR from the Midosuji Namba station, take either exit 23, 24, or 25 and walk due west. You'll see them.
Umeda - Walk east from Umeda on Umeda Kagetsu and go under the express way. Walk another two blocks east and then one block south, and you should see the bright lights of the love hotels.
This from Bruce Cohen... I found really amusing was in the middle of your love hotel article/review. It is concerning the rattan chair you talk about at U's love hotel. You think it is for the slightly less adventurous, but it is not. It is actually used for something called 'basket sex'! This is big at the bordellos in Thailand, I hear. This is how it works: One spins the rattan chair in one direction for a very long time, winding and winding up the rope until it is very tight and really wants to unwind. Remember doing that as a child? There would be a tire or a round piece of plywood for a seat attached to the rope. Then one would watch the weighted rope unwind, spinning faster and faster all of the time? The person in the chair would get dizzy and giddy usually. This is just a little bit different. The rattan hair used for 'basket sex' has a medium sized hole in the bottom of it. After one 'winds up' the rope, the girl gets into the chair. (Or a boy in the case of a gay couple.) Then, the person not in the rattan chair, still holding the chair to keep it from unwinding, sits just underneath. He takes his 'chin-chin' and puts it inside of the one in the chair, letting go of the chair allowing it to unwind.
The question is, who is getting the more exciting ride?
A love hotel (ラブホテル) is a type of short-stay hotel found in Japan operated primarily for the purpose of allowing couples privacy to have sexual intercourse.
Love hotels usually offer a room rate for a "rest" kyūkei (休憩, kyūkei?), as well as for an overnight stay. The period of a "rest" varies, typically ranging from one to three hours. Cheaper daytime off-peak rates are common. In general, reservations are not possible, leaving the hotel will forfeit access to the room, and overnight stay rates only become available after 10pm. They are often used by young couples, since many young Japanese people live with their parents. They are also commonly used for prostitution.
Entrances are discreet and interaction with staff is minimized, with rooms often selected from a panel of buttons and the bill settled by pneumatic tube, automatic cash machines, or a pair of hands behind a pane of frosted glass. While cheaper hotels are utilitarian, higher-end hotels may feature fanciful rooms decorated with cartoon characters, equipped with rotating beds, ceiling mirrors, karaoke machines or decked out like dungeons complete with S&M gear.
These hotels are typically either concentrated in certain city districts such as genzaka (道玄坂) in Shibuya, Tokyo, near highways on the city outskirts, or in industrial districts. Few Japanese people wish to have a love hotel in their neighbourhood, and construction in residential areas is often opposed.
Love hotel architecture is sometimes garish, with buildings shaped like castles, boats or UFOs and lit with lurid pink and purple neon lighting. However, many love hotels are very ordinary looking buildings, distinguished mainly by having small or covered windows.
In recent years, the love hotel business has drawn the interest of the structured finance industry. Several transactions have been completed where the cash flows from a number of hotels have been securitised and sold to international investors and buy-out funds.
In Japan, love hotels developed from tea rooms chaya (茶屋, chaya), mostly used by prostitutes and their clients, but also by lovers. After World War II, the name tsurekomi yado (連れ込み宿, tsurekomi yado?), literally "bring-along inn" was adopted, originally for simple lodgings run by families with a few rooms to spare. These establishments appeared first around Ueno, Tokyo in part due to demand from Occupation forces, and boomed after 1958 when legal prostitution was abolished and the trade moved underground. The introduction of the automobile in the 1960s brought with it the "motel" and further spread the concept.
The name "love hotel" may originate from an establishment in Osaka called Hotel Love, which had a revolving advertisement on the roof, with "Love" on one side, and "Hotel" on the other. The sign was thus easy to misread as "love hotel", which was adopted for the entire concept. The original term has since fallen into disuse thanks to the euphemism treadmill and an ever-changing palette of terms is used by hotel operators keen on representing themselves as more fashionable than the competition. Alternative names include romance hotel, fashion hotel, leisure hotel, knocking shop, amusement hotel, couples hotel, no tell motel, and boutique hotel.