That Time I Went to Dinner in Kabukicho

May 20th was supposed to be a day off, but instead my training group got called together for additional training. See, they schedule them on your day off so that you don't miss work. Just like the normal scheduled day off is always Monday because a lot of the national holidays fall on Monday, and they don't want to give you a 3 day weekend. And, they train you in stuff you've already been doing, making the trip mostly nothing but a frustrating waste.

But, it was the first time we had been all together since being sent off across the country. One kid was sent all the way to Hokkaido, so he never has anything even resembling the chance to hang out with the rest of us.

The down side is, this is an 8-hour workday, so none of us actually had time to hang out or catch up.

I work a different schedule from my group. Monday is my first day off whereas it is their second. I was slow after the day, debating if I wanted to hang out around the training center or go into Shinjuku. Because, yeah, Monday is Shinjuku day.

My training mates were quicker to leave. I figured they were trying to get back to the station to get back to their respective homes to manage a couple of hours before having to go to work. The only exception to my group was the Hokkaido kid. Because he had to be flown in, he was staying the night at the training center and was leaving the following afternoon. It worked out pretty good, since he was one of the guys I hung out with during training. We decided to hit Shinjuku to wander about and find food.

Here's a thing about Japan: nearly everything in the city closes between 8:30-9:00pm. Trains shut down somewhere between 10:45-11:30, I think. Point being, we had a very limited amount of time to hang out.

We tried browsing stores just to walk and talk, but the stores were kicking people out. We wandered the streets a bit, before deciding it was time to find a place to eat. Not very easy when things are shutting down, outside menus are written in stylized fonts, (some places don't serve gaijin), places stop allowing customers in about an hour before they close, and we were looking for specific stuff. Namely no curry because we'd both been eating nothing but that all week.

We went into Kabukicho. I'd been wandering around there enough that I knew places stayed open much later (because it's the red light district). We found a Thai restaurant up on the 3rd floor of a building with a "massage parlor" and other such stores. We got there just before last call at 10pm.

They seated us quickly, and hastily requested we order. An appetizer each, nothing too big since it was late and we were just tired at that point. I'm not sure what we talked about that night. My guess is the job and stuff. This was supposed to be a vent session. Very soon, our Japan experience would take a radically different turn from the rest of our group's.

Around 10:40, there was a bit more urgency to get us to pay and leave. Understandable since the place shut down at 11. We were talking about how to divvy up the check, because I don't know the word and the Hokkaido kid forgot the word. It was decided I'd pay since I only had large notes, and he'd pay me back.

All night, a man had been the one serving us and attending to us, but a woman in her early 20s was the one who came to deliver our check. I felt this horrible jolt as she placed our check on the table: 3 inched from her wrist, on the inside of her forearm was a tattoo made of cheap black ink, 1 inch by 0.5 inches. The first part was difficult to make out, most likely because it wasn't English, but the very last part was clear. It was a number.

The waitress took our check off. (Is immediately intercepted and spoken to by one of the male staff out of ear shot.) Right after she was out of sight I just leaned back in my chair and swore only loud enough for my co-worker to hear. This got a confused stare. So, I explained, "She's trafficked. She's got a branding."

This is not the sort of situation that happens when you go out for dinner, so understandable there was a little nervous laughter followed by "are you serious?" I show him using my arm where to look when she returns. Then I go about being the normal every day customer. Smile. Thank her for my change. I look across the table at this guy, and am strongly reminded that he's my brother's age and fresh from university. He's holding his head, hunched over the table, staring in horror.

I tell him we're leaving, and we descend the stairs back to the street. He starts reaching for his wallet. I flatly tell him he isn't paying me back, and apologize for getting him caught up in this.

That night, he tried to report the incident and immediately hit a wall. This was Kabukicho. No one cares what goes on there. I tell him I'll handle it.

And so, since May 20th I've been reaching out to all sorts of charities to get more info on the human trafficking issue in Japan. I've hit many walls with a big reason being that there are no laws against human trafficking in Japan. Let me say that again: there are no laws against human trafficking in Japan. I've emailed the White House with the story, requesting it be passed on to higher powers so that external pressure can be applied. I've even contacted the United Nations, because Japan cannot ignore human trafficking and be a part of the UN. You can't have both. Other than that, I still go back to Kabukicho every week. I walk through to collect external data on the area. I went back to the restaurant once. But, that's another entry.

Here lies the story of how my Japan experience is now forever different.