Kabukicho is booming with the “papa-katsu bubble”… Shocking tactics used by hosts who “will stop at nothing” to stand out.

Eighty women were caught red-handed waiting for prostitutes on the streets of Okubo Park and other areas.
Forty-two “Toyoko Kids” were rounded up and taken into custody.
The owners of the unlicensed “Men’s Con Cafe” and two others were arrested.

The incidents in Kabukicho, Shinjuku, also known as Asia’s largest entertainment district, never cease. There is a person who is rumored to be controlling such a nightlife district behind the scenes. He is the self-proclaimed “YouTuber who is the craziest YouTuber in Shinjuku,” a.k.a. “Shinjuku’s Woman,” or NEKI. We asked NEKI, who receives close to 100 flame stories a day, about her “manipulation” of Kabukicho.

The world is in a recession, but Kabukicho is in a bubble. Both host and cabaret club operators can make money if they open new establishments, so tenants are fighting over tenants, and even for a “small box” of about 15 tsubo, operators are willing to pay three to four times the market rate for the space.

The clientele is younger than before Corona. I used to have the impression that the youngest girls who started going to hostesses were 24-25 year olds in their second or third year of business, but now there are many girls around 19 or 20 years old. In the past, sex work was the standard way for young girls to earn money. But now, with the development of SNS, “stand-up sex” and “papa katsura” are becoming popular. Nowadays, however, with the development of social networking sites, it has become easy to make a rough income through “stand-up sex” and “papa-katsu”. The money earned by young girls in this way is being dropped into Kabukicho.

Mr. NEKI describes the current situation in Kabukicho as follows. She is a beautiful woman with long, shining hair, good looks that cannot be hidden even by a mask, and an outstanding style. Despite her appearance, however, the words she utters are as if she were a business manager.

She is also the executive director of a company that handles PR for nightclubs and other businesses.

On her YouTube channel, she mainly posts videos introducing selected Kabukicho inflammatory news at a pace of once a week. The channel has about 14,000 subscribers. Not a small number, but probably quite modest for content in Kabukicho, where the big ticket items fly around. Mr. NEKI explains the management mechanism.