Japanese women: Are they subservient and submissive as many in the west believe? Are they shy and docile? Are they immature and childish? Are they fashionable? Are they sex-starved nymphomaniacs or cold fish? Are they as easy to get into bed as some would have you believe? And, do they really treat their man like a king or are they liberated to the extent that they don't need men?

These are questions many western men have asked and one I have come across on many forums and blogs. The answer to the above is both yes and no. It all depends on the woman as well as the man she is with, but one thing I can say for sure is that the one common thread all Japanese women I dated really had was that they know damn well how to take care of their man and make him feel like he is the most important person in the world.

In my younger years in Japan before settling down with the woman I am married to, I had a good 4 -5 years to play the field so to speak after my initial marriage ended in divorce after only two and a half years. It wasn't that the marriage failed because of miscommunication or incompatibility, it ended because I was forced to realize that I married for lust and not love at 20 yrs old. In truth I was not ready for marriage, had not finished playing around, and should've never gotten married at the time. In fact, I married the first woman I met after only being in Japan a month!

After the amicable divorce I vowed to not settle down and marry again, if ever, until I was good and ready to get married. I would not marry again until I was sure that I had had my fun and found a woman that I was completely compatible with on all levels including intellectually and sexually. Impossible you say? I thought so too and figured I may never get married or find the right woman for me, but have patience, date many types of women and you'll eventually find the right one.

Japan can be a wonderful place for a single male. Just don't fall for one because she is great in bed or has a great personality. There are other factors involved. As with women anywhere, she may be great in bed, but is a real bitch otherwise. She may have a great personality, but can't do squat in the bedroom and never will, she may be a great person, but will nag the hell out of you, etc. etc. It's so easy to find and date women in Japan that sooner or later the right one will come along that is just perfect for you and it may be when you were least looking for it!

As a young college student, I had the time of my life and ran the gamut of Japanese women from rich to poor, from nymphomaniac to cold, lifeless fish. I dated OL's (Office Ladies) and bar hostesses; HS students (when I was 19 and in my early 20's) and college students, and a couple of older women in their 30's and 40's. I also dated the truly subservient, submissive well-educated type of woman and, while appealing to many western men however, this type was not at all appealing to me in the long run. And I dated, and married, a liberated woman.

Imagine what it would feel like to walk down the street and have young women squeal and comment on how cute you were. Imagine what it would be like to have women come up to you almost anytime and anywhere to just talk to you or just to meet you. Imagine walking into a strange bar or night club or live house and have women patrons want to sit with you or be asked to be introduced to you just because you were a foreigner. And, if you spoke Japanese, you had an even greater advantage especially in the Japanese only places that you frequented. Granted this didn't happen on a daily basis, but it happened often enough to really take notice of. Yes being a young foreign college student in Japan sure had its advantages.

I almost married a beautiful, rich model, but there were many problems in the relationship so I broke it off. I thought a flight attendant and I might get married, but her father forbade her to see me after meeting me and she broke it off. And I fell in love with and frequently dated for three years the bass player of a fairly popular all-girl band, but she only wanted fun and sex and not a serious relationship. Thanks to her though, I discovered a side of sex that most men only fantasize about. However, if it were not for her I never would've met the woman I am presently married to for 22 years. In time I will write detailed stories of all these relationships.

With the majority of Japanese women I dated and bedded there were practically no taboos when it came to sex. This completely blew me away as it was something I was not used to. Maybe it was because, with the lack of religion in Japan, they were not brainwashed into thinking that sex was something evil and dirty. Japanese women made sex fun and they made kinky seem normal!

Being a shy foreigner in Japan it was quite easy to meet Japanese women as most of the women usually made the first move. If they didn't make the first move because they were shy, it became quite easy for me to approach them with more success than failure after I understood how to read and react to eye contact from them.

Back in the late 70's when disco was popular it was great to go to one of the many discos in Roppongi where you could spend the night for a cover charge of 3,000 yen (about US$15) and it included all you could drink and eat all night! All I and my friends had to do was get there early, find seats near the dance floor, and within 30 minutes or less some Japanese woman, or women, would come up to our table and ask us in English to dance. That was all there was to it! I hardly ever had to ask a woman to dance and if you went home alone or without a phone number it was usually because you wanted to. In most, but not all cases, if she didn't come to your place she would ask you to hers or you would both spend the night in a hotel. Rarely did you go home alone.

To be honest, if I could do it all over again I would gladly trade anything to relive those five years in the late 1970's early 80's when Japan truly was, and probably still is, a paradise for foreign males as far as the opposite sex went.

Even though I dated many types of Japanese women, some seriously, there was always a common thread with them all and that is, as I said above, they made you feel like the most important person in the world. When they came to visit you at your place they usually cleaned your apartment and washed your clothes and even cooked you meals after buying the food! They didn't do it because it was expected of them they did it because they wanted to and cared for you. If we went out together they would often offer to pay for the date or split it, but I never allowed it except in rare cases. And none were ever shy to be with a foreigner in public.

Although a few had little experience in sexual matters and just laid there, most were experienced, knew what a man wanted and when the bedroom door was closed, even the most conservatively dressed, librarian-type of woman could act like a whore and make you glad you were a man. When it came to the bedroom, only one or two were inhibited in my experience. Shy yes, but there almost nothing that was taboo with them. The word immoral was not in their dictionary and what may seem kinky to many westerners was deemed just a normal part of sex to the Japanese women I had relations with.

Many foreign men I knew in Japan often took advantage of these two sides of Japanese women and used them selfishly to their own advantage. They would try and sleep with them on a first date, often successfully, without ever realizing that the woman was giving herself mostly because she was shy and didn't know how to say no as they were not used to a foreigners tactics. Granted there are more than a few "foreigner-experienced" Japanese women who will sleep with any foreigner on a first date, but I am referring to the Japanese woman who has little or no experience with the foreign male and just wants to meet them.

Foreign males would often use a Japanese woman as a kind of slave to clean their apartments, wash their clothes, cook their meals and have sex with and had no plans whatsoever of being truly serious with them. I have seen many men just up and leave the country after dating a particular woman for a year or more much to the detriment and shock of the Japanese woman.

In my own experience I learned about Japanese woman and why they prefer foreign males over their own kind and used that to my advantage when there was one I particularly liked. I would often never try to sleep with them on a first date unless it was they who pushed the issue and made the first move. If they didn't make the first move or I didn't receive the "signals" I would wait a few dates and, more often than not, it was they who crawled all over me and made the first move. It made sex that much more interesting and I feel as if they appreciated it in the long run. In other words I did not want to give them the impression I was just out for sex, especially if they were experienced in dating foreign men as probably 99% of the foreigners they dated probably tried to get into their pants on the first date. Don't get me wrong here, there were more than a few women I slept with after just meeting them that evening as, like two ships passing in the night, it was what we both were looking for, but there was rarely a second or third date.

Being a foreign male in Japan does have its advantages and if one ever wondered what it feels like to be a rock star or someone famous and have women wanting to meet you, all one has to do is go to Japan to experience it. From some of the blogs and posts on forums I have read I gather the same holds true today as it did 30 years ago. Since I have been married for 22 years I have been away from the scene quite a while, but it is nice to know that not much has changed out there for the single foreigner.

Also, in my own experience, since I could speak Japanese almost fluently, I had greater success with women in Japanese only places or places where foreigners rarely, if ever, visited as I was that much more of a curosity to them. The fact that a foreigner could speak Japanese made them that much more interested in you. Besides, it practically tripled your odds in meeting women as many, if they did not speak English, would not approach you or shy away from you if you approached them in English.

Eventually I quit going to places where many foreigners frequented as most of the women there were too "westernized" for my taste. They were clever and sly and knew well how to take advantage of the unsuspecting, horney foreign male looking to get laid. I have seen many a men taken advantage of and/or hurt by them and I was one. Be cautious in these places as these women are experienced and smart in the art of using foreign men. The same goes for hostess bars that are frequented by foreigners.

Still, even today, when I visit Japan and hit all my old spots and a few new ones here and there, the eye contact, curiosity, and interest is still there from women I have never seen before and I know I could "score" again if I acted on it. Granted, the majority of the women eyeing me or talking to me are not in their 20's or early 30's anymore. They are closer to my age, but the interest is still there and I am glad to see that a foreign male, regardless of his age, is still the interest of Japanese women.

END NOTE: Due to the prosperity of Japan and the Japanese the reality is, unlike many other countries, Japanese women do not date foreign males hoping to marry them for a better life outside their own country. They date them and want to meet them because the curiosity is there. Japanese males sadly, for the most part, still treat their women badly especially after marriage and a Japanese woman does enjoy being treated like a lady and not being taken for granted especially when the relationship gets serious.

One downside to this though and one that I hear from quite a few people these days and read of often, is that quite a few Japanese women only want a foreign male as a "boy toy" or fashion accessory with no intention of being serious. If marriage is not your goal then I guess that would be fine as who in their right mind would turn down free sex? On the other hand, I hope you don't fall in love with such a woman. But then again who knows?

And one final note of advice, if you're going out to meet women in Japan, dress well. You don't have to be fashionable or have expensive clothes. Japanese women are usually very conscious of how a man dresses himself and judges him accordingly. Tee shirts and shorts are a turn off to many Japanese women. Dress sharp-casual with clean slacks, (jeans are ok) a nice shirt (preferably button down) and clean sneakers or shoes. You'll have a lot more success.