Tokyo Weekender - February 2017

People,
Parties, Places
TOKYO’S LONGEST RUNNING SOCIETY PAGE WITH BILL HERSEY
Bill Hersey and the age-defying
Mick Jagger, circa 1988
In addition to having a lot of friends from all over the world
visiting Tokyo over the Christmas-New Year's holidays, I
met a lot of interesting people for the first time. This added
up to spending a lot of time meeting and talking with people
from all walks of life in a half a dozen or so of the city’s
many fine restaurants, coffee shops, and parks. Our groups were
always very international and we talked about everything from terrorism
to (ugh!) Trump.
One conversation with a group of young Italian businessmen
working here regarding the perils of Roppongi really surprised me.
One of them told me he and a few friends were lured to a well-known
Roppongi club by a couple of touts who work the streets around the
Roi Building. They didn’t really like the club’s ambiance, so they decided
to have one drink and move on. But somehow someone had
spiked their drinks and two of them woke up in a small dark street
several hours later. One was missing his watch and wallet and the
other just his wallet. They reported this and spent considerable time
filling out a police report. It’s been a couple of weeks and they haven’t
gotten anything back yet. I respect the police here, but it’s not
easy. The Roppongi scumbags who are into spiking drinks, pickpocketing,
and the like really know what they’re doing.
I know Tokyo’s one of the safest cities in the world, but it seems
like no matter where you travel nowadays, you should be careful.
I'd also like to warn you about using drugs here. Most, including
marijuana, are illegal and penalties are tough. I’m sure you can find
people selling drugs, but don’t take a chance. No one needs that kind
of trouble here.
Joined friends from the Big Apple at a first-class holiday lunch
at the Grand Hyatt’s Oak Door. My fish and chips were excellent
and not all that expensive. My four friends who arrived a little late
were loaded down with Christmas décor bags from a half a dozen
Roppongi Hills bags and boxes. “Gifts for friends back home,” they
told me, adding “Tokyo is really a marketing dream.” I suppose
when you consider that about 1% of Japan’s 127 million people are
big shoppers, this is true. If you visit the Shibuya and Roppongi Don
Quixotes, they’re almost always super busy with Chinese and Southeast
Asian tourists with big bags, boxes and even suitcases full of all
kinds of things they bought to take back home.
Even though there are only a small number of Christians in Japan,
thanks to marketing and promotions Tokyo was beautifully decorated
for holidays and sales of gifts were up. An increase in tourism
has helped. Let’s hope it keeps getting better all the time. In closing
this part of the column, my apologies to our Chinese friends for this
late, but truly sincere congratulations on their New Year which was
on January 28.
ALGERIAN NATIONAL DAY RECEPTIONS
Algerian Ambassador Mohammed Bencherif and his wife Amira
hosted their National Day Reception in their beautiful Arabic designed
Embassy/Residence in Minato-ku. Guests were a wall-to-wall
42 | FEBRUARY 2017 | TOKYO WEEKENDER