Switching gears . . . you know, you can’t do the math in Shibuya. You’ve got to get out of the city centers where the pretty girls all concentrate. That just skews your stats. Here’s what you do: There’s a Starbucks in Oji (http://www.starbucks.co.jp/en/search/detail.php?id=191&search_condition=Tokyo&pref_code=13) with a view of the street. You sit there and count, enjoy a nice cappuccino, and I guarantee the numbers will be lower than Shibuya. You’re right, 30 percent’s probably high. In Oji, you’d be lucky to get half of that. But at least you don’t have to study footprints in the snow.

Though I need to confess that I am coming from the part of Europe which is covered by snow about 360 days a year. So I might get a little bit easily excited, like when you can actually figure out the person as woman without studying the foot prints.

I was going to argue that 30% is a lot and that by going with average I would still vote for Japan but you got me with the Hooters. Any argument that has Hooters in it cannot be counter argued so you win.

Now, I do not know about you but I just remembered I need to get lunch in Shibuya tomorrow. There is this little restaurant where you can sit by the window in a busy street. I will do the math, as world needs to know.

Also, the statistics are skewed by area. For example, young women from all around the Tokyo area get dressed up, made up and go en masse to the major shopping areas like Shinjuku, Shibuya, and Omotesando. So those areas have a disproportionate number of attractive women, relative to the population of the city. That’s like determining the number of attractive women in a country by going to Hooters. But if you were to stand on a street corner in a part of town where people actually live, like say, Nippori, and count the number of attractive women between the ages of 18-50, I’d be surprised if you’d get over 30 percent. Try it.

But dude, you must be a gay magnet. Like the masturbation thing, it never happens to me. At least not again. And yes, he changed places and was looking down at me.

I get comfort on the fact that all Japanese girls still look sexy to me. Actually even more than before. When I came only girls in their 20′s did. Now after 20 years also all the girls in their 30′s and 40′s do. I will report back after 20 years, that is if I still remember why I am looking at them.

Yeah, I don’t know what’s up with the whole public masturbation thing. To be fair, I’ve seen a couple of strange things in the U.S. too. Like one time I was going to go surfing, pulled into the parking lot with my board, and the guy in the truck next to me immediately opens his door to reveal that he’s a) wearing no pants, and b) holding something in his hand that resembles a small rocket. I was like, ah jeez, here it is only 8 a.m. and already I’m scarred for life. I don’t know why this stuff always happens to me.

I agree that there’s bad and good to every country. However, I also think there’s such a thing as not whining about the differences in a culture that’s not one’s own. Such as how the language works or how people do business. But then again, sometimes one just needs to vent their frustrations. It’s hard to tell the difference between someone who is venting, someone who is trying to make a point about what he finds ethically wrong about a country and someone who perhaps is just holding his own values as superior to everyone else’s. I don’t know if you know what I mean. But I did not find the Kotaku article to be something I could hold as legitimate criticism of Japan. They were just personal complaints. Or perhaps I just don’t agree with them, so I’m being biased.

I told my husband about the masturbation issue, and he said he’s never heard of that. He’s from Japan. So maybe it depends on where you live? I’m not a guy, so I would never know the truth (not that I would want to).