Drinking A Favourite Pastime In Japan

Press, Issue 32333, 26 June 1970, Page 11

Drinking A Favourite Pastime In Japan

(By KEN COATES, who spent three months in Japan under the 1970 Mobil Travel Award)

Drinking is a favourite pastime with the Japanese, and beer is becoming more popular each summer. As temperatures soar, beer halls and gardens vie with each other for the custom of thousands of thirsty Tokyo people who seek to relax in the world’s most crowded city.

There is, of course, always one of thousands of bars or clubs to drink at, with hostesses provided, but many are expensive, particularly if Mr Salaryman is not on a company expense ac-i count.

This still leaves a wide range of drinking places—with the choice of mood music, the latest in “group j sound,” go-go girls gyrating; non-stop, singing, food and of, course, beers—large, small or! medium.

Particularly popular in Tokyo are the 100 roof-top beer gardens atop the highest buildings. But just as crowded, it seems, are the many beer halls in the city: Let’s take a closer look at one, named the “Yodel Beer Hall,” on the ground floor of a modern office building. The entrance is restrained, almo-t elegant With Swissstyle decor, and furniture, and dark panelling, the place seats more than 100 people. There is no stand-up bar, and customers sit at well-arranged tables. Legions of smartly dressed waiters hover to give peerless Japanese service—in this case, a snack, meal and/ or beer.

Japanese beer comes in! several brands, but the Yodel,! because of a tie-in with the brewery, serves only Asahi beer. This is a light easy-to-take, lager beer with a 3.5 per cent alcohol content. Music With Beer Asahi sells throughout the world (except New Zealand) and the company is strongly linked with Munich. The beer is sold at the Munich Beer Hall at Expo 70. But as for the Yodel, and beer “hall” gives quite the wrong impression, the main attraction is the music served with the beer. And the emphasis is on participation. There is a Swiss-type Japanese band with accordions (the bandmaster makes around $2OO a month, the pianist, $75, and the singers, $88) and of course an excel-

lent sound system. Singers move among the drinkers with microphones, and people join in when they feel like it, which is often. “People come here to enjoy a drink and sing songs,” says the floor manager, Mr K. I Tanaka.

! It soon becomes apparent (that as with most things Japaaese, the Yodel is well organised to help customers, ! and so encourage business. There are printed songbooks, ! “Songs of the Month,” and I like people anywhere who have the slightest spark of 'music in them, a combination iof beer and German drinking songs proves irresistible. “Sometimes people sing from the stage,” explains Mr Tanaka. “And then we give them a special Cinzano on the rocks—mayble it looks the same, but if we make it so, then everyone wants to sing.” A large beer of more than a pint, served in a tankardstyle handle, costs 300 yen, or 75c. The Customers “Most of our customers are salaried men who come here after the department stores and offices close,” the manager says. And women customers are increasing. They used to form 20 per cent, but the number has doubled.

“And some of the girls are stronger drinkers than the men,” says Mr Tanaka. When it comes to discussing business methods, Mr Tanaka is frank: When the place fills up, he instructs waiters to keep filling glasses. And later on they do not show menus that include lowpriced potato chips, salty dried fish lengths and peanuts, but more substantial meals. After all, he says, he has a staff of 30 including chefs. And they must be kept busy. But no-one should get the idea that this or other beer halls are the scenes of drunken Japanese revelry. In many ways, drinking is much more civilised than in Australia or New Zealand.

Asked pointedly if fights sometimes do break out because people drink too much, Mr Tanaka says: “Here we do not have

that kind of rough man; and if there is trouble occasionally, it stops when we say we will call the police.” The average male customer, he adds, drinks a couple of large beers during the evening. And the beer is always cool—a 20-gallon barrel of draught is always “on the ice.”

Roof-top Gardens Most of Tokyo's roof-top beer gardens feature go-go girls. Some don blonde curlytop wigs and gyrate non-stop, seemingly for hours. But the secret here is that they dance in relays. The pop group band of enthusiastic young Japanese, powered by an impressive array of the world’s best sound equipment, can surely be heard all over Tokyo.

June and July are busy months for outdoor beer gardens, and on fine evenings are packed with young people. But one, atop the 13 floor of a large office block, and the highest in Tokyo, has geared its appeal to middle-aged Tokyoites by staging Japanese folk songs and dances. Traditional instruments are played and colourful costumes worn

There are also gimmicks to attract custom. One is that the winner of a “lucky number,” based on entry to the beer garden, receives a huge stein full of beer. Usually the winner has to share his good fortune. Beer is served by waiters and Japanese short-skirted bunny girls dispense cheer and snacks.

Japanese drinkers, compared with Kiwis or Australians, drink beer slowly, in sips and eating often. I never saw a beer “downed” in typical Kiwi style. The only problem in this beer garden is* the weather.

But if it is raining, there are 200 seats beneath a revolving restaurant which provides some shelter. Lead weights at the base of tables keeps them from blowing away in a high wind. This garden is open from 5 p.m. until 9.30 p.m. and 4.30 p.m. until 9.30 p.m. on Sundays. The staff employed in the peak of the season is around 100, and around 1500 people can be seated at one time.

The Japanese get drunk, in (the same way as any other (race, although perhaps they do so on less. But they seldom get objectionable—except over an inability to hold their liquor. But certainly there is a liveliness and variety about their drinking places that would be envied by many 'drinkers in New Zealand.