A four-page article in Aera (11/7) is based on a poll of 300 married women, with more than half its space devoted to bar graphs and pie graphs — a total of 20, if you can believe it. But bear with us; there are interesting conclusions to be drawn from the “sexless” relationships that appear to plague an increasing number of Japan’s marriages.

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In a land where advanced planning is as highly esteemed as it is in Japan, spontaneity is not just something that pops up out of the blue. And the bedroom, it seems, is no exception.

Mood can make or break what’s supposed to be a romantic liaison between lovers. A simple slip could ruin the atmosphere and spoil the night.

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In Shizuoka’s Atagawa Onsen, the private baths are available for rental on a round-the-clock basis. Of late, they’ve been taken over by young couples, who are quite … noisy.

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Talk about sex lives to almost 1,000 Japanese women – as the racy women’s weekly did – and that’s the sort of thing you’ll find out.

Of the 973 women who took part in an-an’s annual survey on sex, 20-somethings averaged from 2.9 partners (from 20 to 29) to 4.5 partners (from 25 to 29) throughout their lives, while those aged 30 to 34 had, on average, slept with 4.2 men.

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“This young woman arrived at the hospital with a green pallor to her face,” recalls Masahiro Matsushima, a urologist at Tobo University Hospital. “I could tell from her face right away what her problem was. It was late at night and I suspected she had inserted something.

I took a look and there, protruding from her urethra, was a rounded glass rod that turned out to be a mercury thermometer. She had been playing with herself and it had become lodged in her urethra and she couldn’t remove it. She was weeping with shame and fear when she came to the hospital.

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Wanted, graduate of a prestigious university for full-time, unfulfilling grunt work at a major corporation. Hours from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m., 100 hours or more overtime per month, work on weekends as needed. Annual salary: 3 million yen.

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While many eagerly await the union between Takacho, the top geisha, and Takuya, the guitarist, just as many are looking back to see how much carnage the pair have caused with past liaisons. Takacho, the Thinking Butterfly, currently commands the greatest attention of all geiko, the name given to women of the arts in the ancient capital. But the 21-year-old superstar of the geisha world is best known for a June 2002 scandal when the tabloid sheet Friday captured her on camera as she left a hotel room.

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It’s cherry blossom viewing time again in Japan – but it shouldn’t be. And that’s causing plenty of headaches for those who make a buck during the few days that the country’s national flower is resplendent in its bloom.

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Soft on Demand’s foray into the world of ballet certainly contained elements of “nutcracker” and “sweet.” Soft on Demand (SOD), of course, is Japan’s most profitable producer of adult movies. It struck gold with its “All Nude” series of films in the early Noughties, which featured a cast of dozens, nearly all women, who went about such activities as athletics or playing in the nude while entirely buff.

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Despite a huge, literally in-your-face sex industry (think of bukkake), Japan’s soaplands are the only establishments where carnality means copulation, but the industry has gone flaccid amid fierce competition from other types of services.

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