A popular restaurant in Japan where customers are ritually humiliated by staff has sparked a lively discussion on social media. - Photo: SCMP composite/X.com
TOKYO: A pop-up café in Japan that humiliates customers has become a hit on social media at home and overseas.
The eatery opened in the heart of Tokyo from September 14 to 23 as a special treat for fans of Japanese producer and influencer Nobuyuki Sakuma’s online shows which feature bad language.
Sakuma had been inviting good-looking young women to verbally abuse a group of comedians on his online shows. Those who laughed or took offence less were considered winners.
At first sight, the Bato Cafe Omokenashi Café, which offers everything – from the waitresses’ cute pink aprons to the food created under Michelin chef Shuhei Sawada’s supervision, seems like an ordinary Japanese restaurant – until the waitresses start to swear at customers.
According to a reporter who shared his experience with the Japanese media outlet Rocketnews24, the waitress that served him was impatient from the very beginning.
“Just order, pig,” she hurried him, using gangster languages instead of keigo, the respectful language required of customer service staff in Japan.
After he ordered a pork rice course priced at 3,590 yen (US$25), the maid said: “You will be eating your own kind.”
She did not go away while the customer was waiting for his dishes to be served, and showered him with more abusive comments.
“What kind of hairstyle is that? You think you are cool or what? What is that T-shirt you are wearing? So tacky.”
Then his meal was served without chopsticks because “pigs don’t use chopsticks”.
The café had around 10 abusive waitresses serving customers at the same time.
It also uses a different cafe manager each day, acted by the most notoriously sharp women that appeared in Sakuma’s shows, such as the 22-year-old model Mirichamu.
The café was popular among not only customers but also waitresses, according to Sakuma, as Japanese service workers are usually required to offer meticulous service to customers, and often suffer from unreasonable requests from aggressive guests.
Each customer could only “enjoy” the abusive service for one hour, and were required to book in advance.
The outlet also offered a paid “VIP service”, which included being playfully spanked with slippers on the face and backside.
Some customers also took home souvenirs, for example, instant photos of them posed as being abused by the waitresses.
It was also possible to dine in the café without being abused and just watching others suffer. This can be done by simply wearing a card that says “no abuse”.
“I enjoyed it so much. The abusive girls were cute, and the food was good,” one Japanese customer said.
“Why did I already know it’s a Japanese café just by the sound of it?” an online observer in China said. - South China Morning Post
