One of Japan's most famous awajo, or bubble ladies, has come out with a training DVD aimed at becoming the definitive work for teaching women how to service customers at soapland brothels, according to Shukan Taishu (4/21).

Awajo is the name the Japanese give to women who work in soaplands, Japan's bath-based bordellos, where great importance is placed on the sexual techniques workers use to pleasure customers.

"Mat Play for Beginners Class," the newly released DVD aimed at training awajo, is attracting considerable attention from those within the bawdy bubble business.

"There have been adult videos displaying soapland techniques or training videos for awajo that have come out on the market before, but none have ever gone into the detail that this one does," a writer on Japan's ejaculation industry tells Shukan Taishu. "This video has 42 chapters which each provide a different lesson on mat techniques for beginners in the soapland business. It really gives you a sense of how the soapland culture has improved and developed over the years of its existence."

The DVD's instructor is Sayaka, who retired as an active awajo at the end of March after 11 years of working in Kawasaki's Horinouchi, one of the most notorious soapland districts in the country. Sayaka apparently spent most of that time shunning the limelight and quietly learning the techniques of her chosen profession. Despite her low public profile, she was constantly among the top designated awajo throughout her career.

"Not long after entering this world, I was confronted by the painful truth that it was going to be hard to make a lot of money if you couldn't get a lot of customers to designate that they wanted you to service them," she tells Shukan Taishu. "I traveled to soapland districts across Japan, like (Gifu's) Kanazuen, (Shiga's) Ogoto and (Fukuoka's) Nakasu and got my senpai (senior/elder) to teach me their best techniques."

Sayaka has parlayed what she learned into a DVD series she hopes will eventually contain 12 parts, each providing extremely detailed information on a particular technique used by the soaplands' awajo. Other titles planned in the series include lessons on using the sukebe isu, a small stool with a hole in the middle for the genitals to dangle down through and a staple of the soapland business, as well as instructions on mat play for intermediate and advanced students.

Having retired from active service, Sayaka sees her role in the soapland business continuing in the form of an instructor for the business's workers.

"Easily the most important part of providing service in the soapland business is having the desire to show a hospitality toward customers that is going to please them. And to do that, you should tailor services according to the needs of individual customers," she says. "I'd like the girls who watch my DVD to use the techniques that I show in it as a reference for working out ways to deal with their own customers."

The writer on the sex business gives the DVD high grades.

"Considering the detail in the work, it really feels like a manual on the Way of the Bathmat (traditionally the awajo's workplace). There's not a single wasted movement (in Sayaka's techniques) and there is meaning in every movement of her fingers and toes. You could watch this over and over again and never get sick of it. It's a waste to only show it to those in the soapland business," the writer says. "Customers should watch and learn from this DVD and use it as a reference to tell awajo the type of service they'd like to receive."

Shun Jusui, one of the most famous photographers active in Japan's netherworld and producer of the DVD, says the series is a valuable cultural artifact.

"Even many soapland businesses have recently gone along with the trend common in other sex businesses to emphasize the amateurishness of their workers. As a result, there are many women who don't have the incredible techniques that used to be an important part of the trade," he tells Shukan Taishu. "We see the duty of this DVD as passing on to future generations the amazing techniques of Japan's soaplands." (By Ryann Connell)