Japan man charges clients US$71 per hour ‘to do nothing’: ‘basically, I rent myself out’

Shoji Morimoto has accompanied his clients to parks to play on see-saws, escorted them to cafes for lunches and waved them off from railway stations

Often, he gets paid to simply exist as their companion. But doing nothing doesn’t mean he’ll do anything – and certainly nothing sexual

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Shoji Morimoto. ‘My job is to be wherever my clients want me to be and to do nothing in particular’. Photo: Reuters

Published: 3:45pm, 6 Sep 2022

Shoji Morimoto has what some would see as a dream job: he gets paid to do pretty much nothing.

The 38-year-old Tokyo resident charges 10,000 yen (US$71) an hour to accompany clients and simply exist as a companion.

“Basically, I rent myself out. My job is to be wherever my clients want me to be and to do nothing in particular,” Morimoto said, adding that he had handled some 4,000 sessions in the past four years.

Shoji Morimoto checks his phone while meeting his client Aruna Chida at a cafe in Tokyo. Photo: Reuters

With a lanky build and average looks, Morimoto now boasts nearly a quarter of a million followers on Twitter, where he finds most of his clients. Roughly one-quarter of them are repeat customers, including one who has hired him 270 times.

His job has taken him to a park with a person who wanted to play on a see-saw. He has also beamed and waved through a train window at a complete stranger who wanted a send-off.

Doing nothing doesn’t mean Morimoto will do anything. He has turned down offers to move a fridge and go to Cambodia, and doesn’t take any requests of a sexual nature.

Last week, Morimoto sat opposite Aruna Chida, a 27-year-old data analyst clad in a sari, having a sparse conversation over tea and cakes.