Her move is like that of more than 400,000 Chinese students who have chosen to study in Japan since the early 1980s. And at that time, many Chinese students took up bar hostessing to finance their study in Japan, said Chinese-Japanese scholar Gracia Liu-Farrer.

After working part-time in a restaurant far from her home, she was on the metro and fainted from the heavy workload.

Her mother offered to bring her into the world of hostessing and for more pay and less work she agreed — she went on to spend more than five years in the industry.

Being a hostess doesn’t necessarily lead to moral corruption, and in the end Hikaru successfully made a new life for herself.

But in the process, she dated a much older man, had two abortions and learned the hard way that men can change under the influence of alcohol.

Hostess work is not as it seems

In Japan, hostess bars and clubs are entrenched in the nightlife industry. Men go to have hostesses accompany, entertain and flirt with them.

The first bar Hikaru worked at had eight hostesses from different parts of China, owned by a middle-aged Shanghainese woman.

The bar was in Tokyo’s central Kanda district surrounded by office buildings and restaurants. The tiny 60-square-meter bar, awash in yellow light was filled with white-collar workers aged from 30 to 50 crooning on the karaoke machine. Customers would come to the bar alone, with colleagues or friends.

They pay 3000 yen an hour (about HK$191) for their own alcohol and 1000 yen (about HK$63) for each drink the hostess has.

Hikaru was the youngest at her bar, aged 20, and would work from 8pm sometimes until 4am. Workwear usually meant a short tube dress and heavy make-up, her role was to drink, sing and try to talk with her customers in broken Japanese.

“When I first started, I was very nervous because I knew nothing. I observed arguments between women and tainted relationships between men and women,” she said.

As her Japanese improved, so did her experience. She learnt to fake her smile and tell racy jokes. And she learnt ways to deal with customers by observing and discussing with other senior hostesses.

“If a customer touched my breast, I would bow down and pretend to pick up something that drops on the ground or I would make him a drink and divert his attention,” Hikaru said. “I would have a smile on my face and not let him feel that I hate his behaviour.”

Playing the game

While Hikaru became experienced at playing the game with men, the beautiful impressions she used to have towards men shattered.

“After drinking, some men who are decent office workers during daytime would argue with you, touch you and insult you at night,” she said, “some of them would even take off their trousers, kneel down and ask you to lash their bottoms with a belt.”

Hikaru’s starting salary was 1800 yen an hour (about HK$115) and it rose to 2000 yen an hour (about HK$128) three months later. At its peak, her monthly salary rose to 400,000 yen (about HK$26,000), while the average monthly salary in Shanghai at that time was about the equivalent of HK$4000.

However, she spent it all.

“You earn money easily, so you spend it easily”, she said.

Bar hostesses are not supposed to provide sex services, but the topic inevitably comes up. The salary system applied by some hostess bars and the job environment can incentivise hostesses to have a sexual relationship with their customers.

‘I sold my body’

“Customers gave jewellery and designer bags to some hostesses as presents. As a woman, I felt bad when others had them and I didn’t. And every hostess was involved in this kind of exchange. So I also lied and sold my body for it, ” Hikaru confessed.

On the other hand, she was romantically involved with her customers. She dated a 44-year-old Japanese software engineer for six years and had two abortions for him.

“I believe he loves me but he doesn’t want to marry me,” she said.

After graduating with a degree in business psychology this August, Hikaru decided to return to China.

And she has no regrets. “I don’t think my previous work was dirty. I used my wisdom and made great efforts to support myself,” she said.