Later that day, while reading through the hotel information, I came across the Terms and Conditions for accommodation, printed in Japanese and English. Firstly, I noticed that much like others I’ve seen in various hotels over the past two years erroneously states in Article 8 that:<\/p>\n
“The guest shall register the following particulars at the front desk of the Ryokan\/Hotel on the day of accommodation: (1) Name, age, sex, address, and occupation of the guest(s) (2) For non Japanese: nationality, passport number, port and date of entry in Japan<\/b> This is nothing new. There have been many accounts from others about this error in Japanese hotel documentation.<\/a> However, the Japanese version also seems to be the same wording as in English.<\/p>\n I’ve attached a scan of the original documents in the files section of the Community yahoogroups site. (Too big to put here as image or thumbnail–see them at Debito.org here:)<\/p>\n English: https:\/\/www.debito.org\/newhotellaws2008eng.jpg<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n Japanese: Furthermore, as Debito has mentioned and documented before<\/a>, the Hotel law article 5 states that accomodation can only be refused by the hotel in the case of:<\/p>\n 1) a health issue involving contagious disease, 2) a clear and present endangerment of public morals, or 3) because all rooms are full.<\/p>\n However, this hotel terms and conditions Article 5 has additional (new?), disturbing provisions:<\/p>\n Article 5 (Refusal of Accommodation Contracts)<\/b><\/p>\n The Ryokan\/Hotel may not accept the conclusion of an Accommodation Contract under any of the following cases:<\/p>\n (1) When the application for accommodation does not conform with these Terms and Conditions<\/p>\n (2) When the Ryokan\/Hotel is fully booked and no room is available<\/p>\n (3) When the Guest seeking accommodation is deemed liable to conduct himself in a manner that will contravene the laws or act against the public order or good morals<\/p>\n (4) When the guest is clearly detected as carrying an infectious disease<\/p>\n (5) When the Ryokan\/Hotel is requested to assume an unreasonable burden in regard to his accommodation [shukuhaku ni kanshi gouriteki na han’i o koeru futan o motomerareta toki–literally, “at times when the burden demanded in terms of staying has superseded the bounds of rationality\/reasonability”–there we go with that easily-abusable “gouriteki sabetsu” “rational discrimination” concept again…<\/a>]<\/i><\/p>\n (6) When the Ryokan\/Hotel is unable to provide accommodation due to natural calamities, disfunction of the facilities and or other unavoidable causes, or<\/b><\/p>\n (7) When the provisions of Article 5 of Iwate Metropolitan\/Prefecture Ordinance are applicable.<\/i><\/p>\n Clause number 5 also is troubling to me. What constitutes an “unreasonable burden” and who decides? Does having Japanese customers complaining about foreign bathers and demanding refunds allow the hotel to refuse non-Japanese out of fear of losing customers? Does not having English-speaking (or other language) staff cause “unreasonable burden” to rural hotels and allow them to turn away people as well?<\/p>\n Clause 7 I haven’t researched as of yet, but it seems that ordinances created at the prefectural level may have the power to refuse others as well.<\/p>\n
\n![\"newarticle8_eng.jpg\"](\"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/01\/newarticle8_eng.jpg\")
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\n![\"newarticle8_jp.jpg\"](\"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/01\/newarticle8_jp.jpg\")
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\nhttps:\/\/www.debito.org\/newhotellaws2008j.jpg<\/a><\/p>\n![\"newarticle5_eng.jpg\"](\"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/01\/newarticle5_eng.jpg\")
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\n![\"newarticle5_jp.jpg\"](\"https:\/\/www.debito.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/01\/newarticle5_jp.jpg\")
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\nAs you can see, clause number 1 seems to me to have a rather broad range of powers to refuse accommodation. Fail to give up your passport\/ID to the front desk and we can deny you a room because you’re not conforming to Article 7 of our Accommodation Contract.<\/p>\n