Wow, didnt expect so much info here for japan.
Just to share my experience, I've only googled around for soaplands few days before I went for a free and easy tour in Japan with another friend of mine, 2 years back.
For me I've ventured alone on foot round the Yoshiwara red light district ... my tour buddy went off for gaming session ...
Indeed it benefits you fellow bros if you can speak and understand Japanese, even if a little helps. Surprisingly the 'butlers' standing outside the soapland shops welcomed me even though I was only wearing a hoodie+jeans+boots and not formal wear, lucky me.
The charges for me was around SGD $250 for a 70 minutes session.
Customer service from the 'pimp' and the girl was really treating u like a VIP.
When I went into the soapland, there was a holding/waiting room where the pimp will chat with u to understand what type of girls u like, then came back with a few photos to choose from.
Glad that the girl whom I've chosen was 99% similar to her photo. She seemed shy and intro herself to me her name was Sakura.
Nuru Massage, foreplays in the bathtub and on the bed were really good, bbbj was really similar to AV ... her slurping sound during the bbbj turned me on seriously
And of course I remember the pimp saying "can do anything to the girl but treat her gently" made me wanna try almost everything on her lol.
Could tell that the girl was a little afraid at the beginning as the pimp must have told her that I'm a foreigner (actually I owned up to the butler before going in) since my Japanese language was rusty due to lack of practice; didn't want to get 'stunt' by the Yakuza catching me lying that I am a local
. But anyways she was less shy and more open and chatty to me once she knew that I could communicate in Japanese and then came the GFE !!!
Anyways, the funny thing then was that both the pimp and the girl told me that I was very bold and daring ... didn't elaborate on it though and I am still wondering what was so bold and daring of me ...
From my view, the Soapland shops seemed to be friendlier and more open to foreigners during night time; I've tried visiting the area during daytime but all I've got was them saying:
1) Gai Jin Dame !! (No outsiders/foreigners), or
2) We (the shop) welcome u but our girls are not comfortable with foreigners (then said sorry to u and asked u to go ...)
By the way I've visited the shop ... vaguely recalled that the shop name was "IDOL <something> <something>" all in Japanese Katakana Words.
Sorry for being too lengthy, just excited to trigger my pleasant memories from my past Japan Trip.