foreign 5s service in Japan

(this was last summer) for financial reasons I needed to have a US phone number before I came to Japan, but knowing I would want to have a nice new iPhone once I landed and got settled; I went to an Apple store in the US and bought (Apple factory) unlocked phones (2) at the retail price plus a 2 year "AppleCare" service. I asked the question: "will this phone work in Japan?" and the answer was, "of course, yes". My mistake, wrongly worded question, wrong answer.

My financial dealings done, I joyously cancelled my AT&T service and went to join the multitude of happy Japanese carrier service providers; and was denied, rebuffed, rejected (but politely) It seems my GSM phone is not "legally" licensed for use in Japan. The famous "international" iPhone is not so. I have been dealing with someone in Apple-Asia, but he has not had success so far, so I am reaching out to the "Apple Community"

By Google and blog, I have since learned that due to intense competition between carriers in Japan for the absolute lowest priced service, such plans are basically loss leaders. The only real money the carriers make is in selling equipment and accessories. Oh, and they will give some services, but are reluctant to do so even for Asian foreigners and certainly NEVER for American iPhones (this includes the US, Canada, Mexico, all of Europe, Argentina and Columbia; see the "legal" regulations under Settings)

I have been advised I can get a 3rd party nano chip and subscribe to a second tier service, but they offer no foreign or roaming features (we would like to travel and be in communication with each other or the "folks back home". And we were advised, we could, for each country we visited by another nano chip and plan for each country or region we visited. Or, finally, we were offered to sell the two phones we have on "eBay" and just eat the loss and go with a first tier service provider.

Has anyone out there had any success bending the unbendable Japanese (on this issue) ?