Posted on 05/28/2025 9:44:24 AM PDT by DallasBiff
One of my favorite things about traveling is being able to see how laws and social taboos (what silly things they are) change across countries.
Differences between Japan and the United States extend beyond simply bowing and taking off your shoes to enter places. The following ten things are not only rare in the United States, but most of them are also illegal. And so naturally, I feel compelled to do all of them whilst adventuring in the Land of the Rising Sun.
Snip
Buy Cigarettes from Vending Machines
Japan has an interesting relationship with cigarettes. Should you need a pack of cigarettes, you do not even enter one of the dozens of convenience stores sprinkled throughout the country, you need only press a button on a vending machine (for around 4-5 USD). How do they keep minors from buying these? Some sort of ID reader? I guess I will have to give one of them a try.
(Excerpt) Read more at halfwayanywhere.com ...
If the Japanese are getting their smokes and liquor out of vending machines, that could explain their love for robots.
It’s the vending machines for sex, though, that people would be more curious to hear about.
Hell, I was born in the 70s and I remember cigarette vending machines being everywhere in the 80s.
I think that
11) Buy Child Porn
was left off the list. Unless I am misinformed.
the Japanese sell used school girl panties in vending machines for the wankers.
And don't ever just take off when the light turns green - you DO NOT have the right-of-way. That was one of the first thing they taught us in the driving class.
Mmmm. Love me some whale.
I read about that years ago. I also read that actual school-girls were not involved in the fabrication of that product.
Thanks, now I know there’s no reason to go to Japan.
I'm also old enough to remember when every Shoney's or Waffle House had a cigarette vending machine near the front door.
These days I always look for red-light runners before I start to move on the green light, in any city. Avoid quite a few accidents that way. Just yesterday I saw people continuing to come through a red light for about ten seconds after it had changed.
11: Blurry porn.
12) Make your mother-in-law be quiet.
When I was stationed at Great Lakes NTC in the early eighties, there were beer and cigarette machines on every floor of the base barracks.
Interesting article on lung cancer in Japan vs US.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3317031/
Every restaurant and bar had a cigarette vending machine in the entry.
That could be helpful for those who aren’t accustomed to the squat toilet and need to do a bit of clean-up.
In college, we had a cigarette machine in the basement laundry room. They went from 50 cents to 75 cents a pack over one summer. Highway robbery, I tell ya...
I hope you read correctly then. Still, pervs.
The customers are definitely pervs and easily fooled if what I read was correct.
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