Vending Machines

One of the first things you'll notice in Japan are the vending machines. They are everywhere. And I mean EVERYWHERE!! On top of a mountain, at the beach, every street corner. The most common are the drink vending machines. They are on every street corner, and sometimes there are rows and rows of them all together. You can never go very far without bumping into a vending machine, even out in the countryside. Some of them even do hot as well as cold drinks, hot tea and coffee in cans.

And then there are the other vending machines - the ones that sell weird things like noodles, cigarettes, beer, saki or condoms. My friend had a beer vending machine in the lobby of her apartment, just in case the residents got thirsty in the night I guess.

One thing I don't get is the cigarette machines. Most of them turn off at automatically at eleven at night and turn on again at six a.m. Someone once told me it was to stop kids buying cigarettes. But how many kids would be out looking for cigarettes at 3 a.m? Surely it would be more logical to have them off during the day and turn them on between 11 and 6, when all those wanna be cigarette smoking children are in bed?

Well I'm out of diet coke so I'd better head out to the machine on the corner and get another can.