The land of vending machines

If you have ever visited Japan, one of the first things you’d notice are the abundance of vending machines. In fact there is one vending machine to 23 people — wow.

It always amuses me that even in the boonies, there are vending machines. I went camping once and there were two vending machines next to the site (which came in handy when we ran out of Coke for the whiskey). Contrary to popular belief that there are vending machines for everything in Japan, I don’t think your lay person would encounter all of them, much less on a daily basis.

In reality, as an expat living in Tokyo, I only really come across vending machines that sell drinks and cigarettes. When I travel outside Tokyo, I tend to see a wider variety of vending machines, like those that sell ice-cream, “gourmet” coffee (proper lattes and cappuccinos), cup ramen, beer/chu-hi, and hot snacks.

I’ve only ever tried taiyaki (fish shaped doughy dessert stuffed with azuki, or red bean, paste) and takoyaki (round doughy balls stuffed with octopus) and for vending machine nosh, they were actually pretty good. I thought they would be overcooked but they weren’t.

For more “sensationalist” vending machines, you can click here and here.

Not meaning to be a wet blanket but some folks seem to think Japan is teeming with out-of-this-world weirdness. It can be true but tends to be confined to a very small minority and everyone else just goes about their own way. So please don’t ask your Japanese friend if there are vending machines that sell underwear (dirty or otherwise) all over Tokyo because it’s kind of gross on so many levels.

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