To add on to the other response, if you go to Akihabara a.k.a. "Electric City" in Tokyo, you'd think you stepped into some kind of anime/manga paradise. There's this one store which has floors and floors of manga, anime, video games, and soundtrack music!! O.o It was a good exercise to go inside, browse through the section, exit on the other side of the store, climb up the stairs, and go through another unlabeled door just to go into another store room. But after going through the fifth floor, you'd begin to wonder if the entire building would end or something.. Haha..

I also heard of middle-aged business men reading manga in the trains. I've seen pictures of it, but I never saw it when I was visiting Japan.


They do have cultural and sports festivals every year. From what I can tell in the Youtube videos, they look more like what you'd have in any other school event such as two leg marathons or dancing to a song. (One event even had high school kids dancing to one of Avril L.'s songs all because it was used for the Japanese Hana Kimi.) One event in the fall and the other in, I think, spring? They probably could expand to those haunted houses and courage tests in certain schools. Not to all, obviously.

Anyone (JLT/Jp local), please feel free to correct me on something. ^_^ But it's fun to see JLT videos on Youtube. You get a good glimpse on the culture and everything.

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Resurecting this, but I'm wondering about how much American culture gets sucked to japan. Like do they watch hannah Montana like we watch DBZ? Or pokemon

Sadly most of what Japanese people know of America comes from TV and movies. MTV and many of the really popular shows do make their way over here. They have formed some really weird ideas about our culture because of this. My host father once asked me if I ate steak for for every meal of the day, or just at dinner, assuming I ate steak at least once a day. I've read of one African American who was ask by a coworker over here how many guns he owned. The kids will basically imitate what they see on TV just like anywhere else, though a 12 year old Japanese boy trying to look "gangsta" just doesn't work.

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and in japan WTF do those vendingachines sell? Cuz it's defintiely not soda. Which leads me to, do Japanese drink soda like sprite or coke ? I've heard of something called calpis which is like carbonated milk?

Most Japanese homes don't have cable. They do watch a lot of American movies and listen to a lot of American music, but they don't have a lot American TV shows in their local channels (which is what most people just get). When I was living there I only saw Ally McBeal, ER, Friends, and Blue's Clues. They don't have Hannah Montana, or Oprah, or any of those huge TV icons.

*EDIT*

Anything from snacks, meals, coffee, bread, tea, energy drinks, even cigarettes. Of course they have soda too, but they don't drink it as much as westerners do. The staple drink in Japan is green tea. That's the complimentary drink in most restaurants and cafeterias next to water.

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So schoolgirl underwears used or not in vending machines was all just comical relief. You would hope that they're all not perverts or something like that. Just a lot of random talk I did with friends so can you give me a clean answer on this thought?

That was true. But that was only just made by three people during the early 1990s. I doubt it still exists now. I've never seen it.

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Don't they sell sex toys in some vending machines, too? I heard that before I went to Japan, and my friends and I tried looking for them, but couldn't find any. Is this a myth or is it really true?

This person wrote about love hotels in Japan and there is a picture of a mini vending machine that sells sex toys.

Here is the link

EDIT: There is some weird stuff there so click at your own risk.

The same person wrote about vending machines.
Click here

It's funny how he was amazed by the ipod vending machine. There is one in a grocery store that is near where I live.

@funkmu1
Yeah, the hello kitty decor is amusing. I don't know why they mixed hello kitty and S&M together.

Last edited by LawX at 8:55 am, Apr 2 2008

The hello kitty decor amuses me.

Haha, that's amazing. Thanks for the links! I'm loving the S&M Hello Kitty room.

Ok someone has to confirm this, are there still mixed onsens in Japan today?? Do some onsens have specific time fr mixed bathing? I read somewhere that it used to be normal but was stopped in the late 19th century- early 20th century..

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There are places that have them still, but they are a lot rarer than regular ones.

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Alright new one, are girls REALLY short in japan? Example is like Lovely complex, they make a HUGE deal about how she's 172cm which translated to imperial system is only 5' 6" that's not that tall even for a girl, most girls I know are about that height anyway. In another manga this girl is 165cm and people are like OMG OMG OMG she's so talll!! that's only 5' 4" which is not that tall.