meanwhile, in japan...

Shirts and pants from 7-eleven:

Thousands and thousands of 7-Eleven stores that have ATMs and even T-O-I-L-E-T-S inside. There are more than 18,000 7-Eleven stores in Japan, which is more than twice the number in the United States. And the fact that many of them contain toilets means that you never have to go to a coffee shop and pretend that you actually want a coffee when you don’t want a coffee, you just want a piss.

Bikes racks that ANY bike can lock into. No need to hire out a potentially expensive city bike to get from A to B. Just lock in your own. And these bike locks are free to use too.

Queues for trains and ATMs that look like this. YES, THIS MIGHT LOOK BORING, but it means that nobody is looking over your shoulder and people can get on and off public transportation without that painful pushing and shoving because nobody knows who is first. Every single train station also has its own jingle – for when the train is about to arrive or depart.

Seats on trains that can switch direction if you prefer to sit, or not sit, with your mates.

A train that is covered in cartoon dogs and features a carriage with a ball pit and a library. It’s called the Aso Boy! and it runs between Kumamoto and Miyaji (Aso). The ball pit and the library are for children.

Vending machines that come with a defibrillator or emergency equipment inside as standard.

Hundreds of TV shows consisting of people making dinner and comments by people watching these people making dinner. Sometimes every channel seems to be airing a show that consists of this format. The people commenting are usually back in a studio or are shown in a box in the corner of the screen while a chef talks and eats food in a kitchen.![Hundreds of TV shows consisting of people making dinner and comments by people watching these people making dinner.

Lockers of all shapes and sizes at every station. Especially useful for travellers, you can store whatever you want for about 500 yen (£2.60/$4) every 24 hours. Many other countries don’t have the nerve to do this.

By the way, you can't store corpses in them :/

Beer vending:

Toilets that can do this when you enter the room. Not necessarily what is depicted in The Simpsons, but they can open to say hello. This can feel weirdly intimidating at first, but you get used to it. There’s even a button on the wall that can lower the seat – so you never have to do it by hand.

Toilets that play sound effects like running water to disguise the sound of you on the toilet. The first time you experience a Japanese toilet, you end up playing with all of the buttons, which include bidets and fans that immediately dry your bottom. Even public toilets have them installed, so you see buttons like this quite often.

#japan #meanwhile #trains #7-11 #toilets #vending machines #bike racks #animated gif