Japanese drinking culture

Drunk people in Japan

Many countries have an alcohol drinking culture. Let me introduce one of the Japanese drinking culture. Tokyo is “a nightless entertainment city” especially near the famous stations. Many chain store Izakaya (a bar with food) are open till morning, sometimes 24 hours. You can find them almost every stations in Tokyo 23 wards. It is very controversial whether it is good or bad for Japanese people. My opinion, it is clearly not positive for Japanese people. Well, I understand that it is fun to hang out and drink with friends till the morning sometimes, but not all the time. Japan does not have a time restriction for serving and selling alcohols in the law. You can buy alcohols at a convenience stores anytime. This is because you can find so many drunk people on the trains and streets in Tokyo. It is surprising that there are so many business men with nice suits puking on the street even in the train. Japan has an interesting way to social/business communication occasion called “nominication”(drinking communication) especially among business men, and I believe it might cause disgraceful behavior of them in the picture below.  I will introduce “nominication” in a different blog post.

I took the picture below at Ikebukuro station around midnight. The girl seemed to be a college student  passed out. Ikebukuro station is one of the largest stations in Japan and very crowded even around midnight.

Drinking is fun, but you should know your limit.