All Over

After three years, I have now returned to the UK and so will not be adding any more posts here. Thank you all for reading

これからもよろしくお願いします!

Until the day I return to Japan-land...

Friday, November 03, 2006

Internet cafes - Japan style



I am currently in an internet cafe. Except this one is Asian style. Some things are normal. I have a computer, a keyboard and of course internet access. But from there the similarities start to fade. Behind me is a wall of manga comics, two metres high. In fact the whole place boasts of 10,000 volumes of big-eyed, pointy-nosed characters in every genre you might think of.

I can also get magazines, newspapers, or a dvd to entertain myself; while sipping one of an array of free drinks (including one called Calpis). I can watch TV, relax on the sofa behind me, even have a snooze with the aid of one of the pillows and sets of blankets provided. There's an array of pastel coloured slippers to put on my feet. I can have my own cubicle with massage chair and array of porn channels. There are showers, billards and darts, dark areas and bright areas, smoking and non. There's boxes of dry violently coloured crusts that turn into nutrious noodles when you add hot water. I can choose different price options: one for 10 mins, another for 9 hours, and in fact I could stay indefinitely.

Food, water, entertainment, open 24/7 - as long I've got money to pay my bill, I have no reason to ever leave. And by the looks of some of the chain-smoking, long haired characters trapsing between the manga aisles, some never do.

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