Alcohol and Tobacco

I know this is a taboo subject in the USA, and I am likely going to get in trouble when I return to the states because of it, but I find this topic very interesting.


First of all, in the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I was very anti-alcohol for most of my life and didn't have my first drink until I was like 23, I don't even remember exactly, it might have been 22 or 24.   Most of the people I was around in college would drink and become very stupid and do stupid things and I always thought alcohol made people do stupid stuff, so why drink it?  But after realizing that stupid people do stupid things when drunk and it's the person that is to blame, not the alcohol, then I eased up a little bit on my opinion on alcohol.  But anyhow, I remember being asked "do you drink" by students in the USA and my answer to them was always without hesitation "no." 

Now fast forward to Japan.  It's basically treated the same as pop in the states.  It's very common for students and teachers to say, upon first meeting me.  "Oh hello Thomas...where are you from?  Oh America?  What beer do you like better, American or Japanese?  Do you like Japanese Sake?" etc etc etc.  Teachers, although it's frowned upon, drink (and smoke) at school.  It's such a different world in Japan.  For proof, here is a teacher's desk.

What is that bottle to the left of the teacher's computer?

Oh just a bottle of brandy.

Once a teacher went to Sapporo on vacation and brought back a case of special Sapporo beer that you can only buy in Hokkaido and just had it sitting in the teachers room for a couple days for anyone to take one.

Another thing to note is that in the USA, when you smell tobacco at school, you know that a student went into the bathroom and smoked.  In Japan, the chances are greater that a teacher went into the bathroom to smoke.  Smoking was only banned at Noheji high school around the year 2000, so the teachers who are on the older side still think you should be able to smoke wherever you want.

The most common way people greet me on the streets is by saying "Tomasu!  Have you been drinking lately?  We should go drinking!"  During the first year or so in Japan I thought everyone was an alcoholic, but it's just their way of getting together.  It would be the same for someone in America to say "let's hang out" but with sake such a part of Japan's culture, "let's drink sake" is a manly way of saying "why don't you come over for tea?"

And lastly, with the abundance of alcoholic drinks and cigarettes in vending machines everywhere, they really don't seem to mind if kids under the drinking and smoking age have easy access to it.