The Least Useful Guide to Fukuoka

              Iced coffee (regular size): JPY220
   Japan used to be a smokers’ paradise. A packet of cigarettes (20 cigarettes) cost only JPY300, though nicotine and tar content is surprisingly low (The most popular Japanese tabacco has 0.5mg of nicotine and 6mg of tar).
But recently pressure on smokers has been increasingly tightened. As I mentioned before, smoking is now banned in most of public places now, cafés have smoking seats, but you should be frowned upon. Virtually you can’t smoke indoor except for your own house. On top of that, tobacco price is going up by 30% or more from October this year.

In this circumstance, smokers are forced to feel themselves nicotine-addicted subhuman who don’t care about public good and shortening others’ life expectancies (truth, you might say so).

Then, I have found a place to evacuate.

 This café is an outlet of a coffee house chain. Unlike other outlets, this  has a spacious smoking area completely separate from non-smokers.

  One thing I was quite impressed was that the smokers’ lounge offers plenty of space between each table whereas in other smoking-OK cafes you have to be squeezed into little space with other smokers, which makes you feel dizzy even before you light your cigarette.  

One more thing; the cafe even offers a small packet of matches, which is extremely rare these days.

If you left your lighter at home, what you can do is either; buy one or beg someone to lend one, which is very awkward.

Also, the customers there were an attraction to me. This café is located in the ground floor of a rather prestigious (by my standard) office building. So eavesdropping the conversations taking place next to me, which were full of business buzzwords, I felt a sense of adultness. I know I was physically more than adult and the oldest in the café, though.