Drinking in Japan

Half way through the day my voice gave out, which is a pretty big problem for an English teacher. On my dinner break I went to a nearby convenience store looking for something to help.

Convenience stores in Japan are exactly that – convenient. Like convenience stores in Canada, they sell pretty much everything. Unlike Canada, you can’t walk down the street in Japan without tripping over at least two different convenience stores.

While browsing in the store, I found a mysterious looking coloured spray. What I could read on the bottle indicated that it was a throat spray. I couldn’t understand most anything else that was written on the bottle. I needed to try something, so I decided that it was probably safe if it was being sold over the counter.

I tried it out when I got back to work, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it helped! The pain went away, and I was able to speak at a normal volume again. The combination of mystery throat spray and doing my best to limit how much I spoke got me through the rest of my shift. I’m not going to press my luck by going out for karaoke.

** Note to readers – it’s probably not the best idea to take medicine that you don’t understand!!