It’s no secret that Japan is widely regarded as a high-tech country where the latest technologies are implemented that would seem light years ahead of almost any other country in the world. After all, Japan is known for so many great inventions that helped thrust society in the digital age such as laptops, portable calculators, cd players, cameras, batteries and so much more.

However, the land of the rising sun is also known for its weird inventions as well. We’ve compiled a list of ten pictures that prove why Japan is such an amazing, unique and futuristic place to live in.

1) Parking in Japan

If there’s one thing that Japanese technology often aims to do, it’s to be incredibly efficient. A lot of their parking spots are actually semi or fully automated, which saves an incredible amount of space. It’s called an automated car parking system (APS), and it basically works as an automated and huge storage and retrieval machine. Space-saving is taken to the next level.

2) Robot employees

If you take a look at this picture showing a hotel reception, you probably won’t be able to spot anything out of the ordinary at first. However, the crew members at the reception are actually robots who simply assist customers with their programmed commands. The sign says: “Don’t touch the robots.”

3) Umbrella locks

The Japanse people hold their umbrellas in high regard, and some stores even have ‘parking spaces’ for umbrellas. Upon entering a store, you can lock your umbrella in one of the electronic locks and pick it up right where you left it when you exit.

4) Gigantic indoor beach

Meet the largest indoor beach in the world: the Seageai Ocean Dome. The building measures about 300 meters in length and 100 meters in width and has around a million visitors each year. It was officially listed in the Guinness World Records book as the largest indoor resort. Unfortunately, the Ocean Dome was demolished back in 2017 after a failed rebranding of the project. Fun fact: the roof was also retractable so that people could enjoy a blue sky even when the weather wasn’t in their favor.

5) Cuboid grooming

Not everything in Japan has to be high-tech, it can be weird or funny too. Just take a look at these adorable pups, for example! Groomers specialize in cubed fur, and it gives these animals a truly unique and funny look. Perhaps cubes are the future trend of grooming?

6) Incredible variety

If you’re often overwhelmed by choice stress, it probably isn’t a great idea to go shopping in Japan. After all, the country is known for its incredible amount of variety in products – just getting a KitKat bar, for example, can take ages before you go through all the available flavors!

7) High-tech toilets

If there’s one thing that the Japanse are known for, it’s their incredibly technological toilets. They took something simple that’s been around for ages and redesigned it with innovation and technology in mind. A heated seat? Not a problem? A built-in sink? A remote control? Japanse toilets have got you covered.

8) Supersize me?

That’s a sentence that the Japanese fast-food lovers probably won’t know. Where Americans tend to supersize things in a McDonald’s, the opposite is true for Japan. Instead of going bigger, they used compact kitchen technology to put a McDonalds in a very small ‘capsule’, so to speak.

9) Hotel pods

As you’ve probably already noticed, efficiency is very important over here. While you’ll find regular hotel rooms for tourists, the Japanese themselves are actually quite used to sleeping in a ‘hotel pod’ or cocoon! You don’t really have a lot of room, but there’s a pull-down cover for your privacy.

10) Food that actually matches the advertisements

No matter how tasty food and drinks look at promotional materials, they almost never look the same in real life. Just think of a burger, for example… However, the same definitely can’t be said in Japan – in fact, products that don’t match the advertisements are the exception over there, not the rule!

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