Vending machines like this one are a common signt on German streets. They are never right next to the machines selling little toys and candy, but sometimes only half a block away. This was one of the first things that struck me as really odd in Germany, partly because of the apparently easy access to cigarettes, but also because the US just doesn’t have vending machines of any sort randomly situated along residential streets. I asked one of my German colleagues about it. The legal smoking age in Germany went up from 16 to 18 a year ago, and about the same time, all tobacco vending machines were required to have magnetic strip readers, so anyone wanting to use one had to swipe a credit card first. Not to pay, just to supposedly prove that the death-sticks are being sold to an adult. I told my colleague that plan wouldn’t go over well in America. Not that I think German teens are less crafty than American ones… I just don’t think German adults are quite so obsessive.
People do seem to smoke more here. Smoking restrictions in public places have gradually been going into effect across Germany over the last several years, and although they aren’t always taken seriously (on train platforms, for example) it is apparently a lot better than it used to be. We’ve been here almost two months and I have yet to be seriously inconvenienced/angered/annoyed by cigarette smoke.
Joe was using the wireless internet in the casino yesterday before German class when a woman came up and asked to borrow his card so she could get a pack of cigarettes out of the vending machine by the front door. He pleaded ignorance. Side note: The building with the cafeteria and gift shop and meeting rooms at DLR is called the casino. The cafeteria itself is called the canteen. Interesting legacy.
Final cigarette note: you can, of course, also buy cigarettes from a real person in a little Tobakwaren or in grocery stores. The cigarettes are kept next to the check-out lines behind a kind of metal curtain that can be retracted by pushing a button at the very top, presumably to keep them out of the hands of children. And short adults. Sorry Lesley.
November 11, 2008 at 10:47 am
I’m fondly remembering the vending machines in Japan, where you could get a whole meal out of one.
Also, we’ve been told that Europeans think Americans are way too uptight about smoking. On this issue, I’m all crazy Red, White, and Blue.
November 11, 2008 at 3:10 pm
what the!?! i don’t want stupid cigarettes anyway. so there.
November 11, 2008 at 4:31 pm
Lesley, I hope you’ll remember that only half of the blog writers at Genauslanders have made cracks about your height. The other half — the Pepe half — only makes fun of the freakishly TALL.