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Year-end jumbo lottery PHOTO BY TARO FUJIMOTO

Wednesday 10th December, 06:21 AM JST

People queue to buy year-end jumbo lottery tickets in Tokyo’s Ginza district. The waiting time at this Ginza booth is up to 90 minutes, even at night. Lottery tickets will be sold nationwide through Dec 19 and winners will be announced on Dec 31. Seventy grand prizes worth 200 million yen each and 140 secondary prizes worth 100 million yen each are up for grabs this year. In addition, 7,000 special prizes (1 million yen each) will also be awarded to mark the jumbo lottery’s 30th anniversary.

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Latest 15 of 17 Total Comments Show All

  • tokyotom at 08:14 AM JST - 10th December

    lining up to pay poor people's tax it looks to me

  • some14some at 08:20 AM JST - 10th December

    Good luck ! Look at counter Nos. 1 2 3 5....Number 4 is dropped (not considered lucky in Japan). But 4th person in front row, is he in prayer mode?

  • smartacus at 08:30 AM JST - 10th December

    How can anyone want to wait for up to 90 minutes on a cold night?

  • soldave at 08:33 AM JST - 10th December

    some14some - what's wrong with 6 too?

  • thepro at 08:36 AM JST - 10th December

    Walking past these lines is so depressing

  • some14some at 08:45 AM JST - 10th December

    some14some - what's wrong with 6 too?

    6 is invisible or 5~7 or my eyesight is poor :)

  • mistyblue at 08:49 AM JST - 10th December

    counter 6 was just closed, ran out of tickets! :D

  • Weasel at 09:00 AM JST - 10th December

    Almost would dare to wonder how nutty people would react if they offered winnings similar to what's usually offered on the PowerBall in the US? Do agree with what's already been said about the lotto...it's gambling for people who are horrible at mathematics, or have a lousy understanding of statistics.

  • cleo at 09:53 AM JST - 10th December

    We all know why there's no 4, but I'd never noticed there being no 6 before.....roku or mu....Could it be that mu (indicating 'no winner' is also bad luck?

  • oyabaka at 10:02 AM JST - 10th December

    It's not a poor people's tax- it's an idiot tax. The bigger the idiot, the bigger the "tax"

  • telecasterplayer at 12:11 PM JST - 10th December

    Uhmmmmmm.. I got mine in Shinjuku on November 25th.. and there was no line at all. Please tell me I didn't buy a forgery.

  • TokyoXtreme at 06:01 PM JST - 10th December

    Here are some Japanese people engaging in the most popular national sport: amateur line waiting. I see some potential professionals in this line-up... must have sharpened their skills waiting for Krispy Kreme and Coldstone Creamery. You have to admire the line waiters for their dedication; overworked from mind-numbing jobs, they devote their minuscule free time training for their sport.

  • Kawasaki at 07:20 PM JST - 10th December

    Notginger - you said people wouldn't retire with 300 million yen? I dunno, that's about 3 million USD.. I could retire very easily with 500k and live an upper-middle class lifestyle.. with 3M, I don't know why anyone WOULDN'T retire unless they have no life (in other words, they WANT to be stuck in an office all day)

  • Kawasaki at 07:44 PM JST - 11th December

    Notginger - yes, I understand it perfectly, thank you. Dumping your money in a bank account and living off the interest is not the way you make money though, maybe that's what you had in mind? It's quite easy to make 500k a year with 3M through trading.

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