Gambling

About two weeks have passed since the last Sunday English club, and I forgot to write about the topic on that day; that was gambling.

Most forms of gambling are illegal in Japan. However, there are goverment-controlled gamblings featuring various kinds of racing: horse racing, motorboat race, bicycle race, and auto race. They are called Sankei-auto (三競オート：競馬、競艇、競輪、オートレース). On the other hand, there are public-managed lotteries: Jumbo Takarakuji lottery, Numbers 3, Numbers 4, Loto 6, and Mini Loto. The Jumbo Takarakuji lottery includes five annual lotteries: Green Jumbo in March, Dream Jumbo in June, Summer Jumbo in August, Autumn Jumbo in October, and Nennmatsu (year-end) Jumbo inDecember. They have been important source of revenue for some loval goverments.

I've never tried any kinds of these gambling, and now I'm very surprised that Japanese have lots of opportunities to do gambling! In addition, we have pachinko, a Japanese pinball game. We have so many pachinko parlors everywhere across Japan. I'm afraid that Japanese people liked gambling compared with others. Tokyo governor has an idea of setting a casino in Daiba, but I think Japanese have already enough gamblings and no need to make a casino. Of course there might be some advantages, but I'm not sure how they are going to use money from the casino.
http://www.macromill.com/client/r_data/20021004kajino/index.html
http://homepage3.nifty.com/nskk/hantairon002.htm
http://www.casinoschool.co.jp/circumstances.html

Somewhat we talked about popular card games in Japan in the end. I used to play Uno or Daihugou, but I forgot how to play them. I got interested in Hanahuda after hearing some basic rules by other members. It seems a traditional Japanese play, so I want to get the hang of it near future.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanafuda