Walk into any convenience or drug store and you'll probably happen across a large shelf displaying lots of small, shiny, intriguing looking bottles. I learned quite a while ago that they were filled with various tonics to cure hangovers, improve health, boost your energy levels, etc., but I've never really felt the need to indulge in these 'genki drinks' (as they're known colloquially, genki meaning health or well being) since I don't drink a lot, and I feel that my health is generally ok. However they do look interesting, and even kinda tasty in their funky looking bottles and all wrapped up in their shiny, text covered labels. So for those of you who also wonder if they really have any special powers, wonder no longer. I decided to do a taste test of 4 of the most popular ones (according to the pharmacist) over a period of 4 days and give you the results right here. Onward!

Thusday May 25th
The first one I tried is called 'Oronamin C' and was the cheapest of the four coming in at 120 yen. Not sure what Oronamin means but C probably stands for vitamin C since it's listed in the ingredients. Wasn't sure what to expect for taste, something mediciny maybe, but was pleasantly surprised. Tastes pretty much like a softdrink, something similar to Doctor Pepper but not quite. Very sweet and kind of syrupy, made me feel thirsty later on. Ingredients besides vitamin C are sugar (go figure), grape extract, honey, salt, citric acid, caffeine, and a bunch of other amino acids. There's also one that looks like it says vitamin P. Vitamin P? Isn't that from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory? Anyway not much in it that makes it any different from a bottle of juice. So how did I feel? No superhuman effects unfortunately, actually no effects at all except thirst, better luck tomorrow.

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Friday May 26th
Today I went for S.CUP Gold II, kind of a long meaningless name, but my expectations were higher than yesterday since the price was a bit steep at 315 yen. The label says, in English: 'S. CUP Gold II is an efficient energy drink, which contains 3000 mg of taurine, DADA and various vitamins as well. When you get tired, just try S.CUP Gold II.' Wonderful, but what is taurine and DADA? A quick web search informs me that taurine is an amino acid used to treat such things as diabetes, Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy, alcoholism, etc. Not sure what I'm doing drinking it then, or how exactly it's supposed to boost my energy. Another interesting fact, taurine is abundant in catfood.... DADA was harder to find, but it seems to be another kind of amino acid and the correct way to write it is dadA. Other ingredients are pretty much the same as yesterday's drink except that S.Cup contains Royal Jelly, an even longer list of meaningless chemical names, and get this, alcohol! Well only 0.2ml. Taste? Well, it was sharply sweet, and bitter, very mediciny like cough syrup. Altogether not really pleasant. So how did I feel? It might have been imagination but I did feel perked up a little. Still, today was hardly tiring what with my morning classes being cancelled....

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Saturday May 27th
Well it's Saturday morning and I just got back from the gym, what better time to drink a genki drink? On the menu today we have ripobitan D and if the name alone doesn't make you feel better I don't know what will. Ingredients? Well pretty much the same; a bunch of aminos, lots of different vitamin Bs, taurine again (1000mg only) however instead of alcohol, it's got nicotine! Damn next I'm gonna being doing drugs or something. When I opened the bottle I thought it smelled pretty nice, but the taste unfortunately is reminiscent of yesterday: sharp, thick, sickly sweet with a hint of bitterness. Still, slightly better than S.Cup Gold II, but more importantly, after working out hard I feel pretty good hours later, perhaps there is some extra genkiness in my system? Maybe it's the nicotine....

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Sunday May 28th
Last but not least for sure! I drank the Regain 3000 after playing ultimate today. What better time to drink an energy drink after running around in the sun for hours? So how did it stack up? First of all it was friggin delicious!! Perhaps the fact that I was parched for anything liquid affected my judgement slightly, I could've drank 5 bottles of the stuff. Tasted sweet, but not overly so, nor was it bitter or too medicine-like. The price was steep at 350 yen, but because of that I expected results, and got them! Definitely felt more energized afterwards. Ingredients were almost the same as S.Cup Gold II, but Regain 3000 contains something called liverall, which is made from fish liver or something. Maybe that was the magic ingredient?

So there you have it! Congratulations to Regain 3000, a bit expensive but hey, if you want results in this world you gotta pay a bit extra right?

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Harajuku to Tokyo, Park Photowalk
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