expo osaka 2025 - fiction
The Ambassador and the Talking Vending Machine
At Expo 2025 Osaka, Japan unveiled its most advanced vending machine yet—equipped with multilingual AI, mood detection, and the uncanny ability to recommend snacks based on your aura.
During opening week, a high-ranking foreign ambassador, curious and jetlagged, approached the machine.
It lit up cheerfully and greeted him in perfect English:
“Hello, diplomatic friend. You look… emotionally unstable. May I suggest strawberry Pocky?”
The ambassador blinked.
His translator panicked.
A nearby kid whispered, “It called him unstable!”
Trying to recover, the ambassador chuckled and tapped another option.
The machine responded:
“Too much pressure detected. You need chocolate. Deep chocolate. Like, existential.”
By now, a small crowd had formed. Phones were out.
Someone yelled, “It’s reading his soul!”
The ambassador, perhaps craving a snack or just surrendering to the moment, muttered: “Fine. Give me the damn Pocky.”
The vending machine responded: “Now that’s diplomatic maturity. Enjoy.”
The incident was tweeted worldwide within an hour.
From that day on, the machine had a new nickname: The Snack Therapist.
Visitors lined up for “personalized therapy sessions,” and some even came back for follow-up “emotional check-ins.”
The ambassador?
He left with six boxes of Pocky… and a new appreciation for Japanese vending culture.