There is one lottery stand in the center of my city and I bought some here.
It shows the history of winning big prizes at this stand. The most recent one was about 1.1 million dollars in '08.
Each piece of lottery costs about 3 dollars, but you have to buy at least one unit (10 pieces). You can choose whether "serial number" or "random number" for one unit.
There are three lotteries called "jumbo" in Japan. They are a) Dream, b) Summer, c)Year-end jumbo. a) is sold in spring, b) in summer, c) around the year end. The reason why these lotteries are called "jumbo" is because the top prize in each lottery is about 3.4 million dollars at a maximum ( to win 3.4 million, you need to have additional two adjacent numbers).
For example, in this year-end lottery there are 70 top prizes (2.3 million dollars), and 140 second prizes(1.1 million). The probability of winning the first prize is 1 out of 10 million, and the second prize 3 out of 10 million. But some people never fail to buy these jumbo lotteries, and this year-end lottery is the most popular one in Japan. You can buy these lotteries at a shopping mall or elsewhere, but the most popular lottery stand is the one called "West Ginza chance center" in Tokyo.
I've never won big money on lottery, but I succumbed again to the temptation to buy some this month.
