Imagine getting to the gate line on the Tube and instead of touching out with your Oyster card, you presented an inspector with a passport. The inspector then duly stamps a large but elaborate badge into your book which depicts the locale of the station.

Well this is exactly what happens at some stations in Japan. It’s called an Eki stamp and it’s really rather wonderful…

“First introduced in 1931 at a station in Fukui, the stamps soon proliferated across the country, shaped like circles, squares, pentagons, and hexagons. They were used to boost tourism, with the Japanese National Railways (JNR) launching the Discover Japan campaign in 1970, providing 1,400 stations with individual stamps that all bore the words “DISCOVER JAPAN” in English. As part of the same initiative, special notebooks were published for travelers to carry with them to collect stamps, which are still available for purchase today.”

Source: The Design Nostalgia of Japan’s Train Station Stamps