I love living and working in Japan, but I wouldn't recommend moving here unless you're committed to becoming fluent in Japanese and integrating into the culture. This is probably mostly true for any country one could move, but Japanese is one, if not the hardest language to learn for native English speakers.
I do, however, recommend everyone visit! Japan is a beautiful country with a unique culture and has something for everyone. You'll be safe, and have all the amenities you would expect from a first world country.
I stayed and worked as a Lawyer in Japan for a few years, and I wouldn't say it makes a difference whether you want to integrate or not. I would even tend to think that not integrating can result in being better accepted. Just be the French or the US guy they like to hang out with, the one who knows to do stuff they don't know, and everything will be fine. Try to become a japanese, and you'll end up being crushed by the system.
Speaking japanese is a great plus of course - but it's quite easy to learn, reading and writing don't help much - except if you want to explore the vast trove of japanese culture.
But the most important thing is to know that there is nearly zero interest in working in Japan if you're not the boss. Your career will be painful and difficult. You will suffer. It's a worst of two worlds situation.
I think it all goes to every other foreign countries. You must adapt to its language (unless it's English) and adapt to its culture. It's an SOP if you want to migrate or work into any other country, not just Japan. People like to live in Japan for many other reason as it is one of becoming one of the most livable city and you can almost leave your bike outside your house without getting stolen. And I almost forgot, there's pikachu and mario almost everywhere, how'd you like that?
I really think any techie would appreciate the consitency of two of the three alphabets in Japanese. (Hiragana and Katakana) The very fact that both of these alphabets are the exact same phonetic pronunciations, but written slightly different to visually distinguish them, is the only complication. But that they are designed specifically to distinguish between Japanese and foreign words is just brilliant.
Their Kanji script/written alphabet is a travesty left over from cave paintings and Chinese. But the spoken language is easy, easy to learn. The variations with polite (public or hierarchical relationships) vs common speaking, seem to mainly affect verb conjugations.
But their sentence structures are reversed from ours, but many languages seem to be, but they have fewer words, and make a number of a assumptions about context that make speaking actually less complicated, but require more understanding.
Also, they don't have any exceptions in pronunciation like English, which is huge. The extra effort saved on this alone can balance out the other complications.
This is my limited experience with a few years training in the language, family members learning it and a few relatives that lived there for years. (one permanently now)
Feel free to correct any errors I've thrown out.
My point is that Japanese can be easier to learn than other languages, but for reasons that may not be obvious.
I used to live in Japan and I found the language fairly easy to learn (compared to other languages I have attempted, like French, Spanish, German, and Finnish). Japanese is consistent in its pronunciation and grammar, doesn’t have all the tenses English has, and uses tons of English words. As an engineer, Japanese made a lot of sense to me. The only real difficulty I had with it was reading Kanji.
Everywhere else immigration and Japan are mentioned on HN, the consensus seems to be that Japan is doomed to lose its unique culture and societal cohesion due to immigration and the loss of its ethnic homogeneity... but apparently not when "we" are the immigrants.
Don't get me wrong, Japan is truly a wonderful place to visit but living there seems like playing life on "hard mode" as compared to other countries: new language and culture, never truly becoming "one of them", and relatively poor working conditions.
Unless you have existing ties to the place, it seems hard to believe that people will move in droves; although I can understand a few people moving.
Japan is notorious for very formal work culture, very long "working" hours (really, "working" just means "staying in the office" - it's customary not to leave the office before your boss does, but perfectly acceptable to spend the waiting time playing solitaire).
It's one of these countries where "an engineer is just an engineer" and management, even if it's middle management, is god.
They do need tech workers, which is probably why this propaganda piece got published. But I doubt they're getting many applicants, except maybe from 3rd-world countries as shown in the article.
> Unless you have existing ties to the place, it seems hard to believe that people will move in droves; although I can understand a few people moving.
The opposite is also true. You can grow so bored of western culture that Japan become interesting with its different way of life. It is however quite a bit "western" in some ways (compared to China, some of the middle east, etc.) so moving there can sound like a challenge without being scary.
Nope. Just like tiny fraction of a fraction of silicon valley. A ridiculous small portion of americans ( even in silicon valley ) move to japan and vice versa. But it gets a lot of clicks and views.
The Japanese (and Korean) work culture, or at least the external perception thereof is the biggest factor that turns me and others off. Who wants to work most of their life and put in twelve or more hours a day six days a week or more? It's worse than America which is already quite bad and off-putting. I don't know what it is about hard work that people have fetishised, but it's not all that it's cut out to be and frankly, if one doesn't have to work that hard, working that hard is stupid. Not to mention unhealthy. Doing it for low pay borders on insanity or disease. Workaholism is no different than alcoholism at its core. Both are extremely destructive. Well at least with the former, there will hopefully be money to pay one's medical and early funeral bills.
You are generally right, but in the tech sector the work culture is highly variable---I'm saying this as a native Korean having worked for Korean tech companies for a decade, and I have heard similar accounts for Japan. South Korea also enjoys a universal healthcare for everyone; there are mandatory healthcare plans for long-term foreigners as well AFAIK. They do generally have lower tolerance on diversity issues (even while the workplace can be much better, the society is not), so that's something to keep in mind.
Recently, there was a long autobiographic thread on twitter about a young US woman who could not make it into an adequante job in the gaming industry, simply because she is a woman. For women, it seems to be very hard to find a job generally, with few exceptions. For example, plenty of Nanny jobs seem to be available in Japan.
Any non-Japanese person who wants to work there should think long and hard, and give it a trial first. Poor pay, strong work culture, stifling weather and crazy weather events for much of the year...it's no paradise. You'll frequently see things happen which are downright illegal in the Western world. For example, being explicitly denied service because you're not Japanese. You might not see these things as a tourist but live there and you'll see it.
It's sad that some introverted/vulnerable people seem to gravitate towards Japanese culture. If the Japanese themselves have a tough time in their own society then why do outsiders expect to fare any better.
> For example, being explicitly denied service because you're not Japanese. You might not see these things as a tourist but live there and you'll see it.
There are very few such places. I haven't seen any myself, and I don't know first-hand anyone who has seen any themselves either. The rare cases I heard about were all a shortcut made to essentially mean "can't serve people that don't speak Japanese". As in, they did actually serve foreigners that speak Japanese. Which is somehow understandable, although the form might not be appropriate.
Speaking of form, it is worth noting that when combined with poor English, the signs can be huge fails in meaning. For example "Japanese only" can mean "Japanese people only" or "Japanese language only". I'm sure there are many ways people with good intentions can end up with badly worded signs. And obviously, a foreigner seeing a badly worded sign is unlikely to tell them the sign is badly worded, keeping the status quo in place.
I've actually heard of instances of foreigners telling about signs, with the signs being replaced as a result.
While it's true that salaries are low on average, a tech worker relocating from overseas wouldn't (and shouldn't) settle for an average offer. Same goes for work culture.
Sugoi! I'd be interested in hearing the price breakdown for living in Tokyo at current exchange rates ($USDJPY = 110.00)?
For a moderate two bedroom in a cool neighborhood? As well as office space. And how is the availability of gigabit residential fiber options. Say, comparable to Verizon FIOS (~$150/mo)?
In short, if anyone has set up a remote office for 2-3 months or even permanently I'd love to hear their experiences ;)
Fiber to the home (ftth) is dead cheap here, only about US$50 (¥6500) for 1Gbps unmetered. Rent for a cheap 2LDK really depends on how far to the station, how new, etc. As a bachelor you could get a nice 50-60sqm 2 room plus Living/Dining/Kitchen in Yoyogi for ¥150,000-200,000 per month. The hard part will be getting a landlord to accept your lease application without being hired by a local company. Rent guarantee companies can be used to avoid having to find a Japanese guarantor. Serviced apartments run by foreign companies will be large and well positioned, but start around ¥500,000 per month.
A short term stay in an AirBnB of 2-3 months might be possible, but you’ll only be able to get a tourist visa, so no earning an income locally and be really careful of overstaying.
Investor visas are not so hard to come by compared to US (lower monetary bar) but you’ll still a handsome sum to get one.
* residential gigabit (min 1 year contract): $60/month
* food for one month, either eating out or buying decent groceries and cooking: $800/month
---
Those are off the top of my head. I'm not very interested in living in a cool neighborhood and rent where I live is more like $1400 (office space is presumably correspondingly lower).
This sounds oddly familiar to me, I worked in Japan for a year and a half despite taking a large paycut from my job back in the US because I wanted to explore something new. I ultimately left to Silicon Valley ironically because they were offering nearly 4x the pay and better learning opportunities (the Japanese compensation structure is not kind to new grads and SV has ridiculous COL). However I loved my time in Japan and my ultimate career goal is to somehow move back there but with a better opportunity. Good to see some people finding gainful employment over there, it really is a great place to live.
I know this is about Japan, but I did something similar. I went from San Francisco to Saigon about 2 years ago. Significantly lower cost of living, motorbike culture, great food and craft beer, super friendly people, easy travel to other SE Asia countries. I don't regret it one bit.
I visited Saigon (and the rest of Vietnam) a couple of years ago with an eye to maybe moving there and working remotely.
It didn't take me too long to decide that I wasn't going to move. The main reason was just the lack of creature comforts. No offence intended to Vietnam, but everything there was just a bit shitty and in a state of disrepair. I just felt like everything was put together with a minimum of effort, and then no effort was made to maintain it. Whether it was motorbikes, or roads, or buildings.
The other things that you might think were obvious downsides weren't actually problems for me at all. I didn't mind the traffic, or the pollution, or the noise. Riding motorbikes everywhere was actually fine as well. The heat was pretty bad, but I'd get used to it.
I think at the end of the day the main reason that I didn't move was that my reason for wanting to move was the lower cost of living, so I could save money. I don't think that saving money is really a good reason to move countries. Instead, I moved to another country with similar cost of living but higher wages.
That's why I find these articles interesting. What works for one person really might not work for others. I've seen stories posted/linked to on HN about people who moved to Japan and hated it.
If you're ethnically Asian but don't speak Japanese, Japan will not be welcoming at all.
If you don't look ethnically Asian, Japanese people will give you allowances and defer to you. However, if you're Asian and not Japanese, they look down on you. Read about ethnic Koreans in Japan and how they're oppressed[0]. They speak fluent Japanese and their families have lived 3 generations in Japan.
My student who was of Korean decent but was the most popular person in high school and went to a good university would disagree with you. As would my friend who was born in Korea, married a Japanese woman and moved to Japan. There is discrimination in Japan, but it's frustrating to see this trotted out time and time again as if you'll be systemically discriminated against no matter where you are. It's just not true.
But if you don't speak Japanese, it doesn't matter if you are Asian looking or not, you won't fit in here. There are lots of other ways you won't fit in here too. Not speaking Japanese well is an absolute deal breaker, though.
Edit: I should point out that there is nothing wrong with the Wikipedia page. As far as I understand what it states is absolutely correct. It's simply that Japan does not have dual citizenship at all. So if you want Japanese citizenship you can have it -- you just have to give up your other citizenship. Japan also does not give citizenship automatically if you are born here. You have to have at least 1 parent who is a citizen. However, you can apply for citizenship and you will get it -- as long as you give up any other citizenship. Otherwise you will essentially have permanent resident status. The latter point is admittedly crazy and it is very unfortunate that many Koreans are born into this situation, but they can fix it by naturalising. They don't want to. BTW, the student of a friend of mine was American and had exactly the same issue. It's not an issue of racism.
To name Koreans as an example is disingenuous. If you read the Wikipedia article you will also see that the problems come from both sides. The Koreans the Wikipedia article talks about do not want to fully integrate - they insist on their Korean nationality and demand rights of both Korean and Japanese nationals. At this point in time they have managed to obtain a special status that is the opposite of being oppressed and is actually a source of irritation among Japanese I know. As anectodal evidence to counter your claim, in the Japanese company I work for (in Japan), my direct superior is Taiwanese, one colleague Korean and another Malay and they are all treated like any other.
It sounds like an interesting idea. Certainly Japan is an interesting place. In general I envy those who get to move abroad to work. The adventure appeals to me. These days I might be good enough for it too. It wasn't always that way,but certainly I'm currently one of the more capable engineers on my team. But the ties that bind are too strong still. I will stay here. To those who get to do this, I wish them a good ride.
They found one engineer who wanted to live in Japan and call it a story? You could do this for literally any topic about anything and call it a trend apparently
Is this an appropriate place in HN to say "Me too"? :-) Moved here 10 years ago. Don't regret it for a second.
But seriously, in the past 10 years I've noticed a lot of high tech people either moving here or wanting to move here. When I first came, it was really rare to bump into a foreigner who was a programmer. They were either English teachers or factory workers. Now I run into people relatively frequently (even out here in Shizuoka prefecture).
It kind of is, especially in a relative sense. I was in Japan for a few weeks this year. Some of the unique anime things that I found in Japan that I don't see in North America:
* Anime girls (specifically Azur Lane) plastered all over Yamanote Line trains
* Shops playing music from animes I've watched and other recognizable Jpop music
* Conversely, the way that cities, train stations, and other scenes are depicted in anime is fairly accurate to how Japan looks like in real life
This is not to say that Japan is 100% anime, because that is obviously false. All I'm saying is that if you want to see a place that upholds the anime lifestyle more than anywhere else in the world, then Japan is the only answer.
People are mentioning pricing for living there. I just visited, so not the same, but noticed some things.
1. Many things try to round out to a flat amount (¥100 instead ¥253). Some places don't.
2. Cash is king. Many places refuse to accept credit or contactless payments if you carry cash. Some places only accept Cash. You can see this when you look up places on Google Maps.
3. Coins are used for denominations of 1 cent up to $5. $10 is the first bill you get so be prepared to carry lots of coins. Also, I still don't understand the reason for it, but they usually refuse to pay things using two methods (e.g. to get rid of the 35(!!) ¥1 coins I had).
4. Tax is usually included or a second price, higher price is shown with the tax included. As in #1 you may see on receipts with tax included. E.g. ¥2000 first shown as total with a smaller number of ¥1740 as sub total and then the final amount with tax included (same as total).
5. There was never a tip where I went and I believe it's not done pretty much anywhere.
6. Many things in major cities are being adjusted for the olympics so things are actually fairly nice for foreigners to get around.
7. Besides going between major areas most train cards can be used in most other places. Assuming you land in Tokyo (e.g.
HND) you can get a Suica card for the subway and put ¥2000 on it. It takes face ¥500 as a deposit on the card. I used the same card in Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka.
sn: That card can be moved to your phone in to Apple Pay if you switch to Japan region in your iOS settings (language and etc doesn't need to change). Apple doesn't require FaceID for it so you can swipe to enter subway super easily with just your phone. Once you do this you get the ¥500 deposit on the card back to use without returning the card.
8. Neat trick for changing prices is put a decimal after first two numbers since your in ¥100 == $0.90 != $1.00, but it's close enough.
9. Restaurants often have english menus, especially in cities, but it's much better experience to be able to read normal menus. At least I'm assuming given I know basically no Japanese.
10. Food and restaurants are comparable to the US. Cheaper meals are $6-7 where nicer sit down restaurants are around $16-25.
11. As far as cheap food: FamilyMart bread is a must try. Also the various Rice+Seaweed+Protein meals are cool.
I'm thinking of moving to Japan myself. Really enjoyed visiting it as a tourist. I learned the language for my side-project and planning to take a language proficiency test this December. Anybody need a Python programmer who worked at Yandex?
If someone were working in Silicon Valley as a permanent resident (not US citizen), and wanted to try working in Japan (say, for a year), could they do that without jeopardizing their ability to go back to the US?
The crazy political correctness is turning anyone working on Silicon Valley into a paranoid person. You are expected to behave and think in a certain way, being an individual is not acceptable.
[+] [-] ericdykstra|7 years ago|reply
I do, however, recommend everyone visit! Japan is a beautiful country with a unique culture and has something for everyone. You'll be safe, and have all the amenities you would expect from a first world country.
[+] [-] soufron|7 years ago|reply
Speaking japanese is a great plus of course - but it's quite easy to learn, reading and writing don't help much - except if you want to explore the vast trove of japanese culture.
But the most important thing is to know that there is nearly zero interest in working in Japan if you're not the boss. Your career will be painful and difficult. You will suffer. It's a worst of two worlds situation.
[+] [-] CitizenTekk|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RobertRoberts|7 years ago|reply
Their Kanji script/written alphabet is a travesty left over from cave paintings and Chinese. But the spoken language is easy, easy to learn. The variations with polite (public or hierarchical relationships) vs common speaking, seem to mainly affect verb conjugations.
But their sentence structures are reversed from ours, but many languages seem to be, but they have fewer words, and make a number of a assumptions about context that make speaking actually less complicated, but require more understanding.
Also, they don't have any exceptions in pronunciation like English, which is huge. The extra effort saved on this alone can balance out the other complications.
This is my limited experience with a few years training in the language, family members learning it and a few relatives that lived there for years. (one permanently now)
Feel free to correct any errors I've thrown out.
My point is that Japanese can be easier to learn than other languages, but for reasons that may not be obvious.
[+] [-] innocentoldguy|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xaranke|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] krapp|7 years ago|reply
Odd, that.
[+] [-] xaranke|7 years ago|reply
Don't get me wrong, Japan is truly a wonderful place to visit but living there seems like playing life on "hard mode" as compared to other countries: new language and culture, never truly becoming "one of them", and relatively poor working conditions.
Unless you have existing ties to the place, it seems hard to believe that people will move in droves; although I can understand a few people moving.
[+] [-] dunpeal|7 years ago|reply
Japan is notorious for very formal work culture, very long "working" hours (really, "working" just means "staying in the office" - it's customary not to leave the office before your boss does, but perfectly acceptable to spend the waiting time playing solitaire).
It's one of these countries where "an engineer is just an engineer" and management, even if it's middle management, is god.
They do need tech workers, which is probably why this propaganda piece got published. But I doubt they're getting many applicants, except maybe from 3rd-world countries as shown in the article.
[+] [-] Raphmedia|7 years ago|reply
The opposite is also true. You can grow so bored of western culture that Japan become interesting with its different way of life. It is however quite a bit "western" in some ways (compared to China, some of the middle east, etc.) so moving there can sound like a challenge without being scary.
[+] [-] qubax|7 years ago|reply
Nope. Just like tiny fraction of a fraction of silicon valley. A ridiculous small portion of americans ( even in silicon valley ) move to japan and vice versa. But it gets a lot of clicks and views.
[+] [-] mnm1|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lifthrasiir|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] astonex|7 years ago|reply
I work at Korea's biggest tech company and the law is strictly followed.
[+] [-] mr_overalls|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] knbknb|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anjc|7 years ago|reply
It's sad that some introverted/vulnerable people seem to gravitate towards Japanese culture. If the Japanese themselves have a tough time in their own society then why do outsiders expect to fare any better.
[+] [-] glandium|7 years ago|reply
There are very few such places. I haven't seen any myself, and I don't know first-hand anyone who has seen any themselves either. The rare cases I heard about were all a shortcut made to essentially mean "can't serve people that don't speak Japanese". As in, they did actually serve foreigners that speak Japanese. Which is somehow understandable, although the form might not be appropriate.
Speaking of form, it is worth noting that when combined with poor English, the signs can be huge fails in meaning. For example "Japanese only" can mean "Japanese people only" or "Japanese language only". I'm sure there are many ways people with good intentions can end up with badly worded signs. And obviously, a foreigner seeing a badly worded sign is unlikely to tell them the sign is badly worded, keeping the status quo in place.
I've actually heard of instances of foreigners telling about signs, with the signs being replaced as a result.
[+] [-] hocuspocus|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ArtWomb|7 years ago|reply
For a moderate two bedroom in a cool neighborhood? As well as office space. And how is the availability of gigabit residential fiber options. Say, comparable to Verizon FIOS (~$150/mo)?
In short, if anyone has set up a remote office for 2-3 months or even permanently I'd love to hear their experiences ;)
[+] [-] throwaway-jp|7 years ago|reply
A short term stay in an AirBnB of 2-3 months might be possible, but you’ll only be able to get a tourist visa, so no earning an income locally and be really careful of overstaying.
Investor visas are not so hard to come by compared to US (lower monetary bar) but you’ll still a handsome sum to get one.
[+] [-] m3at|7 years ago|reply
- 1 bedroom in a quiet neighborhood, small designer appartement: $1100/mo
- 1G fiber: $23/mo (special 1 year price, need to change vendor yearly, ~$40 otherwise. Search on kakaku)
- monthly expenses: $400 restaurants & groceries, $100 subway
(Source : I've been living in Japan for two years)
[+] [-] Aeolun|7 years ago|reply
* office space (3 people) somewhere central, shared facilities, private office: $2000/month
* residential gigabit (min 1 year contract): $60/month
* food for one month, either eating out or buying decent groceries and cooking: $800/month
---
Those are off the top of my head. I'm not very interested in living in a cool neighborhood and rent where I live is more like $1400 (office space is presumably correspondingly lower).
[+] [-] laurieg|7 years ago|reply
Rent and bills for a 1 bedroom 1 kitchen room apartment: 500 USD
Fiber connection: 40 USD
Food: 200-300 USD
Transport: 100 USD or less ( I walk to work).
Office space(1-3 person) subsidised by the city: 200 USD
All in all very liveable.
[+] [-] cosmic_ape|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] emchamp1|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] latchkey|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toomanybeersies|7 years ago|reply
I visited Saigon (and the rest of Vietnam) a couple of years ago with an eye to maybe moving there and working remotely.
It didn't take me too long to decide that I wasn't going to move. The main reason was just the lack of creature comforts. No offence intended to Vietnam, but everything there was just a bit shitty and in a state of disrepair. I just felt like everything was put together with a minimum of effort, and then no effort was made to maintain it. Whether it was motorbikes, or roads, or buildings.
The other things that you might think were obvious downsides weren't actually problems for me at all. I didn't mind the traffic, or the pollution, or the noise. Riding motorbikes everywhere was actually fine as well. The heat was pretty bad, but I'd get used to it.
I think at the end of the day the main reason that I didn't move was that my reason for wanting to move was the lower cost of living, so I could save money. I don't think that saving money is really a good reason to move countries. Instead, I moved to another country with similar cost of living but higher wages.
That's why I find these articles interesting. What works for one person really might not work for others. I've seen stories posted/linked to on HN about people who moved to Japan and hated it.
[+] [-] nguyenthanhloc|7 years ago|reply
Can you share with me more about your experiences in Vietnam?
Could I buy you a coffee, sometimes?
[+] [-] foobandit|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimmywanger|7 years ago|reply
If you don't look ethnically Asian, Japanese people will give you allowances and defer to you. However, if you're Asian and not Japanese, they look down on you. Read about ethnic Koreans in Japan and how they're oppressed[0]. They speak fluent Japanese and their families have lived 3 generations in Japan.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koreans_in_Japan#Integration_i...
[+] [-] mikekchar|7 years ago|reply
But if you don't speak Japanese, it doesn't matter if you are Asian looking or not, you won't fit in here. There are lots of other ways you won't fit in here too. Not speaking Japanese well is an absolute deal breaker, though.
Edit: I should point out that there is nothing wrong with the Wikipedia page. As far as I understand what it states is absolutely correct. It's simply that Japan does not have dual citizenship at all. So if you want Japanese citizenship you can have it -- you just have to give up your other citizenship. Japan also does not give citizenship automatically if you are born here. You have to have at least 1 parent who is a citizen. However, you can apply for citizenship and you will get it -- as long as you give up any other citizenship. Otherwise you will essentially have permanent resident status. The latter point is admittedly crazy and it is very unfortunate that many Koreans are born into this situation, but they can fix it by naturalising. They don't want to. BTW, the student of a friend of mine was American and had exactly the same issue. It's not an issue of racism.
[+] [-] dbjh|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Karishmra1234|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] timwaagh|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dawhizkid|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mikekchar|7 years ago|reply
But seriously, in the past 10 years I've noticed a lot of high tech people either moving here or wanting to move here. When I first came, it was really rare to bump into a foreigner who was a programmer. They were either English teachers or factory workers. Now I run into people relatively frequently (even out here in Shizuoka prefecture).
[+] [-] Fej|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nayuki|7 years ago|reply
* Anime girls (specifically Azur Lane) plastered all over Yamanote Line trains
* Shops playing music from animes I've watched and other recognizable Jpop music
* Anime-themed cafes (Gundam, Card Captor Sakura, etc.)
* Stores for secondhand anime goods
* Rentable display cases to sell your anime goods
* Anime mascots printed on public banners
* Gaming arcades with anime goods
* Conversely, the way that cities, train stations, and other scenes are depicted in anime is fairly accurate to how Japan looks like in real life
This is not to say that Japan is 100% anime, because that is obviously false. All I'm saying is that if you want to see a place that upholds the anime lifestyle more than anywhere else in the world, then Japan is the only answer.
[+] [-] 0xCMP|7 years ago|reply
1. Many things try to round out to a flat amount (¥100 instead ¥253). Some places don't.
2. Cash is king. Many places refuse to accept credit or contactless payments if you carry cash. Some places only accept Cash. You can see this when you look up places on Google Maps.
3. Coins are used for denominations of 1 cent up to $5. $10 is the first bill you get so be prepared to carry lots of coins. Also, I still don't understand the reason for it, but they usually refuse to pay things using two methods (e.g. to get rid of the 35(!!) ¥1 coins I had).
4. Tax is usually included or a second price, higher price is shown with the tax included. As in #1 you may see on receipts with tax included. E.g. ¥2000 first shown as total with a smaller number of ¥1740 as sub total and then the final amount with tax included (same as total).
5. There was never a tip where I went and I believe it's not done pretty much anywhere.
6. Many things in major cities are being adjusted for the olympics so things are actually fairly nice for foreigners to get around.
7. Besides going between major areas most train cards can be used in most other places. Assuming you land in Tokyo (e.g. HND) you can get a Suica card for the subway and put ¥2000 on it. It takes face ¥500 as a deposit on the card. I used the same card in Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka.
sn: That card can be moved to your phone in to Apple Pay if you switch to Japan region in your iOS settings (language and etc doesn't need to change). Apple doesn't require FaceID for it so you can swipe to enter subway super easily with just your phone. Once you do this you get the ¥500 deposit on the card back to use without returning the card.
8. Neat trick for changing prices is put a decimal after first two numbers since your in ¥100 == $0.90 != $1.00, but it's close enough.
9. Restaurants often have english menus, especially in cities, but it's much better experience to be able to read normal menus. At least I'm assuming given I know basically no Japanese.
10. Food and restaurants are comparable to the US. Cheaper meals are $6-7 where nicer sit down restaurants are around $16-25.
11. As far as cheap food: FamilyMart bread is a must try. Also the various Rice+Seaweed+Protein meals are cool.
[+] [-] Grue3|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paulsutter|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Camillo|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sevensor|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lanevorockz|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leogiertz|7 years ago|reply