Back in November of last year, I spent two weeks in Japan. I’ve been meaning to blog about it ever since. Though almost a year has elapsed, a basic overview is all I’ve produced. Part of the problem is the volume of photos the trip generated—more than 3,000 pictures. Processing them, deciding which to keep and which to throw away, has been quite a chore. Now, the situation is under control, thanks to iPhoto and my relatively new MacBook Pro. So, let’s get started.
Getting to Japan was easy enough. I already had a passport, so it was as simple as buying a plane ticket and arriving on time at the airport. There was no need to obtain visas, notify consulates, get immunizations—none of that. The real trick was in getting to Japan cheaply. It’s commonly thought in the US that Japan is a very expensive destination for tourists. Even my Japanese wife preached that line to me. The reality, I discovered, is a little more complex. Indeed, Japan can be very expensive, and that’s probably what most western tourists experience. But, if you know where to look, fantastic deals are easy to find. In fact, excluding airfare, my two weeks traveling all over Japan were cheaper than two weeks in Dallas! I’ll be sure to write more about this in future posts.
Of course, I have to give full deal-finding credit to my wonderful in-laws, who accompanied me on the trip. Both seasoned international travelers and experts at stretching the (Canadian) dollar, their wisdom was solely responsible for making the trip the complete steal that it was. Thanks, Kay and Aki!
The airfare was the single largest expense of the trip. For tickets, my in-laws introduced me to IACE Travel. IACE is a travel agency that caters to Japanese people living in the US, providing low-cost tickets to visit home. They even answer the phone in Japanese. Fortunately, they also speak English and will happily sell tickets to non-Japanese. My round-trip ticket, all fees included, cost about $1000 from IACE. That beat all the other agents and airlines I checked; some of those had prices almost three times as expensive.
Another key purchase was the Japan Rail Pass. Japan’s public transit system is one the best in the world, allowing tourists convenient access to the entire country. The JR Pass gives you unfettered access to the cross-country trains within a certain time span. The cost is quite reasonable — a seven-day pass costs about the same as the regular fare from Tokyo to Hiroshima and back. So, for anyone planning travel between cities, the JR Pass can be a very good deal. Best of all, with a pass, you can choose to alter your travel plans at the last minute (or while on the train!) without having just wasted your ticket money.
Only foreigners (or Japanese nationals living elsewhere) can buy the JR Pass, and the process to get one is a bit convoluted. First, you have to buy what’s called an “exchange order”. These are only available outside Japan. IACE sells them, so I purchased one when I bought the plane tickets. Once you are in Japan, you’ll need to find a JR exchange office (located in certain stations) to convert your exchange order into a real JR pass. After a bit of legwork, I was able to find the office in Shinjuku station and obtain my pass.
Another aspect of preparing for a Japan trip is coming to terms with smallness. As I would come to discover, Japan is a culture of the small. Whatever things you have, you can be sure there are smaller ones in Japan. This pattern certainly holds when considering the provisions Japan makes for a tourist’s luggage. While there are systems in place to shuttle a westerner’s bulky baggage between airport and lodgings, the traveler is soon required to adapt to an environment designed for Japanese concerns. To enjoy one’s stay in Japan, it is absolutely necessary to travel lightly. When boarding a train for another city, it’s best to take just a small- or medium-size backpack. You don’t need anything more than a few days’ clothes and basic toiletries. The ideal hotels have laundry machines and public computers, and other needs can be met by the surrounding environment. With this in mind, I packed a small travel backpack into my luggage.
There was another reason for packing lightly: omiyage, or gifts. The trip itinerary included many visits with members of my wife’s extended family. Cultural rules required that I distribute omiyage to each of these people. This was especially important for those relatives who had volunteered to let me sleep in their home. My wife and I spent several weeks here in Oklahoma searching for fitting, individual gifts for more than twenty relatives. The final luggage manifest was as follows: one large suitcase full of clothes and supplies, one large suitcase full of omiyage, and an additional roller bag full of — you guessed it — omiyage. In other words, the gifts accounted for more than 60% of my luggage!
It’s worth mentioning that the electricity in Japan is a bit different. I did the research at this page. Here in the United States, a wall socket pushes around 120 volts. In Japan, it’s 100 volts. The western half of the country runs at a frequency 60 hertz (like the US), while eastern Japan uses a frequency of 50 hertz. Japanese power sockets are the same as the US two- and three-prong sockets, though the two-prong sockets are more common. Fortunately, the power difference was not a problem for me. The few electric devices I did pack were all battery-powered with external chargers. The chargers were clearly marked as to what types of electricity they would accept, and all accepted Japanese 100V at 50/60Hz.
My last bit of preparation was to devise a strategy to handle the thirteen-hour flights between Dallas and Tokyo. I had never taken so long a flight, and I certainly was not looking forward to listening to jet engine noise for that amount of time. After several days of research, I settled on a plan: noise cancellation, chill music, and drugs. Interestingly, the best noise cancellation does not come from so-called “noise-canceling” headphones. Rather, the most effective (and safest) option is an in-ear monitor, which is like an earplug with a tiny speaker inside. I picked up a set of Etymotic ER4s, which are fantastic. The chill music was just my ever-growing collection of ambient electronica. For drugs, my doctor prescribed Ambien to convince my body to sleep.
That’s it for preparations. While it was simple to get physically to Japan, a bit of forethought and preparation saved a ton of frustration and thousands of dollars.
In the next post on this subject, I’ll talk about arriving at Narita International and my first day in the country.