Tokyo and Japan (2018)
Every so often, I stumble upon my old post about Tokyo and Japan (I was there in 2018), and I feel the urge to share it. It’s time to refresh my impressions, but still. My thoughts on some matters would be different now, but I’m not going to redo anything. So, here’s the text:
Food. Well, I’m not a big fan of seafood, so there’s not much for me to catch in Asia. But in Japan, it’s better than in Korea; their food is at least edible and more diverse. They eat a lot of noodles and rice, seafood. They mainly consume ready-made food; you can hardly find ingredients for cooking in stores. And there are many cafes around. But they look quite unassuming, easy to miss. In cafes, there’s often a vending machine where you insert money, select your food, and get a coupon — you give it to the bartender. In decent places, there are waiters, of course. There’s no food cult, just food.
Alcohol. Lots of beer types, just a crowd of various Asahi variations. Strong, mild, medium. Fruit beer is popular, bitter — not so much. Dark beer is not consumed at all. By the way, Japanese people drink a lot, every day. If Koreans prefer to eat, Japanese prefer to drink. But a lot — I mean more in terms of frequency. Just consistently in the evening on any day — everyone drinks beer, maybe they have 1–2 glasses, no alcoholics in sight. Also, in many cafes, you can find a business lunch with 0.33 beer. I like that, yes, it’s cool. (not anymore — :D)
Safety. Again, no frames, few police officers, everyone is friendly. You feel very calm. Moreover, I googled — Tokyo is the SAFEST city in the world. Why is that? I’ll try to explain in the Culture section. But the fact remains — you just walk around at any time of the day and feel like a fish in water.
Technology and public transport. Actually, if Japan has achieved a lot in trains and cars, then in terms of banking and communication — Russia seems to be the world leader. Cash is popular here, lots of paper, checks, and other annoying stuff. Almost nowhere do Apple Pays work. In Russia, even in various hole-in-the-wall places, they already work, yes) But there are ATMs everywhere, finding cash is not a problem. High-speed trains — it’s really cool. Very cool. 1600 km in 9.5 hours — excellent. Plus, for tourists, there’s the Japan Rail Pass — you buy it and can travel as much as you want for 7 or 14 days. Because travel is quite expensive.
Prices. Actually, it’s not that expensive. Housing prices are big, but they are also expensive in Moscow. In Tokyo, the housing is the MOST EXPENSIVE, of course. But you can eat well relatively cheaply. Alcohol costs the same as in Russia. Overall — everything’s okay. Well, maybe slightly more expensive than in our country, but the standard of living is higher here. I didn’t feel poor.
Events, places. There’s just a bunch of cool stuff here — manga streets, anime, Nintendo streets, Shibuya crossings, imperial palaces, a zoo with pandas, giant ferris wheels, Disneyland, plus in Kyoto, for example, there are also very beautiful natural places. Everything is very distinctive and interesting.
Cleanliness, convenience. Everything is very clean, just fabulous. Even in the suburbs of Nagasaki, which is also not the capital — everything is clean. Saw a lot of disabled people — probably not because there are crowds of them here, but because in Russia a disabled person simply cannot leave the house. Here, everything is there for them, excellent walking routes.
Culture. This is the most important part. To me, to understand Japan and live like a Japanese, you have to be Japanese. It’s completely different, not like in Russia, it’s just different. In their culture, the most important thing is not to bother other people, they are very modest (most of them), even the youth. They try very hard to help, very polite. Knowing English here is very honorable, so they are always very happy if they can help a foreigner. Very often, random people on the street nod and smile at you if you make eye contact with them. All the police officers greet people, and people respond to them. At the same time, no one litters, no one swears. And it’s not because there are executions or huge fines here. I checked the fines — 1000 yen (600 rubles) for littering. So it’s not a super fine. They don’t litter because it’s their culture. A lot of people do sports, constantly running on the street. Very few overweight people. Very few dogs, or rather, they don’t walk them on the street much, so as not to bother other people. It’s safe again not because there are a bunch of police officers with batons around, but because they are just cultured people and do everything so that no one bothers anyone. They greatly respect etiquette, and it’s all really cool. It’s much better than intimidation with fines and some sharia or police enforcers. In the supermarket today, I wanted to let a person go ahead of me because I had a full basket of everything, and he had bread. And he told me — no, you were here before me, it’s okay, he thanked me.
People. Japanese are beautiful. Both guys are some kind of Asian machos with chiseled faces, and girls. Much more delicate facial features than Koreans and especially Chinese. You can see that these were fighting guys who took the most beautiful women for themselves, and the weakest men died. As a result, just crowds of very decent-looking people. Of course, there are exceptions, but overall, it’s very interesting to observe people.
Verdict. So far the coolest experience, I don’t think it will be the same in other cities. But we’ll see. But I couldn’t live here, well, I mean — I need company. :)
