Just back from two weeks in Japan

[RadarScope1]

It was amazing. My wife and I went for about 12 days on a vacation. We booked it all ourselves, no planning other than our first hotel stay, no schedule to keep. We spent four days in Tokyo, five in Kyoto (and the Kansai area), and two more days in Tokyo before flying home. For any Americans or Brits considering going, I can tell you the whole country is very English-friendly and it's easy to get around thanks to the stellar train system. And yes, I went to Akihabara and it was pretty damn cool. Bought Ouendan for the DS, Super Bomberman 4 to play in my modded SNES and a the Famicom and FDS version of Super Mario Bros for collection purposes only (I don't own either system).

I'll have some pics posted to a blog my wife and I keep and will link if anyone is interested. I mainly just wanted to say that if you're a gamer and are even the least bit interested in Japanese culture and thinking about going, do it. I was a bit nervous about the language and the train system, but it was pretty easy and very memorable.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Nice, do you have any cool pics to share?

[izdead]

Awesome! My friend and I have been really interested in going lately. If we are able to, we would like to try an go maybe next summer or something.

I really want to see the Tezuka Museum.

[brokenpavement]

Great to hear, I'm glad you had an enjoyable experience! I'm also happy to hear that you were able to visit the Kansai region and not just Tokyo. I, too, would like to see pics whenever you have a chance. I'm hoping I will make it back there sometime in the near future.

I really want to see the Tezuka Museum.

The Tezuka Museum is fantastic, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone, whether you are a fan of his work or not. I went in not knowing anything about him (other than being the creator of Astro Boy) and now he is one of my favorite authors. His work is so diverse that it speaks to people of all ages.

[RadarScope1]

Ah, I didn't even know there was a museum. I saw all that stuff around Kyoto (I got my pic taken with an Astro Boy statue), but didn't really know why it was there. I didn't realize it was a museum. Is it at Kyoto station? I was right there! I'm not really a manga guy, though.

Did lots of other cool stuff though. Went to arcades and Super Potato in Akiba, went to a Yakult Swallows baseball game, Edo-Tokyo museum, top of the Tokyo Municipal building, Imperial palace grounds, rode the Shinkansen, walked the bamboo forests and hillside temples of Kyoto, had drinks at Kyoto Tower, climbed to the top of Himeji-jo castle, ate a nice beef diner in Kobe, went to the Peace Museum in Hiroshima, fed the deer and saw the massive Buddha at Todai-ji in Nara, gawked and had drinks at night in Shibuya, shopped at Harajuku and the all the crazy-ass huge department stores at train stations and had lots and lots of GREAT food.

[Hobie-wan]

Sounds like an awesome trip. Glad you resisted the temptation to spend too much time in Akihabara. Though presumably you wife would have protested that.

[RadarScope1]

She was good with it. We travel well together. I spent a whole day going to designer fashion stores in Harajuku for her.

We spent a morning in Akiba and came back later at night for a couple of hours on our second time around in Tokyo. I hit two game shops and one arcade. Also at ate Go Go Curry, which was delicious. Yeah, I could tell there's no reason to spend tons and tons of time there.

[elvis]

I travelled around Japan for 5 weeks back in 2000. If you stick to major cities, the language barrier is non-existent. In fact, I was blown away by the number of people who wanted to use me as a free English lesson.

And likewise, the train systems were brilliant. I was there over new year, and I remember Japanese folks whining that the trains were running 2 minutes late. Here in Australia +/- 15 minutes is about as good as you'll get even during non-peak times. Just forget about any public transport working at all during a major public holiday.

Language-wise, smaller towns and the countryside were a different story. But luckily I had a Japanese-speaking girlfriend at the time to cover that. But any big cities are definitely easy to traverse as an English-only speaker.

[RCBH928]

is it expensive?
I hear Tokyo is expensive like you can't believe

[Breetai]

Hey, I'm glad you had a great time! Nice that you got to your baseball game. The Edo-Tokyo museum is awesome, isn't it? The entire city of Kyoto is awesome, and you even got to Hiroshima. Great job!

I hear Tokyo is expensive like you can't believe...

It sure was... 20 years ago. It's just like any big city now. It's only stupidly expensive if you decide to live right in the centre of somewhere like Tokyo in a full-sized apartment.

If you have a decent job, you'd be fine. If you're a tourist, you'd be fine. Don't be an English teacher.