Oh hey, remember when I went to Japan and then never really talked about it on the blog after we got back? I have learned an important lesson here, friends: making vacation videos takes a lot longer than you’d anticipate and when your schedule is already pretty jam-packed, you have minimal desire to finish ’em.

With my procrastination excuses out of the way I figured I’d share a little bit about our Japan trip before I have a video and some specific recommendations for ya. I’ve gotten a bunch of questions related to traveling to Japan and what our experience was like – it was my first ever trip to Asia and such an amazing experience overall. Tokyo and Kyoto should absolutely be on your travel wish list and I cannot recommend Japan enough; if you’re at all considering it, book it and go! Given how different Japanese culture is I wanted to share a few things I learned that would be helpful for planning a trip of your own:

1. English is Minimal: After successfully navigating the language barrier in France last year without any real troubles I went into our Japan trip overconfident about how English-friendly things would be after reading many articles about how Japanese students take several years of English in school. I’m not really sure what happens after graduation but we hardly encountered anyone who spoke any English on our trip. The good news is that the Japanese are extremely polite and will do their best to communicate despite of the language barrier but it was a bit tricky and we definitely got by with a lot of pointing and saying kore kudasai (this please) followed by copious amounts of arigatou (thank you). Learn a few basic Japanese words (this guide was extremely helpful!) and be prepared to be pushed out of your comfort zone with the language barrier. For navigating via mass transit most signs will have words in both Japanese characters and the Roman alphabet and train announcements will often play in both Japanese and English, which was extremely helpful.
2. Breakfast Isn’t a Thing: I’m a breakfast person and rely on my morning meal and coffee to get me started for the day and learned the hard way on our first few mornings in Japan that breakfast options are pretty minimal as most places do not open until 10 or 11 AM. Unless you’d like to eat ramen or curry for breakfast, plan out breakfast locations in advance or grab snacks and coffee to have in your hotel room/apartment to avoid a hangry, desperate breakfast search in the morning.
3. BYOWC (Bring Your Own Washcloth): I noticed that many shops sold small washcloths (many in adorable colors and patterns, there were like 100 for sale in the Hello Kitty store!) but it took me a bit to understand why until I started connecting the dots about why carrying around your own washcloth would be useful. First off, most public restrooms do not have paper towels or a hand dryer and while I was stuck wiping my hands on my pants, the Japanese women would use their own washcloth to dry their hands off. The washcloths also came in handy on hot days to wipe away any signs of sweat (one serious perk of Tokyo was how clean and odorless it was – even when it was hot and the subway cars were packed no one smelled or even looked sweaty!).
4. Oh Thank Heaven for 7-Eleven: It was super interesting to see so many familiar brands in Japan but the most surprising was 7-Eleven, which was seemingly everywhere. Instead of simply being a connivence store, it’s a one stop shop for everything from sandwiches to drinks, but most importantly, their ATMs will allow you to withdraw yen from your foreign credit cards, saving you the hassle of dealing with having currency exchanged. We found that most places in Japan were cash only and 7-Eleven was our lifeline for grabbing the cash that we needed throughout the trip (and for stocking up on hi-chew because let’s be real, they are delicious).
5. Suica is Your BFF: The Japanese mass transit system truly puts everywhere else to shame. We would not have been able to do and see as much as we did without Tokyo’s subway system – it is incredibly efficient and easy to navigate, trains are always on time and much faster than the trains we have in the states. After arriving at the airport look for a green Suica kiosk (it’ll have a penguin on it!) and get yourself a Suica card – this will be a reloadable transit card that will allow you to easily swipe to get on the trains and also can be used to purchase things within the train stations and the shopping malls that are usually connected. Our Suica card came in handy non-stop and we were able to easily cash out when we arrived back at the airport for our flight home making it a really affordable helper for traveling throughout Japan.

Have any specific questions about traveling to Japan? Curious about anything in particular with Tokyo and Kyoto? Leave a comment and I’ll be happy to help! More details to come about our recommendations and favorites.