Japan - Travelling Thread

[ringledman]

Anyone been to Japan? Have any travel stories, tips, must sees?

I am heading back in a few months. Thoroughly enjoyed the place last time.

Extremely nice people. The politest I've ever met.

Anyone been down to Kyushu?

 

[Caveat]

I haven't been but it sounds like a fascinating place - I'd love to go.

However, a couple of things bother me culturally. The whole respect/bowing/saving face/honour thing - they're all related. I just don't see any logical reason to have such a tiered society. Women are not respected much either particularly among the older generation.

And the politeness thing? Although it's nice to be on the receiving end of niceness - regardless of whether it is genuine or not - I have it on good authority that a lot of the time this is merely mockery. To a lot of Japanese people (again, particularly the older generation) western Europeans are practically subhuman.

But I'd still love to go

 

[ringledman]

I haven't been but it sounds like a fascinating place - I'd love to go.

However, a couple of things bother me culturally. The whole respect/bowing/saving face/honour thing - they're all related. I just don't see any logical reason to have such a tiered society. Women are not respected much either particularly among the older generation.

And the politeness thing? Although it's nice to be on the receiving end of niceness - regardless of whether it is genuine or not - I have it on good authority that a lot of the time this is merely mockery. To a lot of Japanese people (again, particularly the older generation) western Europeans are practically subhuman.

But I'd still love to go

Thats not what I experienced. Although I ddn't have a clue whether they were mocking due to the language, you get an intuative sense of how genuine someone is from their expressions.

I found the place to be extremely friendly. They are not as reserved as people think. Quite up for a laugh and enjoyment, particularly in the bars!

 

[Caveat]

Great! I'm genuinely glad - but just relating what I've been told by long term residents there. I'm sure it's not the whole picture. But I'm also sure Japan is about as different as you can get in a state that isn't actually oppressive.

Any other feedback?

 

[Tintagel]

Has anyone any first hand recommendation for a reliable travel company that do excursions to Japan from Ireland? Thanks

 

[Deiseblue]

I travelled to Japan and South Korea for the World Cup in 2002 with Trailfinders in Dawson Street and found them to be excellent.
I had a friend who worked in Tokyo and he echoed Caveat’s post that the Japanese politeness was only a facade and that they considered foreigners as inferior.
It’s no coincidence that they refer to foreigners as “ Gaijin “ which means outsiders!

 

[Barney Magoo]

Mrs Magoo and I are on the last day of an 18 day trip to Japan. We fly back home tonight.

We organised it ourselves as we found most of the 'inclusive tours' to be expensive as well as quite restricting and not what we wanted. While some of these tick all the boxes regarding sights and cities, the thought of traipsing up and down following a guide with a flag and being transported around in coaches is just not our thing.

For instance, we met two couples the other day outside Tokyo Station (one Australian and one Canadian), who met teaching English in China many years ago and now meet up again every year for holidays together. They were about to go to Mt Fuji the next day and the Canadian guy said 'we sit on a bus for 2 and a half hours to get to the mountain and then we get off, take a few pictures and get back on the bus to return to Tokyo'. He accepted it with charm but my idea of torture.

We were meant to do the trip for a milestone birthday back in 2020, but events got in the way and we reawakened our interest when Japan reopened late last year. We traveled business class and stayed in spacious airbnbs. Booked and paid for the the flights last December before the spiral in prices got too high. Overall the trip came in quite a bit less expensive than some of the ones advertised. We Stayed in Osaka and Tokyo and visited Kyoto, Kobe and Himeji as well as exploring the larger cities on foot and public transport.

We found most people to be friendly and very helpful. Not unusual for a stranger to approach you in the street to help with genuine interest in helping you with directions or information about the highly confusing transport in busy Tokyo.

We felt safe and secure everywhere. Sure, you get some funny looks on trains and subways from kids and some older people, but I look on that as interest rather than prejudice and have seen it all over the world.

We'll be back