My sister and I recently landed in the beautiful city of Tokyo, Japan, and my experience (aside from the hideous jet lag) has been fantastic. Tokyo boasts an array of fantastic restaurants, places to visit, friendly people as well as surprisingly cheap food and goods. While I’ve literally only been in Japan for two days as I’m writing this, I already have a lot of great things to say.
1. The train system is astounding.
We have useful train services in the United Kingdom, especially ones connecting to London, but in the smaller towns and cities trying to connect to each one is lengthy, typically expensive or often limited.
This does not seem to be a problem in Japan. While it’s a smaller country, the islands of Japan are well-connected via Japan Railways and the Shinkansen railway that links the majority of Japan together.
Where I’m staying, in Tokyo, the entire city is connected with marvelous interweaving railways and subways. It’s one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, and with a punctual and economically viable transit service to boot it’s superbly simple to navigate the beautiful metropolis; and it helps, also, when it looks so gorgeous.
2. Tokyo is gorgeous.
I say this word a lot, but it’s a good adjective to explain what I mean. Tokyo is known for being a vibrant and superb metropolis, and that’s very true, but Japan embraces nature in its architecture by letting flora entwine and integrate with its buildings.
Even where there are just masses of buildings it still has a superb atmosphere with colourful lights, skyward buildings and wonderful modern designs that really make every corner stand out in its own way.
Even where I’m staying in Hatagaya I love the way trees line the streets and there’s a delightful compactness to its design; shops and vending machines exist in tight spaces, and the roadways snugly fit to form magnificent roadways. Part of the charm, of course, comes from its uniqueness and difference to the typical cities I’m used to.
3. People are polite and helpful.
Arriving from a 12-hour journey on a plane, almost 3 hours on a train to get to our hotel and topped with jet lag made our arrival in Japan… uncomfortable. That cannot be helped, but it certainly made it difficult for my younger sister and me to navigate with our heavy bags and foggy minds. Also, we had never been to Japan before, so that kind of made it tough.
But as soon as we left the airport, from my personal experience, we were greeted with helpful staff and people throughout our travels to the Sakura Hotel Hatagaya; our accommodation. It was very beneficial to have people at the airport and at most train stations understand our attempted Japanese (which doesn’t come easy with extreme fatigue) and English, and they helped us find our way.
What’s more, pedestrians could tell we were new and a little frazzled with the heat and tiredness, and if we accidentally bumped into someone they were entirely understandable and friendly. That was a breath of fresh air, and something I wouldn’t have expected to witness in somewhere like London and just made it feel even more welcoming.
4. The food and its affordability are godly.
Let me tell you something: I love food. I eat all the time; when I’m happy, sad, angry, sad again - always. In the UK food isn’t that expensive, but a meal out typically sets you back quite a bit.
Our experience in Japan, so far, has been the opposite. A meal out, unlimited drinks of any type included like teas, coffee and soda was ¥1070; roughly $9 dollars. Not only is food affordable, it’s delicious and everywhere.
By everywhere I mean walking a minute or so finds you a new restaurant to try or a vending machine to use, and then another restaurant and about two vending machines (Japan really likes vending machines). A simple take-out meal, maybe some rice, can be as little as a $1 exchanged.
On my plant-based diet, I'll admit it's not that easy to find vegan food, even vegetarian food being difficult at times, but it's out there. Sometimes, food isn't going to be vegan at all, and that's, unfortunately, something you may have to deal with, but doing your research and practice asking for non-dairy and meat-free food certainly helps otherwise!
Granted, I have far more to visit of Tokyo, and, hopefully, Japan, so perhaps things will change. But as of now, my experience has been superb, and returning one day doesn’t seem out of the question.
