Hey everyone!
I will be going 1 month in Tokyo to study Japanese. I will be attending class everyday at a language institute in the very heart of Tokyo, not far from Shibuya. At the same time I really wanna see but above all LIVE the city.
Can anyone give me any suggestion in regards on how to learn all I can in one month and give me some ideas as to what I can visit or do to actually live Tokyo?
I will be staying with a host family the whole time so I am hoping that will help too. Thanx in advance guys!!!
ありがとう！
Anything from tourist attractions to the very heart of Japanese culture. What do you think is a must-see/do in Tokyo? Staying one month, I wanna live Japan not just as a tourist so anything you think it's worth doing or anywhere you think it's worth going!
I hope it's clear enough, I didn't think it would be difficult to understand, sorry
First thing you should do is check out which matsuri coincide with your trip to Japan. You should visit some if you can.
Plan your days so that on national holidays and friday nights / weekends you're in places that you'll enjoy people watching (Akihabara, Yoyogi, harajuku etc) and not in places where you'll be stuck in long lines waiting to get in somewhere (Tokyo tower, Sky tree etc).
Do you know Hiragana/katakana? If you don't then it will be nice if you spend a little time learning them. It will help you on your trip, and it will make your trip much better.
Don't ignore the food, there's so much different and lovely Japanese food that you could (if you wanted) never eat the same dish twice while you're there. Japanese food (unlike for example: the food in some other western countries like the UK) is a HUGE part of their culture, don't be affraid of it. You'll miss out if you do.
There's some places that could be considered standard for any tourist, for example:
Shibuya crossing/Hachiko (btw, seen the movie?)/getting lost in the surrounding areas.
Yoyogi Park.
Ueno Park.
Shinjuku.
Harajuku.
Akihabara.
Ikebukuro.
Maybe Odaiba too.
BUT what you do in Tokyo largely depends on your interests, and you can do only so much in Akihabara. for example:
Depending on how HUGE of an anime fan you are you may want to visit more places like: nakano broadway, studio ghibli museum (needs advance reservations), or maybe go to comiket or Tokyo International Anime Fair (that's if your dates coincide with any of those) etc.
If you like / don't mind J-pop you may want to visit akb48's Theater and the idol training cafe in Akihabara.
If you like Jazz you may want to visit the pit inn. Also, there's a huge punk-rock, noise etc underground music scene (much of it plays live in places in Shimokitazawa as far as i know).
If you appreciate old retro video-games there's several places that you could buy em in Akihabara and there's a lot of places where you could play em.
Maybe you're big on fashion and should go for some shoping in Shibuya.
Maybe you enjoy art, there's various art spaces and there are art some fairs in town throughout the year.
Maybe you enjoy history so you'll want to visit 47 ronin graveyard (Seen any of the movies about them?) or Yasukuni shrine & the war museum.
Maybe you're a fan of the Japanese martial arts or enjoy watching Kyudo etc, it won't be easy finding a way to see some of that - requires serious planning. Sumo , do you like it? Would you spend some money and time on it? It's not on every month. When will you be going btw?
Maybe you enjoy the folklore: Youkai, kaidan? (Seen the movie Kwaidan by Kobayashi? Seen gegegenokitaro anime?) Museums? (Especially Edo-Tokyo museum you shouldn't miss) Traditional theatre like: Kabuki and Noh ? (Kabuki-za is opening soon) etc etc etc.
Tokyo is a huge lovely chaos of a city, and doesn't have so much your typical tourist sites. In my opinion the point of visiting Tokyo is to enjoy it like you would if you lived in it. Kyoto is the exact opposite, it's a town that has many very specific sites and areas worth visiting.
You should also consider possible side-trips. For example: Kamakura, Yokohama (which has a great Chinatown), Nikko, Fuji, Enoshima.
Get married, get a job, have children, get a home, pay taxes.....practically anything else you do is going to be as a tourist, because there really isn't anything you can be except a tourist for such a short time as one month.
A lot of the places you go, a lot of the people around you....including Japanese people....are going to be tourists. You're going to be seen as a tourist, and you be a tourist. It isn't the end of the world.
I never said I didn't wanna be a tourist, I just wanna have both tourist experiences AND life ones. I have done it in other countries, one month can be a really long time...
Thanx Eudaimonia for the great advice, I'll look into those things!!! I'll be there from the 19th of July till the 19th of August.
Wow, this is really helpful! I will look into it and you have certainly given me some great ideas, thx a lot, very kind of u ^^
And yes I know kana and some Kanji(really few ones, but I'm trying to make it on my own), plus I'll be attending the course, hoping that will help too along with staying with the host family!
Thx again, any other ideas would be greatly appreciated if anything comes to mind! I agree with your statement, I should try and live Tokyo, not just rush through it
I'll be more than happy to try to suggest something just as soon as I understand what is wanted. Or at least what he likes. I'd like to see him get full satisfaction from his visit.
Sure he'll be a tourist, but maybe he means what i meant by this...
Tokyo is a huge lovely chaos of a city, and doesn't have so much your typical tourist sites. In my opinion the point of visiting Tokyo is to enjoy it like you would if you lived in it. Kyoto is the exact opposite, it's a town that has many very specific sites and areas worth visiting.
Which is that by visiting Tokyo (in my opinion) one should act as if he has a few days off from his job in the city and go out and do whatever he's interested in. Instead of doing what a typical tourist would, which most of the time is the typical top10 that some book guide tells him.
Anyway, NihonLover should indeed tell us what his interests are because i was shooting in the dark with many of my suggestions.
As far as my interests go I love anime, so I'll definitely check out the Gibli museum.
I love Japanese culture, anything regarding Japanese history, beliefs and values.
As far as food is concerned I love it, I try to eat everything and everywhere at least once, in fact I believe it is essential to a people's culture. To this regard I'm hoping I'm gonna try typical Japanese food thanks to the host family.
My deepest passion traveling and above all, languages. I'll have the course for that, but I wanna try and meet locals and get to know them.
Some examples of where I have stated as a non-tourist are Munich in Germany. After seeing some tourist attractions I spent the whole month hanging out with the locals, experiencing the city with them. I like to make a lot of friends everywhere and my love for languages helps.
The same thing I have done in StPetersburg, Russia.
There you go guys! Is that a bit more clear? I hope so
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