After my Japan trip this is what i tell people “If Japan is not your favourite country then you have not been to Japan”. Japan has so much to offer to all travellers.
Japanese people are wonderful, very polite and extremely helpful. You will feel very welcomed. I am a vegetarian although some times i have to take non vegetarian food abroad but its never my preference. During my stay in Tokyo, i had selected a restaurant called T’s Tantan at Tokyo station to try out some Vegetarian ramen. Tokyo station has 3 or 4 levels and its huge and if you are not familiar with it then it can be tough to navigate. I was hungry and had been searching for the restaurant for about 40 minutes and google map was of no help, finally i approached a commuter at the station who knew English. He took his luggage and asked me to come along but he was also not able to locate, at this point he took me to a station employee who immediately guided us in Japanese. He then was able to take me to restaurant. All this while he had his luggage trolley with him, I was just so much thankful to him. I would have never been able to locate the restaurant on my own.
Tips are not accepted in Japan !! I do some research before my travels and i was surprised when i came across this. In fact giving tip is considered rude. When you give tip that it implies service was better than you expected which Japanese people don’t like, they want you to expect top quality service.
You will always find a tray at the cash counters and you are supposed to put money in tray and rather than directly handing it over directly in hands. I like this a lot.
Japan is an extremely safe country. Even if you are out late in night, you will not face any issues.
Japanese cities are very clean and there are beautiful gardens everywhere. During Spring and Autumn season those gardens turn into paradise with colours everywhere.
Whether you like mountains or beaches, hot springs or snowy mountain tops, rural areas or cities, nature or technology…Japan is the place to visit.
Japan is paradise for food lovers. There so many different type food which you can try in Japan. Here are some of them, some details are also there in my Japan Diary blogs.
While travelling from Tokyo to Kyoto, i had planned an overnight stop over at Miyajima/Hiroshima and carrying my whole luggage along would have been very troublesome. This is when i decided to avail Japan’s luggage delivery service. There are such good reviews about it in terms of reliability and punctuality that i decided to go ahead with it. There are various companies offering this service but i decided to the service offered by Japan Post office :). As part of this service you can transfer your luggage to another destination/Hotel. So i sent my luggage from Tokyo to Kyoto hotel via post office as i travelled to Miyajima/Hiroshima and by the time i reached Kyoto, my luggage was already at my hotel :). This is not an expensive service and i would recommend it if you want luggage free travel.
I can add lot more to this list. All i would say is that you must travel Japan once and experience it yourself. I will definitely be going back to Japan to cover more cities and locations.