22 Simple MISTAKES to AVOID when you first visit Japan

I'd say 99% of firsttime visitors to Japan make at least one of these Noob mistakes so let's start with the smallest erors what I like to call Sushi size slip-ups so on your trip what are you going to do first thing in the morning because if you've answered take a shower you're doing it wrong why well first of all if you're staying anywhere with shared bathrooms like guest houses hostels or capsule hotels the showers get completely rammed in the mornings but are dead at night and second if you're staying in a hotel you might get to use an onen or big public bath instead but you should always use these at night because of the next mistake which is going late to breakfast I know it's so easy to get completely wiped out hunting down that perfect ramen restaurant or having one too many sories as you do your best Bill Murray impression but if you've paid for a breakfast buffet don't wait until the last minute because news flash you might not find your favorite onigiris getting restocked it's not uncommon to find Japanese guests lining up before the buffet opens at like 600 or 6:30 you don't have to be there that early of course but just don't leave it until the very last minute now with your belly full of natto and miso soup you're thinking better get my case packed cuz it's time to check out well yes go and do that but don't make the mistake of trailing your luggage around with you all over the city even if they're small carry-on siiz cases I see so many people doing this and it's completely idiotic because a almost all hotels in guest houses will keep that luggage for you for at least the rest of the day B you can also Whack Your Case into luggage lockers at almost every railway station and see if you find all the lockers are full up just go to tourist information information they'll tell you where they have extra lockers and sometimes they'll actually keep your cases for you right there for free and speaking of Staff that's next because one of the most common mistakes first timers make is not letting people help them believe it or not tourist attractions get a lot of foreign visitors and you're not going to be the first non-japanese that staff have met so let them do their jobs and explain to you what ticket to get or when the attraction closes because I can assure you there's nothing more dehumanizing than having Google translate shoved in your face and being ignored as a person now the next mistake is what about 95% of firsttime visitors do and that is stay in Tokyo for the entirety of their trip now don't get me wrong there's a ton of incredible things to do and see in Tokyo but if you think the capital gives you a good flavor of the rest of the country I'm going to ask for what you've been smoking because you really really need to get out and see somewhere else on your trip and if you're heading for Kyoto or Osaka at the start of your trip don't make the mistake of flying into Tokyo you can get to Kyoto in just 80 minutes from canai airport whereas if you're coming from Nara it's going to take you 3 and 1/2 hours now all these mistakes so far have been relatively small so let's look at the errors that are going to waste your time money and energy what I like to call blowfish size blunders for the first one let's rewind back to your plane landing you've cleared immigration picked up your case what do you do next well if you're anything like about 90% of Travelers you'll be telling me a long list of things to do pick up a SIM card or Wi-Fi router collect your Jr pass or bus ticket buy a sua card and get some cash but rushing around straight off the plane isn't any fun with jet lag and it's a mistake you can easily avoid if you do a bit of planning ahead cuz let's start with picking up rail passes you can easily waste a ton of time at the airport waiting in line at the Jr counter doing this and then going on to reserve seats so instead just buy a separate ticket into Tokyo or Osaka and collect your passes there the following morning you'll usually find that the queue is so much shorter if there even is one this where your plans are less screwed up if your plane arrives late and you can get to your accommodation much quicker but you're probably thinking at this point that's a great idea Andrew but what about the internet I need to pick up that pocket Wi-Fi router or a SIM card at the airport because without Google Maps I'm totally sunk but do you have to because if you've got a reasonably new phone you can get an eim meaning you don't have to fuf around and pick up any physical items you can just download an app choose the plan you want and activate it and that's your internet ready to go and you can get that in installed before you even leave home I put an affiliate link for a company that you might want to check out in the description so go and use that if you want an eim and you also want to help me make more videos like this there is one more mistake that you can fix before you arrive in Japan and that's to do with money now I really couldn't give a flying monkeys if you want to pay for everything by credit card cash or IC card just as long as you always have an alternative in case one of those isn't accepted a lot of people Rave about IC cards and how credit cards are now fine in more places but the fact is nobody is going to refuse cash so bare minimum order some Yen before you leave home pick it up at the airport and put it in a money belt because it'll get you started and you'll have some backup money right there now the next mistake is kind of mediumsized because if you don't do this you're going to spend more on transport than you really need to but I know it's hard to avoid it because course I've done it myself a few times I'm talking about checking for Discount and special passes it really does pay to do some research before you leave home especially for the rail passes but once you're already in Japan just head to tourist information because the stuff there will tell you all about the greatest discounts and City travel passes that you might have missed so here's where I get slightly controversial because I'm going to tell you you're making a big big boo boo if you completely avoid taking taxis in case you didn't know cabs in Japan are flipping expensive for example a distance that costs 220 Yen on the subway in Kyoto is going to cost almost five times that at least 1,000 yen by taxi but although taxis are pricey it makes a lot of sense to use them in two situations first if you're traveling in a group and can split the cost the journey might well be cheaper than using public transport the second time is if you're going across a city and you just don't have time for complicated transport routes now if you've done some trip planning already you might have made this mistake you make a list of all the places you want to see in Tokyo or the cities that you want to see across Japan you get here and start your tour and before long you realize that some of those places aren't quite as close to each other as they might have looked on the map I've seen a lot of itineraries where people are spending entire days getting from City to city but this also happens when you make unplanned excursions too Japan is much bigger than you think you know and although you might assume that you can get anywhere in Japan quickly because of the shinkansen the fact is you can't because many places don't have it so don't make that mistake because many places almost require slow travel if you want to visit them but equally don't fall into the Trap of only visiting places that have a shinkansen connection there are so many destinations in Japan I can think of that are only accessible by Express train or bus and if you limit yourself to shinhan cities you're going to miss out on so many incredible and unique sites and experiences I hope you're finding this video helpful so far because I'm trying to make your trip to Japan the best it can possibly be and if you'd like to get more tips recommendations and news to help you get planning go sign up for my monthly Insider email it's completely free and you'll find out about events and places that nobody else is talking about go find the link in the pinned comments all right now we're into the big time error Zone what I like to call Godzilla size gaffs these are mistakes that are going to make you look stupid make your trip harder or potentially ruin it completely I should probably have made this section sound a bit more serious like earthquake size errors but anyway here goes so as you might imagine from looking at other videos on this channel I travel a lot in Japan and that means I run into other tourists from time to time and one time earlier this year I was waiting in line at the ticket office and just for fun I decided to listen in on how one foreign tourist handled the conversation with the staff now I won't say where this person was from because well I don't really know but this guy rolls up in front of the staff and greets him with a big friendly good morning I don't know about you but I'm pretty sure even I know how to whip out Google translate and push the button so it can speak for me if I really can't be bothered seriously though have some manners and just learn the basics before you get here now although it's good to know a few simple phrases Japan does serve English speakers really well with things like signage transport announcements and leaflets you can get at a attractions but don't fall into the Trap of expecting good English support everywhere because you're setting yourself up for a major disappointment there's considerable variation not just across the country but also within the major cities but if you do your best with learning the basics using Google translate and being patient with people you can get a really long way and speaking of major disappointments a couple of years ago I went to Hokkaido and stayed at Lake Toya and I was really excited about visiting the newly opened IU Museum on the south coast so I made my plan went to the station got on the train and when I arrived at the Museum I found out that I couldn't go in because it only accepted Advance reservations when I went back to the station I was sure that the station Master took pity on me for this really Noob error but don't let this be you check ahead and see if the attraction you're visiting needs advanc reservations because it's becoming increasingly widespread these days this next one sounds like common sense but Common Sense usually being well uncommon this mistake is understandable and I find myself doing this I have a list of like five things I want to do on a given day and I get up at the crack of dawn and rush through breakfast to get to the first place as soon as it opens Dash around hurry on to the next place and the next and the next and collaps in a pole at the end of the day utterly exhausted here's the deal less is often more you can rush and rush and see as much as possible but will you have time to savor the carp in the pond or the herens in the river probably not don't cram your itineraries to bursting Point slow down and thank me later and while we're talking about things bursting let's address the problem of luggage what are you going to bring to Japan because if the answer is an enormous suitcase then I have one thing thing to say to you don't you don't want the major hustle and trust me it is a major hustle of lugging it around it's going to slow you down dramatically Japan is the home of small because space is at a premium leave it at home and bring something smaller the best way to make this work for you is simply to use the washing machine at the hotel or hostel that you're staying at so you don't need to bring tons of clothes okay I'm going to get serious now because avoiding this mistake can save you some serious cash if anything bad happens how do I know well because a few years ago my friend came to visit me and while he did have a big suitcase which really made me laugh he didn't have the one thing he needed when I had to take him to the hospital during a stay and that is travel insurance well no actually he did have travel insurance from the Andrew travel insurance company yes that's right I had to pay for his treatment now thankfully this wasn't a Mega Money level treat treatments but my friend actually didn't have enough money to pay himself and while I'd like to be your travel insurance company and make sure you buy coverage before you travel the best I can actually do is point you toward one company I've used in the past which is linked down in the description and this brings me to the final mistake this is a trap that I see almost everybody falling into at some point is when you take somebody else's trip taking someone else's trip what on Earth am I on about well let me tell you once when I was living outside Japan one of my colleagues came to see me and said Andrew I'm going to Japan soon do you have any ideas about where I should visit and you can imagine that I had a couple of suggestions so they went off and made a plan and took the trip but when I bumped into them a couple of weeks later and I asked them how it had gone it turned out that they had just gone to pretty much all the big tourist traps and completely ignored all of my suggestions now I'm not going to lie I was a bit disappointed about this but not actually because they hadn't taken my advice it was because of their reasoning it basically came down to I can't visit Japan without seeing x y and Zed because I want to show my friends that I went there well you went to Japan what's the problem so if you're making plans based on what you're going to tell your friends and family or what you want to post on your Instagram just a suggestion for you it's your money use your imagination take your own trip you have my permission not that you need it to skip anything that looks like a tourist trap and just do something entirely different that you find interesting and if you're looking for some unique ideas for your trip just sign up for my Insider email I mentioned before it's a really easy way to level up your Japan trip in just 5 minutes a month it's completely free and I load it up with all my handpick suggestions on where to go and what to see if I find some new discounts or Flight Sales I'll tell you about it in the email I also put in tons of tips based on my experience of traveling to every single prefecture in the country and you can also send me your questions that I'll answer in future emails or videos so if that sounds good the link is in the pinned comment and when you've done that make sure you're packing the right things for your trip in this video up here but for now see you

Channel: Japan Unravelled

Views: 132,865

Keywords: beginner mistakes japan, common mistakes japan, trip mistakes japan

Id: 5IKu7msAgFY

Length: 15min 22sec (922 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 24 2023