Comments by "XSportSeeker" (@XSpImmaLion) on "Tokyo Lens"
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From the docs and what I've seen myself in Japan, Sherry is right on her guess... not sure if it the case there though. xD
The absolute most common thing for Japan regarding seemingly abandoned pathways, roads, tunnels... even entire villages and roadside venues like restaurants and cafes is simply because a more modern and convenient route was built afterwards, which lead to decline and eventual abandonment of what used to be an inconvenient but only way to go from one spot to another.
Which is kinda fascinating... it's sort of a weird side effect of a country that had a period of huge infrastructure investment specifically targeting the benefit of the majority. You don't see much of that in developing nations like mine. :P
Well, you do occasionally, but it's like the state of abandonment and how crude the original pathways were makes them untraversable... like, nature takes over, things break and deteriorate to a point you just can't go there anymore.
In Japan there are all these places that are either maintained by small groups or even individuals, or that were so well built in the first place, that they are still there.
Anyways, great finds as always Norm!
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The more I learn about Tokyo, the more I understood rent there isn't very expensive at all... xD
I mean, sure, if you have very specific demands, you could be looking at ridiculous prices... like those apartments Sharla and Chris visited.
But on average, rent prices in Tokyo don't seen to come even close to the ridiculously inflated prices of some medium to large cities all around the world.
Heck, I've seen prices that were cheaper than comparable places in large cities in developing nations, such as here in Brazil... well, back when the currency exchange wasn't as bad as it currently is. But leveling it out with cost of living and minimum wage, it just sounds several times more doable for an average worker to live in Tokyo metropolitan area in comparison to an average worker managing to live in, for instance, Sao Paulo metropolitan area (outside a slum, that is).
From what I understand, this is due to some quirks and specifics on how real estate works in Japan... but I dunno a whole ton about it.
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It may sound a bit counter intuitive or "icky", but here goes a tip from a tropical nation - you wanna stay in the shade no matter how you do it - umbrelas, more rather than less clothing, etc. Better to just avoid getting under direct sunlight altogether.
And for the hot humid effect that makes you sweat profusely... you want a wet small towel around your neck. Some people might say it's gross, yadda yadda, but you stop thinking about that when you are constantly at the verge of a heat stroke. :P
Drink tons of water no matter how many times you have to go to the restroom. :P
For people who already sweat a lot, it's just better to use a wet towel rather than being constantly drenched in your own sticky sweat anyways. And for people who don't naturally sweat much, it's even more important... because it means your body doesn't cope well with hot temperatures.
It's because the most important thing is reducing your internal temperature, there's a whole lot of blood flowing through your neck that is more exposed, so that's why there are so many neck cooling contraptions out there. But I guarantee none of them will be as effective as a towel soaked in cool water. And yes, you wanna carry around a cold water bottle which you will use to soak the towel from time to time. Clean the towel and soak it constantly.
We're in the middle of winter down here, but during the day it's almost as hot as it is there. Crazy. We don't really have winters that are cold all throughout the season, but this year it's completely abnormal. It's like, we had a week long colder days, then perhaps half a dozen couple days long colder days, and the rest was the same as summer... the only difference is that at nights it's cooling down a bit, but not by much. I don't even wanna think how hot our summer will be...
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Incredible.... xD
I mean, I can admire, but never do it. Nice that it seems to fit his lifestyle, but man, it can't be an easy thing to maintain.
It's interesting though - he has a GPD Win Mini, a Nintendo Switch and a Macbook. GPD Win Mini you can also play games (though not Nintendo games), and you could do most things that you do on the Macbook in the Win Mini too, though you'd have to deal with different OS and small screen.
I think his camera gear could also be minimized somehow, but you always end up in that situation of jack of all trades, master of none.
Still, just amazing. I can really empathize with the ease of moving... xD Moving once a year or two is a nightmare scenario for me personally, having done it twice for me and twice with my mom. It does make complete sense what he's talking about - that it helps rethink what you need and what you don't.
Sharing the video with relatives... xD Thanks for the video and interview Norm! Rare finds
Oh, also love that coat! xD Closest thing I have laying around but almost never use is a fishing jacket filled with pockets. Useful for the exact same reason, but I can't imagine going around with only it and no bags... :P
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I've been to Japan twice... back in 2008 and in 2018.
Weird as it may, speaking as a foreigner/tourist myself, I just gotta say... Kyoto back in 2008 was just better, more balanced. Less crowded, more beautiful, less artificial. More... japanese.
While I do understand how much foreign tourism drives japanese economy these days, and that a sudden drastic drop in tourism like 2020 was must be extremely harsh for the economy in general, plus the inevitability of attracting foreign workers due to an aging population and stagnant economy, I can't ignore the difference I saw in those 10 years. And it's not that back in 2008 Kyoto didn't have tourists... of course it did. But it was at more manageable levels. You could still visit some touristic spots without feeling you are entering an overcrowded metro at peak hours.
My own hometown here in Brazil is a touristic city. It's nowhere near as huge as any famous touristic city, specially one like Kyoto, but it's a city oriented towards tourism. This orientation towards tourism can often have a creeping slowly encroaching effect in the place that is not very pleasant to watch.
Crowds are the most obvious visible effect, but you also have a change in attitude from the community, prioritization of resources, quality of service, how open to conversation people are, stories that are told throughout the place, the mood and relationships people have towards each other, and several other general sense stuff that happens in daily life.
It's not that I don't understand why places like Kyoto will change overtime and 2020 was just a brief pause on things, this is a process that started way before 2008 in any case, but I do worry that something was already lost there.
But you know, it's just something that happens everywhere. Japan is still fairly insulated, the language still generally presents itself as a barrier, it has some very strong sense of internal culture and code of ethics, and tourism generally hits only the biggest urban centers, so there is a degree of separation there, which I hope gets intelligently managed over the years.
Looking at global tourism, there are some places that have been worse hit, and that already turned into something else losing all it's cultural backgrounds and local customs because of it.
The ultimate consequence is extremely worrying... people don't pay much attention to it because you know, we all want to visit several places in the world, and no one wants to say tourism is evil or whatnot.
But I've read about entire cities where stuff like AirBnb has practically driven entire neighborhoods out. You have blocks and blocks of city space where the vast majority of real estate is dedicated to tourists alone. Apartment buildings, houses, etc all either unoccupied or occupied by weekend tourists. Consequently, so does commerce turns to tourists alone, the attitude of the place changes, and it becomes sort of an empty shell.
So what happens is that there are no locals left. No culture. No authenticity. Nothing there but the buildings and infrastructure that are slowly being transformed to attend tourism alone. The place became so attractive due to it's looks for tourism, which majorly pays attention more to looks than to substance in a mainstream way, that it got carved out of what made it, and got replaced by an onslaught of gawkers. A museum, or greek ruins.
As important as I understand tourism and foreign workers to be for the japanese economy, I don't wanna see what makes Japan the country it is today to slowly vanish into the sunset or something. Bit alarmist to think of it this way now, but I guess the decade difference between my trips gave me a perspective that I didn't really want to see...
And I am very self aware how highly hipocritical this is coming from a foreigner who visited Japan only twice and has a limited understanding of the culture itself, and still wants to move to Japan one day to adopt the culture as his own, but you know.
Even back in 2008, I understood that the Japan I liked was not in the big cities... we visited smaller towns up towards Fukushima that had a different vibe. While I did enjoy a lot the vibrance of Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara, Osaka and whatnot, I think the places that really connected to me were small cities and towns we saw while my relatives were trying to find connections to their ancestors. In 2018 we didn't have the opportunity to go much into the weeds, my family and relatives who went with me on both trips are all at retirement age, it's hard to stray much outside urban centers with mobility problems.
If I was to go back to Japan by myself though, I think I'd stay away from the big cities. Stick to the west coast or something. xD But I digress.
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Great info from experience!
I'd not cycle in Tokyo or any major city mostly because I'd likely end up in an accident. xD More to do with me being a lousy cyclist than anything else.
I wouldn't cycle in New York not even if I rode a bike like a pro... xD
Calmer cities and towns are fine though, kinda wish to do that someday.
Having cars and trucks passing that close is kinda unnerving to me... I'd just prefer going slower and just walking, even if it takes way longer.
And I used to bike a lot back in my hometown... I guess my perspective changed over the years.
City I live in currently has some bike infrastructure and lots of people who bike... like, it's pretty good in comparison to other cities in my country, but still very dangerous compared to Tokyo.
In fact, this just reminded me of something... wow.
I'm pretty sure that a kinda distant relative of mine died in a bike accident in Japan. He was the son of the sister of my mom's aunt, I was still a teenager back then, he was just over 18 if I'm not mistaken. Their family helped and guided us in both our visits to Japan, but this was much much later on. Like well over 20 years after they lost their son.
At the time, it surprised all of us because of the perception that Japan was a safe country... must've been devastating to the family there.
Anyways, personal rambling aside, it's calm and leisure biking around that seems fun there. Commute... not so much. xD
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The allergy and diet restriction thing is hard because that's too broad a range... you gotta really get into specifics in order to think of a strategy.
Broadly speaking though, you could either learn the words and terms for it, or even make some simple graphical cards to show to staff in restaurants before going in. There are some stuff that you are going to have trouble though.
For instance, an uncle of mine developed extreme allergy for sesame pretty late in his life, this is a source of problem almost anywhere he goes unfortunately, because sesame seed oil and sesame in general is used everywhere, particularly in Asian cuisine. So he was kinda forced into an extremely restrictive diet over a decade ago when he went to Japan... but he still enjoyed the trip. xD
I think because of how tourism is booming in Japan, there are far more options these days... but you know, all these food trends that we have in the west comes kinda slow into Japan simply because there has never been a real need for it before.
Traditional Japanese cuisine already doesn't have many sources of allergens, and there isn't a long history of dietary restrictions based on ideology or religion, so it's a less common thing all around - the concept itself.
Vegan, vegetarian, and other dietary restrictions, you'll need to look around. There are restaurants, cafes and bars that do have that stuff in the menu and prepare food with that in mind in particular, but it's not everywhere. I've heard that exclusively vegetarian and vegan restaurants are popping up all around, but they are not as common as in western nations.
Lactose intolerance, years ago it wasn't common to have lactose free options readily available everywhere, I'm not sure how it is nowadays anymore... but also, milk already isn't something used everywhere in Japan, there are tons of soy based alternatives, so if you are ok with those it may not be necessary. If you really really want lactose free milk alternatives though, I think some brands in Japan do have those... perhaps you won't be able to find it in kombinis, but in specialty markets and perhaps big supermarket chains they'll be there. Perhaps Norm has a more up to date view on this, I went to Japan twice back in 2008 and then again in 2018 and I didn't look much into it because my lactose intolerance isn't 100%... I can still take few stuff with a bit of lactose without things going haywire. xD You can always take your lactaid with you though.
Oh, still more or less on this spirit - take your own medicine. See travel restrictions on that and whatnot. It's not that you won't find plenty of drugstores in Japan, it's just that names can be all different, some stuff you won't be able to buy unless you have a prescription, and it's just more convenient and fast to use what you already know goes well with you - you don't wanna waste trip time needlessly.
As for the language, I have only this to say: Japan is likely the best country all around which you can go without knowledge of the language. Things can get a bit confusing sometimes, but you just make room for it, be patient, try again.
See, I have a couple of relatives who went with me in both trips, they don't speak or read Japanese, and get this, they also don't speak nor read English. It's Portuguese only and a bit of Spanish at most because we are from Brazil.
A few times all they had were cards with addresses and information to show prepared beforehand, and gesturing, and they still managed, a few times in the trip by themselves. xD Both trips we were actually in a group of 6 people with mixed language knowledge levels.
Worse yet, we all look Japanese because we are Japanese descendent, so weird looks and questions on why we couldn't speak Japanese. xD And like I said, our first trip was back in 2008 more or less... no smartphone, we didn't even take cellphones, calling back home was still done with international phone booths, Google maps was nowhere near what it is today, Japan also wasn't as prepared to international tourists as it is today, and back on the first trip we also went into some smaller towns and neighborhoods. Still managed ok.
It's just like, don't sweat it. I'm willing to bet that if I knew nothing of Japanese nor English, only had my plane tickets and hotel or stay reservations (because you need those in order to apply for tourist Visa here), and went totally blind for the trip... I'd probably still enjoy plenty. Be respectful and patient and you'll do fine.
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That would be a nope. xD
I spent my entire childhood in a pretty big house with big garden front and back, moved for a year into a 40 something square meters apartment with an aunt aged to be grandma (studying for university entrance exams), back to the house, and then moved cross state into another 40 something square meters rental apartment, and then on my own 70 square meters apartment.
Live comfortably by myself? 40 square meters will do, as long as I'm aiming towards the upgrade to 70, which I can then live very comfortably.
Over that I don't really need. In fact, I really just don't want. Despite living my entire childhood plus teens and few years of adulthood in a pretty big house, I have no dreams of living in mansions, palaces, having a country villa, beach house, and all of that stuff lots of people dream of when retiring or something. xD I'm utilitarian almost to an extreme... enough space to have my stuff that's easy enough to clean up. :P
I also want to eventually get rid of a whole ton of personal stuff that occupies lots of space... books, paperwork, collections. Sometime ago I was trying to become a minimalist, but it conflicts too much with my personality. In fact, if there is one thing that flies off minimalist inspirations at all, is that I kinda wanna have a full tinkering space at home... a place to store and use tools, do lotsa noise, etc. That won't fly on apartments at all.
But something the size of a capsule hotel... erm... room? Bed? That is pushing a bit too much. xD
I'd still like to have a few different places to sit, a big TV/monitor, comfy sofa, workspace, my own bathroom... asking for too much already, aren't I? xD
But I guess more than the space, the real problem for me is all of the rest being shared... that's harsh. I'm very much anti-social. :P
Now... we did stay for about 20 days on vacation in one of those tiny APA hotel rooms, if that counts. You know, if that's what it takes visiting Japan - sure! It's all about the pros and cons, plus details, right? Well, as long as you are not claustrophobic, which I'm not. Claustrophobics will see that as worse than a coffin... xD
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