Looking for advice about moving to Tokyo
September 9, 2023 6:55 AM Subscribe
I'm moving to Tokyo in a few months. I've done my due diligence and am doing plenty of research, but can definitely use more advice or resources on the details of moving/living in Tokyo/Japan
I'm an American and my wife is Chinese. I can speak Japanese, though I'm mainly comfortable conversationally and while I can understand most anything, I am not used to like...navigating bureaucracy in Japanese. My wife speaks much more limited Japanese, but is working on it and her main priority when moving is going to be improving her Japanese (which she is excited to do).
We are likely going to be moving in mid/late November. The move itself I'm not too worried about, we don't have much stuff and already have some good options for the stuff we want to bring.
The stuff I'm more interested in is...the details of actually living in Japan/Tokyo. An example I like to bring up is how seriously Japanese law treats carrying even relatively small knives around. This isn't relevant in the sense that I ever carry knives around (I don't fish or hunt or even cook very often :P), but more just that it's easy to assume that things work in a way that..they don't. So I'm looking for things that I should be aware of...differences in systems, in laws, etc that could be important when living here. I've visited many times, know Japanese people as well as people living in Japan, so I'm not completely without any context...but still, living there is different.
For example, I'm curious about how one should deal with the police. I try not to spend too much time on reddit, but if you spent any time on reddit/twitter at all you hear horror stories about people getting harassed, along with all sorts of different views on how to deal with that. What should I do, in general? What should my wife do?
My wife is a small woman who can't speak much Japanese. She will try and be situationally aware, but is there anything in particular she should be aware about?
If something bad happens, who should we call? Are there numbers/locations we should have?
Those aren't my exact questions (though I would love answers if you have them!), they're more meant to be representative of the types of things that you have to think about a lot more seriously if you live in a place, versus just visiting.
A few other question areas
- How does one navigate the medical system as a foreign resident? My medical Japanese isn't great, but I mean, I've navigated the medical system in China (but with my wife's help), and we can navigate it in Japanese...but I don't know what the availability of good care is in English or Japanese. But more generally, if I get sick and need to see a doctor...is that hard? If I need/want a test? If I want to see a specialist? Is it worth getting medical insurance on top of the insurance I'll be paying for via taxes? (I will not have an employer providing that)
- Apartments...enough said @_@ our budget seems adequate and honestly while I've heard horror stories, people we know who've looked recently have said it's not too bad, so mainly just not sure what we should be keeping in mind when looking besides the obvious stuff like "what area do you like", subway access, "where do you want to be able to go easily"...should we be thinking about earthquake/tsunami related issues? eg if the city floods or loses power, parts of the city will likely be affected much more severely than others
- This is sort of orthogonal to moving, but I do need to find a japanese corporate accountant who can prepare taxes for my japanese company. I'd certainly appreciate any leads! I will also need someone to convert those to a form my american accountant can use, though my american accuontant may be able to provide leads there.
And I'd be interested more generally if there are any sites/forums/etc (dare I say, subreddits) that are useful. There are lots of japan related subreddits, but I've found them to be of wildly varying quality. I'm certain there's good information there.
But really...I'm just open to advice or resources that you think are relevant. I'm especially interested in the so-called "unknown unknown", the things that are important but might not think about at the outset (I know a lot of people have forgotten to make pension system payments, for example...we are on that, but it's an example!)
I'm an American and my wife is Chinese. I can speak Japanese, though I'm mainly comfortable conversationally and while I can understand most anything, I am not used to like...navigating bureaucracy in Japanese. My wife speaks much more limited Japanese, but is working on it and her main priority when moving is going to be improving her Japanese (which she is excited to do).
We are likely going to be moving in mid/late November. The move itself I'm not too worried about, we don't have much stuff and already have some good options for the stuff we want to bring.
The stuff I'm more interested in is...the details of actually living in Japan/Tokyo. An example I like to bring up is how seriously Japanese law treats carrying even relatively small knives around. This isn't relevant in the sense that I ever carry knives around (I don't fish or hunt or even cook very often :P), but more just that it's easy to assume that things work in a way that..they don't. So I'm looking for things that I should be aware of...differences in systems, in laws, etc that could be important when living here. I've visited many times, know Japanese people as well as people living in Japan, so I'm not completely without any context...but still, living there is different.
For example, I'm curious about how one should deal with the police. I try not to spend too much time on reddit, but if you spent any time on reddit/twitter at all you hear horror stories about people getting harassed, along with all sorts of different views on how to deal with that. What should I do, in general? What should my wife do?
My wife is a small woman who can't speak much Japanese. She will try and be situationally aware, but is there anything in particular she should be aware about?
If something bad happens, who should we call? Are there numbers/locations we should have?
Those aren't my exact questions (though I would love answers if you have them!), they're more meant to be representative of the types of things that you have to think about a lot more seriously if you live in a place, versus just visiting.
A few other question areas
- How does one navigate the medical system as a foreign resident? My medical Japanese isn't great, but I mean, I've navigated the medical system in China (but with my wife's help), and we can navigate it in Japanese...but I don't know what the availability of good care is in English or Japanese. But more generally, if I get sick and need to see a doctor...is that hard? If I need/want a test? If I want to see a specialist? Is it worth getting medical insurance on top of the insurance I'll be paying for via taxes? (I will not have an employer providing that)
- Apartments...enough said @_@ our budget seems adequate and honestly while I've heard horror stories, people we know who've looked recently have said it's not too bad, so mainly just not sure what we should be keeping in mind when looking besides the obvious stuff like "what area do you like", subway access, "where do you want to be able to go easily"...should we be thinking about earthquake/tsunami related issues? eg if the city floods or loses power, parts of the city will likely be affected much more severely than others
- This is sort of orthogonal to moving, but I do need to find a japanese corporate accountant who can prepare taxes for my japanese company. I'd certainly appreciate any leads! I will also need someone to convert those to a form my american accountant can use, though my american accuontant may be able to provide leads there.
And I'd be interested more generally if there are any sites/forums/etc (dare I say, subreddits) that are useful. There are lots of japan related subreddits, but I've found them to be of wildly varying quality. I'm certain there's good information there.
But really...I'm just open to advice or resources that you think are relevant. I'm especially interested in the so-called "unknown unknown", the things that are important but might not think about at the outset (I know a lot of people have forgotten to make pension system payments, for example...we are on that, but it's an example!)
For places to ask questions or look through previous answers, I like to look at the HN Tokyo slack group and talk to folks on the famichiki mastodon instance.
Carry your residence card with you at all times. I'm a white woman so your mileage may vary, but I think the most likely stop by police is to check your residence card. I've never had my belongings searched, but have heard about it before. Just do what they ask.
The nearest police box is genuinely a good resource if you're lost, or have lost something/found something.
The best disaster info app to keep an eye on an approaching typhoon or look up an earthquake is NERV. That name may or may not sound familiar. It's a real app.
119 is the phone number for ambulances and fires. I can't find the Japanese govt page that shows proof, but every area in the country should have interpretation services for 119 now.
Garbage sorting is a pain. We keep our towns garbage calendar on the wall to keep track of what's coming up when. If in doubt (dirty plastics, not obviously recyclable like cans) it can go in burnable garbage. If your garbage area is not an exposed pile of bags, you can usually put your garbage out the night before instead of the narrow window of time in the morning.
As a Japanese speaker/reader, your local city hall is a good resource. If you have a weekday open and need to know something you can just go to the division in charge of whatever it is and ask. If you can't go during regular business hours I've had good results with asking questions via phone or email form on the website.
There should be an international association in your area that might be able to provide support like volunteer Japanese classes, medical interpretation, etc. If it doesn't seem that useful or doesn't exist, there may be a wider area international association to go to as well. For example, I think my current town doesn't even have an international association, but my prefecture does.
For medical care, I'm pretty sure you don't need anything extra on top of national health insurance. To find good doctors, I usually rely on word of mouth and/or online reviews (Google maps). It can sometimes be hard to figure out which kind of doctor you're supposed to be going to (I once tried ent for throat/ear pain and got bounced over to 外科 for what ended up being a thyroid problem) but just do your best. Googling a symptom and 何科 can work.
Apartments: I'd be most cautious about places right next to a river and right next to the ocean on low ground. You might want to look up the ハザードマップ for the area, see if it's in a flood zone etc.
If you haven't done this, register with Smart Traveler so the US embassy knows where you are in a disaster. I didn't leave the country after the 2011 tsunami but if I wanted to, I could have. The embassy was texting me with info about bus/plane ticket assistance because I'd registered.
If something happens and the cell network is down for whatever reason (overloaded, damage) you can go find a public phone booth to make calls. There are a healthy number around.
posted by karasu at 5:59 AM on September 11, 2023
Carry your residence card with you at all times. I'm a white woman so your mileage may vary, but I think the most likely stop by police is to check your residence card. I've never had my belongings searched, but have heard about it before. Just do what they ask.
The nearest police box is genuinely a good resource if you're lost, or have lost something/found something.
The best disaster info app to keep an eye on an approaching typhoon or look up an earthquake is NERV. That name may or may not sound familiar. It's a real app.
119 is the phone number for ambulances and fires. I can't find the Japanese govt page that shows proof, but every area in the country should have interpretation services for 119 now.
Garbage sorting is a pain. We keep our towns garbage calendar on the wall to keep track of what's coming up when. If in doubt (dirty plastics, not obviously recyclable like cans) it can go in burnable garbage. If your garbage area is not an exposed pile of bags, you can usually put your garbage out the night before instead of the narrow window of time in the morning.
As a Japanese speaker/reader, your local city hall is a good resource. If you have a weekday open and need to know something you can just go to the division in charge of whatever it is and ask. If you can't go during regular business hours I've had good results with asking questions via phone or email form on the website.
There should be an international association in your area that might be able to provide support like volunteer Japanese classes, medical interpretation, etc. If it doesn't seem that useful or doesn't exist, there may be a wider area international association to go to as well. For example, I think my current town doesn't even have an international association, but my prefecture does.
For medical care, I'm pretty sure you don't need anything extra on top of national health insurance. To find good doctors, I usually rely on word of mouth and/or online reviews (Google maps). It can sometimes be hard to figure out which kind of doctor you're supposed to be going to (I once tried ent for throat/ear pain and got bounced over to 外科 for what ended up being a thyroid problem) but just do your best. Googling a symptom and 何科 can work.
Apartments: I'd be most cautious about places right next to a river and right next to the ocean on low ground. You might want to look up the ハザードマップ for the area, see if it's in a flood zone etc.
If you haven't done this, register with Smart Traveler so the US embassy knows where you are in a disaster. I didn't leave the country after the 2011 tsunami but if I wanted to, I could have. The embassy was texting me with info about bus/plane ticket assistance because I'd registered.
If something happens and the cell network is down for whatever reason (overloaded, damage) you can go find a public phone booth to make calls. There are a healthy number around.
posted by karasu at 5:59 AM on September 11, 2023
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- If you take any prescription medication, or routinely use a certain medication available without a prescription at home, can you get it in Japan as easily, or at all? The US embassy has some advice on how to check here: https://jp.usembassy.gov/services/importing-medication/. It may be worth working with your doctors now to see if there’s a way to transition to another treatment if you need to.
- If you drive, check into the requirements to obtain Japanese driver’s licenses, because for Americans, it varies by the state where your license was issued. You will also want to get an International Driving Permit to cover you with your US license for that first year. Here is the Tokyo Police Department’s page on this: https://www.keishicho.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/multilingual/english/traffic_safety/drivers_licenses/index.html. Driving in Tokyo probably won’t be something you’d want to do routinely, but in my visits to more rural areas in Japan like northern Tohoku and eastern Hokkaido, renting a car was the difference between the trip being feasible at all and not being able to go. You may also want to consider obtaining a license to deal with more unwieldy but not really delivery-worthy furniture you’ll be managing, or how a trip to a big-box store, home-improvement center, Costco or IKEA might be easier with the ability to drive there.
- Your local Tokyo ward will probably have some specific trash/recycling rules that will intersect with your move, and it would be nice to know those before you pack. For example, are there rules for foam packing material or cardboard boxes or bubble wrap that would mean you might be swimming in moving detritus the trash collection folks can’t or won’t take for days after unpacking?
- If you are even remotely considering buying a bike to get around Tokyo, check what this would look like day-to-day as you look for a place to live and plan your commute. Would you need to chain your bike up outside? Is there a covered, secure bike storage area? If you’re in an elevator building on an upper floor and there’s no bike storage, can you use the elevator to bring the bike upstairs to the apartment? What are the rules for bikes on trains, buses and the subway? Legally, it’s mandatory throughout Japan for cyclists to carry liability insurance and, since April 2023, to wear a helmet. There’s a bike registration system through the police which might make registering a bike bought overseas tricky. A good bike shop could help you navigate all this, I’m sure.
- The US embassy in Tokyo has a lot of information on dealing with the police and the criminal law system here: https://jp.usembassy.gov/services/arrest-of-a-u-s-citizen/
posted by mdonley at 9:47 AM on September 9, 2023