Charades in Tokyo

By Ailsa | Thursday, 25 June | 4 Comments

Japan, it’s big, it’s loud and filled with a diverse culture.

A few months ago I had the pleasure of being able to visit the place and go on a tour around some different places. I visited a shrine, saw some Harajuku girls and ate some foods that I hope I’ll forget sometime soon.

To anyone even thinking about going to Japan, my first big and major advice is to LEARN THE LANGUAGE.

I know it sounds a bit silly, but the majority of the people in Japan don’t speak English as fluently as you might think. I was lucky because my tour guide was able to take care of the majority of talking that was needed, and was willing to translate into English whatever took the tour group’s fancy.

He couldn’t do it all however, and ordering something like McDonalds by pointing at the pretty pictures like a five year old is rather embarrassing to say the least. Besides, you can only have so much fun playing charades with a shop assistant or a waiter in a restaurant.

Once I got off the plane in Narita Airport (and had a very fun time going through customs and getting my fingerprint and picture taken) I had to make the very sad attempt of trying to catch a train to Shinjuku where my hotel was located.

Have a look at the train map below and you might have a little understanding of how difficult this task was, especially since buying train tickets is all done on computers; that are in Japanese.

After completing the task thanks to a friendly train clerk (who was there because of non-Japanese tourists like me) I managed to catch the two different trains I needed in order to get to Shinjuku.

Coming out of the train station and into the gloriousness which is Shinjuku, I was struck by large flashing neon signs and buildings, posters for various things, large crowds of non-English speakers and a horrible sense of “what the heck have I gotten myself into?”

Finally, I managed to reach the hotel after finding a taxi, walk up, tired, to the front counter with all my bags in tow. Luckily, the clerks were able to understand me (to an extent) and quickly got me to my room.

The next day I met my tour guide, who gave me a very easy English map and told me the rest of the tour group would arrive later on that day so it was a free exploring day for me.

Of course with my luck, since I couldn’t read any of the signs, I would stumble into the ‘red light district’ where the host clubs and other entertainment facilities were.

One of the main reasons I didn’t realise was because no one was avoiding the area and there were no glaringly obvious signs. However once I managed to figure out where I was thanks to the lovely pictures on buildings all around me, my walking stopped and I slowly backed out the way I came.

I think I’m cursed, because shortly after my attempts of an escape began, I had three encounters with some host club members attempting to talk to me and gesture to come in their respective host clubs with them.

I think if I was in any place besides Japan, I might have had a lot more trouble, but they were very happy to leave me alone after it became clear that I wasn’t interested and couldn’t speak the language.

I met the other people in the tour group later on that day at the hotel and became good friends with the majority of them.

We spent the next couple of days going to different places such as the Ghibli museum, which features art by Hayao Miyazaki (“Howl’s Moving Castle,” “Spirited Away”), and a lot of other really cool anime movies. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside but it was really amazing and one of those experiences you need to go and have for yourself.

One of my favourite places was Miyazaki’s studio, which featured hand-drawn rough sketches, character designs and scenery shots. Moving further into the studio, there were pictures which had been hand-painted using different techniques and it’s just incredible to think that some of the amazing pictures could actually be done by hand.

One of my other favourite places was the souvenir shop, where I bought a large amount of items for myself and friends back home.

Another place we visited was the Meji shrine which really looked like what you’d expect a traditional Japanese shrine to be. There were no signs of western development in the actual shrine itself and it was a lot of fun just looking around and taking pictures.

While I was there, I was actually lucky enough to see a Japanese style traditional wedding.

I also got to see some Harujuku girls and managed to take some pictures along with all the other tourists. Sadly for me, the Harujuku girls I met were just plain rude and were quite happy to confuse me by ignoring me and talking in Japanese with each other when I asked them for a photo (in very shaky Japanese).

Now I can truly sympathise with their annoyance over the fact that they’re constantly getting tourists taking their pictures like they’re some kind of animal on display. However, I don’t think it gives them the right to act like they’re ‘too cool for school’ or just plain regular jerks. Either way, I took their picture and made a run for it to Yoyogi Park, which is the home of musicians and other cosplayers who dress up like 1950s rockers and other random styles. It was a lot of fun! Some of the 1950s rockers were performing and having a great time while on the other side of the park, there were random bands blasting out their music for all to hear.

I also visited Takeshita (Ta-ke-shi-ta) street and managed to buy some very pretty costumes and clothes that I will probably never wear but like many tourists, I wanted my own little slice of cosplaying fun.

Another great arcade place to visit is ‘Akihabara’ (A-ki-ha-ba-ra) which is famous for dozens of anime, manga and electronic goods stores. It’s a shop-till-you-drop sort of place!

There was actually a store where you could buy some robots, and one of the clerks demonstrated one of their more expensive robots playing air guitar and doing a bit of a dance for my gawking pleasure.

Unfortunately because Akihabara is so big, I managed to get lost with a tour group friend when we tried to find the meeting place and couldn’t ask anyone for directions since we couldn’t speak Japanese.

We found the other tour group members-eventually.

For the rest of the tour, we got to do some pretty incredible things like visit an animation studio where artists showed their different work with special effects, animations and colouring on various animes.

We also got to take a trip to Mount Fuji (but unfortunately not all the way to the top), got to ride on the infamous bullet train, visit Sensoji (Sen-so-ji) temple and see some beautiful gardens as well as experience a traditional tea ceremony.

Those are only the few things that I managed to participate in while I had my one week holiday in Japan. It is merely scratching the surface, but what a fantastic time I still had.

For anyone who’s thinking of touring the world and needs some places to go, Japan’s certainly one of those places. I’m not saying to go because ‘it’s got really cool anime stuff’, but because there’s so much that you can enjoy there which isn’t anime. There are so many amazing sights, foods and a diverse culture that even an anti-anime fan will gain some grudging respect for Japan.

If anything, do it for the robots, because I mean, who doesn’t love robots?

Rules when Travelling to Japan:

1. Learn the language, or at least have a very good tour guide.
2. Be very good at charades or miming if you don’t follow rule number 1.
3. Go with people you know you’ll have a good time with (whiny friends excluded.)
4. Be prepared to loose your ego because you will make stuff-ups and feel foolish at times.
5. Have lots of money.
6. Enjoy yourself!