Things I learned living in Japan

[Sinner_sb]

I was never really the type of person to really dress for different seasons, in Brazil we kind of joke that we have two seasons, hot and hotter, with some wet along the way.

Well in Japan I discovered that dressing for the seasons is a must for summer and winter. I can easily get by during the colder parts of spring and autumn and takes me ages to truly get into full winter wear for my standards, but when the weather starts warming up or cooling down as the seasons change it can be a pain in the ass especially if you can't just easily change clothes or remove and add layers as needed, so I end being forced to dress to the temperature that bothers me the least, AKA I dress to keep myself cool even if the night temperatures are in the lower double digits as long I am not exposed to moving air and winds.

Summer in Japan is hell, there is no other way to describe it. The direct sunlight here hurts when hitting bare skin and I am of one quarter Lebanese descent giving me a natural light golden tan skin color and I don't sunburn easily. For 2 or so years I thought that buying summer clothes were stupid and a waste of money, it also helps that it took me that long to actually find shirts that fit me. So I was stuck wearing kirdland brand cotton shirts that I am positive that were meant to be winter shirts given the fabric's thickness as well my fucking uniforms. Let me be honest and say that I was sweating like crazy and even showering daily I would be stinking like crazy even halfway before lunch.

So after year 3 or so here in Japan I started trying to find thinner shirts to wear, after experimenting a bit and actually suffering friction and sweat burns on my sides and upper arms from one brand of shirts that I tried I gave up and bought dry-fit/wick shirts and wore my more standard cotton shirts under them and boy how it made a difference. I was still a sweaty mess and stinking to high heavens but I didn't feel as broiled as I did before them. I also bought and used menthol sprays, the cooling sensation did help a lot. I also bought 'towels' made of the dry-wick material to use as bandannas and neck guards, by soaking them, wringing the excess water and shaking them a bit they actually get quite cool and refreshing for a fair while, then they pull away the sweat and help cooling you off by sending slightly cooler blood to your head. I also bought shorts of the same stuff to wear under my uniform's pants because you can't wear non-uniform pants and they are supposed to be worn regardless of the season and they are thick enough to not feel too cold during winter, so they are horribly hot during summer. Later I found dry-wick shirts meant to be undershirts and they also helped a lot, it took longer but I found underwear of the same material, sadly it was boxer briefs since sadly Japan doesn't have many briefs, so I tend to adjust it to make them brief shaped by pulling up the legs.

My last/recent summer discovery was me finally giving long sleeved dry-wick UV blocking shirts a try because after nearly 5 years of living in Japan and seeing people wearing them I felt curious enough to give it a shot if I found it cheaply enough, it took me this long to try because I am very heat prone and sweat easily, so I always felt the need to have at the very least the skin of my arms exposed to cool off, I am so heat prone that one of my Japanese coworkers that worked with me in the outside of the factory during winter, who was bundled up in at least three layers of proper winter clothing including those padded vests asked me, who was wearing just two cotton shirt, a thin heat-tech long sleeved shirt with the sleeve rolled up to my mid biceps and my thin uniform shirt if I was cold because it was around 1 or 0 degrees outside and in a area with no breeze/wind and I said no, not really. So yeah, summer is hell.

Anyway I found a shirt for under 1,5k yen and decided to give it a try, so I went to work only with that as the top, since I saw a lot of people that doesn't work in the manufacturing lines doing so, I was shocked that it actually worked, the fabric did help me feel cooler because the sweat wasn't sticking to my skin and dried out fast, when I left work the strong sun doesn't sting my skin and I felt cooler even without moving air, with a breeze or wind it was even better. So it actually made me feel like maybe it wasn't as stupid as I thought it was.

A lot of the long sleeved or longer pants and dresses for summer are made of either very light fabric if not of materials meant to be dry-fit and UV blocking, which is why a lot of Japanese people had no issue with if much just letting their faces and fingers exposed when going out. Trust me I was also one of the people who looked at Japanese, specially women, wearing long sleeves, several layers and covered head to toe and think "Why are you wearing so many layers and long sleeves?! I feel hot just looking at you!"

So if you plan on coming to Japan at the summer months I advise going to uniclo or shimamura and buying some Japanese summer wear, I personally like the "silky style" of dry-fit clothing over the odd square raised weave of some shirts, the interior actually feels pretty coarse on those and it also "grabs" body hair and feels even weirder. If you buy what is normally sold as "cool towels" they are meant to be moistened with water, wrung of the excess and shaken slightly before being wrapped around your neck or head. You can actually unwrap them and given a shake to refresh the coolness, they also dry fast so you can give a quick hand wash in your hotel and the next morning they are good to use again.

However these dry-fit clothes, specially the shirts, tend to gather BO very fast given how they work, so they tend to be something to change daily if possible or washed every day of use. At shimamura a shirt is usually 1000 yen without taxes. Pair these kind of shirts with antiperspirant with alum, as they actually do help reduce BO a lot, here is my recomendation, it is 1000 yen and one tube lasts me 1 month of daily use.
this brand, the blue tube

Now this is IMPORTANT!!! Japanese summer heat is a killer and I am not exaggerating here. People die every summer from heatstroke every year. It is that bad, the government has adds, leaflets and posters warning about the dangers of dehydration and heatstroke. Two years ago I went shopping at 9AM, I wore summer clothes made of dry-fit material, wore shorts, a baseball style cap, took water with me and bought more stuff to drink while shopping and on the way back, sure I went walking and walked back, but before I arrived home, not even 30 minutes away from arriving I started to feel bad, I soldiered on for 15 minutes, bought a drink and had to give up and call my mother to pick me up 15 minutes walk away from home because I was feeling faint and was honestly afraid of passing out from heatstroke. This is with me taking every precaution that I could, drinking over 3 liters of sports drink and water. I got home, stripped naked and laid in bed for 1 hour with my AC turned on max.

Japanese summer is brutal and you will suffer if you don't take proper precautions, drink a lot of fluids, not just water, sports drinks like pocari sweat or aquarius, here they sell salt replenishing tablets, they are super important during summer time, buy at least two packs and keep them with you all the time specially if you aren't drinking sports drinks and you are sweating a lot. You can easily drink a shitton of water and it won't help if you don't replenish your minerals and sugar. If you are going out during the day try and keep one bottle of water or sports drink with you at all times, drink from it often, whenever possible go somewhere to cool off, wear a hat and sunblock at the very least as well.


Now for winter stuff. working night shift at a mostly semi-outdoors depot meant that I am exposed to the chill at the very least half of my shift having to go inside the heated part of the factory the other half, always leaving the heated part and colder part, so the changes get worse for me, so I can't actually dress up for 0 degrees or lower, it is a good thing that I am actually good with cold weather.

If you are coming to Japan I advise once again going to uniclo or shimamura and buying the heat-tech or fiber-heat shirts that they sell, they are meant to be worn over your bare skin as the base layer under other clothes and they not only trap heat pretty well specially as they can be as thin as pantyhose, but by some sort of chemical reaction with your skin moisture or sweat generate a little heat, making easier to endure the chill as long you wear a couple extra layers. If you are just traveling here for a short while and not really leaving a city you won't need much more than that and your own winter gear as long you came from another country with proper cold winters.

Now if you are planning on doing camping trips or going some some outdoors activities in open or windy areas, WTF dude during winter?, you might consider investing in reusable pocket warmers if you are going to do it for days or more than once. I personally don't like or use the disposable ones because they don't work or don't work well enough for me. This is my personal recommendation I like this brand of reusable pocket warmers, you buy it and some lighter fluid or other similar fuel and they keep you warm and toasty for hours, I learned how to fill my 24 hours size one to give me 8 hours of continuous use. You can put a cord on the cover that it comes with and hang it around your neck under you coat, or between other layers, and just by keeping your core warm you will feel much better.

It is currently a bad time to buy them here in Japan and will only get worse as winter goes by, the price can easily double and I only find it on the internet, best time to buy them is summer when there isn't much demand. But as I said this is if you really plan on going camping or some other trip where you will be outdoors for hours more than once. You will need to judge if it is worse the cost or not. I personally own 5 of them, three of the 24 hours ones and 2 of the 12 hours ones. I normally wear one on my chest and two at my back at shoulder blade level as for some ungodly reason I get really fucking cold at my upper back and shoulder area. One large zippo lighter fluid bottle lasts me around seven weeks worth of use with 3 warmers and I still have some leftover for the next winter. It is a bit expensive to buy specially if you don't live in places that get super cold at winter, but if you have relatives with joint problems these warmers help to relieve the ache, so there is this use too.

Another bit of advice for winter is buying a beanie or earmuffs if it is windy, something to cover your ears and keep them warm, same with gloves or scarves, I actually bought what they sell her as neck-guards, they are pretty much de-attached collars that you can use in place of scarves, I usually tuck those under my shirt's collar and tighten it on my neck or chin, it is less troublesome to wear than a scarf specially when working, less chance of catching on anything or coming undone.

Autumn and spring I can actually dress more "normally" for my standards, AKA as I used to in Brazil, no need for special season clothing or coats, most of the time I wear this fairly thin long sleeved shirt that I bought back in Brazil meant for Brazilian cold weather and most of the time I roll the sleeves up unless the breeze gets chilly as the sun sets, only as early winter I change into a thicker USA made pullover meant for Autumn that I got gifted from my uncle who lives there.

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Okay, I am ending this segment on dressing for the season as it covers pretty much everything.

 

[Sinner_sb]

My grandmother is diabetic and I have been on a diet to reduce weight and sugar intake because of it. My mother bought something that google translate translated as an artificial sweetener that turned out to be essentially sugar syrup, for a couple of weeks my mother couldn't figure out why my grandmother's sugar blood level was so high until I translated the damn thing and discovered that it WASN'T a sugar free slash diabetes friendly sweetener, it was also around the time that I found an seller in Amazon.jp that sold and shipped Splenda sucralose to Japan because for some god forbidden reason they don't sell or forbid the sale of it here in Japan, the common artificial sweetener here is aspartame and no one in my family likes the flavor of the stuff and for me I can keep tasting and drooling like crazy after drinking or eating anything with it for hours.

Japan has a stupid law that allows a company to advertise their products as zero sugar if they have a 5% or less of sugar. I was honestly shocked at that as I was giving a fucking good effort in reducing my sugar intake and purchased a fucking case of this sparkling lemon drink that didn't taste sweet and was advertised as 0% sugar, I took a bottle and asked my doctor if it was okay to drink it and he told me that if I drank only 1 500ml bottle of it per day it would be okay, but I bought that to drink at work at my breaks and lunch, so 3 bottles total, and he told me of that law.

If you have diabetes or is on a sugar restriction diet you need to look for products that state to be sugar free and even then use a translate app and check the ingredient list at the back for sugar, corn or rice syrup, starch syrup and other similar sweeteners especially for sweets, deserts and drinks. Savory foods may also contain sugar as a lot of traditional Japanese foods have some sugar on the seasonings, but it is usually very little most of the time and as long you aren't chugging gallons of sauce or eating tons of barbecue with sweeter sauces you don't really need to worry much if it is done once a day or in small amounts.

In my experience most beverages that are diet use aspartame and taste horrible, trust me I tried a fair amount of them, on my experience diet monster energy drinks taste decent enough, coke tastes like shit and the aftertaste lingers for ages. Cheaper store brand sodas that are less than 100 yen per 1,5 liters bottles taste horrible because they use the worse and cheaper aspartame or other sweetener as possible. There is this brand called Lotte with a Zero sugar line of products that actually taste pretty good and I can't taste the difference in flavor on it, their chocolate covered vanilla crunch popscicle is delicious and usually fairly cheap as under 150 yen per unit in most supermarkets.

I personally advise to bring a fair supply of your own preferred sweetener if you are coming to visit Japan, either sachets or bottles of liquid sweetener for your own personal use, then carry some with you if you are going out for drinks, it is easier to order a unsweetened coffee or tea and add your own sweetener than risk having a bad time with whatever sweetener they use, unless you are willing to take the drink with sugar. You can also make an allowance and allotment of foods with sugar and plan around it.

This is meant to help you and those around you with issues as Japan isn't that good with sugar free options and the sugar free options are limited, taste bad or are just reduced sugar options.

 

[Sinner_sb]

Since my original post was about dressing for the seasons, mostly summer and winter, I didn't add this tidbit. I was rewatching a emirichu video about her complaining slash warning people about summer and recalled the other non-clothing options of helping with heat.

If possible go to a store such as Don Quixote and purchase an USB battery powered hand fan. Any sort of fans help but these don't require you to exert more effort than holding it in place. I purchased three since coming to Japan, the second because the first broke and wouldn't work, the third because the blades would jam and get stuck so I replaced it, still each one last at least three months of use if not longer, my third is two years old and I use for 4 to 6 months once it starts warming up. They usually cost 1000 yen before taxes and the battery lasts 6 hours in the top speed. Every time that I traveled even during winter I took it with me because hotels here don't have fans and I need the moving air to keep me cool and sleep well. Charging takes 1 or 2 hours. So it is a lifesaver during summer.

Unless you are really going out of your way you can buy some USB battery powered mini fans that you hang on your belt to shoot air up your shirt or maybe hang it around your neck to shoot air on your neck, chin and face. But these are quite heavy when compared with the hand fan, but they do offer a hands free option making them pretty good for people who are working and can't spare a hand to hold a fan. I don't really recommend it, as I was given a couple and they didn't work well for me and the charge didn't last that long.

Another option are neck fans, they are a contraption similar in construction to headphones that you hang around your neck to shoot air to your face, chin and neck, not the best but it is still pretty decent, especially if you don't want to hold a fan, they are also USB powered and at max speed last around 4 hours. I would recommend this over the belt fan for a hands free option. They range in price from 1500 yen to 5000 yen.

The hand fan and neck fans are the ones that I would say that you could use even outside Japan with little issue.

Now unless you are really staying in Japan for a long time as at least two months you might consider a fan vest, they are more common among people who actually work outdoors and are powered via USB power banks that can be changed, I have no idea how long a power bank lasts because I never got one, they don't make those vests on my size, it is Japanese LL tops, it costs 10000 yen before taxes and you need to buy the power banks on the side. They are also washable as you can remove the fans and stuff to wash. They don't cool you down as if you were indoors with AC and a fan, but help to lessen how much you feel by 2 to 5 degrees, which is huge, pair it with dry-fit shirts and cooling towels it is a major help if you are working outside or just walking outside for a long while. Still unless you plan on using them in your homecountry I wouldn't advise it, but if you plan on doing so it might be a worth investment.

For non-fan options, well they are selling what they call "ice rings", they are semi-solid U collars that you place on your neck and because the chemical inside of it "freezes" at temperatures as high as 22 degrees they cool your neck and blood a bit, it lasts around 1 hour and you just need to toss it in a fridge for 15 minutes to reset it, or go inside a AC place and take it off to let it reset. They cost under 1000 yen, it is not the best option but as most things in my first season post and this one it is meant to be one of a few measures to be used together that when stacked together helps a lot.

This kind of neck cooling also have USB powered options, they are more expensive and I never bothered looking for them where I live, I prefer the cool towel method over the 'ice ring' one.

As mentioned in the summer part of dressing for the seasons, Japan sell menthol sprays, they aren't aerosol ones, they do help because of the cooling sensation and because I believe that there is alcohol in the formulation, so it helps with evaporating and the chemical reaction of the menthol with your skin and sweat, as it feels pretty cool. The bottles cost from anywhere from 500 yen to 3000 yen, some are even meant to be sprayed inside of your shirts so when yo sweat the menthol cools your down.

Lastly among the stuff that I know is getting a parasol/umbrella and use it to always have shade on you when needed. I don't really use this method and it is mostly used by women and women with children. But it is a option to take if the sun and heat is getting unbearable.

 

[Sinner_sb]

I watch Trash Taste and while I like the boys and can agree with a lot of their takes I don't agree with their take on some of the more touristy and widely known franchises of Japan.

Eating out in Japan can be quite intimidating if you aren't native or live in the country long term.

In the first city that I lived in there was this small mom and pop restaurant that my family and I used to go to. It was the first place where I had a true Japanese ramen experience, it was a good bowl of ramen, but not really great, yet it was a good first introduction to nearly home made miso ramen. Sadly the menu was in Japanese, very hard to translate with translation apps and the prices weren't written in normal numbers, so it was pretty hard to know the exact prices. Yet we would try and visit that shop once a month. The old couple that owned the shop were always very welcoming and the auntie running it was always very happy that I would finish the ramen and drink the soup. I was never harassed for being foreign and the closest of that that ever happened was a group of drunken Japanese people asking me to take pictures with them in virtue of me being a 1.86 meters (6'1") tall broad shouldered Brazilian tank and the tallest person on their group barely reached my nose height.

On the other hand once my mother and I went to eat in a yakiniku place and the experience was horrible, overpriced and they charged for rice refill that was included on the set that we ordered, and some of the stuff that came in the set we had no idea of how to cook and it was overall a bad birthday meal. The staff wasn't rude or anything like that, but the language barrier was again a major issue.

Finding local privately owned shops is something that the TT guys advice for, honestly I can kind of agree with it too. But unlike them I have caveats, if you are in Japan for just a few days it is not worth the time and risk of trying to find a small shop to eat even using Google maps or tabelog.

With some stuff I honestly advise you to go for the big chains. You want to eat sushi, go for kappa sushi, hama sushi or other big chains of the revolving sushi, no need to try and bother looking for artisanal handmade sushi places unless you really want to. Japanese people also love those chain places and they are always packed.

You want a decent bowl of tonkotsu ramen? Ichiran was either my first or second bowl of true tonkotsu ramen, and it is a great baseline to judge the style from other shops. There is another chain that I don't recall the name and never went because I never saw a shop near me that rivals Ichiran, it is another option.

I don't know if the Rairaiten chain is nation wide, but it is also another good franchise for shoyu ramen and Chinese food, they added tonkotsu ramen to their menu a couple of years ago and they have English menus too, they have a big eater set that used to be under 1.500 yen that can really fill a big eater's appetite.

For yakiniku slash Korean style bbq the chain King/Kingu is a good option for an all you can eat experience, the highest tier costing around 5k yen with the option to pay 500 to 1k more for all you can drink bar of soft drinks only or all drinks.

Another all you can eat place is Shabuyo, it is a hotpot restaurant, I don't vibe with most of their broths, but it is a good place if you want an all you can eat option that is less greasy than yakiniku.

Another ramen franchise and one that I am unsure of how widespread it is Yamaokaya, they serve ramen in large bowls that even their "normal" size is fairly large and they have two more size options that are even larger.

All those places have easy to translate menus or English menus, or their digital ordering systems have multi lingual options with English on it.

Now back to deciding if it is worth bothering in looking for small local places instead of chains. Well it is up to you if you want to do so. It takes time and effort to find and you might risk running into a place that won't let you eat there because you are a foreigner.

While I personally never experienced that the risk is always there, however I also don't go to hole in the wall places that are super hidden or traditional. The closest that I ever went outside that auntie's place was a basement level ramen place in Akihabara and while I appreciate the experience I would never repeat it or recommend it to anyone.

If you have a friend that can take you to one local place sure, go ahead and have a nice meal. If you have the time, like you are visiting Japan for 3 months or so, sure try and find a local spot to eat. However if you are visiting for a week or so, well unless you really need to experience a true local experience I would say don't bother, save your time and effort for other things. But if you come across a place that interest you while doing something else go for it.

Where I currently live there is a small private ramen joint a 10 minutes walk away that I visit at times, I love their tsukemen, I also visit a small local franchise/shop called Hassashia that serves my favorite tonkotsu ramen, it is the best that I had, but I admit that I haven't had from that many shops. I did last year stumble in a ramen shop that has a tonkotsu as good as Hassashia, it is a old shop that I am unsure if is privately owned or a small franchise, it is still old and the evidence is the bowls, as I could see the wear and tear of long used porcelain on it.

However I have lived in Japan for 5 years and 1 month, I can bother with trying to find small joints to try, even so I don't normally bother in trying to find super obscure places, I keep to what is near me and occasionally decide to go to more distant places, that Yamaokaya place, I only went twice, because it is a one hour drive away from where I live and I don't find it worth the drive. The first time I ate there it was after my work shift, my mother and I went by invitation of other workers that she was friends with and it was a Friday night, so we didn't have to work the next day and it was 4AM and it was the only place open, the second time I had mostly forgotten that it was so far away and the local options were too packed that made the trip kind of worth it. Since then never again.

As a tourist it is unlikely that you will have a car or motorbike to go to places like that. In Tokyo and other larger cities it is unlikely that you will find a parking spot nearby either. So you need to think and plan accordingly.

As for manners, well don't be a jerk or forgo etiquette and you are okay. Don't do stupid shit like licking public use bottles or spoons to return to the tray for use, don't cause a ruckus, common sense stuff.

When eating on "family restaurants" you might consider bringing salt sachets if you have access to them, or a small salt shaker. I personally find that some stuff come heavily undersalted and they don't offer salt at the table or the option to request a shaker on the menu or digital ordering system, so having your own source of salt would be helpful, as long you are discreet about it. By family restaurants I don't mean mom and pop places, but places like Danny's, Saizeria and so on.

Most restaurants will have cutlery and will provide if asked, if they don't already have it at the tables, however some places won't have them. If you can't eat with chopsticks you might consider buying a small travel kit of cutlery for your personal use, my grandmother is blind and because of that she had to use only fork, knife and spoons to eat, so my mother made sure to always have a set for her in the purse, and I also carried a small kit that I got from buying some cup noodles that I kept on my bag for the few times that I needed to buy a bento on the go.

Having some pocket tissues wouldn't hurt either, some places might not have it or it might not be the best ones. However they normally do have tissues that do the job.

Also carry cash on you, smaller shops don't have the option to pay with cards of E-money, so it is cash only.