The first day in Japan

Before travelling to Japan

• Write down your accomodation (for the customs slip)
• What to bring with you
• Things to consider
• Visas etc.

Arriving

Airport

The first steps into Japan, physically not that exciting as they will be inside a corridor connecting the flight to the terminal gate. However, the exictement is present within you.

Your first goal is to get out of the airport, which might seem a little more involved than what you are used to (if you have travelled inside Europe). Before landing, you might’ve gotten a small paper slip, named “Customs declaration”. that you need to fill in before going through the customs gates and to your luggage. See example customs.go.jp. Most of the information is regarding what you bring into the country. If you are visiting as a tourist, it shouldn’t be too difficult to fill in. You didn’t get a paper slip? No worries, they have them at the counter before the customs gates. They only give it to you in the flight to try and smoothen the process for all the passengers.

After having filled out the form and presenting it with your passport to the customs office, you will have gotten a landing permit in your passport. This indicates that you can stay within the country for 90 days without needing a separate visa; examine it, admire it. Now you should be on your way to your luggae (if you had any with you). One you’ve waited the dreaded period where all passengers’ luggage’s move from the aircraft, through the airport and onto the belt, your next objective is to get into the city. This is where the instructions deviate somewhat depending on where you land. If you land in Tokyo, the two airports are Narita and Haneda.

If you are lucky, you will be in the closer airport, Haneda. If you happen to arrive in Narita, no worries. This is where the majority of international flights land. The difference in travel time is from the short 30 minutes from Haneda, to the slightly longer 1.5 hours. And as you migh’ve heard, the Japanese railway system is quite reliable.

Narita airport / 成田 空港 (Narita Kūkō)

The recommended way to travel from Narita airport to the city center is to take the train. Other options are bus and taxi, the latter is not recommended as the travel time is roughly 1 hour and costs roughly 150 USD according to Google Maps. The bus can be a good option if you have a lot of luggage and younger kids that can be difficult while boarding and transfering trains. However, while I believe that it’s possible to buy tickets at the airport, I don’t think it is as trivial as taking the train.

Train option

The recommended way to get from Narita to the city center is to take the train. It is possible to buy physical tickets for the train. However, I recommend to consider aquiring a Suica or Pasmo card for a multitude of reasons. There are mainly two options if you decide to take the train: JR Narita Express or Keisei main line. The first being the quicker but pricier, while the latter slower but cheaper.

(bus https://tyo-nrt.com/en)

Haneda airport / 羽田 空港 (Haneda Kūkō)

Haneda stuff

Heading to your accomodation

Tokyo is huge, as such it would be difficult to write a guide on how to get to your accomodation, and there is no one size fits all. However, the major station hubs are quite useful to know as you get almost anywhere from any one of them. I would say that there are four major stations that are good to remember in order. Shinjuku, Shibuya, Shinagawa and Tokyo station. Ironically, Tokyo station might be the least frequenly used out of the four. You will most likely hit any of these hubs on the way to your accomodation.

• Shinjuku is the busiest station in the world. You can go anywhere from here.
• Shibuya is the most fun place accoring to me and the most frequented station. Also a very large station.
• Shinagawa connects to Haneda airport, is not far from Tokyo station, and one of the major hubs where the shinkansen (bullet train) stops at.
• Tokyo station is self explanatory. But also a place where the shinkansen arrives and departs from.

You could try to choose your accomodation address from Google Maps as your destination and the airport as your starting location and most likely get a good result. Otherwise, try to find the closest the four major stations and do a new search from that station to the accomodation. This might not be the most efficient route, however, most likely the easier one. Also, because they are major stations, you will most likely find someone that can help you in case you need it.

Hopefully the trip wasn’t too confusing and difficult and you arrived at your accomodation. Now, depending on the time of the day, you might want to take a short nap (if you arrive early), or head out for dinner and call it an early night. Or the third option that my friend did, ignore that you just had a 13 hour flight plus additional transportation, have a quick dinner and go to the local bar and club until 5 am when the first train arrives. Be mindful that this trip will take a toll on your physical capacity as you will walk a lot. I frequent 25-30k steps most of the days during my vacations in Japan. You might want to plan out so that you alternate the trip with days where the activities are more active, with ones that are less. However, this is quite difficult as most of the activities require you to walk around a lot.

Let’s call it a good night for the first day. 🌃