by canofhumdingers » Tue Nov 26, 2013 10:27 am
The people were generally very nice, though I think we sometimes mistake cultural differences in etiquette and politeness as being nice. (In Japanese culture etiquette is FAR more important and FAR more structured and defined than in America. Someone may appear to be very nice to you when in fact they are just obeying the social norm - as in society may obligate them to help you or be nice to you even though they don't really want to). But even so, I'd still say the people were very nice over all. And like anywhere you go, there are people of all types.
In Tokyo, while I wouldn't say "most" people spoke English, we never had a problem finding someone nearby who could speak enough English to help us communicate. Outside of Tokyo, it was much harder to find anyone who even spoke very broken English. Somewhere like Mt. Koya-san it was near impossible; the lady who checked us into the temple (a sort of travel agent working for the monks from what I could tell) was the only person we encountered who spoke any English at all during the two days we stayed and even she spoke so little that it was a bit of a struggle just to check in. She had a list of rules to explain - etiquette for staying in the temple - and it was kind of hilarious because she had to do more pantomiming than talking. Luckily the website we used to book our stay already had all that information in English and we had read it before arriving.
But with regards to language, I'd highly recommend learning some basic Japanese. I had gotten a book to learn the alphabets (hiragana and katakana can be learned pretty quickly) and also had begun doing the Rosetta Stone. By the time I arrived I knew some very basic phrases, had a very small vocabulary much like a toddler still learning to talk, and could sound out words written in hiragana and katakana, again like a child learning to read. Even this very basic level was extremely helpful at times. Finding specific stores, reading street signs, being able to ask for specific things while shopping - it was very useful. Again, in Tokyo, many signs and things were dual language or at least had the romanji (Japanese spelled out phonetically in English) in smaller print under the main sign, but not always. Outside Tokyo pretty much everything was Japanese only.
I don't know how much they enjoy our pop culture but I got the impression that, much like in America, there are subsets of people who are fans of specific things. The shopkeeper for Monsters Labo told us he's a huge Bruce Springsteen fan and has been to America to see his concerts. But more than meeting fans of some specific pop culture icon, I remember how many people were genuinely excited at the fact we were American. It's the only place I've been in my life (and I travel for a living) where it actually felt like a genuinely rare thing to be American. Even in Tokyo, where you see the most foreigners, Americans aren't common. In the two weeks in the country, we actually never met anyone else from the U.S. The closet we got was meeting a group of Canadians. At the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo we were talking to a shopkeeper and he said we were the first Americans he'd had in his store in months.
Which brings up another point. If you aren't Asian, you will stick out like a sore thumb. Even in Tokyo you will be in crowds (and I mean, the biggest most crowded crowds you've ever seen) where you will look out across a sea of black hair and be able to play "spot the foreigner". It's pretty hilarious. My wife and I are both white as white can be, tall and with blonde or light brown hair. It didn't matter how crowded or how far separated we got. If we had line of sight we literally NEVER lost each other. My wife took some really funny pictures of me in crowds where, at 6'3 I'm literally head and shoulders above this sea of hundreds of Japanese people around me. It was actually quite fun as I often felt like some sort of giant walking around.
Like I said earlier, it's the only place I've personally been where I truly felt like a complete and utter foreigner with absolutely zero hope of ever blending in. It's also the only place I've been where I felt like I was from some exotic far off land.