As some of you know, I am set to return to my beloved
favourite city of Tokyo in May 2013. After years of waiting I am quite excited
to be going back, and would like to document it properly for those who would
find it useful. In order to get myself into the spirit of writing about it I have
decided to begin posting pre-trip reports on my planning and ideas.
I am quite an avid planner, and as my last trip
to Tokyo in 2010 was the result of about 4 years of saving, it was the
result of about 4 years of idle planning too. I didn’t just read most
guidebooks on the subject, as well as most websites: I developed my own
printed map and tips book combining all of my information. In
comparison, this trip was thoroughly rushed. After waiting years to have
both the money to return and for my partner to be able to accompany me,
I finally had the money in January 2013 and decided ‘Do you know what?
My partner can accompany me on the next one.’ This took pressure off of
him to save money fast just because I’m talking about going back to
Tokyo all of the time. I went in the winter last time, and I hit the big
winter sales (New Year’s lucky bags, and the big January sales
sometimes taking up to 70% off). This time around I wanted to try
another season. I didn’t feel that summer sale time would be much fun
weather-wise (Tokyo weather in July is kind of like living in a sauna to
a dry weather Australian), so I was considering autumn weather in
September, but then suddenly found out how cheap the flights currently
were for May. BOOM! End of spring festivities it was!
This
gave me only about 4 months to plan, which for me was tiny, but luckily
I had been obsessing over airlines, hotels, and other return trip ideas
for a while. Within the month I had flights booked (two 7 hour legs,
stopping for a few hours in Kuala Lumpur, flying with Malaysia
Airlines), a private hostel room reserved to save money for shopping (a
one person, 3 tatami room in Minami-senju, but the price was right at
around ¥3300 a night!), and yen exchanged and put aside for most major
expenses (train trips to and from the airport, Suica card, a food budget
based on my daily spending from last trip, money for Disney tickets).
Now I must confess that I am a huge shopper. I shop for fun. I try my
best to be frugal, as I don't earn a lot, but I've found I make a lot of
sacrifices in the area of food and home comforts for more shopping
money. When I visit a new place, the shops are the part I am most
looking forward to. When I go to Disneyland, I often look forward to the
shops just as much, if not sometimes more so than the rides. The last
time I went to Tokyo I had saved a lot of money, then was confronted
with a country full of amazing clothes and gadgets that just aren't
available in my country. I must admit, I went crazy. My only travelling
companion was possibly a bigger shopper than me, which only encouraged
me. I still find little things in my house from that trip which have
never been used or even opened, because I bought so much. This time
however, I had little time to save, and I am working on a much, much
tighter budget. I am determined to keep myself in check and not let
myself go like last time, while still letting myself have shopping fun.
Will it happen? That remains to be seen.
For fellow shoppers, I can’t stress two packing tips enough:
- The less you bring with you, the more you can bring back
- BRING
A TRAVEL SCALE. If you think you’ll come anything close to the maximum
weight allowed for your baggage, have something to weigh it with.
Airlines will often charge you $15-$30 per kilogram your suitcase weighs
over the limit, which could be seriously expensive. My first trip I
packed up my suitcase and found it 5 kilograms too heavy! Luckily, I was
saved by a promotion for members of the frequent flyers club allowing
an extra 5 kilos exactly, but I never expect to get that lucky again.
I
thoroughly recommend making a packing list early on, and working out
a) If you need everything on that list or if one item can fulfil several
uses, and b) If there’s anything you’d like to bring that you don’t
currently own. I know one doesn’t need a lot of travel gear for a big
city like Tokyo as you can buy most things there, but some things are
very useful and it’s good to have time to research and buy them bit by
bit. I am a regular reader of websites like onebag.com, which teach you
how to look for items that can serve multiple purposes and pack well.
Despite my impulsive nature, this pre-planning allows me to make my
light packing list and stick to it (Think of the souvenir space!).
Once
the basic planning was over, it was on to the frivolous stuff. I read
up on stores and bars that had changed in Tokyo since my last trip, read
the new guidebooks and websites (make sure the guidebooks came out
AFTER the 2011 quake, as most new editions now did, otherwise you may
find entries for places that have unfortunately closed or changed and be
disappointed). Overall, Tokyo has not changed overwhelmingly since the
tsunami/quake as it was far from the main disaster area, but there were a
few casualties in the form of stores being closed to go be with their
family and never reopened, or due to the electricity cuts or other
damages. My printed guide from last time needed updating from both these
events, the new destinations built since, and from the personal notes
scrawled all over it when I experienced each destination in the book. I
was also aware that one of my favourite anthropological and shopping
haunts, Tokyo Disney Resort, had suffered some minor tsunami/quake
damage, but had repaired most of it as far as I was aware. So I looked
into some Disney research, and awakened a monster…
I
LOVE RESEARCHING TOKYO DISNEY. I had no idea how obsessed I would get
over the next couple of months with tip sites, trip reports, forums, and
even the basic official English language site. It had occurred to me
that for the first time EVER I would be doing Disney parks alone. This
meant I could be as commando or laissez-faire as I wanted, go for the
exact rides I wanted, and spend my time hunting down as many popcorn
buckets as I saw fit without enduring head shaking and light-hearted
mockery (my partner refers to them as ‘feedbags’).
For
those of you who are confused as to why a Japanese culture fanatic who
adores the rest of Tokyo would want to spend time on Disney, let me
explain. Many people feel that going to Tokyo Disney is a waste of time
when you could be visiting the sites of more ‘authentic’ (read old and
traditional) Japanese culture. I believe that visiting landmarks,
shrines and places that highlight the beauty and culture of Japan is
very important on a trip, it’s just that I don’t believe that just
because a place is modern or attempts to be Americanised it doesn’t fit
this criteria. The beauty of Tokyo Disney is that it’s a place where the
Japanese tried to be as Americanised as possible, but still came out so
very Japanese. The strange rules added, the differences in food, the
completely different merchandise geared to a Japanese taste, are all
amazing to me, as they are statements that MODERN Japanese culture is
still so strong, not even the all encompassing power of Disney could
change it. Watching the differences in how Japanese patrons behave here,
and how all of the conveniences have been geared toward that, is one of
my pet field studies.
These changes in culture
at the park also allow for a variety of advantages you wouldn’t get at
the American parks. When you go to a park in other parts of the world,
you know there are rules, but what you find is a park full of screaming
children and sneaky long-term patrons who have time honoured methods of
breaking these rules. People exit ride vehicles during dark rides, stick
chewing gum to the scenery, drop their food all over the place and let
their children run amok. For the rule-abiding park goer, it just becomes
an expectation that several someones will darken their day a little by
pushing in front of them, dirtying and disrespecting the scenery,
generally adding to noise pollution, and waywardly crossing in front of
you when you least expect it with no apology. In most cases, these
things are glaringly absent in Japan.
Instead
you find everyone lines up in order, trying not to cause too much bother
to the other patrons (Sadly this does lead to one disadvantage – the
lines can get LONG). There are somewhere between twice and three times
as many Cast Members available any time to assist you, and they are
ALWAYS SMILING (except in The Haunted Mansion, where it is the rule not
to). The patrons adhere strictly to the rules, and rarely litter or
deface anything, as this behaviour is selfish and dishonourable.
Tokyoites grow up learning that in a city of so many people, one person
behaving like this can ruin it for the rest. In addition, the Japanese
cultural bias against eating while walking vastly cuts down on
accidentally dropped food in the park. Due to a much higher love of
characters here in Japan (seriously, their tv stations and electric
companies have cute, cartoon mascots), most things are geared toward
parades and performances here, and the Japan-only ones tend to be of
high quality. The merchandise is different due to this also, geared
toward specific character rather than park merchandise, and usually the
items sold are either useful or disposable, as Tokyoites don’t have much
room for collectibles in their tiny apartments. Everyone knows how to
use the Fastpass system here too (it’s one of the rules ;) which can be a
disadvantage to commando park goers, but it does make me happy to see
the patrons of a park actually using it effectively. These differences
are like delicious food to my academic and travelling soul. So I
absolutely love going to Tokyo Disney, and I believe it is a
surprisingly cultural experience, so long as you define ‘culture’
correctly.
Anyway, as I researched changes
since 2010, my Disney reading got intense. I started trying to hunt down
as many trip reports from the last 3 years as I could. I even got to
the point where I would get quite unreasonably frustrated when someone
would angrily complain about a thing being ‘backward’ or ‘inconvenient’
when I knew (from all of my other reading) that there was a perfectly
logical explanation. “How could you not know that they do that because
of safety issues with thing A/Japanese law B/to create convenience
C/Japanese cultural difference D?!???!??” I’d worked myself into a
pretty amusingly and unreasonably obsessive state. Logically however, I
knew that most people are not an armchair anthropologist who reads
surprisingly relevant Japanese cultural studies and ALL THE TRIP
REPORTS, and if it was important some lovely person online would often
explain the reason to them anyway.
Tokyo
Disney is different than the other parks in some odd and unexpected
ways, but there are as many good surprises as bad ones. Sadly some
people remain stubbornly determined that Japan is ‘backward’ and
determined to ruin their Disney experience for ‘no good reason’, but
that’s their funeral. Overall, I feel that if you approach the parks
with the idea that every strange Japanese difference has a reason behind
it, even if it’s just that enforcing the rules is important in a place
with that many people, including when the many people aren’t in that
particular spot, you’ll feel better about your experience. Sometimes it
can be heavily frustrating or downright disappointing, but you don’t
need to know the reason for the rule/omission/design choice – the park
managers do. I must admit I have cheered myself up from a few
disappointments by trying to figure the reason out, but this attitude
still helps.
Speaking of this attitude, it
helps with Tokyo in general. Every traveller I know who has been to
Tokyo, even with the best attitudes and expectations, has as some point
been disappointed by a Japanese rule or custom that they didn’t know
about which requires them to change their plans. This can be very
frustrating, but its part of travelling to a country and culture
different from your own, which is why we go, right? Luckily, I have
personally found that every disappointment came with some form of silver
lining. I would find wonderful things I never expected to find, and
rules that I didn’t know existed that made things so much EASIER too.
When
I went to the New Year’s Lucky bag sales last trip was one such
occasion. For those who don’t know lucky bags (or fukubukuro) are bags
that are sold on New Years to thank customers for their year of
patronage. They contain a large amount of merchandise for a very small
fraction of the price, but the buyer is usually not allowed to know which merchandise
it contains. It’s like a very expensive lucky dip which can turn out to
be a huge bargain. Whether you like the merchandise or not, you are
always guaranteed more value than what you paid, and the patrons of many
places (notably Shibuya 109 fashion mecca) have system in which they
run out the front of the store and hold up an item they don’t want, in
the hopes that someone will come and trade with them. Now, given that in
the top fashion stores you can buy a bag for ¥15000 that has up to
¥45000 worth of merchandise in it, I was expecting this tradition to be
like a sample sale or Black Friday – full tilt jungle madness. I have
seen girls in physical tug-of-war matches, tustles, and even full on
fights at these sales back home, so I was prepared.
What
I found when I got to MaruiOne Shinjuku for my first lucky bag day was
an orderly lineup split into careful sections to allow foot traffic to
pass through, with uniformed men with signs every few sections holding
signs saying “End of line (arrow pointing behind them)”. No pushing, no
shoving, no line cutting from passers-by. I thought maybe this was due
to the presence of the sign holders, and the trouble would start when we
were let in. About half an hour before we were let in some ladies came
around with a garbage bag for any rubbish we had, and showbags for
everyone with maps of which stores were where inside, lists of the bags
they had for sale, and some tissues and candies to keep us going. Still
the line stayed excited, but well-behaved. Then the doors opened,
AND…people were let in five at a time so as not to run in crowds up the
escalator and hurt each other. When I got up to the store I wanted,
nobody was fighting. Girls walked very fast to the bags and very quickly
grabbed one, but nobody fought over them, nobody took them once
somebody else had them, and everyone lined up happily to pay. I have
never had an experience like this before or since, and the only ones
that come close - you guessed it - all from Japan.
Sadly,
this time around there will be no New Year’s sales, but there will be
shopping. I will be shopping the alternative fashions of Harajuku, from
lolita to aristocrat to street to high fashion to just downright wacky. I
will be shopping the hip boutique and youthful department stores of
Shibuya, where you can barely fit between racks of clothing in some of
the stores but I love every minute of it. I will be returning to my
shopping paradise in Shinjuku, searching out my favourite collectibles,
idols, games and character goods in Akihabara, looking to replace broken
or worn out parts of my kimono collection in Asakusa, and of course
searching for those perfect exclusive springtime Disney souvenirs. In
between of course I would bathe at onsen and sento, meet fellow
travellers, view beautiful gardens, monuments, temples and shrines, and
photograph everything possible.
Will I be able
to stick to a budget this time and not go shopping mad? Will the new
30th anniversary Disneyland merchandise overwhelm me? We'll find out.
So now, with less than two months to go, I have set up this
pre-trip report with the hope that it will help me to focus, to share with you
all, and to get my excitement out. I hope you enjoy it!
