Fares and time table of Japanese trains

Salam, I am back again.

It is summer, time for trips. If you are planning to take trains, there is a very useful website called Hyperdia which is a search engine that allows you to do specific point-to-point rail searches for travel in Japan. It covers virtually all train services in Japan. It allows you to know, for each course proposed, the time required, the distance (km) and the total amount of money.

The english version : http://www.hyperdia.com/cgi-english/hyperWeb.cgi

The japanese version : http://www.hyperdia.com

Have a nice trip!

How can you travel cheap in Japan

You might be interested in discovering the beauty of Japan. Have you heard that traveling in Japan is very expensive? Well, traveling in Japan is not necessarily expensive. Fortunately, there are cheap ways to enjoy traveling in Japan.

• Transportation: Japan Railway (JR) provides very cheap tickets that you can use to take JR trains anywhere in Japan. These tickets are called 18 kippu. They are usually sold during vacation (see here). 18 kippu are sold as a set of 5 tickets. You are allowed to share with other people. One 18 kippu costs 2.525 円 (about 24 $) and you can use it for 24 hours with different JR trains! So convenient. You can plan your trip in advance by using this database of transportation in Japan.
  

• Hotel: There are youth hostels (Japanese website, English website) everywhere in Japan. Usually, one night costs around 3000円 (about 29$). Youth hostel is a dormitory, where you share your room with other people. An excellent opportunity to make friends. Women dorms and men dorms are separated in Japan. In some youth hostel you can stay in family rooms, but usually they are more expensive. I personally like staying in youth hostels because they are clean, cheap and offer a friendly environment, like a home!
  

• Food: Generally, the managers of youth hotel provide you with sanitary hot water if you ask. Now, you may ask what you can do with hot water. What about having Nescafe with sweets that you brought from home as breakfast? What about having sea food cup noodle as dinner? Moreover, some youth hostel have shared kitchen. So nice, you can cook your dinner and prepare sandwiches or obento for lunch.

Finally, is it safe to travel in Japan? Yes it is! Actually, Japanese are glad to meet foreigners that are interested in their local customs and sightseeing. If you behave politely and respectfully then you receive warm welcome and generous help.

Enjoy your trips :) !

Things you need to bring when travelling to Japan

I thought may be it will be interesting for muslims who are coming to japan to know what things they should bring with them:

1. Medicines: bring with you all the medicines you need or may need (in case of flu, headache, ...). It is may be impossible here in Japan to find the same medicines that you use in your country. Medicines here are sold under doctor prescription. There are drug stores where you can buy drugs without doctor's prescription but when you are new and do not speak/read Japanese it is difficult to find what you are looking for. If you have a baby, it is better also to bring medicines against fever because doctors here refused to give drugs against fever for my baby .
2. Clothes: it is difficult for a Muslim woman to find suitable clothes for her (I mean long skirts, long jackets, scarves...). It is more difficult if you wear large sizes, most of clothes here are size S, M or L and sometimes LL. LL is considered a very large size here. The same thing goes for shoes.
3. Bring lace-less shoes or shoes you can easily slip on. You’ll be surprised to find how often you'll be taking them off.
4. If you have problem to speak English, bring with you a dictionary to translate from your language to English. But do not worry because Japaneses do not speak English well so you will need to talk in English occasionally.
5. It is difficult to find Halal vanilla and gelatin, so if you need them, bring them with you. Tahini and Nigella sativa (black seeds) are also difficult to find. I recommend also to bring dried herbs like Oregano, verbana, mint.
   
6. Bring some food with you if you do not know any muslim where you are going to live, it is difficult in the beginning to know which food is halal .
7. Bring with you your official papers (translated in English) like the driving license, original transcripts and degree, vaccination record for children....
8. Many institutes pay salaries at the end of the month, it’s important to bring quite a bit of cash.
   
9. Gifts: it is appreciated to give a gift for your professor.
   

Things you do not need to bring with you:

1. Electrical appliances like a hair dryer because you will face electrical compatibility problems. Japan operates on 100 volts. In addition, used appliances are very cheap here and can be found easily.

Once you are in Japan and realize that you need things for your new home like plates and spoons, batteries, pens..., you can buy them from 100yen shops, these shops sells things at 100 yen, very cheap when you are in Japan.