Planning a trip to Japan for 2 weeks this December

[Kanjiru]

Nuked.

[kaleb_zero]

I think you can have your cake and eat it too. If you want to check out 'high tech tokyo' and such, but also want to get a taste of tradition, you can hop on a quick train ride to Kamakura (Wikipedia) which isn't that far from Tokyo, and is basically like a mini Kyoto of the Kanto area in that it has many many shrines and temples and famous places to see including the famous daibutsu statue (Wikipedia Link).

[jstn]

I was in Japan recently, and had a great time. I think that if you take the attitude of only going when you feel you are at a high enough level, you'll probably end up never going. Just bite the bullet, buy your ticket and have a great time there.

I would recommend just visiting as many places as possible, so, if for two weeks, maybe stick to the areas of Tokyo, Osaka and Kyoto, I'm sure you can visit a fair few places within a two week period. I was also able to visit Hiroshima as well within the same time frame!

[Kanjiru]

Thanks for the advice guys.

@kaleb_zero: I checked out your blog as well and stole some ideas from it while I was there. Good job with it!

[Eijioo]

I am just wondering, are you going alone or with someone or meeting someone there? If so, do they speak Japanese?
Why will you visit Japan ONLY if you are happy with your Japanese level by then?
For a short visit, you don't really need to speak Japanese unless your reason for going there is have conversations with Japanese people, otherwise all important things, signs, info for tourists are in English and most store, restaurant, hotel, airport, workers have someone who speak English well enough to help you. I will assume you will stay within a major populated area and not plan to go wandering off in the middle of nowhere.

I understand it would be more fun and convenient to be more fluent in Japanese, especially if you are going to be there alone and be intimidated by a different culture and language, but it is not a necessity just to visit Japan for 2 weeks. I went there for the first time, all ready with speaking basic and common tourist phrases and had my English/Japanese dictionary and translator ready to use, but I never had to use it, because it seemed whoever I needed to speak to for any important information, knew how to speak English.
If you were to stay there a month or more and really travel around, then yes, I would say it would be better to be more fluent in Japanese. If you are planning to go there and stay there as a guest in the home of people who only speak Japanese, then okay, I understand wanting to be more fluent in the language.

Japan has a great network of trains. You can easily travel from one city to another in a short amount of time. Planning train trips from places like Shinjiku, to Akihabra, to Yokohama to Kyoto to Mt Fuji, and so on is fairly easy and can visit many places within the 2 week visit.

[Kanjiru]

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[Eijioo]

Kanjiru, I understand you as well that you want to be more fluent in Japanese for personal reasons and not just another gaijin.
I cannot say pinpoint exactly one thing that was the best part of my trip. The sights, food and eveything else was great. I was amazed at how fashionable they dress in modern fashion much more than American people do.
You can get on a train and see people in business suits, women in nice dresses, people in kamonos going to a festival, a bunch of young teens dressed like punk rockers, girls wearing very sexy clothes which you would never see people wear in public on an average day in the U.S.
However, the best part of my trip was landing after a long 12 hour plane ride. I was kind of nervous of how the whole passport and customs entry would be, but everything was easy and fairly quick.

[Kanjiru]

I'm going to have to splash out on a new high end digital camera so I can record everything. I'll say one thing about this website and the people here, I feel like working harder to make my dream happen because the people are nice and helpful.