25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Immigration matters, finding a place to stay, and much more, January 10, 2003
This review is from: A Practical Guide to Living in Japan: Everything You Need to Know to Successfully Settle In (Paperback)
A Practical Guide To Living In Japan: Everything You Need To Know To Successfully Settle In by travel expert Jarrell D. Sieff is a definitive, "user friendly" guide for students, business travelers, and vacationers arriving in Japan for their studies, business operations, or sight-seeing. A Practical Guide To Living In Japan covers immigration matters, finding a place to stay, money and banking, studying the Japanese language, getting around Japanese cities and countryside, health and insurance, as well as Japanese customs and social etiquette. A Practical Guide To Living In Japan is a highly recommended resource that will save the traveler, businessman or student an immeasurably valuable amount of time, expense, anxiety, confusion, and hassle.
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26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not really that useful as a practical tool, September 4, 2008
This review is from: A Practical Guide to Living in Japan: Everything You Need to Know to Successfully Settle In (Paperback)
The book contains information on getting a visa, housing, banking, getting a car, utilities, and a good list of phone numbers in the back. In other words, stuff that's pretty easy to find online.
Unfortunately, a good bit of it is either outdated or purely informational.
The book is geared toward the college grad who just wakes up one day and says "Hey, I want to move to Japan!" It's for the person who doesn't have a job, doesn't have a sponsor, and generally doesn't have a prayer of getting a resident visa without taking a job at an expat bar or strip club. Here's what I mean:
Housing: Generally, you can't rent a place in Japan on your own. Your company must do it for you, and generally pays rent directly to the landlord. You just show up, pick the place, and someone else does all the work. If you're an English teacher, the JET program handles it, and if you're coming on an expat package, your employer does it. In regards to the housing, the landlord doesn't deal directly with you, the landlord deals with your company. If you're one of those people coming over here and then looking for a job, then get online and check Metropolis or one of the other Japan expat sites and look at the classifieds for people needing roommates. It works much better than getting over here and learning you can't rent an apartment on your own just by handing someone money.
Visas: Tourist visas are easy to get, resident visas are harder and require a sponsor (i.e., that company that gets you your apartment). You don't just show up at the registration office, the paperwork MUST be completed in Japanese, and to get the resident visa, your registration must be completed before you even enter Japan, or you have to leave, go back to your home country, and get it there before they'll even think of giving you a visa. The book tells you that, but makes it seem that you just go to the Japanese Embassy in your home country, and you're set. The book offers nothing with respect to the rules that came into effect in November 2007. It doesn't discuss giving power of attorney to a bin goshi (Japanese lawyer) who completes the paperwork on your behalf, it doesn't discuss the requirements for your visa and that your company must show why you are so special so that they must move you here. Once you get the visa taken care of and come over here, the Ward office tells you, in English, exactly what you need to do to register.
Health Insurance: The Ward Office tells you how to get National Healthcare. If you have international insurance, your company tells you what you need to do. With respect to doctors, the best and only way is to get recommendations from other expats, either through work or make friends. Expats learn pretty quickly which doctors are good and speak enough of the desired language to allow you to get proper care. The pages with the Japanese words for body parts/medical conditions is great to have if you ever need to call 119 (Emergency). In the back of the book there are lists of phone numbers for medical services. Some are still accurate, but the names of the specific doctors to contact are not provided. This information is necessary when you call the numbers. For this reason, the recommendation to get recommendations from others is so necessary.
Phones and utilities: The information is completely outdated. You go to a company called Softbank, get a cell phone, and you're set. Of course, you need your alien registration to get a phone. You can't get one without it. If you have a home phone, it is because it is owned by your landlord. You just get the line and pay the service fee as part of your rent. In other words, your boss pays this bill. You get a separate bill for long distance that you pay at the NTT office. Gas and electricity are almost always paid by your company/boss.
Shopping: Other guides (Lonely Planet, e.g.) provide more and better information than this book.
Keeping in touch with home and getting internet sections: They are outdated. They don't provide the right information at all.
Banking: It's pretty easy these days. A couple of the banks in Tokyo have programs for foreigners. Most ATMs are bilingual. The book is good in regards to providing information that you can get a bank account at the post office, though. That doesn't exist in most countries, so it's a "good to know" part of the book.
Postal services: This is all accurate, but largely outdated. The only courier you'll need to know about is the Yamato Transport, the one with the cat.
Education and learning Japanese: There are a million Japanese teachers who advertise online through the English publications. For children, it depends on where you live, and the lists of schools in the book are still accurate.
Public transportation: It's also outdated for the most part. The rail passes have changed, and the subway passes have changed.
Clothing size information in the book is not even close to being accurate. Calendar year stuff is unnecessary because they use the same calendar as the West.
There is very little in this book that you won't get in other, better and probably more necessary books or the internet. The japanese translations are in a japanese-english dictionary which you will need anyway. The up to date phone numbers for services are available online through Google searches, but having this book to allow you to have all the numbers in one location is a plus. But it is probably the only plus to an otherwise useless book.
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