Three Cities in Japan

All of Japan seems to be in the same time zone, so where in the US are you wanting to compare to? (East Coast, West Coast, Hawaii, somewhere in the middle?) There are several conversion sites.

Silver-Midnight said:

The Eastern part of the U.S.

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+14 hours, then.

I have Tokyo among my world clocks on my computer. It's 05:29 here, and 19:29 in Japan.

Actually, you could just google "time in japan."

Japanese culture is very popular in the US right now. If you Google "Osaka culture" or "Japanese culture" you'll probably find about a kazillion pages. Then you can compare and contrast what you read to what you know about the US.

If questions come up that internet research can't answer, feel free to pm me. I don't know much about the USA, but I'm majoring in Japanese Studies, I've spent some time there and I'll be there again from April to March next year. So I'll do my best to help

Silver-Midnight said:

How would I look up how the town looks, like skyline and amount of buildings and what they look like?

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While you should never take anime locations at their word, a lot of them are pretty painstakingly based on real-life places. Here's a site that compiles photos from all over Japan (and the world) that correspond to scenes from various anime. Here's one that has side-by-side comparisons from Haruhi, which takes place in Hyogo, which is near Osaka.

Kyoto's known for having many shrines and temples and for being a "spiritual" city of sorts. It's one of the reasons Kyoto, I believe, went unscathed during WWII when the Allies were bombing the cities. The Allies were afraid that if they bombed Kyoto, they'll just get the Japanese even more gung-ho. Kinda like if you went and attacked the Vatican.

use google earth and just zoom in.

AKyber36 said:

Kyoto's known for having many shrines and temples and for being a "spiritual" city of sorts. It's one of the reasons Kyoto, I believe, went unscathed during WWII when the Allies were bombing the cities. The Allies were afraid that if they bombed Kyoto, they'll just get the Japanese even more gung-ho. Kinda like if you went and attacked the Vatican.

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This is a digression, but I believe Kyoto was to be one of the targets for those first two A-bombs, but weather or something intervened, and they went to Nagasaki. I could be misremembering that, though.

caw

Kyoto's structures definitely have an older feel to them, while the architecture in Tokyo and Osaka is newer. Kyoto was built on a grid pattern, and the city still retains that structure. While Kyoto does have a lot of shrines and temples (and is a popular destination for the tourists who want to experience traditional Japanese culture), the city is still very modern, and there are lots of shopping districts. It all makes for a very interesting fusion, because as AKyber said, Kyoto didn't incur much damage in the war.

Tokyo is where I lived when I was over there. It's pretty packed: space is at a premium, so an average income family will probably own an apartment, not a house. Most people use public transportation, even if they own a car, or they commute by bike. There are parts of Tokyo that are pretty much always crowded - Shinjuku, Harajuku, Shibuya, and Akihabara, to name a few - but there are quieter parts of the city, too. Hikarigaoka, where I lived, is almost suburban, and it has a gorgeous park.

I've only been to Osaka twice, sadly, and never for a full day. They do speak Kansai-ben, which is extremely distinctive, and Osaka has a very strong food culture. Okonomiyaki is probably one of their best-known dishes. (Because it's AMAZING.)

Best of luck! Feel free to PM me if you have any specific questions, especially about Tokyo - I'll do my best to answer them!

blacbird said:

This is a digression, but I believe Kyoto was to be one of the targets for those first two A-bombs, but weather or something intervened, and they went to Nagasaki. I could be misremembering that, though.

caw

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I think that they were going to bomb Kokura when they discovered it was socked in by clouds, so diverted to Nagasaki. Kyoto was on the first lists, but they decided against it because it was too important of a historical site.

Silver-Midnight said:

The Eastern part of the U.S.

Can you give a link please?

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I think this has been covered by others, but try: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/convert_time_in_JP.aspx

I've been to Kyoto for two days in October. If you're lucky you can see Geisha walking around on the street. The city at night is vastly different from what most tourists see at daylight when they visit shrines and such. There's this part of the city, I don't remember the name right now, it will probably come to me later, but there's a lot of clubs and such and Japanese people ran around looking sort of slutty (forgive my word choice) and not at all how you usually see them. I'm willing to bet some of them are Yakuza, too. I was with a korean girl who was actually scared.

Also, it's easy to get lost in Kyoto since everything looks pretty much the same. I've heard they have a song there that includes all the street names and they teach it to their elementary school kids. But I don't know exactly how it goes.

I have a couple of pictures of Osaka and Toyko. I'll try to upload some later.

(Btw, from above, if you fly over Osaka, it looks like a lot of tiny islands seperated by artificial and real rivers. All of these islands are of course highly populated and you can't see much green. Flying over Tokyo...well... have you seen Star Wars? Think Coruscant. Buildings. And more buildings. And then some.)

I've stayed in Osaka for six weeks last year. Okonomiyaki is definitely popular, as someone mentioned here, but their other specialty is Takoyaki. (Grilled Octopus). You'll see a lot of food shops with giant octopus signs... I should upload a picture of that, too. (Also, Japanese usually display plastic models of the food they serve in the window of their restaurants, so it's easy for foreigners to choose something, too. )

slashedkaze said:

(Also, Japanese usually display plastic models of the food they serve in the window of their restaurants, so it's easy for foreigners to choose something, too. )

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Cool! I remember that from the 40+ years ago that I lived there. I miss the Ginza - the shopping center street. I remember it from Yokohama as being huge and exciting. I was amazed to find out Tokyo had one too, and even more amazed to see it was even huger, gaudier, more exciting.

I remember the spicy smell of the markets, and how even the regular shops had open walls to the street, so that it seemed like a big open air market. Oh, and the pachinko machines! I'm getting homesick... and it wasn't even my real home, in this lifetime.