Not OP, but I traveled through Japan with a few friends before the pandemic and none of us speak Japanese. It's true that almost no one there speaks english. However, everyone we've encountered (especially the people working in the service industry) was super friendly and tried their best to be helpful. The public transport system is thought out and labeled very well, even in english + it plays well with Google Maps, so navigation was never an issue.
One thing that I didn't expect (although it makes perfect sense) is that OCR of Japanese writing is very bad compared to what we've got used to. Aiming a phone with Google Translate at some sign will often produce total garbage. You can attempt to transcribe the kanji with your finger and that usually gives better results, but is tedious and difficult (since the order of strokes matters and you have no clue about it). We've quickly learned a few crucial kanjis, e.g. 出口 for `exit`.
A tip for the restaurants that only offer japanese menu with no pictures: open the listing in Maps, browse through the photos and show the waiter a photo of the meal you would like.
I found it kind of boring/isolating though. Did you? It's unbelievably easy to move through their society, eat well, etc etc. But not truly interacting with anybody for weeks at a time besides tourists is kind of annoying.
I was there only for a bit more than two weeks, so I crave to go back. We are rather introverted so we socialized (for more than a short dialogue) only two times IIRC.
Once was with other foreigners at a hostel. But the other time it was at some tiny pub in Hiroshima. They had like 3 tables and there were only the owners (a couple) and 2-3 regulars. All of them wanted to drink and hang out with us and they were very loud and enthusiastic even though we didn't understand each other almost at all. We loved it, I will never forget it.
I've gone on two separate trips. I did have this feeling at times. What helped though was finding groups of people who shared hobbies with me. This way I could chat with them, even using Google Translate, and have some form of that connection.
Yeah but just in general it seems like they're an insular society, don't have random big parties and stuff. It's all like rigid, at the specific bar area. I went to a language meetup and met some cool ones that spoke enough English. But that was about as far as I got. All the "side quests" were with foreigners who I met.
Discussing where in the world to travel, someone told me roughly: When I can manage conversations, my travel is about people. When not, it's about places. As I prefer people to places, that's my first filter.
Yeah I enjoy both. But the little "side quests" that happen when you're able to regularly interact with people didn't seem to happen as much in Japan. Only with foreigners who lived there who could act as a bit of a bridge. It's an insular society too.
> Only with foreigners who [...] could act as [...] a bridge
Hmm, or perhaps some other subculture which addresses both language overlap and (sub)cultural openness? Like local alumni, or some software-related community (eg ruby, or XR, or ...), or ... ? HN people? In context of TFA, perhaps something surfing? One dream the net was weaving a world where you could have a friend in every city.
One thing that I didn't expect (although it makes perfect sense) is that OCR of Japanese writing is very bad compared to what we've got used to. Aiming a phone with Google Translate at some sign will often produce total garbage. You can attempt to transcribe the kanji with your finger and that usually gives better results, but is tedious and difficult (since the order of strokes matters and you have no clue about it). We've quickly learned a few crucial kanjis, e.g. 出口 for `exit`.
A tip for the restaurants that only offer japanese menu with no pictures: open the listing in Maps, browse through the photos and show the waiter a photo of the meal you would like.