There is technically a “hidden” six month tourist visa if you can show you have a significant amount of money in your bank account. In practice all it does is save you an entry/exit.
And a world of difference in stability and perception. If you have $35k+ to dedicate to this (and note that it does not cost $35k, these are more like initial capital requirements), you should 100% go the investor route.
People underweight how amazing it is to be able to pay less than $50k for the equivalent of a golden visa to a top 5 GDP nation that is well regarded, safe, has some opportunity and is generally easy to live in.
Eh, I ran a business in Japan and have had that visa. I still tell most people who just want to dip their feet in that the digital nomad visa is totally fine and a good way to go.
That stability and perception only matters if you _truly_ want to live here, and quite a number of people spend ~3 months here [1] and realize that it's got issues past the honeymoon period (like anywhere else). There's also no reason you can't change your visa type if you find you actually like it after the DN trip.
[1] "here" because I'm back in Japan for a few weeks for friends at the moment, but you get the idea
While this is purely anecdotal, the friends I have that ended up bailing earlier than planned got really annoyed by nonsensical things like ATMs having operating hours and having to use a fax machine to do something. They probably weren't the main problem but more straw that broke the camel's back.
The ATM working hours can be annoying but honestly I understand the reasoning, it's to prevent drunk guys from being taken advantage of or threatened into making withdraws.
Other than those who have built up Japan as a magical place in their head and are inevitably disappointed that it fails to match, I think that the reason that people end up bailing out of any country is one where they are unable to adapt to a culture and it's nuances.
Most people would get annoyed when you have to take a document to city hall, get it stamped at one desk thane take it 5 desks over for the stamp there as well. Or you can try and understand why their workflow may be this way. Or just not care.
If you are the kind of person who gets annoyed, then you will end up leaving.
>got really annoyed by nonsensical things like ATMs having operating hours and having to use a fax machine to do something.
The ATM operating hours are silly, but 1) you don't need cash that much here anyway, and 2) any decent bank has an ATM with reasonable hours. What are they doing trying to get cash at midnight?
Fax machines are a myth today. I've lived here for several years and have never used one for anything. How long ago was this, over a decade ago? Businesses still use them for some dumb reasons, but regular people don't. People don't even have landlines any more, and usually not even printers at home (you can print stuff at your local konbini).
Yes, you run the company. IIRC the visa is about management not investment and the company is expected to be profitable for the visa to be renewed. That's quite a different bunch of requirements than just buying a visa and sleeping on it.
The golden visas usually have no strings attached. I am not sure about this particular visa but last time I checked Japan they demand that you have a certain amount of activity on the company to keep your residence.
> People underweight how amazing it is to be able to pay less than $50k for the equivalent of a golden visa to a top 5 GDP nation that is well regarded, safe, has some opportunity and is generally easy to live in.
The Japanese are incredibly racist and xenophobic. Numerous businesses outright place signs barring foreigners (particularly russians, chinese, etc)
Japanese citizens are almost always completely trusted by police over anyone, say, white or black. So Japanese who want to fuck with someone will bait them into a confrontation (or just outright lie) so they're arrested - and Japan has a nearly 100% conviction rate, with the worst prison conditions in the developed world.
Some of those assertions are true, some half true, and some are twisting the truth so much that I'd like to note (been living here for 7+ years):
- The Japanese are incredibly racist and xenophobic
Half true, some Japanese are those, but not all and "incredibly" is stretching it a lot (also, it's not good to generalize a negative trait to a whole country, I wonder what that's called). There's also famously a lot of "positive racism" towards Westerners.
- Numerous businesses outright place signs barring foreigners
There's been a handful of places in a country with 120M people, and each and every one of those has made the news, exactly because of how rare they are!
- Japanese citizens are almost always completely trusted by police over anyone, say, white or black.
Sure, this is true.
- So Japanese who want to fuck with someone will bait them into a confrontation (or just outright lie) so they're arrested.
While I don't have any number against it, this feels like such an incredibly bizarre event that I'd like to ask for some sources since it sounds very unbelievable given my personal experiences.
- Japan has a nearly 100% conviction rate
Absolutely not true in that this statement is grossly misconstruing a narrative of "arrested => 100% convicted". ONCE the police decide to pursue a matter, then it's true, but they only do so with incredibly strong evidence. See wikipedias' notes: "If measured in the same way, the United States' federal conviction rate would be 99.8%." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conviction_rate#Japan
- With the worst prison conditions in the developed world
Fairly true, if we consider only the handful of countries that can be called "the developed world".
Scholars say the biggest reason for Japan's very high conviction rate is the
country's low prosecution rate and the way Japan calculates its conviction rate
is different from other countries. According to them, Japanese
prosecutors only pursue cases that are likely to result in convictions, and not
many others. According to Professor Ryo Ogiso of Chuo University,
prosecutors defer prosecution in 60% of the cases they receive, and conclude the
remaining 30% or so of cases in summary trials. This summary trial is a trial
procedure in which cases involving a fine of 1,000,000 yen or less are examined
on the basis of documents submitted by the public prosecutor without a formal
trial if there is no objection from the suspect. Only about 8% of cases are
actually prosecuted, and this low prosecution rate is the reason for Japan's
high conviction rate.
Also worth noting that, when evaluated equally, the US justice system has a similarly high rate:
According to Bruce Aronson of New York University School of Law, Japan's conviction rate is
misleading because it is the rate at which defendants admit guilt in the cases they are
charged with. According to him, if the method of calculating the conviction rate in Japan is
applied to the United States, the conviction rate of federal defendants in the United States
in 2018 was also over 99%. According to him, when there is a discussion about Japan, it
is easy to misunderstand because people quickly rely on broad cultural generalizations and
stereotypes.
None of which is to say that there aren't serious problems with the Japanese justice system (or the US one, for that matter).
I am glad they prioritize and look out for their own. That's how it should be. Not everywhere needs to be in love with globalism. And yes, I would say the same should be the case in other places as well.
Rented a flat in Tokyo for a month too as a tourist. But it wasn't cheap. Around $1500/month, in 2011. But it was 3 rooms, and very nice. So maybe not so bad, actually? But then again, it was many years ago.
For whatever reason, people in our generation seem completely unaware of how often they cite things from 15-20 years ago.
I've taken to pointing out that it's like if someone in the 90s used advice from the 70s. For whatever reason, it tends to put things in perspective timeframe-wise.
Pretty much all non-luxury housing in Tokyo is built to a much lower standard than equivalent housing built in say Canada or the US in the same time period.
Much thinner wall insulation, single glazed windows (until recently), much smaller elevators in high rises, etc…
So on a quality and square footage adjusted basis it’s still quite expensive.
Not really: the difference is that "lower standard" housing of the same age simply doesn't exist in the US. You want a small, 20-30 year old apartment in a decent building with small elevators and everything is maintained well and isn't broken, and you don't want roommates, and at an affordable price for you on your non-tech job paycheck? You can't have that in a decent American city; it doesn't exist. It's either some very expensive "luxury" apartment (where stuff is still broken, but hey, it has granite countertops and new appliances that'll break down in a year!) where you'll need roommates, or some nasty shithole (where you'll probably still need a rooomate).
I just left an apartment in Shanghai that was two bedrooms, a bathroom, and a kitchen for $700 / month. I was advised that prices have come down over the last year, so that if I was planning to renew my lease I should negotiate a lower price.
True, and it generally has better amenities than a hotel too: a kitchen (though tiny), fridge, microwave, stove (no oven though), clothes washer, maybe a vacuum, etc. Also importantly, a mailbox, so you can receive deliveries (and in newer places, there's an automated delivery box system).
Those are "grills". If you want to bake stuff, you can get real ovens, but they're fairly small, and not built into the apartment, and usually combined with a microwave oven. Any decent appliance store sells them for around 30,000 yen. You're not going to cook a turkey in it, but if you want to bake a small cake it's perfect.
Yes, they are meant for grilling fish but they can be the world's tiniest oven if you believe enough(or just use a thermometer probe for temperature adjustment!)
My recollection of the countertop oven is that it would fit half a small size turkey...for we did do that one year.
Yes, unlike Americans who apparently absolutely need to bake a whole turkey on a regular basis, Japanese don't normally bake stuff at home, so Japanese homes (at least in the big cities) don't normally come with built-in ovens. There's no space in Tokyo apartments for the comically-large ovens that are common in America, and the cuisine people make here doesn't normally need one, just a stovetop. For baked goods, people usually just buy them at the grocery store or bakery or other specialty shop.
These kinds of comments seem to be like a fire starter on this site, but I cannot for the life of me see how they fit in the site guidelines.
(At some point this place has to contend with the issue of “we started as people trying to build cool things and wound up with every thread being nonstop complaints or nitpicking”.)
I think there is a valid claim to be made that web frameworks cost more to learn than they pay off in value in using them.
Mind you, I don't assert that claim. I don't know; I'm not in web development. But I could see how having to learn a new framework that wouldn't pay back the effort would give rise to some valid complaints.
haha yeah it was a bit tongue in cheek as I'm learning another framework right now. If we can't have a little levity I'll just delete my comment if it upsets you. :)
