The "I've been to Japan" thread

I have been twice now, once in March of this year and just got back last week from a two week stay, going again in January for TAS + some work related things and a few more times in 24 and 25 for more work related things. Poor me.

The most interesting time was my most recent trip, sold my S13 early this year and bought an Altezza (shoutout Tweed Autogarage) and had the opportunity to drift at Motorland Suzuka.

Would once again like to mention the GOAT Tweed Autogarage for making the dream of drifting a car in Japan a reality, buying a car there and driving it there is seriously an experience that I fail to find words for.

The following week I headed to Fuji Speedway with my product rep for Nismo fest and to scope out the new Hyatt hotel next to the track for an upcoming work conference. Hotel is cool as shit and has some incredible pieces of motorsport history on display in the lobby ($10 USD to enter)

Also attended an event at Nikko hosted by Car Modify Wonder the day after we landed which was very cool as well

Also stayed in Yokohama for a few days and went to Daikoku a bunch of times and visited a ton of shops around the area but I don't wanna blow up this thread with 100000 Android pics.

Some helpful tips/advice:

• 99% of tracks are either completely inaccessible or a pain in the dick via public transportation, rent a car

• Be smart and courteous when visiting shops, especially smaller ones, in my experience a lot of them are very friendly and will gladly have conversations with you but don't bust in there demanding or expecting a full tour or for them to step aside while they're busy

• As mentioned above don't expect to hop off the plane and see a million cool drift cars littered all over the streets, with that being said there's PLENTY of super cool non-car related shit to see and experience

• Current exchange rate is working strongly in the USAs favor, getting there is expensive but being there is not

• I love Tokyo but don't spend all your time there, the rest of the country (even an hour outside of the city) is incredible as well and if you're going for car nerd reasons you'll see most of the cool shit elsewhere anyway

• Rent a damn car, international drivers permit in the US is literally $30

this thread is so cool, really want to go when i have the money to go see the sights, eat food and of course car stuff too, just dont know how to do it!

I will have to fire up the old HDD for pictures... this is my type of thread!

I've been twice. 2015 and 2017. I love japan aside from the blatent racism people gloss over.

The majority of people are awesome and welcoming, but it's not this mecca of drift cars and anime an 18 year old would think it might be.

That said, walking down the street in Osaka and seeing Low Rise cars drive toward the highway was pretty cool.

Just don't be an asshole, and go for the culture, the food, and the sights. It won't dissapoint. Just don't expect it to be whatever you have built up in your head.

Heres some old videos I made of our honeymoon trip:

I went with my family for 3 weeks in 2010. We started off in Tokyo and did all the tourist things - stayed in at the Park Hayat in Shinjuku (big Lost in Translation fan) and got Kobe at a steakouse in a skyscraper (can't remember the name), went to Harajuku and the fish market (showed up late and only got to experience the smell), and took the train all over the place to temples and markets and restaurants. Then we took the shinkansen down to Hiroshima and did more tourist stuff - walked the arcades, visited the memorial, ate okonomiyaki (hold the mayo plz), and visited Miyajima.

Then we spent a couple nights on Naoshima, "the art island," which was super cool. There are a ton of art installations and exhibits all over the island.

Then we made our way to Osaka where my dad met up with the rest of us. I hadn't planned on doing any car things other than stopping by an UpGarage or two, but I saw a flyer for D1 at Fuji that was taking place that weekend. Despite it being 5 hours away, my dad and I said fuck it and made a day trip out of it. Iirc it took 2 trains, 2 buses, and 1 taxi each way, but it was totally worth it. It was mind blowing how much better the driving was than FD at the time. We also of course had to check out Osaka Castle, where my sister got sick and puked on the stairs leading up to it. Some locals picnicing nearby ended up giving her water and a wet towl for her head while they gave us a quick history lesson on the Castle and saved us the $40 tour fee.

Kyoto was next on the list. We stayed at a hotel near the Imperial Palace and did a lot of exploring around that area. While walking back from dinner one night, my sister spotted a single narrow window with a single red rose in a vase in it on the 3rd or 4th story of a building. We were a little drunk so we decided to find out what it was all about. We took the elevator up and saw a black door at the end of a dark hall with no words on it. My sister pulled the handle and opened the door while the rest of us watched from the elevator. She ran back to us excitedly and loudly whispered, "it's a bar!" We opened the door and were greeted by the biggest wall of whiskey bottles I've ever seen. We sat down at the bar and the bar tender said "you found the secret bar!" I think between the four of us we racked up a $400-500 tab drinking some of the best whiskeys in the world. It was quite a magical experience and that following day we went to an Onsen, whcich provided some much needed rejuvination after a night of heavy drinking.

We made our way back to Tokyo and had one last night of debauchery before my dad had to head home. We went out to an amazing old school hibachi restaurant where I had to confront my hatred of seafood. Luckily they kept the sake flowing, whcich made stomaching things I'd never eat in my right mind managable. I have to admit it really wasn't that bad. I think there were only a couple dishes (of 12+) I struggled with. After that we finally made our way to a karaoke place that was serving $2 pitchers of beer. The put us in our own room right at the front of the building, facing the street. Several pitchers later we had totally forgotten how to use the remote to select a different song and were stuck singing "Spiderwebs" by No Doubt on repeat as my dad jumped around on the seats lining the room. We had forgotten that everyone passing by on the street could see us and when I went to go to the bathroom I was met at the door by a camera crew who said they worked for Japan's tourism bureau. They asked if they could film us so I let them in and went about my business. When I went back to the room, the mood was starkly different and now everyone was trying to seriously sing Spiderwebs. After about the third time through the song, the camera crew excused themselves with what, I'm sure, was about .37 seconds of usable footage.

For whatever reason, it was cheaper for my mom, sister, and I to spend 3 additional nights at Tokyo Disney than to fly home right away. After two days out in the sun, wandering around the park and then staying up until 5am watching the World Cup I was completely exhausted. Do not reccomend. Slept great on the flight home though! It was definitely a hell of a trip.

Went to visit Derek Slyter during Golden Week 2019, SO much rad shit in a week.

• Went to watch streeting almost every night till 4 or 5 AM, we drove 2 hours to go see it

• SR Allstars, met Okachan/Nomuken

• Met the Charme dudes at a private 1J meet in a parking garage

• Got dinner with Tomoya/Enokin of Sexy Knights

• Got invited to a BBQ at SB Corp after briefly meeting them at SR Allstars and took us streeting afterward

• Nikko Circuit practice day and Tochigi All Stars the following day

• Nagahama-san showed us around N-Style, his shop was down the street from Derek's place

• Did all the other typical touristy stuff - Odaiba/Gundam Store, Daikoku day meet, lots of hikes since we were up in Gunma rather than Tokyo. Tons of good food, definitely need to go back.

Once upon a time in 2018 me and 2 friends decided to impulsively plan a trip to japan, to buy a car and drive Summer Matsuri at Ebisu. I had a friend who was stationed at Yokota at the time who, along with his wife, would be able to foster us for the 2 weeks we were there. I remember the weeks leading up to the trip he sent me a handful of cars that were for sale within our group budget, but understandably neither of my friends trusted enough to send a pretty big chunk of change to some random dude they've only ever heard of for a car sight unseen on the other side of the world. We had just boarded our flight to Tokyo in Dallas and I received the photo below, our last good chance at securing a car for our trip.

It was a bone stock, turbo '94 zenki s14 converted to s15 front then converted to kouki front. It wouldn't come with the origin aero, fenders or wheels. It did however still come with a pretty neat IMPUL rear bumper and side skirts. We paid $3500 for this car, so hard to believe that was actually a reality now. I still regret not taking anything home from this car. The carbon fiber door panels it had are something I would love to have in my own car. The owner even had some OEM light up Silvia s14 quarter glass louvers that he had kept from it that I remember him offering to me for like $200 at the time and I turned them down and never followed back up on, am a big idiot.

This was the day we got it, before we pulled the rear subframe out of it to remedy it from basically almost falling out of the car, as well as to install a borrowed nismo 2-way from a very kind friend.

Anyways,

After handing over the money, replacing the rear subframe bushings at autohobby and scavenging for spare wheels and tires, we were off to the mountains of Tochigi for the night.

The video below picks up where this leaves off. This trip was by far the trip of a lifetime, was so fortunate to be able to experience the things we were able to. From getting to run up and down Happogohara until 5am, to catching the car on fire on school course and being yelled at by Andy Gray for using our fire extinguisher instead of a water hose, a blacked out alcohol poisned evening underground in a Shibuya night club, to running from the police twice in one evening ontop of a mountain, sleeping in PA's, living off of 7eleven and even being allowed to stay with an extremely welcoming Japanese family in their home for the times that we weren't out and about. There's so much to be said about this trip but it's already long winded enough.

I crave to visit Japan again.

Some time stamps:

7:55 - short clip of me going up Happo at probably something like 6am

21:01 - 25:14 - clips of me driving our s14 during the 2nd day of matsuri as well as driving my friend Ricky's old JZX100 Chaser he had at the time at Kurukuruland 2. 

Highly recommend watching the whole thing though.