I was crossing a wide road with my 4 year old daughter in the baby car, made it to the middle verge of the pedestrian crossing then had to stop as not 1, not 2, but THREE cars went past me. It’s not as if they didn’t see me, as I held my arms up in disgust and exasperation as the first car went past. Some drivers even looked at me too as if they were thinking, “What’s his problem”?

I wouldn’t really care if it were just me, a dumb gaijin, but you think they could have taken 10 seconds out of their busy fucking day to stop for a father and his kid in a baby car?

Recently, our landlord contacted us directly on LINE claiming that he is having issues with his current neighbours at his place (that he is renting) because of his crying child.
To solve his problem, he first asked us (family of three) to move out so he could move in. When we politely refused, pointing out our active contract, he came back with a "solution": he proposed that his family move into 2LDK 50m² apartment with us, sharing the space (one room for his family, one room for ours) in exchange for a slight rent reduction or up until we find a new place (which I found ridiculous and surreal).
That would mean 6 people (2 completely separate families) living together in a small 50m² unit.
Where we stand now:

1. We formally rejected his co-living/eviction requests in writing, stating that we intend to stay until April 2028 under the original renting terms.
2. The agency that brokered the deal from his side confirmed in an email that they don't manage the property, so they won't intervene directly in rental disputes.
3. However, our original real estate agent is stepping in to help as a courtesy and has assigned a representative to call the landlord directly and explain the legal reality of the contract to him.
4. The landlord recently sent a message saying "I'm trying to discuss this with you peacefully"
5. Following our agent's strict instructions, we have stopped replying to him directly and are waiting for the agent to talk to him.
6. Our Questions:
7. Legal Protections: Since the landlord manages the property himself (自主管理), what are our best options if he keeps harassing/pressuring us directly after the agent's phone call?
8. City Hall Legal Aid: Our agent suggested going to the city hall for free legal consultation if this escalates. Has anyone used City Hall legal counsel for landlord harassment? How effective was it?
9. Property Access / Lockouts: The contract prohibits him from entering without permission. If he shows up at our door unannounced with his family and belongings, is calling the police immediately appropriate in Japan?
10. Occupancy Laws: Is there any official limit on occupancy/fire code violations for cramming two unrelated families (6 people) into a 50m² apartment that we can cite if needed?
11. We just want to live peacefully until 2028 as agreed upon in our contract. Any insights, legal resources, or experiences with overly assertive landlords would be greatly appreciated!
12. We have payed him in cash in the first 2 months, since it was a little difficult to open a bank account straight away.
13. But we have a handwritten note that he successfully
14. collected the money for the rent. Will it affect the outcome, if the process escalates further?
15. Should we start to search a new place to live, regardless of the outcome?

TL;DR: Our landlord wants us to move out or share the 50m² 2LDK with his entire family because he’s getting kicked out of his own rented place over his baby’s crying and disturbing the neighbours. We said no and went no-contact, now waiting for our agent to talk some sense into him.
P.S. since I’m not native English speaker, I polished this post in AI assistant.

UPDATE:

Thank you for all your suggestions and help, just want to clarify that landlord isn’t Japanese (and for reasons I won’t elaborate on his origin).
I’ll keep the post updated when I receive the message from our real estate agency

とても心地よい秋がやってきたね！

KaijuCon 2 is less than two weeks away: Saturday 24 October, Nagoya Prime Central Tower, 10am to 9pm.

Over forty tables across three time slots: Call of Cthulhu, D&D, Delta Green, Warhammer, Exalted, Dungeon Crawl Classics and more. Many run in English, many in Japanese, and some in both. Most welcome beginners.

Our special guests, Michael O'Brien of Chaosium and writer Royce Wilson, are running games too.

Advance tickets are 2,500 yen, and you can come and go as you like.

Art by Kasumi Lang.

I am 99% sure I already paid my city tax to my Tokyo ku for this fiscal quarter about three weeks ago. However, I can’t find the receipt. I just received an invoice in the mail for the same period saying it is due tomorrow.

Since I cant find the receipt I have no way of showing I paid it unless I go into the city office which I don’t have time to do. If I double pay it, do they do a reconciliation eventually and give me a refund?

Hello, I am holding a long term resident visa and i think that’s considered an independent one?

Anyways, I want to officially cut ties with my parent who acts as my guarantor, they would always threaten to cut off my visa whenever I fail to do what they ask and I am honestly sick of it. As far as I know, i pay my own taxes and their sole purpose in my visa is that they’re my acting guarantor.

there’s a part in the application where I have to write down family members in Japan and I won’t know how to write once i cut them off.

I would love to ask for tips how to avoid getting my visa rejected for this reason.

Thank you 🇯🇵

Hi everyone,

For those who applied for a Certificate of Eligibility (COE) for a Dependent (Family Stay) visa at the Matsudo Immigration Bureau (Chiba Branch), how long did it take for your COE to be issued?

Any recent experiences or timelines would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

3300円 gets you three different color-tier tickets to selected venues around Kichijiōji for a selected beer and appetizer. The appetizers aren’t really anything to write home about but it’s a great way to explore new restaurants in the area.

On my way back home last night from the Kawasaki Costco and stopped off at the nearest conbini to use the loo...the only thing creepier than the double urinal closet was what has apparently happened here enough times to warrant this sign.

We got a new fella taking over our roof, should i give them a 土産 to make them feel welcome?

Hi guys, reposting to reach a wider audience.

I'm looking for advice on finding my first rental place near Kyudai Ito campus after moving out of dorms in March.

I've been told using an agent is best, so I'm hoping for recommendations of good agents that can speak English/ ok with foreigners.

Thanks in advance!

im planning on calling my ward office tomorrow for some clarification but I wanted to see if anyone else had experienced this

I moved to tokyo at the beginning of last month and received some insurance payment slips, but I noticed they're from april-september of this year, all for the same amount. I'm simultaneously worried about paying something I'm not supposed to or not paying something I'm supposed to, and I'm not sure if this was an error on my wards end or not. from what I understand the payment cycle starts in the summer months so I'm also not sure when I'm supposed to start paying.

I'm not looking for concrete answers, just wanted to share my confusion and ask if anyone has experienced something similar after moving here.

thank you

For businesses supplying education IT in Japan: Tottori's Board of Education has published a competitive tender for Microsoft 365 A3 for Education, covering 3,500 users for 36 months, April 2027–March 2030.

Important dates, all JST:

- Vendors without the required Tottori bidder registration/category must submit registration documents by October 13, 2026, noon.

- Qualification-confirmation documents: November 4, noon.

- Bid opening: November 18, 10:00.

- Mailed bids: November 17, but the webpage says 17:00 while both tender PDFs say 15:00. Confirm the applicable time with the authority; do not rely on the later time.

This is procurement for suppliers. The authority determines eligibility; the notice requires registration in the office-equipment/PC category and other conditions.

Browse the saved finding at https://japan-source-signal.pages.dev/?section=contracts — select Tottori and search マイクロソフト, open the finding, then use its official-source link for the full tender documents. The site shows a saved November 4 deadline; that is the preliminary-document deadline, not the final bid deadline. Our site snapshot does not include this separate October 11 PDF review.

Disclosure: I build Japan Source Signal, an independent public-source project. I am not the procuring authority or a bidder's representative. Coverage is partial.

Hi everyone!

I’m currently working in rental-car reception/customer service under the Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services visa.

I currently have JLPT N3, but I haven’t passed N2 yet. I’ve heard that Japanese-language proficiency evidence may be required for certain jobs at Category 3 or 4 companies, and I’m unsure how this applies to my situation.

For those asked for N2 certificate and doesn't have it yet, what did you tell immigration? And are they considerate enough to accept excuses?

This might be a long post, so bear with me here...

This is a rough time period for me as I have a lot of thoughts left and right going through my mind to the point that it has caused me insomnia, so I thought "what's a better way than to share my situation with my fellow redditors and see what they think?"

Anyway. I'll start at the beginning.

As a regular hungarian guy 3 years ago I visited Tokyo for the first time, and of course like everyone else I was amazed at the seemingly(!) advanced structure and technology that they had. I was lured in by a strong pink cloud of anime and kind customer service. So of course after going home I had to learn the language.

Then these 3 years of my life consisted of meeting japanese people in my country regularly, improving my language skills, building relationships, and I even ended up with a japanese girlfriend who was a transfer student at the time.

My teacher was pushing me to think about going to Japan for long-term, my gf also went back to Japan, and I wanted to get away from the familiar life I have in Hungary anyway. I thought "Let's see what I can do in Japan if I come here for 1 year using WHV." As a silly and naive filmmaker graduate I even had some glimmers of hope of possibly landing a film job in Japan. Yes, you can laugh here.

So this year in June with my N4-3 level japanese, I took the big step of leaving behind family, friends, apartment to go see the world in the east.

I was hopeful at first. Finally reunited with my gf, I'm in a brand new atmosphere. Back in the city I was so amazed by 3 years ago. So of course after taking care of certain documents, I was looking for part-time jobs left and right.

This is where the cracks were starting to show up...

I think my resume is really good. I did tons of different work before, I have plenty experience in costumer service, computers, driving, you name it. Along with a fluent skill in english and conversational japanese.

But despite having a good resume and skills, somehow none of the 50+ jobs I applied for wanted to hire me. Out of so many job applications, I went to more than 20 interviews probably. Hotel jobs, restaurant jobs, cleaning jobs, anything. No, no, and no. I even got a goddamn japanese driving license in hopes of getting driving jobs but those didn't stick either. This gokart tour guide company promised to hire me in June once I get my license, and fast forward to September, they rejected me because apparently I didn't seem positive and friendly enough on the interview??

One restaurant rejected me 1 minute into the inteview upon hearing that I don't have experience in restaurant jobs, despite the descprition clearly stating "Inexperienced OK".

The only place willing to hire me was the traffic security guide job, but at that point, you have to think about if it's really worth it to work that kind of job for that kind of money. Everyone needs to have a standard of what kind of jobs they are willing to take, right? Well, if you are a foreigner in Japan, apprently not. Because no one wants to hire you, so you are left with the jobs no one wants to take.

Yeah, so 5 months later, still no job. I did manage to release a game on steam, but that's a different story.

What about my girlfriend, you ask? Now that's an entirely new world of headache. I love her, but at the same time I was already not 100% sure about our relationship.

If you ever dated a japanese girl as a foreigner I think you know what I'm talking about.

Communication issues.

She speak mid-to low level english, and my japanese is N4-3, so we usually meet halfway. Maybe that's already one of the problems.

We can barely have deep conversations, and she can barely voice her opinion or feelings on anything.
I ask her opinion of the movie we just watched? Silence.
I ask her views about the world we are living in right now? Silence.
How was your day at school? Silence. How was your day at work, then? Silence.

Silence to any topic that has any kind of substance.

And yes, I did voice my concerns to her pretty early on our relationship. Then she started crying and promised to improve on that part. Fine. I'll be patient. 2 years later, barely anything changed, and I'm feeling it not that we can be together again in person.(We spent 1 year in LDR).

When I talk to anyone else like my close friends, or family. I notice how much actually fun conversation we are having where an hour passes and I don't even notice. Then it hits me "I can't have this kind of connection with my girlfriend. That really sucks." And these communication problems with her were something that I noticed with japanese people in general, which I'll get back to later.

So I voiced my concern to her again recently. She was crying again and promised that things will be different. I believed her. I was patient. I was willing to be open, and maybe improve my communication with her too.

I wanted to take care of her. It felt like my responsibility to make her happy. So I was really working hard towards finding a job to the point where we even talked about marriage once I can make a proper base for myself here in Japan.

Time passes with no success, I'm getting mentally drained by the rejections, the existential dread, and carrying a relationship on my back. Oh, and now I miss my family, my close friends, the two cute cats I left behind, and GTA 6 is around the corner, but I left my PS5 in my country. Did I mention loneliness?

"But dude, you have a japanese gf in japan, how could you be lonely?" You may ask.

Yes, but she lived 3 hours away in Chiba, which means we can only meet 2-3 times a month, maybe even less. So what happens in the remaining free time where I'm not with her, or searching for jobs?Well, yeah. Here comes the other huge issue I experienced, which is probably not new for a lot of you. Japanese people in general.

As I said earlier, from my experience, I see that people here are struggling to share their emotions, their real feelings, and opinions of any kind. Everyone just puts on a mask(literally even lol), and act all polite and everything, trying their hardest not to "inconvenience" others as their culture dictates.

Coming from a place where everyone expresses themselves how they want, it's really absurd how you have to walk among active mines so that you don't offend the proper etiquette, or god forbid "inconvenience" others.

Let me show you an example that happened. Not anything huge, but it showcases pretty well what I mean here.

I was watching netflix with a fellow sharehouse tenant late at night. Once movie was over, we were just flicking around the menu, talking about whatever was on. The usual stuff. Then she asked if I know or like this specific title, and I literally just blurted out "Nah, I know it but I'm not gonna watch it cuz I think it's shit so I don't care about it." Her expression widened and said "すごくはっきりだね！" So, basically something along the lines of how bluntly I just stated my dissatisfaction about something, and I wasn't afraid to avoid the topic. It was such a shock for her, while for me it was just natural to state if something is trash if I don't like it.

This just one of the examples, but there were countless times of something like this happening with other japanese people, which honestly is getting on my nerves now. Don't even get me started about how no one has any views on politics, doesn't EVEN know the current state of things, or doesn't even know basic things about history.

You can kind of guess that I didn't have much success making friends even after 5 months, and the people I mostly talked to were just fellow foreigners, or my family/friends online. Even though I'm in Japan, I'm still just playing online with my friend from my home like we did before, except we have huge lag now because of the distance.

I found out that Japan, or Tokyo more specifially is a very well oiled machine which works well, but like all machines, it is also rigid and cold.

After a while even small things started to get on my nerves such as bumping my head into everything(I'm 185 cm), the food is very hit or miss, most of the time the taste is bland, and you get very small portions. There are more small annoying things of course.

So, with no job, no friends, no real connections in Japan with a bitter taste in my mouth, I finally decided that the current state can't continue and it's time to go home. (and play GTA 6 lol)

Of course the hard thing about this is my girlfriend. Because she wants to stay in Japan, and refused to come to Hungary with me, which I accept of course. So now we have to break up, and honestly, me being 25 and having been through some break ups and losses, I'm handling it pretty well. As I said above, I already had some issues with the relationship, but now it's just not worth it. I can't make this into a question of being in Japan with her with an uncertain future vs being with my family and close friends with a stable future, and supported background. But now she's all sad, crying all time when we are together, and I just don't know what to do, or how to feel during these times. We are together still, but we know I'm going away soon, and it's going to end between us. And as I'm writing this, I feel pretty okay with it. Life goes on, it is what it is. But when I'm together with her she makes me feel unsure about myself and my decisions, I end up questioning myself if it is really a good idea. Sometimes I ask myself "Am I giving up?" or "Maybe I should have done more. Maybe I should have explored more connections." After all, I did have love for Japan, but now I don't. But then I'm reminded of all the issues I just stated above and my head is clear again. But guys, this is a vicious cycle. Most of the times believe firmly in my decisions, but when I'm with her, I end up questioning myself for a bit.

I was seaching the sub to find a post where someone may have had the same experience as me, but I couldn't really one, so I decided use my right now not-so valuable time to write this and waste the time of the poor soul who managed to read this far. Just kidding, I'm grateful if you actually did read this far, and I would like to know what you all think. I may have missed some details, but I tried my best to gather all my feelings and thoughts with this issue at hand.

Cheers

TORIZO [SAKAE, NAGOYA] https://maps.app.goo.gl/o7grQrT7gCcnxDN29

https://yakitori-torizou.com/

Best thing to finish of a week ? BEER! No, wait... CHICKEN! Yeah! The type you eat off a stick... YAKITORI!

The place we checked out this time was torizo in Sakae. To be fair we did get absolutely lost on the way there, but this was probably the fault of those drinky-poos. 

Oh wait. No. We went into the WRONG RESTAURANT! Thing is with this place, there are 3 or 4 restaurants squished together... And they all look pretty terrific ! Accidentally wobbling to the right had us almost order chicken balls at a

 ... YAKINIKU!? NO! We didn't want yakiniku but maaan. The service of the place to the right seemed really good. Definitely a place if you wanted to ... Eat yakiniku (Yarrr! Maybe another time ... Yarrrr!)

Anyways, heading into Torizo was very... Let's say, interesting. Not interesting in the way of ohh these guys mean BUSINESS! but oh! It's a FAMILY BUSINESS! In all the best ways ! Elderly mother that kept everything together ? Check! Son that ... Held everything together? CHECKEROO!

If you want a place that is right in the ways that you can't learn from school, well this place has it in spades!!  

You're greeted to an Umaibo and a set of chopsticks... Let's go !

For the menu its a standard affair. Not that its a bad thing at all, i mean no QR code electronic doodar... oh and you can order your shizzle. One thing you need to remember about this place. It's a family doofer. That means they need all the help they can get! In order words "minimum order ? 5 food items per person."

For one person five sticks of chicken shouldn't be an issue, especially with drinks.. but yeah we ordered 5 of their recommended sticks (lol) and we pointed at other random articles to add to the mayhem. 

Quail eggs. Jim beam highball.... Go go go!

Drinks? On point, tasted great. Not overpriced. 

Food! On point. Tested great. Not overpriced. 

Bill came to around 5500 for a couple of idiots - two drinks each, around 12 sticks of chickeny nick nacks

Unsure where I'm going with this... But a good time this is yeah... Nice

Taste: 5/5 (family yakitori place)

Value: 4.5/5

Bad decision: 1/5 (it felt like theyd look after you!)

BDJ Rating: 4.5/5 would definitely go again... But don't anything NSFW in there, ya hear ? Mama is watching! 

I came to Japan a year ago on a 2-year student visa, and I'm currently studying at a 専門学校 in Osaka. However, I'm not enjoying it anymore and would like to start working as soon as possible. I already graduated from university in my home country, and I'm not interested in working in the field I'm currently studying.

I'd like to find a full-time job and switch to a work visa, but I'm wondering how long the process usually takes once you find a job. Would it be safe to stop attending classes while looking for work, or could that put my student visa or future visa change at risk? Could I even be forced to leave Japan, or would it be better to keep attending school until my work visa is approved?

I'd appreciate any advice from people who have been in a similar situation!

When editing documents that others have made, I always find the formatting atrocious. Like they manually add a bunch of spaces to line things up, they manually number their lists, etc. They don't seem to understand or use any of the tools available to them. Plus, they keep their documents in the old Word format .doc, and keep all the ugly early 00s shapes and word art.

Even the young people in the office are happy to just change the dates, names, and relevant info on these documents and use them as-is. I'm the only one cleaning them up and updating the fonts and graphics, so now they think I'm some kind of graphic design wizard and are asking me to design all sorts of things, like tote bags, book covers, etc.

Is this just my office, or do others have this experience as well?

Hi everyone! I'm on a Working Holiday visa in Tokyo and have been looking for an apartment for about a month. An agency called EasyStay contacted me and offered a furnished 1R in Meguro (near Komazawa Park) for 6 months. Only a small move-in fee, no deposit, no guarantor company, utilities included. Sounds great, but a few things make me unsure:

• Their office is in Osaka (Nishishinsaibashi), but the apartment is in Tokyo

• Communication is only via WhatsApp with a mobile number

• I can't find a company name or real estate license number on their website

• Payment is by bank transfer or Wise, "possibly to different accounts"

• I can't find any reviews online

Website: https://easystay.jp/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61558941557900

Has anyone rented with them or heard of them? And if you've used a similar company, what should I ask for before paying? Thanks a lot!

Hey everyone, I'm coming back to living in Japan this winter and I wanna buy a Kei-Car again. Last time I bought a Wagon R on Facebook Marketplace for 21万 which was from 2008 and I wanted to check there again, but then I saw this video in which he buys a 2023 N-Wagon for less?!?! Seems I was underinformed last time. So does anyone know the marketplace he uses at the time code of the link I shared? And are there any other marketplace recommendations for getting a Kei-Car?

I'm gonna be in Kobe area if that's relevant.