As an English speaker visiting Japan you can get along okay at the Narita International Airport and in Tokyo using your native language. While not everyone speaks your tongue, many Japanese know some English. Also, as a practical courtesy, all announcements on trains and subways are in both languages.
Outside of Tokyo, for a short visit to the resort community of Kawaguchiko—popular with Japanese vacationers because of its location at the northern base of Mount Fuji—you can order food, find an inn and get directions using English because of the kind acceptance people show to foreigners. However, when you do business in the smaller cities seldom visited by westerners, knowing some spoken and written Japanese is helpful and polite to the local people.
Because we plan on making several trips to Wakayama, Japan, to research our book about a US Navy veteran, we are learning to speak, read and write some basic Japanese. On our first visit, many locals went well beyond common courtesy to help us locate sites and historical resources. Before our next trip, we are using the Rosetta Stone Totale program to gain some verbal and written language skills in Japanese.
During the next several months, we will be reporting on our progress. This may be especially interesting because one of us has a natural ability to learn languages and the other is less gifted.
We have just signed up for a three-month starter program using the Rosetta Stone.
Wakaura Harbor in Wakayama Japan—the USS Montpelier CL-57 anchored here in September 1945
Originally appeared in the On Our Minds blog at Village Hiker.
