But wow if you get out of Tokyo, people are so nice and friendly. Kyoto is my absolute favourite place. People are so kind and helpful and friendly, and they want to help you and recommend places to visit or eat at etc.
> Tokyo is one of the worst places I’ve visited
and
> Kyoto is my absolute favourite place
Are people’s personal experiences now to be conflated with claims of an objective nature? I’m not sure why you would do that but it’s no better than a straw man.
Kyoto is just an example as it’s my favourite place I’ve visited. But pretty much everyone outside of Tokyo is a billion times better than those in Tokyo.
Edit: also I said one of the worst places I’ve visited. I didn’t say most unfriendly.
The local post office in a Setagaya suburb and the ticket office for the ferry in Asakusa are going to be worlds apart.
I don’t have this experience elsewhere. I think Kyoto folks are just burnt out on tourists and many shut down when they see a foreign face. Not all people in Kyoto have this problem, but I’ve encountered this consistently each time I’ve been there but nowhere else in the country.
But yes, foreigners are a dime a dozen in Tokyo so nobody really cares. If you go out to inaka (countryside), you get a lot more attention.
Wow, what kind of logic is that? Someone is doing X and you are deciding their reasons for them?
Maybe someone is tired and still going out of their way to help you, but you choose to view it as insincerity.
Sounds like you are projecting your insecurities on to others, or got treated as less of celebrity than you were looking forward to (a common thing among Westerners visiting Japan). Judging people for helping you, really?
Let's look at any country in Asia. If you're lost, and you see a couple of people just chit-chatting with each other, in no hurry. You approach them and ask them for directions. The vast majority of the time they are more than willing to help, and in my experience, I haven't had someone not try to help. Singapore, Cambodia, Thailand, Korea, Vietnam, Indonedia, Taiwan... Now do the same in Tokyo, the majority of the time they don't want to help, were rude, walk away, get flustered even if you try to speak Japanese instead of English.
Yet you go to any other part of Japan and this is not the case.
You're telling me that because Tokyo is the 1 place in Asia I've visited where people tend to be rude, agitated, flustered, walk away, etc. That I'm the problem because I'm a westerner visiting Japan. Even tho talking to my Japanese co-workers who say "oh this is just Tokyo, we are just too busy here". Nope I'm a westerner and I'm the problem.
> https://www.businessinsider.com/japanese-worker-punished-for...
Your experience is definitely very uncommon. I’ve been to Tokyo countless times and they’re not any different than the small town I currently live in in Japan. If anything, you probably talked to some people who are way too used to tourists asking them for “directions” then trying to turn it into a chance to hook up—way too many people try this and some people have learned to just avoid tourist-looking types, especially women.