I want to visit japan for about a month next summer, so how should I prepare?

Question:

I am 20 y.o. and a student at university, I want to know what should I prepare for this vacation like money, language(I just know the Hiragana and little grammar), visa (by the way I have a French passport) ...
when should I do all these things? is studying Japanese gonna help me or not?
maybe I should go there as a student and study there "maybe language" (I can stay there for 3 months if it isn't expensive)

I know it's early to ask some questions, god know what will happen after one year, but I just want to a general idea, thanks in advance

Answer:

Knowing Japanese will be a big plus. I'd recommend getting familiar with what merchants will potentially ask you as well so you know how to answer in advance to avoid any awkward moments, haha.

You can actually check on wikipedia for how long a french resident can stay in Japan without a visa. I know for americans it's 90 days, so it might be the same for you guys. Better check, though, so you don't get chucked out of the country for overstaying your welcome.

Food shouldn't be any more than ¥1,000 a day if you know what you're doing. You're going to do a lot of living out of convenience stores like 711. Stick to eating Japanese food there if you don't want to go poor quickly. Eating western food every day will make you spend all your money.

Make sure you have enough money for transportation. Since you've not said where in Japan you're going, I can't give you an estimate, but realize that you're going to take a train from the airport to a hub, and then from the hub you'll take more trains to your destination. Don't take the bus- etiquette on the bus is too much of a hassle if you've never been there before. Trains are way better anyway. :)

Make sure you have a hotel reservation, of course. Western hotels can be cheap, but you're basically living in a closet so prepare yourself for that. If you have more money to burn, you can get better hotel rooms that seem more 'normal' from a western perspective.

Souvenirs can cost anything from ¥100 to thousands of euros- it's all up to you. I'd really recommend checking out the ¥100 in Japan, though, as they've got some good stuff sometimes.

I would recommend preparing three months in advance at least. Book your hotel a month ahead of time at the LEAST. The earlier you can book, the better. Once you're there, your main costs will be food and transportation and that's pretty cheap. :)

Good luck!

PS: If you can go to Japan through a 3 month exchange or something, that would be fantastic. It would give you guidance on how to live and travel in the country and give you new friends to get confused with, which is always a plus, haha. I would suggest trying to do the 3 month exchange instead if you can since you'd have everything explained to you as you go along. :)