What I Regret From My First Trip To Japan 🇯🇵😵‍💫

These are the mistakes I didn’t see coming. 👇

Written by Katie Rhodes

Updated 17 August 2026

I Thought I Had Planned The Perfect Japan Trip

I'd been dreaming about going to Japan for years.

 

So when my husband and I finally decided to go, I wanted to make sure we did it right.

 

I spent months planning.

 

I saved hundreds of Facebook and Instagram posts with titles like

"10 Things You HAVE To Do In Tokyo" 
"The Best Hidden Restaurants In Japan"
"Don't Visit Japan Without Doing This." 

So by the time my husband and I finally booked the trip, I thought I was ready.

 

With months of research done. What could possibly go wrong? 

 

Well… Pretty much everything. 

The First Sign Of Trouble Came Before We Even Reached The Hotel

Our first stop was a taxi. 

 

I tried to tell the driver our hotel address. 

 

He just shook his head, confused.

 

That was the first sign of trouble.

 

I remember thinking, Okay... this might be harder than I expected.

 

A few hours later, that same problem followed us into dinner.

 

That night, tired and hungry, we walked into a small restaurant near our hotel. 

 

The whole menu was handwritten in Japanese. 

I pulled out my phone and tried to translate the menu.

 

But Google Translate couldn’t make sense of the handwriting.

 

It just kept giving me random words that made absolutely no sense.

 

Meanwhile, the waiter was standing there waiting for us to order.

 

I could tell he was getting impatient.

 

So eventually, I panicked and just pointed at a random line on the menu.

 

A few minutes later, they brought out this cold bowl of raw salted organ meat.

 

My husband and I just looked at each other.

 

Neither of us could eat it.

And then, because apparently I hadn’t embarrassed myself enough yet, I tried to leave the waiter a tip.

 

I had no idea tipping is considered rude in Japan and can actually come across disrespectful.

 

Dinner did not exactly go as planned.

 

At the time, I thought the language barrier was going to be our biggest problem.

 

I was wrong about that.

One Wrong Turn Costed Us $240 And Half A Day In Japan

Everyone told us Japan's trains were incredible.

 

They are.

 

But nobody tells you how confusing they are.

Japan has 8 of the top 10 busiest train stations in the world.

 

On our 4th day, we walked into Shinjuku Station to catch a train to Mt Fuji.

 

But we had no idea what we were walking into. 

 

Shinjuku Station (the busiest train station in the world) has 3.5 million people passing through it every day. 

 

That’s more than the entire population of Jamaica in one single station every single day. 

 

It has more than 200 exits, 50 different platforms, and multiple lines on 10 different floors. 

So when we got there for the first time it was chaos. 

 

Trying to find our platform was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

 

We wandered for 45 minutes, sweating, trying to flag someone down for help. 

 

Most people gave us a quick, apologetic bow and kept walking. 

 

By the time we finally found the platform we had completely missed our train.

 

We lost $240 in non-refundable express tickets. 

 

We then wasted an entire morning of our vacation arguing in the train station.

The Food Almost Ruined The Whole Trip For Me

I was determined to save the day.

 

So I pulled up a famous ramen shop I had saved on Instagram and Google Maps. 

 

It had thousands of five-star reviews. 

 

I'd seen it everywhere.

 

Every "must visit Tokyo" list. 

 

Every foodie account.

 

So naturally we went. 

And when we got there, the line wrapping down the block.

I told my husband "It has to be worth it."

 

55 minutes later, we got a table.

 

We ate. We walked outside.

 

"That was it?" he said.

 

The food was pretty salty to be honest. 

 

And it was definitely a tourist trap. 

 

Then that was the moment it hit me.

 

We’d just given up almost an hour of a trip for a meal neither of us even liked that much.

 

What made me feel worse was that we only had three dinners left.

 

When you’ve come all the way to Japan, you suddenly realize how few chances you actually have to get it right.

Japan Is An Amazing Country But My Experience Was Kind Of Terrible 

Japan was incredible. That's what made it so frustrating. 

 

We'd done the research. 

 

Hundreds of hours of it. 

 

And we still spent half our trip checking our phones instead of looking up. 

 

Which train? 

 

Which exit?

 

Is this the the right way? 

 

Do we need a reservation?

 

Is this actually worth the wait?

 

By the end, we weren't tired from the trip. 

 

We were exhausted.

On the flight home, I told my husband:

 

"If we ever go back, I want to do this properly."

I Spent Months Planning Japan. Our Friends Barely Did. Guess Who Had The Better Trip?

A couple years later, one of my friends went to Japan.

 

When they got back, they wouldn't stop talking about it.

 

The food. 

 

The neighborhoods. 

 

And places we'd never heard of.

 

At one point my friend said, 

 

"Honestly, I don’t know why people say the trains are so confusing. They're actually pretty easy."

 

Pretty easy?

 

I had practically lost my mind inside Shinjuku Station.

 

She kept going. 

 

Restaurants we'd missed. 

The hidden spots we never even knew existed.

 

I have to admit... I was jealous. 

 

Because she was describing the trip I thought I was going to have.

 

What made me more angry was that I spent more time planning than she did.

 

So I had to ask. 

 

"What did you guys actually do differently?"

 

Her answer wasn't what I expected.

“Oh, I bought A Guide A Friend Had Told Me About” 

A guide?

 

You've got to be kidding me...

 

If more information was the answer, I should've been the most prepared woman in Tokyo.

 

But she kept talking about it. 

 

How much they'd used it. 

 

How helpful it was.

 

So she sent it over.

 

It was called The Ultimate Tokyo Travel Guide by Farr East.

I opened it mostly out of curiosity.

 

It had been put together by two local brothers from Japan. 

 

And almost immediately, I started seeing things I wished we'd known the first time.

 

That got my attention.

 

But I still wasn't convinced that one travel guide was going to make that much difference.

So Later That Year, We Decided To Go Back

We'd always wanted to go back.
 

Despite everything that went wrong, we still loved Japan.

 

But this time I wanted a completely different trip.

 

So we booked the flights.

 

Before we left, I went through the guide properly.

 

Made some changes to our plans.

 

Booked a couple things ahead.

 

Saved a few notes on my phone.

 

But I still wasn't convinced it was going to make that much difference.

 

Then came our first big train station.

My Husband Looked At Me And Said, "Uh Oh."

Crowds everywhere. 

 

Signs pointing in every direction.

 

Exits going four different ways.

 

I knew exactly what he meant.

 

Because last time, this was where everything would start going wrong.

 

We would go upstairs too early.

 

Realize we were on the wrong side.

 

Go back down.

 

Walk around for another ten minutes.

 

And somehow end up right where we started.

But this time, I knew what to look for.

 

We stopped.

 

Checked what the guide said. 

 

And followed the signs it told us to watch for.

 

A few minutes later, we walked out exactly where we needed to be.

 

“Well... that was easy.”

 

I laughed. 

 

Because two years earlier, navigating the train station ruined half our morning.

 

This time, we were already on our way to lunch.

 

And that was when I started thinking:

 

Okay. Maybe this trip is actually going to be different.

Then We Had The Best Meal I’ve Ever Had.

A few nights later, we followed one of the local restaurant recommendations.

 

It was tucked down a small side street.

 

Honestly, if I had walked past it on our first trip, I probably wouldn't have even noticed it.

 

We went inside.

 

Ordered what they recommended.

 

And it was easily the best meal of the trip.

 

Halfway through dinner, my husband put his chopsticks down and looked at me.

 

"Okay. THIS is what I thought eating in Japan was going to be like."

I had No Idea That I Was Doing Things That Could Be Considered Rude In Japan

This part honestly made me cringe.

 

Because once I knew some of the etiquette rules, I started noticing tourists breaking them everywhere.

 

Someone talking loudly on a quiet train.

 

Someone walking through the street eating.

 

Someone sticking their chopsticks straight up into their food.

 

And every time I saw it, I had the same thought:

 

Oh no... we probably looked exactly like that the first time.

 

That's what was so embarrassing.

 

Looking back, I hate thinking that we came across as “rude tourists” who don’t follow the rules.

This Time Around The Trip Was So Much More Enjoyable

Trains were easier.

 

We ate better.

 

We weren't constantly worried about navigating the city.
 

This time, I felt less anxious.

I didn’t need more information.

 

I already had too much of that.

 

I needed someone to tell me

 

“This is worth your time.”

 

“Skip this place.”

 

“Don't make this mistake.”

“Book this before you arrive.”

 

“Download this app.”

 

“Take this train.”

 

Google could only tell me what was popular.

 

Instagram could only tell me influencers like.

 

But neither could tell me whether something was worth giving up one of our ten days in Japan for.

 

And that’s why I found this guide so helpful. 

 

I didn’t need another hundred restaurants saved on my phone.

 

I needed someone who knew Japan to help me make the right choices before I wasted time figuring them out myself.

 

And because the guide was put together by locals, it covered a lot of little things I never even knew I should’ve been asking about.

 

If you’re planning a trip to Japan and you’re worried about making etiquette mistakes, falling into tourist traps, or just already overwhelmed with planning, you’ve gotta get yourself this guide.

 

We actually got pretty lucky when we bought ours because it was 40% off at the time.

 

You can click the button below to get the guide.

GET THE ULTIMATE TOKYO GUIDE 

Get The Guide
Title

GET THE ULTIMATE TOKYO GUIDE 

🎁 FREE BONUSES WITH YOUR ORDER ($65 VALUE)

GET THE GUIDE →
Title

10,000+ Happy Travelers 

Instant Download

Order today with a 30-Day-Money-Back Guarantee!

If You Are Overwhelmed With Planning, You Are Not Alone.

Planning our first trip completely on my own was exhausting.

 

I was constantly second-guessing everything.

 

Did I pick the right hotel?

 

Are we trying to do too much in one day?

 

Is there something we should be booking now?

 

Are we missing something obvious?

 

Is this restaurant actually worth going to?

 

Am I even spending enough time planning this?

 

Do we really need this reservation, pass, app, ticket, or whatever else everyone keeps recommending? 

 

Should I book this now or wait until we're there?

 

And the problem was, there was never really a point where I felt done.

 

There was always another video I could watch.

 

Another restaurant I could save.

 

Another thing in the itinerary I could change.

 

I could spend three hours researching Japan and somehow finish with more questions than when I started.

 

That's what felt so different the second time.

 

I didn't feel like I had to figure out every little thing by myself anymore.

 

Someone who actually knew Japan had already done a lot of that thinking for me.

 

For the first time, I could look at our plans and think:

 

Okay. We've got this.

 

I honestly wish I'd had that feeling before our first trip.

GET THE ULTIMATE TOKYO GUIDE 

🎁 FREE BONUSES WITH YOUR ORDER ($65 VALUE)

GET THE GUIDE →
Title

10,000+ Happy Travelers 

Instant Download

Order today with a 30-Day-Money-Back Guarantee!

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