An evening trip to Funabori Tower, Tokyo

We heard about Funabori Tower from one of the friends last week. Funabori is just a two minutes by Toei Shinjuku line from Higashi Ojima. Yesterday, we went to visit Funabori tower with two friends.

Funabori tower, an integral part and main attraction of Tower hall Funabori, is also a place of conference, wedding parties, meetings, events and hotels. Calm and quiet Funabori station is just less than a minute walk from the tower hall Funabori.

Funabori Tower got its name from the place name Funabori. Funabori is near to Higashi Ojima and Ichinoe in Toei Shinjuku line. Funabori tower is approximately 7 minutes from Yawata/Motoyawata when we come from Narita Airport in Keisei line. A 7 minute walk from Keisei Yawata is required to reach Motoyawata in Toei Shinjuku line. It is recommendable to burn the extra fat accumulated! Japanese people are health conscious to the extent that they purposely make some of the destinations reachable by walking only!

It was around 6:30 PM when we started from Higashi Ojima with kids. Kids like to play outside and such journeys are ideal occasion to impart knowledge on them by talking about what the elders know about the place and history. Unfortunately I was not much informed on the importance of Tower hall Funabori.

Funabori tower is named after the tall tower, which is 115 meters tall and location, Funabori. At the entrance place there were wooden sculptures of musicians with violin in their hands. When we entered the Tower hall building, the first thing I noticed is a Japanese girl clad in black suit with a black hat coming walking to the reception area. Our friend approached the reception to ask how to access the tower. They explained how to go to the top of the tower.

We could see model statues of bride and groom on the first ground floor (First floor in Japan).Tower Hall Funabori is an ideal venue for holding events that ranges from expos to conferences to weddings. Funabori tower hall also have a bridal salon, restaurant and cinema. Funabori tower hall have a big hall, small hall, Banquette room, Event hall and Shop & Service room. Parking lot, Movie Theater, Exclusive service yard etc makes the Funabori tower hall a unique place for events.

The staff at the ground floor guided us to the elevator (Erabeta in Japanese) which took us to the seventh floor. Came out of the elevator at the seventh floor, we walked on the corridor which is long that reached to the end of the building. There another staff guided to us to one of elevator. Baby strollers are allowed to take up to this point only.

We entered to the elevator to reach the top of the Funabori tower. The digital display inside the lift showed the distance we covered in meters. When the display showed 105 meters, the lift stopped. Conveying our Arigato gozaimasu to the lift operator, we entered to the observation tower area. It is built in a square shape allowing 360 degree view of the surrounding Tokyo city and skyscrapers.

The night view of Tokyo is exciting! The extreme engineering skills manifested through the construction of attractive tall structures illuminated with electric bulbs are a feast to the eyes.

We saw Tokyo Tower from the observation tower in dim light, Sky scrapers in Odaiba was also visible. The photos taken from the top of the Funabori Tower at night were not so clear.


The view of vehicles moving not so far away on the bridge along with Arakawa river was really amazing. Another attraction was the view of trains moving on Toei Shinjuku line from the top of the tower.


We spent more than one hour at the tower top. There were no crowd and the observation area was silent, except our children made some noise when they played. Funabori Tower in the Tower hall Funabori is a recommendable place to visit in Tokyo.

Funabori tower is free to visit. To reach Funabori Tower the following link have a pdf file showing the nearby places and approximate time to reach the tower from Narita Airport and Keisei line.

How to reach Funabori Tower and Tower Hall Funabori? Click here

For those who are interested to contact the Tower hall Funabori for any kind of events, conference, the following address and website address will help. The site is in Japanese language;

Tower Hall Funabori
4-1-1 Funabori
Tokyo, Japan
phone: +81 3 5676 2211
fax: +81 3 5676 2501
Funabori Tower Hall

Again on the living expenses for a foreigner family in Tokyo

On March 22nd I wrote a simple article on living expenses for a foreigner in Tokyo. As I told in this blog and other discussion forums, cost of living in Tokyo is much higher compared to other East Asian and European nations. When I was writing that post in this blog on March, I was living alone and my family was in India. Almost three weeks after writing that post, they joined with me along with my mother.

It will be interesting to compare the cost of living in Tokyo for a bachelor and for a family, especially for foreign people. I think this will be a helpful hint for at least some of the Asians planning to come to Japan for work.

In order to tell how big the difference in expenses will be for a family in Tokyo when compared to the bachelor life, I would like to narrate the real incident. One day in May, I got a phone call from my wife saying that, one of the Japanese woman has come to our home telling something. As my wife was new to Japan, she could not understand even a single word, but could guess it is something related to the bill for gas.

As I also did not have confidence to speak in Japanese especially over phone, I requested help from one of my Japanese colleagues. My Japanese colleague after talking over phone explained to me that the Gas bill has suddenly shoot up to 13340 Japanese Yen (JPY) for the last month. Compared to the March month’s bill of 1600 JPY, that was more than 8 times high! The Japanese staff from the Tokyo Gas company was surprised and doubted for some leakages inside home. She wanted to enter the home and check! When I heard from my colleague, I thought of the promptness and alertness of Tokyo Gas company’s staff. It is really appreciable. They are not only for billing the customer, but also to educate and alert them of a sudden change in the billing amount.

My colleague explained that my family has joined with me from last month and that was the reason for sudden change. Taking the high cost of living in Tokyo with family, we could control the Gas bill for the subsequent months by putting restriction on the usage of gas heaters and water heating system.

The same thing happened to the Electricity bill during summer seasons, when we switch on the air conditioners almost throughout the day. Compared to the bachelor life, the bills for Gas, Electricity, Water and sewage, has more than tippled on average. Yahoo BB bill is same and there is no much change. The Softbank mobile bill has increased a little to reach something around 3600 JPY per month. Putting all the bills together, it comes around 30,000 JPY per month for Water and Sewage, Gas, Electricity, Mobile, Internet connection, Cable TV etc.

The drastic increase in expense is on the education. The school fee and the bus fee for children is the biggest contributor to the high cost of living for foreigners. The education is free in Japanese schools. The fee in international schools in Tokyo is too high for an average paid foreigner especially in Japanese companies. Japanese companies mostly have no separate rules for giving special allowance to support the education of children of foreign staff.

We are paying 60,000 JPY per month for the kid’s fee and 15,000 JPY for school bus. The miscellaneous expenses for the children relating to education may vary from 10,000 JPY depending on the schools. Since my kid is going to Indian International School in Tokyo (Morishita), she has to go by school bus.

To summarize, the living expense for one month on an average for a simple living family will be around 300,000 Japanese Yen. This expense does not include the House rent, tax and other deductions. Including the house rent, travelling expenses, the expense will be around 450,000 JPY per month if the whole amount of house rent is to be paid by us. Many Japanese companies pay 70 to 80% of the house rent to their employees. This is a great support for employees. Since the tax depends on the basic pay, I don’t want to make a comment here.

In short, living in Tokyo is not simple! There are very few chances in Tokyo to live simple and save a lot of money from our salary, compared to many other major cities. This makes Tokyo unique. One of the biggest cities in the world, where more than 12 million people reside at the heart of the city and more than 30 million people including the surrounding areas. The cash flow in Tokyo is high…….and still Japan has been the second strongest economy in the world!

Living with kids in Japan – Free medical insurance scheme for children

One of the Japanese Kanji character I like most is the one for Child. The Kanji character for child is 子. By simply writing 子 we can understand it stands for ‘child’, ‘children’ etc. Pronounce as ‘ko’ in kun’yomi and ‘shi’ in on’yomi 子 is one of the simplest Kanji very easy to write and remember. But in Japanese language, child is Kodomo. Then the first sound ko is written as 子 and the remaining ‘domo’ is written in hiragana. There are some occasions where the kodomo is written as 子供.

Thus the Otoko no ko becomes boy child and onna no ko is girl child. When I approached the health insurance section of ward office, they inquired me about number of children. I replied in my broken confused Japanese ‘onna no ko wa futari desu’. I am not sure about the grammar, but they could have understood.

子 is a widely used Kanji helpful in many life situations in day to day life in Japan. Combined with other kanji characters 子 forms different meanings like the one in ‘suki’ which means ‘like’, ‘loving’ etc. Interestingly when I learned the kanji for suki, it is a combination of a child and woman. Woman loves child naturally and that love is considered from the heart which Japanese people think will convey the best meaning for love and like. This has prompted me to think the complex mind process involved in the past years to derive the Kanji characters. 子 is used in Choushi which means ‘tune’ or ‘condition’ and in ‘yousu’ means ‘state of affairs’. I can not proceed further with my meager knowledge on Japanese Kanji.

Coming to the subject of living with children in Japan, it is a fun and different As I wrote in the previous post, the alien card for children will be issued on the same day by the ward office. Once the alien card is received, we have to apply for National health insurance or other health insurance schemes. This will provide 70% free treatment in hospitals and medical stores. We need to produce the health insurance card to the hospitals and medical stores. The first time the hospitals and medical stores will register the card details in the system and subsequent visits will be easier by just giving the card to them.

70% free medical insurance is a great help, the Japan Government provide to Japanese people and for foreigners who intends to live in Japan for one year or more. Generally speaking, people who have alien card will be covered under one of the national health insurance schemes. So, they can avail 70% free medical treatment. The health insurance card is a green colored card with the same size of the alien registration card.

For children under the age of 15, ward office will issue another health insurance card. The green health insurance card is required to apply for this special card for children. If we produce both the cards in hospital and medical stores, 100% of the medical expenses will be free. This was something new information for me on the conveniences the Japan Government provides to the citizens including temporary foreign residents. How can we say Japan discriminates foreigners! I wonder. Temporary foreign residents are also covered under the national health insurance scheme and national pension scheme and their family members are also entitled to the facilities provided by the Japan Government.

I am not sure whether the child’s medical expenses card for 100% free treatment is available in other ward offices as well. Edogawa ward office had issued these medical expenses cards for my children. The diagnosis and treatment for which the medical expenses become free are slightly different. For example, child’s vaccination fee, health examination fee and the charges for using rooms are not covered by health insurance plan in Japan.

This free medical treatment for children is available even in case we travel out of Tokyo and fall sick in other part of Japan. In such cases, we need to get the receipt or expenses, health insurance card, child’s medical expense card issued by the ward office, and the guardian’s bank pass book to the ward office’s respective sections.

Children will get infected with the seasonal diseases and common cold easily and every time parents has to take them to the hospital. Thanks to the Japanese Government, due to the free medical treatment schemes, the life in Japan with kids will not be an additional financial burden for parents.

Living with family in Tokyo – Alien registration card

To be frank, I was little bit skeptic before coming to Japan, for conditions of a foreigner to live in Japan with family. This was due to the biased concerns over the cultural differences. Though we have learned about Japan in school books that Asian cultures have similar root and have many things in common, the fear remained in mind till I personally witness the good receptive attitude of Japanese people.

It was on April 10 of this year, more than one month now, wife with two kids and mother moved from India. The first thing to do in Japan once the immigration procedures are completed and reached at the apartment is to apply for Alien card. For foreigners, Japan Government issues Alien Registration card. This card is the identity card for foreigners in Japan.

Called ‘Gaikokujin Toroku Shomeisho’ in Japanese, the Alien registration card is a must to carry along always. Foreigner could be asked to produce it at any time by the law authorities including police at any time during travel in Japan. We have to apply to the respective ward office as early as possible since many other documents required for living in Japan depend on receipt of Alien card. To apply for alien card, the required documents are original passport and two passport size photographs taken with the last 6 months.

In ward offices, called as Kuyakusho in Japanese language, there will be English speaking staff at foreign registration section. The reception at the Kuyakusho will guide you to the proper counter. When I went to the Edogawa kuyakusho to apply for the alien cards for my wife and children, the receptionist guided us to the registration counter. The lady staff at the foreign registration cell could communicate to us in English. She handed over some forms which are written in Japanese and English and explained to us what information is to be written.

Since we went to the ward office with our children, some of the staff at the counter came out to see our kids. One staff gave some toys to my elder daughter to play so that she will not get bored. I filled up the necessary information and submitted at the counter. She told us to wait one hour. Generally foreigners above the age of 16 years will receive the alien card after approximately 20 days. For children below 16 years old, the alien registration card will be issued on the same day. That is the reason she told us to wait and gave toys to the kids for playing.

We talked with other foreigners waiting at the counter. Alien registration card is required to apply for health insurance card and to apply for telephone connection or mobile phone connection. Yahoo BB application also asks for photocopy of alien card.

After almost one hour of waiting, we were called to the counter to receive the alien cards for our kids. They informed, the alien card for wife will be issued after 20 days at the local ward office branch. It can be collected by showing the passport in which a copy of the application for alien card is attached. For kids, the size of alien card is different. It looks more like a folded pass book. For elders, the alien card is similar in size of an ATM card.

Now we realized that our fears before coming to Japan were baseless. Japanese people are warm and pleasant. The staff at that local ward office branch where we went to receive the alien card of my wife were also very kind to direct us with more useful information on how to fill up the application forms for health insurances for kids.

More details about the procedure for application for alien card can be read from; Useful information on Alien card application

Cost of living for a foreigner in Tokyo, Japan

Tokyo is the most expensive city in the world. The recent statistics shows that capital of Japan, Tokyo is the most expensive place in the world to live. Japan is the second strongest economy in the world, but the most expensive.

One reason for this high expense is the highest living standards by its citizens. The quality of life is also high in Tokyo. Everything contributes to the expenses.

From the last one year living experience in Japan, let me brief the costs of living in Tokyo. The apartment rent per month is 115,000 Japanese yen. For Yahoo BB broadband internet connection with a land phone the bill be around 6,400 Japanese yen. It is quite reasonable considering the quality of service Yahoo BB offers and the advantages of having a landline telephone from Yahoo BB in combination with Apa Kabar international calling card.

The monthly electricity bill will be around 6000 Japanese yen. I paid the last water bill approximately 3600 Japanese yen for two months. So, monthly 1800 Yen is nominal for a single man. The gas bill will be around 1600 Yen, because I don’t cook at home. This gas consumption is for heating the water for making coffee and water heating for bathing. The NHK television bill will be 1390 Yen per month. Softbank mobile phone charges for a month is around 2000 Yen. This includes the extra calls I make to friends within Japan. For making international calls I use Apa kabar card which costs 2400 Yen. I have to buy at least 3 Apa Kabar cards in a month, thus this amounts to 7200 Yen per month.

Daily commutation charges by train to office and back will be 580 Yen per day. So accumulated for a month and also including the extra travels I make to visit friends and for purchase will total to 20,000 Yen. This kind of expense depends on the place where we live. For others, this amount may be less or high.

For food and snacks monthly approximate expense for a single head will vary from 45000 to 60,000. If I go for eating out together with other friends once in a week, this amount will go further high.

Hair dressing charges are quite noticeable in Japan. My hair dresser charges me with a small bill of 3,000 Yen. This is where I got astonished with the living expenses in Tokyo. Every month I pay 3,000 Yen for hair cutting. I am not going for any beautification of my hair! In my country, for this amount of money, even if I go for a medium luxury hair saloon, I can have my hair cut for full two years! Here in Tokyo, we are not paying for the actual work he does rather we pay the hair dresser to live in Tokyo. He has to live in Tokyo in order to render his service to us!

The clothing and physical fitness charges will vary according to the individual and I don’t want to put any amount, but it won’t be less than 10,000 Yen if we take the average per month.

Then there are vacation expenses for a foreigner. Entertainment expenses another category. Today I went to see a movie. One movie ticket costs 1800 Yen.

Since I have insurance, I have to pay some 30% of the expenses. Monthly medical expenses are approximately 5000 Yen.

Living with family and kids is quite highly expensive in Japan. The lowest international school fee won’t be less than 60,000 Yen per month for one kid. The school bus expense may vary from 20,000 Yen and more. Then comes the other education expenses separately.

All the above mentioned expenses are purely from my own experience and have nothing to do with a national average figure. I don’t want to do a totaling of all the expenses and state a particular amount as the monthly expenses. Some companies will take care of some type of expenses. Again that depends on the individuals agreement with the company and company's commitment to the employees. Therefore Just I have given the breakups of living expenses in Tokyo. There are other types of expenses, which I might have missed out. I will update once I remember those expenses.

Japanese houses with Tatami and rent a house in Japan

All praise to Japan till now, here we go a bit sarcastic. This phrase was conveyed to me by a friend: A lucky man is one who lives with an English house, American Salary, French cook and Japanese wife. (This is again praise to Japanese people!)

Then the unlucky man lives with an English Cook, American wife, French Salary and Japanese house! (This one may not be praise!)

Though little exaggerated, the above phrase reflects the traditional belief that Japanese houses are just enough to live. When I entered to the apartment allocated to me I realized it. People with 6 feet height can raise their hands and touch the ceiling. We don’t need to search for a stool to change the lights for example.

Traditional Japanese houses are simple, neat and beautiful. Japanese houses are built with a bedroom with Tatami. The meaning of Tatami in Japanese is ‘folded and piled’. Tatami mats are a traditional type of Japanese flooring. Tatami floors are made of woven soft rush straw, and traditionally packed with rice straw.

The modern Japanese technology uses sometimes styrofoam though it is not widely accepted and not considered traditional. Tatami are made in individual mats of uniform size and shape, bordered by brocade or plain cloth. I am not sure of the exact dimension of Tatami mats, but my boss when he took me to the apartment first time during February 2008 told me that Japanese building standards use different Tatami sizes and bedrooms are identified with the number of Tatami used in a bedroom.

When I changed to a new apartment at Higashi Ojima, my boss accompanied me to select the house. Foreigners may often face problem to find a house in Japan. Many house owners turn their face against foreigners. If approached through a real estate agent, foreigner’s application may be turned down. I have heard of such problems in Japan, where it is difficult for foreign people to find a suitable apartment alone. Many of the house owners have problem in communicating with foreigners.

The language barrier is one of the biggest problems. Also the house owner thinks that due to improper language communication for day to day living, the foreigners may trouble the neighbors. Foreigners come from different background and may not be aware of the garbage disposal procedures and other social gatherings on which Japanese people mix together and contribute to the cleanliness of the building. Japanese house owner is more worried about the interpersonal relationship of the foreigners with local Japanese. Very often this attitude of Japanese people is highlighted as discrimination and racism of Japanese people towards foreigners. If we meet this land owner individually, he is very polite and nice talking and may not have any false prejudice inside. He just wanted to avoid complications (communicating in English with foreigners is a complicated thing for many Japanese people – true!)

Anyway, coming back to our discussion on Japanese houses, the Tatami laid Japanese houses represents Japan’s simplicity even at the height of technological advancements and achievements. Tatami reminds us the nature’s presence inside a Japanese house. Finally at night, for sleeping, we withdraw ourselves from all the modern life stresses and interpersonal strains and go back to the nature! That is a great idea behind Tatami.

Tatami were a symbol of luxury item for the wealthy at a time when lower class people’s houses had mat covered dirt floors. Tatami were gradually popularized and finally reached the homes of commoners around 300 years ago. Otherwise my house won’t have built with a Tatami floored bedroom!

House rent is high in Tokyo. The house rent for my dwelling is $1150 per month, including the maintenance charges. This home is just enough for my family with two kids. In Japan, it is tagged as 1LDK. This means the house is with One bed room, one living room, one Dining hall, one Kitchen. Kitchen is always a part of extension of the dining hall. If we go for more comfort, half of the salary will be consumed by the house owner!

If you are looking for a rented home: http://www.propertyworld.com/_Japan

http://www.sakura-house.com/

http://www.oakhouse.jp/eng/

http://www.arkadia.com/usa/real-estate/for-rent/japan/

http://www.realigro.com/House-for-rent-Japan/index.php

http://www.forleasebyowner.com/x_japan.asp

http://www.housingjapan.net/tokyo_apartment/index.php

http://sabbaticalhomes.com/Home_Exchange_Cities.aspx?country=Japan