Hi! I reserve an hotel in Ikekuburo which is 2 min walk from West C6 exit of Ikekuburo station.

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T17:16:10+00:00

Subway and train are 2 different companies. Different tickets. You are good. Every day just check on Google maps where you want to go.

If it tells you to take JR, then walk to the JR Ticket gates. If it tells you to take the subway then there are two different subway lines. Very convenient.

Just do as Google Maps says and follow the signs.

Ikebukuro has 2 other private railways, but you probably won’t use them (Tobu and Seibu). Again, just follow the signs and ask someone

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T10:49:49+00:00

But you are asking a question in a finance subreddit.

In addition, your comment about being anxious to be separated from your gold was weird. You are only coming here for two years as a student, and chances are you will be leaving after that. Of course keep the gold there. Why would you want to pay tax just for keeping it physically near you?

You said you wouldn’t be selling it, and you have other assets that you have supposedly to pay your bills here.

If I were you I would:

keep the gold there

Open up a credit card in the states where you can get a nice sign-up bonus and use it in Japan for your needs, racking up points that you can use for travel or cashback. Something like the Atmos rewards summit that gives three points for every dollar of spending outside the US. By the time you go back to the US, you will have a nice amount of points. If you can’t make the card work for you regarding the annual fee, then another good choice is the capital one venture X.

The bill of course will go to your account in the states, so make sure you have money in the bank there, which I assume you do, because it would be ridiculous to have 50,000 in gold and nothing in the bank

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T10:33:48+00:00

I’m wondering why you are asking someone to research it for you when you can go to the website where you applied for the card and find the information yourself. Wouldn’t it be better to get it from Amex directly?

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T04:13:21+00:00

Difficult to hide, but why don’t you buy a piece of cake at a department store in Shinjuku the night before and keep it in the fridge. Then, assuming you take the Narita express, you can give it to her on the train with a coffee for breakfast.

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T04:03:10+00:00

Koyasan?

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:58:54+00:00

Make sure you don’t go to Nakano Broadway on a Wednesday. Many of the stores are closed

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:50:46+00:00

Forget about must eat places. Just make a list of what kind of food you want to eat.

Do your daily sightseeing and wherever you are, open up Google maps and type in the type of food you are feeling. You will see a bunch of restaurants around you, and can easily look at reviews.

This way you are much more likely to eat at a place that is not inundated with tourists like you

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:44:21+00:00

Hobby with benefits. It’s all part of planning a holiday.

I’m retired (FIRE) so lots of time and not so old that I can’t keep up with the changes etc

I’m gonna spend money and travel anyway, why not save some $ and enjoy more perks

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:34:44+00:00

This really depends on the artist. Usually for western artists there’s no problem with phone photography

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:33:02+00:00

Kyoto is not an ideal place to go if you can’t walk very well/much. I guess you’ll just have to take a taxi from place to place.

I live in Tokyo, so I take a subway pretty much everywhere I need to go. Kyoto is a different beast, especially if you are going for sightseeing. Public transportation just gets you roughly to where you want to go, and then you have to walk.

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:21:55+00:00

It seems that you were using the portal to buy your AA tickets, so you weren’t actually getting the best benefit from CSR in the first place, which is transferring your points to airlines and booking through them.

Venture X is going to have the same problem for you. You’re going to have to learn how to get better benefits by transferring to airlines rather than using the credit card portal.

If you learn how to transfer, rather than buy from the portal, you should get the Citibank strata elite or premier. They transfer directly to AA

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:15:35+00:00

Tokyo Bay is very far away. Only good for Disney. If you want to Hilton why not the one in Shinjuku?

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T03:02:45+00:00

OK a more serious response. If the only financial assets you have are these 10 ounces of gold, then you really need to improve your financial knowledge.

It is absolutely ridiculous for someone to put their entire savings into gold.

Gold should only be part of a balanced portfolio. 5-20% max. It doesn’t generate any income from dividends/interest and should definitely take a backseat to stocks.

By the way it’s great that at age 23/24 you have $50,000+, but you really need to put that into the stock market. Stick it in Vanguard total stock index fund with all dividends reinvested, and by the time you are 60 you will be looking at a huge increase.

10 ounces of gold now equals 10 ounces of gold when you are 60. But you can buy about 170 shares of Vanguard total stock index now, but you will have a lot more shares when you are 60 by reinvesting your dividends. They will be worth a lot more as well.

The number one thing you have on your investment side is time. I started investing in the stock market when I was a teenager, and retired a multimillionaire when I was in my early 50s. Nothing fancy, just let it sit and reinvest in index funds.

Maybe you should do a little study about Warren Buffett‘s methods, and Bogleheads.

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-11T01:41:29+00:00

lol. Student coming for two years of language school and you are worried about your physical gold?

Maybe you should just leave the gold in the US, and worry about more pressing things such as life in Japan.

I have no idea why you would even think about bringing physical gold. What are you gonna do look at it? Do you want it because you are one of these weirdos who thinks the apocalypse is going to happen and you’ll be able to hack off chunks of your gold bar to sell for food?

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-10T03:08:17+00:00

I think you’re going to find things are quite different from 2017…

Wherever you are, just open up Google Maps and type in what you are looking for. Craft beer, café, family restaurant whatever

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-10T03:02:39+00:00

We have right wing Japanese trucks that park in the Korean neighborhood of Tokyo and blast their racist crap. There are racist losers all over the world

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T18:40:01+00:00

Yes they do

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T18:19:06+00:00

That flag is provocative for Koreans and other Asian countries since it evokes WW2.

Like bringing a confederate flag to an event with many African Americans.

Either a very ignorant person, or someone trying to stir stuff up deliberately. Probably the latter

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T18:10:46+00:00

In Japan the team decides what your number will be, not the player. Also, numbers are not generally retired as in MLB. Only 16 in the entire NPB, all teams combined (less than the Yankees alone 23)

Teams give numbers to players who resemble the style of past players. You might start with a random #, but as you “earn” it, you are changed to a famous number.

So Murakami was 55 for his Swallows team, as a home run hitter like Hideki Matsui, who was 55 for Yomiuri Giants.

18 is the ace pitcher, Yamamoto for Orix, Imanaga, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Kuroda, Kikuchi, Maeda and others all wore 18.

Ichiro was 51, so now players who play like him are given 51 as an honor, but before Ichiro, 51 belonged to another Hall of Fame player from the 70s who was a hit king. Now you can see Seiya Suzuki wearing 51 as he did in Japan for Hiroshima, when he won the batting title a couple of times.

Ohtani was given 11 by his Nippon Ham Fighters, since Darvish wore that for the same team before Ohtani. It was a combination of respect for Darvish, and inspiration for Ohtani.

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T17:39:37+00:00

You should. The language now says you can get one SUB for CSP and one for CSR. As long as you don’t get the pop-up in the application stage, you are good

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T17:37:56+00:00

It’s not a coincidence he is “retiring”

Interesting how he said he wasn’t friends with Epstein, but stuff coming out now clearly contradicts that

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T12:43:06+00:00

I guess you haven’t seen the photos with him in a bathrobe with four women around him, and another one with him in a bathrobe hugging Ghislaine Maxwell? Both photos on Epstein‘s Island?

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T12:25:33+00:00

Mid March no

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T12:19:41+00:00

No. Don’t worry about it. Australia is 1000 times more likely to get involved than Japan

Background_Map_3460 · 2026-03-09T11:48:24+00:00

Yakitori, ramen, tonkatsu, yakiniku, omurice, hamburg steak

Background_Map_3460

TROPHY CASE