Useful.Links

Japan Expat .blogs

Other people have done some amazing websites. I have linked to the ones that held my interest the longest
japan newbie - great collection of comments and photos
Porcelain Monkey - Living in Nagoya. I probably read this the most often. Always full of something new and interesting
Kikuko's web site - Best links about Nagoya. Especially check out her "Monthly Info" and sushi pages
Declan Murphy - The Yamasa Institute
The Quirky Japan - SAQ - Answers many questions that expats often ask, such as why traffic lights can be red and green at the same time.
CScout Trends in Japan - See what is new and bizzare

Japan Discussion.Boards

Ask your questions about japan here:
Japan Guide Forum - Good place to post questions about japan


Regular Newsletters

xpat-files byrelocation firm H&R Consultants
Nagoya international Centre Magazine


Japan Tourist Related links

Kyoto Travel Guide
Japan Meteorological Agency
Weather reports, but also tracking the colour change in Autum, or when the cherry blossoms will be out
5 Day weaher report from Japan Meteorological Agency
Japan Travel Wiki - useful general travel page on from the wikipedia. The Wikipedia also has a Nagoya page.
Yokoso Japan - Aimed at US tourists but has useful information such as locations for tea ceremonies.
Japan National Tourist Organisation- Good National information
JNTO's Independant Traveller Maps


Nagoya Tourist.Stuff

Nagoya Visitor's Guide Useful 24MB PDF by the Nagoya Convention and Visitors Bureau. They also have a Restaurant guide on the website.
Aichi prefecture PDF Guide - from the Aichi Prefecture Official Site
Another Aichi prefecture Guide PDF
Aichi Siteseeing guide - Another good official page in English
Good PDF map of downtown Sakae from Nagoya Visitors and Convention Bureau
Best Sakura viewing in Nagoya - NIC website
Chubu Wide Tourism Portal (Just discovered in April 2008 - Just as we are leaving)

Nagoya Public Transport

Nagoya Subway timetable and Map
Aichi Meitetsu Train Timetable, map
Intercity JR/JapanRail Website
Centre-air Airport and Fujigaoka Bus To and from airport


General TV.Guides

http://metropolis.japantoday.com/tokyo/recent/tvguide.asp#01
http://www.sarjam.com/Csatconfig.html


skyperfect TV.Guides

Skyperfect is the main pay tv option in Japan. It has a wide range of english programming, though no cooking or home rennovation shows and no Australian content.

Skyperfect Website

Monthly T.V. Guides in English for Pay TV Channels (as PDF). The Monday English edition of the Asahi Shinbun has a basic weekly Pay-TV guide.
History Channel Japan
Discovery Channel Japan
MoviePlus
CineFil
AXN
LaLa
Star Channel
Fox Japan


Podcasting.Streaming Radio

We have used podcasts to get english language radio to play in the car. Basically we download radio programs on our PC and burn them onto a CD which we play in the car. We did this quite a bit for the first month of our stay, but we do this less now we use the laptop to stream radio from Australia into the house.

We found that the ABC, the BBC and NPR had wide ranges of shows that can be downloaded as podcasts if you are interested in news/current affairs.

Most radio stations now can be streamed directly over the internet. So with a wireless connection and a laptop you can have radio anywhere you like, this can be great at night or on the weekend.

Podcast Software - http://juicereceiver.sourceforge.net/
ABC Podcasts - http://www.abc.net.au/services/podcasting/
ABC Streaming Radio - http://www.abc.net.au/radio/

(October 2006 - now I have an Ipod I am using itunes for podcasts which is a bit simpler than Juice. Mark Kermode's Film reviews are worth listening to, as is NPR's Wait Wait Don't Tell me. )


Nagoya Radio Stations.with English Content

Radio-i is a bilingual music station based in Nagoya. I have it on in the car.
Radio-i nagoya
I also tune in to Zip FM, another music station


Translation On the Computer

I use the Google toolbar in windows. It has a translate button on it that will translate a complete web page into english. The result is often quite garbled but can be helpful. I have found it helpful when looking for specific information from a shop website.
Google Toolbar

The other translation tool I use is Altavista's Babelfish. But this I find works best for short phrases. (My computer is Japanese language and often I use babelfish to give me a trnslation of error messages that I receive.)


Voip.Internet Telephone

Rather than using phone cards we use Skype to call home.

Skype (www.skype.com) has been invaluable and much less confusing than phone cards usually are. Calls to other people also using Skype are free and if both skype users have webcams then you can see each other and talk at the same time, though this requires at least ADSL 512kb to work well.

Calls to landline phones are on par with phone cards with quality and price Finally, with Skype you can organise a local number in Australia so that friends/family can call you cheaply.



Local Newspaper .Services

Japan Today - Japan News in English
The Asahi Shinbun/ International Herald tribune has an english edition that you can have home delivered. (Our deliveries arrive before 6am every day.) Note that the Sunday paper (the AsahiWeekly) is not worth getting, it is very thin and mainly comprises of stories that were in the paper through the week.

Another newspaper that I see around is the Daily Yomiuri, it is not bad. Some of the shops in Nagoya station sell all the english papers. (Thekonbini inside the station, on the corner near JR Takashimi is always a good bet..



Other.Sites

DFAT - Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
Japan baseball schedule 2007 for theNagoya based Chunichi Dragons in english
Seek Japan's "Japan Living Guide" - good starting point for someone new to Nagoya or to Japan.
English Yellow Pages for Japan - (I have not it used much)
MLC Free resources for learning Japanese (Scroll down)
Aichi International Association - Contains links to many community groups and useful local information
Nagoya International Centre - Organised by the Nagoya City Goverment. You can subscribe to their events newsletter called the "Nagoya Calendar"
XE Universal Currency Converter
Nagoya City Living Guide (pdf) - Government Information on recycling, alien registration etc
relojapan - have a good page on the average prices of items in Japan
japanzine - It is a free english magazine - but has a good little website aimed at expats
Japanguide.com - Living in Japan Page

Dangerous Areas
Nagoya City Council - Maps of Shelters - Safe Areas (pdf's) - Information for disasters









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