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Every guide on Tokyo Notes

Each article carries the date its facts were last checked and links to the official pages they were checked against. Where something could not be confirmed, the article says so rather than filling the gap.

Transit

Trains, buses, IC cards, and the gates where trips stop making sense.

Suica & PASMO: which one, and how to actually use it

Choosing between the two cards, getting one on your phone or in your hand, topping it up, and what happens when the balance runs out mid-journey.

Transit

Four pieces of Tokyo advice, checked against the official sources

Bus doors, Shinkansen gates, deodorant, escalators. Three of the four turned out to be wrong — including one correction that gets posted underneath the original mistake.

Verified 25 Aug 2026TransitPractical Tips

Practical Tips

Money, rules, health and bookings — the parts of a trip that have a right answer and a costly wrong one.

Getting sick in Tokyo: which numbers work in English, and which ones nobody will say

119 has an English speaker on duty at all times, and you do not need to know the address to call it. The number for "should I even go in?" is the one where no official page will state what language it answers in.

Verified 26 Aug 2026Practical Tips

Tax-free shopping changes on 1 November 2026: you pay the tax first

The discount no longer happens at the till. You pay the full price, clear a customs step at the airport before checking your bags, and the money comes back afterwards — on a timetable that depends on the shop.

Verified 23 Aug 2026Practical Tips

Neighborhoods

Beyond Shibuya and Asakusa.

Nothing here yet

Places worth the trip that English-language guides have not reached — including ones that welcome visitors but have never said so in English. Being worked on.

Accessibility

Step-free routes, lifts, and what is actually there when you arrive.

Nothing here yet

Verified access information for wheelchair users, families with strollers, and anyone for whom a missing lift changes the whole day. Being worked on.

How these are put together

Claims that circulate in English get checked one at a time against the operator's or the government's own Japanese pages — the tax agency, the transport bureau, the railway companies, the fire department, the venue itself.

Only what those pages actually say goes into an article. Anything that could not be confirmed is left as a visible gap, and every page carries the date it was checked, because rules change.