What to bring...

[Keshu]

Hello fellow Canadians who may (or may not) be panicking over omiyage, my biggest piece of advice is wait to hear from your pred as they will be your best resource in preparing the quality/quantity you need!

Second piece of advice, maple flavoured anythings will be your best plan of attack, within one day of handing out cookies I think all of my coworkers will forever remember I am Canadian and not American lol! I also had several "special" omiyage ready for my principle, JTEs, etc. but for my other random coworkers who I have limited interaction with.....

A cheap and cute idea, I bought 3 boxes of maple cookies at my local grocery store (approx 30 cookies per pack) and then once I got to Japan I hit up the 100yen store for cute omiyage food baggies with twist ties (easy-peasy to find at ANY 100yen store in Japan thanks to the omiyage culture here, 1 package of 20 baggies = 100yen). Went home and put a few cookies in the baggies and then put those personal baggies all in a nice gift bag to bring with me to school and use to carry them around as I walk around the staffroom at lunch and hand them out TIP: bring all omiyage in a carry bag, many people will want to shake your hand and you don't want to have to juggle 20-30 other omiyage to do so lol.

Hope someone out there finds this useful, anyone else can do this too if there are special cookies from your home country not individually wrapped. My American friend did the same thing with lemon-creme cookies.

I approve about the maple thingies (also being from Canada). Just a sidenote, you can find maples cookies in Jupiter (foreign food store in most big cities) and I've seen them appearing in Aeon shipping malls since 2 weeks ago (Aeon is like the Wal-mart of Japan right now). The cookies I'm talking about are of the Leclerc brand made with real maple syrup. You can also find the Dare ones in Japan. As you probably won't be able to hit one of those stores before your first introductions, I do recommend bringing some... just don't go overboard, you can also get them here (but Japanese usually don't know that).

[bananathursdays]

I''ve only been on a place once before and it was just to California, not out of the country, so I apologize if this question is a little noobish...
I just want to get straight in my head how many bags I can take with me.
2 check-in bags/rollers plus a carry-on bag to stow above AND we're allowed a normal sized backpack as well, as long as we can keep it on our lap or put in under our seat? So we're pretty much allowed two carry-ons, then?

[dtrue]

I''ve only been on a place once before and it was just to California, not out of the country, so I apologize if this question is a little noobish...
I just want to get straight in my head how many bags I can take with me.
2 check-in bags/rollers plus a carry-on bag to stow above AND we're allowed a normal sized backpack as well, as long as we can keep it on our lap or put in under our seat? So we're pretty much allowed two carry-ons, then?

Yes you are correct. It seems like a ton of luggage to me now but I'm sure I will be trying to make more space come July.

[bananathursdays]

I''ve only been on a place once before and it was just to California, not out of the country, so I apologize if this question is a little noobish...
I just want to get straight in my head how many bags I can take with me.
2 check-in bags/rollers plus a carry-on bag to stow above AND we're allowed a normal sized backpack as well, as long as we can keep it on our lap or put in under our seat? So we're pretty much allowed two carry-ons, then?

Yes you are correct. It seems like a ton of luggage to me now but I'm sure I will be trying to make more space come July.

Thanks! That's pretty good news to me, considering I'm already wondering how in the world I'm going to pack all the things I want to take haha

[sloth]

I''ve only been on a place once before and it was just to California, not out of the country, so I apologize if this question is a little noobish...
I just want to get straight in my head how many bags I can take with me.
2 check-in bags/rollers plus a carry-on bag to stow above AND we're allowed a normal sized backpack as well, as long as we can keep it on our lap or put in under our seat? So we're pretty much allowed two carry-ons, then?

It depends on the airline. Most airlines are now restricting checked bags to one, but you can check a second one for a fee. For carry on you get one bag, and one "personal item" for most airlines. I normally take a carry on suitcase and a large purse.

[Kirari]

I''ve only been on a place once before and it was just to California, not out of the country, so I apologize if this question is a little noobish...
I just want to get straight in my head how many bags I can take with me.
2 check-in bags/rollers plus a carry-on bag to stow above AND we're allowed a normal sized backpack as well, as long as we can keep it on our lap or put in under our seat? So we're pretty much allowed two carry-ons, then?

It depends on the airline. Most airlines are now restricting checked bags to one, but you can check a second one for a fee. For carry on you get one bag, and one "personal item" for most airlines. I normally take a carry on suitcase and a large purse.

Of course, we probably won't know until the last minute which airline we'll be taking. But someone told me that the Atlanta consulate used American Airlines last year. Both AA and Delta (and probably more) offer 2 free checked bags on flights to Japan from the US. For most airlines, the checked bags can each be up to a total of 62" length + width + height, and up to 50lbs. Carry-ons are usually 45 max inches, but I haven't seen consistent (or any) dimensions for personal items, I guess because they can vary.

I'm taking a backpack as my personal item, plus the regular carry-on and 2 checked suitcases. I'll bring just the carry-on & backpack to TO, then I'll just keep my backpack if they need to load up the bus the night before we ship off to our prefectures. That's the plan, anyway.

[ChottoMonkey]

I'm taking a backpack as my personal item, plus the regular carry-on and 2 checked suitcases. I'll bring just the carry-on & backpack to TO, then I'll just keep my backpack if they need to load up the bus the night before we ship off to our prefectures. That's the plan, anyway.

Sounds like a good plan...and yes Domestic flights only allow one bag...international flights allow 2 checked bags.

So my plan:

2 checked bags
Backpack with Laptop
1 carry on bag

[Gekishinken]

Something a friend of mine was able to do when he flew to Japan (on JAL) was take:

2 backpacks as carry-ons
2 large suitcases

This allowed him to bring TONS of stuff with. Not sure if this is feasible for JETs but might be worth looking into.

[texasteachercc]

If you are female and prone to UTIs, I would suggest bringing some OTC meds that you can take for the pain and discomfort until you can make it to the doctor. I've not found it OTC here (I think the doctor must prescribe it) and the pharmacies close early. I had to have a family memeber mail me a pack of AZO pills (the kind that turn your urine colors).

[hawkharness]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I flew AA to Japan last year and they had just instituted a new luggage policy which only allows you 1 checked bag instead of 2 for international flights. I was allowed 2 (though I only needed one) since I had bought my ticket before the cutoff date, but I'm pretty certain it's been changed.

[teabot]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I flew AA to Japan last year and they had just instituted a new luggage policy which only allows you 1 checked bag instead of 2 for international flights. I was allowed 2 (though I only needed one) since I had bought my ticket before the cutoff date, but I'm pretty certain it's been changed.

may have been just your flight? my consulate also used AA last year and i (as well as most of the JETs flying with me) had 2 checked bags at no extra cost.

i also recently flew home [to the US] for a bit via Delta and though i checked only 1 bag, it was still possible to check up to 2 bags free of charge.

[Kirari]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I flew AA to Japan last year and they had just instituted a new luggage policy which only allows you 1 checked bag instead of 2 for international flights. I was allowed 2 (though I only needed one) since I had bought my ticket before the cutoff date, but I'm pretty certain it's been changed.

It's not necessarily international flights in general, but flights to Japan and China. Here: https://www.aa.com/i18n/travelInformati ... e&from=Nav

[jou_chan]

Don't overpack, send stuff ahead and leave some room for when you learn where you'll be. My recommendation, if you wanna have winter clothes/gear, ship them. You can buy some in Japan but it isn't as warm usually (or size is a problem for some). Schools aren't heated in winter usually so most teachers work with a coat on and sometimes small gloves. Most JET houses are also old and cold so unless your pred tells you your house is nice and warm, think that it'll be as warm inside as it is outside in winter (check the average weather on internet and you'll get a good idea). For example, in Hokkaido I had to drain the water pipes before going to bed otherwise they could freeze and burst... But places like Hokkaido has a lot more facility in buying warmer clothes than say, Osaka. Like I said, it depends where you land. Ask around... pred, other JETs around there... get in touch with people.

So we can send stuff ahead of time?? Reading this that was my biggest concern. I have decent sized suitcases and know what I want to bring with me. The biggest thing is the desktop/monitor...I could leave them here, but my laptop has some serious issues right now (needs a new battery, power plug and disc drive). I have NO clue how to put computers together and I would really want to bring it and my laptop (with a new battery) for bringing to school with me. I also will be looking into bringing my 360! I loves me my video games XD

[merkypie]

Don't break the monitor if you insist on bringing your tower. You can easily buy a monitor in Japan or even a television with a HDMI port and use that as a monitor. Unless you plan on shipping this stuff and paying $$$$$$ to make sure it arrives not all banged up: don't bring it.

[Gizmotech]

So we can send stuff ahead of time?? Reading this that was my biggest concern. I have decent sized suitcases and know what I want to bring with me. The biggest thing is the desktop/monitor...I could leave them here, but my laptop has some serious issues right now (needs a new battery, power plug and disc drive). I have NO clue how to put computers together and I would really want to bring it and my laptop (with a new battery) for bringing to school with me. I also will be looking into bringing my 360! I loves me my video games XD

Yes you can ship ahead of time. I sent 2 boxes (winter clothes/boots/books) over about a month before I came, they arrived about 2 months after I got here.

As for your computer, leave the monitor at home. Hell, leave the case and powersupply as well. Just pack up the internals and put it in some carry on luggage. It's safer to bring it over that way than ship it freight (2-3months) and hope for the best. (There is NO reason to ship a PC air, at all.) Once you get here, pick up a case/powersupply off amazon.co.jp and you're good to go.