how do i survive as a gaijin?!

[essex]

any other english speakers living in japan have any tips on where to get foreign stuff on the cheap, or how to generally not go insane living in such a different place?

... or especially anything to reduce the cost of living.

[Nyororin]

Originally Posted by essex

any other english speakers living in japan have any tips on where to get foreign stuff on the cheap, or how to generally not go insane living in such a different place?

... or especially anything to reduce the cost of living.

Make stuff yourself and not rely on imported things?

If you want to reduce the cost of living, live like a normal person does. Your cost of living is going to be high as long as you need foreign stuff to live.

What is it that you feel you need to buy from overseas?

[MMM]

Originally Posted by essex

any other english speakers living in japan have any tips on where to get foreign stuff on the cheap, or how to generally not go insane living in such a different place?

... or especially anything to reduce the cost of living.

Japan is not the place to go to get foreign goods (I assume from English speaking countries) on the cheap.

But you need to give a bit more information for anyone to be any help to you. Where do you live? What, in detail, are you finding that is driving you insane?

[Columbine]

Originally Posted by essex

any other english speakers living in japan have any tips on where to get foreign stuff on the cheap, or how to generally not go insane living in such a different place?

... or especially anything to reduce the cost of living.

Basically any 'foreign stuff' you actually NEED while living in Japan (and this will vary on your person but for me generally involved toiletries and proper black tea) you have effectively struck out already as it either won't be available in japan at all, or if it is, won't be cheapy cheap.

Everything else can be forgotten about.

[evanny]

Originally Posted by Columbine

Basically any 'foreign stuff' you actually NEED while living in Japan (and this will vary on your person but for me generally involved toiletries and proper black tea) you have effectively struck out already as it either won't be available in japan at all, or if it is, won't be cheapy cheap.

Everything else can be forgotten about.

how about clothing? dont know if you are tall but lets say if i were to go, how likely is that they will have something for a 6.3?

[Columbine]

Originally Posted by evanny

how about clothing? dont know if you are tall but lets say if i were to go, how likely is that they will have something for a 6.3?

Depends if you're a guy or a girl. Guys can sometimes get away with it as there ARE tall Japanese guys in Japan and they have to shop somewhere. There were plenty of tall guys living at the Japanese Uni I went to, most of them went shopping at some point. Uniqlo, I think, is pretty good for catering to the Long and Tall. Obviously the less tailored the item, the more likely you are to find something that fits off-the-peg. Big feet is usually more of a problem. As a girl, provided you are not absolutely Pamela on the top, you can normally find tops even if you are tall, but jeans/trousers might be harder to find for the leg length. Again Uniqlo is pretty good, or vary your style of trouser/ switch to skirts. There was one exceptionally tall girl I knew who simply 'saved' all her trousers for when it was cold and wore skirts all summer. Depends on if that would bother you or not!

If you do need especially larger sizes, then you again will probably have difficulty so best to stock up from home.

If you are a girl, definitely bring your own bras if you are a D or more. You can by larger size bras in Japan, but it may take you a while to find ones that suit you, depending on where you are.

[evanny]

im a guy
so basiclly bring your own stuff

[Columbine]

Originally Posted by evanny

im a guy
so basiclly bring your own stuff

Only really jeans/shoes-wise. You can get pretty much everything else; it's not like Japan's suffering a clothing shortage.

[Nyororin]

Or... Make a trip to a big department center, pretty much all of which have "Big and Tall" areas - or at the least plus size departments with a tailoring service. Or order from somewhere online. Now it is not nearly as hard to find specialty sizes as it was in the past.

There are very tall people in Japan too. They`re not extremely common, but they`re also not extremely rare. They buy and wear clothes too, and shops realized they could make money by catering to them.

I`m quite short, but have very large feet for a woman in Japan. These days it`s not even that hard to find cheap shoes that fit. My husband - 100% Japanese - has huge feet, and although it`s a pain to find shoes in the style he wants... finding shoes is not an issue.

Or you could just bring your own stuff along.

Let me just ask - are you already IN Japan, or just thinking it is going to be incredibly hard to live there before going?

[GoNative]

It really does depend on where you live I guess. Up here in a small country town in Hokkaido I find the cost of living to be very cheap. Much cheaper than living back in Australia. Partly because there's hardly anything to spend lots of money on here.
My wife and I use the internet to buy english books and DVD's and about once a month we head into Costco in Sapporo and buy up a whole lot of western foods we enjoy (like decent sized beef steaks!). We bought a dedicated freezer to store up the stuff we buy.
Clothing wise, well I hardly ever buy clothes. Maybe once a year I'll head into one of the big outlet malls in Sapporo or Chitose and buy a few things to last me out another year and I'm a big guy but can generally find a few things in my size.
We are lucky in that having two incomes makes a big difference and we fully own our home so no paying rent each month. Still I don't find the cost of living in Japan as a foreigner to be all that expensive at all. Thankfully I don't live in a megatropolis like Tokyo or Osaka! I'm sure that would cost me a hell of a lot more...