Before I ever visited Japan I had heard about how expensive it was. This received truth always seemed to be illustrated by the experience of the hapless business traveler who had to pay $8 for a cup of coffee. (This was before Starbucks made the 50-cent cup of coffee obsolete.) As in any new endeavor, things are more difficult and expensive when you don’t know what you’re doing. Thus I have had the accidental $100 cab ride and the $75 pasta lunch (no alcohol). If you care what you spend on food the #1 rule is to avoid eating in the hotel. Hotel food is convenient, uniformly delicious, and service is excellent (and in English), but there is a cost associated with that. The unfortunate pasta lunch mentioned above was at the Hilton Tokyo Bay. Today I can easily find a similar meal at a local restaurant for 1/3 of that. One time it was raining and miserable outside the hotel so I thought I’d bite the bullet and see if I could find a “special” in one of the hotel restaurants that wouldn’t break the bank. I went into the Chinese restaurant in the hotel and found a cashew chicken special for 850¥ (about $8 at the time) and felt quite pleased with myself. When the waiter asked me what I wanted to drink I unthinkingly asked for a coke. I enjoyed my meal, congratulating myself that I had beat the system: until the bill came. The cashew chicken was 850¥ - and so was the coke! By contrast, last night I went to the restaurant across the street from the hotel here in Nagoya for dinner. It is one of those places where there is a ticket vending machine at the front door with pictures of the various menu offerings and the cost for each. I found what I wanted, inserted my money, got a ticket, was met by a waitress who showed me to a seat and took my ticket. Minutes later I was eating a delicious hamburger steak dinner with roasted potatoes and veggies, miso soup, salad and rice for about $8.50. Even better, get some tasty udon noodles and tempura for $6. Let’s see you beat that in LA!
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