Slashdot Mirror
Japan Pins Tourism Hopes on PDA
Sammy at Palm Addict writes "According to Australia News.com, Japan will start lending PDA's to foreign visitors to help tourists get to grips with the country. The aim is to make Japan more attractive to foreign tourists, who are often put off by the country's language barrier. The PDA's will be loaded with travel information and translation services as part of a tourism promotion scheme. "Japan's tourism authority will lend the PDAs containing Chinese, Korean and English software, to selected tourists who land at Narita Airport near Tokyo from February through March to test the response" Japan's transport ministry said."
Why does it have to be a PDA? I mean a magazine or pamphlet would seemingly be just as useful to most people (and much cheaper). Put some common translations that tourists might need in a little book, and throw in a good map and some sightseeing information, and you're all set. Now granted, the magazine will not have GPS capability or be able to talk to me or whatever...but still it is only
On another note, PDA's are still pretty touchy most times. They do lock up occasionally, and someone who has never used it could get confused. The batteries die, the screens get scratched up, the stylus gets lost...all of which make it inconvenient to loan out to someone visiting the country.
having traveled in Japan, I've found the double sided maps adequate for getting around. They are printed with Japanese on one side and another language, say English on the other. It's a simple matter of pattern recognition to get around and after a while one learns to read the Japanese signs at the transport stops. The PDA will make this a little easier, but a paper map is much more robust. A phrase book is also very helpful and incorporation into the PDA will be handy.
http://www.narita-airport.or.jp/e-navi/howto.html
No, no, no,
...
USA: They knock you down [blame you] and steal the PDA [blame society for their lack of income]. Thus concluding that none of the actions were their own responsiblitiy.
Canada: They knock you over [apologize] but don't help you up [don't really care] and then swipe your PDA when you're not looking [finder keepers]. When caught they try to laugh it off and say "it was only a PDA".
Mexico: Well they're all drunk so they'd stumble into you [pissed] would see the PDA and not know what it is. The flashy lights though would trigger some primal instinct and they would steal it and try to fence it for some more urea contaminated drinks.
But let's get international:
France: They would run you down with one of those 400lbs minis. Then back up, steal the PDA and mutter something about your heritage why driving away.
England: They would hoof ya with a good soccer kick, write "liverpool forever" on your chest and steal the PDA to pay for a pint.
Switzerland: Would let you walk by and watch on as Canada, the USA, Mexico, France and England beat the shit out of you. They wouldn't need the PDA because everyone knows when you're hiding in the hills you don't need electricity.
I kid because I care.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
A guide to katakana (Japanese phonetic characters for foreign words) would be nice.. Or perhaps a little education campaign about it.
Many of the most important signs are written in katakana, which in essence means they are written in English. There are only 46-or-so basic characters to learn, which you can get a decent handle on by the time you step off the plane. This is more than enough to find hotels (hoteru), order food and drinks off most menus, find restaurants (resutoran), etc.
I knew katakana in Japan and only a few Japanese words. I'm not kidding about how handy it was.
RESTAURANT
or:
ENTER HERE FOR EXPRESS VASECTOMY SERVICE
[Credit: Dave Barry, "Dave Barry Does Japan"]
"There are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and Usenet is NOTHING like Shakespeare." - Blair Houghton
second question, i had 4 japanese girls come and ask me if i was searching for a girlfriend...interpret that as you will, that is all i have to say about that
Time to figure out what the Kanji on the back your T-shirt says?
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Tourist areas all over the world manage this without PDAs.
And when you don't want to be confined to the tourist traps?
English is widespread, but not _that_ widespread. Many visitors to Japan aren't Westerners, but Chinese or Korean. That second language should probably be Mandarin, which likely wouldn't help most slashdotters much. A restaurant not close to the usual tourist haunts may get foreign customers a few times a year at most; that would be a lot of work keeping the menus up to date in three languages just for those few occasions.
And since English knowledge in general is not up to the standard where you are confident to write a legible menu, who is going to do that translation work to begin with?
I think this is a pretty good idea. It may give visitors the confidence needed to go off the beaten tourist path a bit and try some really different experiences. There's a lot more to Japan than temples and expensive fish restaurants.
Also note that while they'll be passing them out freely during the pilot, nothing precludes the use of a deposit system, or even rental, if the trials pan out.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
They ran a similar pilot during the same period last year.
From the looks of the website - the devices haven't really changed much.
http://www.narita-airport.jp/e-navi/
They are, however very fun toys even if nothing has changed. I'm planning to be in Japan again in a few months and if they have any available I'll definitely try them out.
Judging from just the comments so far, I fear this amount of misinformation this thread is going to pickup about Japan. Perhaps the PDA can just have a nice little FAQ for the uninformed who somehow or another managed to wind up in Tokyo. (Because they thought it would be neat.) Or the simple things, like "proper business card manners" for the businessmen.
So far in this thread I've seen all the typical: misleading posts about Japan hating foreigners, misleading posts about Japanese loving foreigners, uninformed posts about the language, complete and utter guesswork abound... etc. Japan seems to be a really popular place for folks with a few thousand bucks and too much time on their hands to head off to these days, head full of myths and a complete unwillingness to deal with anything not of their own culture... then come back and proclaim to all they meet what they "learned".
I figure it's only a matter of time before someone posts the myth that immersion (as an adult) instantly and automagically equals the best way to learn the complex language and writing that even the Japanese spend much of their schooling learning. In short, best of luck... you could actually study the language, culture, and actually try to make a good impression, but I suppose that was never really the point.
I went to Japan for the first time this year as part of a tour group. I also was afraid of the language barrier, even though I actually know a little Japanese and can read a bit. But it was a lot easier than I could have imagined. Many of the people know enough English to answer basic questions, especially the younger people.
At the hotels, all of the staff know quite a bit of English, as well as the staff at all the tourist spots. Mind you, I was in Osaka, not Japan, which should have been less-English friendly but wasn't. Many of the signs are in English on the Highways and in mass transit, so getting around was a piece of cake.
It was certainly easier to get around than I expected, and although I knew a bit of Japanese, I avoided using it (mostly due to my fear of being embarassed for saying something inadvertantly inappropriate). I'd imagine Tokyo would be even more friendly for tourists, and I'd definitely like to go there one day. In short, everyone should consider going there; the language barrier isn't much of one. I think I had a harder time getting around in Europe than I did in Japan.
AnimeNEXT anime convention