Japan on $30

Question: it’s your last night in Japan. You have no lodging. You have 30 dollars, minus the 7 dollars you spent on ramen. What do you for a whole day and night?

As an icing on the cake, all the hostels, hotels, and couchsurfing spaces are full because of a festival you didn’t know about when you booked your tickets. So even if you had money, you STILL wouldn’t have a bed to sleep in.

The answer to the quandary… Manga café!

Manga cafes are open 24 hours. They have a vast supply of Japanese comic books and computers, and you can even rent a small room. Other times it’s more of a cubicle.

You pay per hour, usually between 3 and 6 dollars per hour. I got my cubicle and it was surprisingly comfortable. The floor of the cubicle was a pad, about as soft as a bed, and it had enough room for me to stretch out in, and even came with a pillow. The people were all very quiet, and there was even a shower in the bathroom.

Now, due to my lack of funds I could only afford a cubicle for 6 hours. 9 pm to 3 am. I was out on the street at 3 am, and had several hours until my 12 o’clock departure.

Having spent 7 dollars on the ramen, 20 dollars on my manga café, I had 3 dollars left. Now, in most countries, 3 dollars won’t get you much more than a candy bar and a soda. Not so in Japan! You actually have a lot of options here.

711, Family Mart, Daily Miyazaki are all convenience stores with some great options. $1.60 slabs of fried chicken. $1 rice balls. $1 cups of sake (for the drinker on a budget). But when you’re looking for cost, taste, and the feeling of being full, nothing beats a Matsuya (or the almost as good Yoshinoya).

You’re gonna want to go with the gyudon. This is a bowl of rice with strips of grilled beef and onions on top. It’s served alongside a small bowl of miso soup and all the water you can drink. The cheapest option and smallest portion size is about $2.30. But a $2.80 bowl is surprisingly filling, and many people actually struggle to finish this one.

So at this point it’s 4 am, I’m out of money, and have about 8 hours left until my departure. Not a whole lot to be done. I had no money for bus fare so I walked to the ferry (about two miles away) and spent the rest of the morning enjoying the sunrise, practicing my Japanese with a homeless man, and trying to stay out of the rain.

Long story short: when you’ve got next to no money, and no substantial options for food or lodging, just know there’s a manga café and a Matsuya waiting for you. Also, bring cash to Japan, never expect a foreign bank card to work, even if it’s worked countless times before.