There are countries that are so interesting, educational and useful for understanding the world around us that it is simply impossible not to visit them! Japan is one of these countries.
This country only seems distant and expensive: it is quite achievable. There are many things here that are both surprising and attractive to foreigners, who are called "gaijins" in Japan. Whether it is a combination of picturesque mountains and a stormy sea, or a poetic change of four seasons, or an amazingly exotic, tasty and at the same time very healthy national cuisine... The Japanese amazingly combine in their culture ancient myths with faith in gods and demons, on the one hand, and modern features of an advanced "society of tomorrow", on the other.
Where else can you find ancient temples in the shadow of ultra-modern skyscrapers? Where else can the latest technology be combined with ancient customs and superstitions? Where else can you see people who can go out in a traditional kimono and in designer clothes? Where else... you can ask many similar questions, but the answer will be one: only in Japan. East and West, past and future merge here, forming a unique, original civilization that has blossomed like a delightful flower on the islands between Asia and the Pacific Ocean.
Japan is a country both large and small at the same time. Just a couple of hours from Tokyo, the largest metropolis in the world, lie the seaside resorts of Izu or the hot thermal springs in the mountains of Hakone. In the north, on the island of Hokkaido, the weather is no different from the central zone of Russia, with its snowy and frosty winters. And in the far south, on the islands of Okinawa, eternal summer reigns all year round with white sand beaches and an always warm azure sea.
Japan is also a very comfortable country. The Shinkansen super express, which translates as a "bullet train", flies a distance of half a thousand kilometers from Tokyo to Kyoto in just two and a half hours. At the same time, the contrast between the futuristic skyscrapers of the "Eastern capital" and the elegant temples of the "Western capital" is so great that such a trip becomes like a trip in a time machine!
You can talk a lot about the legendary Japanese service, about Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples of amazing beauty, about the pleasure you get from immersing yourself in a rotemburo - an open-air bath made of stones and filled with scalding water from a thermal spring, about the impeccable silhouette of the majestic Fuji, but ... it's better to see it once.
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