Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
59
tailored to your interests. For more infor-
mation on escorted tours departing from
North America, go to www.japantrav-
elinfo.com; for tours departing from Eng-
land, go to www.seejapan.co.uk.
For more information on escorted gen-
eral-interest tours, including questions to
ask before booking your trip, see www.
frommers.com/planning.
10
STAYING CONNECTED
TELEPHONES
To call Tokyo from outside Japan:
First,
dial the international access code:
011
from the U.S.;
00
from the U.K., Ireland,
or New Zealand; or
0011
from Australia.
Next, dial the country code for Japan,
81.
Finally, dial the city code for Tokyo,
3,
and
then the number.
Domestic calls:
If you're calling Tokyo
from outside Tokyo but within Japan, the
area code
for Tokyo is
03.
Despite the proliferation of cellphones,
you can still find public telephones in
telephone booths on the sidewalk, in or
near train stations, in hotel lobbies, and in
restaurants and coffee shops. A local call
costs ¥10 for each minute; a warning
chime will ring to tell you to insert more
coins or you'll be disconnected. I usually
insert two or three coins at the start so that
I won't have to worry about being discon-
nected; ¥10 coins that aren't used are
returned at the end of the call. Most pub-
lic phones accept both ¥10 and ¥100
coins. The latter is convenient for long-
distance calls, but no change is given for
unused minutes. All gray ISDN tele-
phones are equipped for international calls
and have dataports for Internet access.
If you think you'll be making a lot of
domestic calls from public telephones and
don't want to deal with coins, purchase a
magnetic
prepaid telephone card.
These
are available in a value of ¥1,000 and are
sold at vending machines (sometimes
located right beside telephones), station
kiosks, and convenience stores. Green and
gray telephones accept telephone cards. In
fact, many nowadays accept telephone
cards exclusively. Insert the card into the
slot. On the gray ISDN telephones, there's
a second slot for a second telephone card,
which is convenient if the first one is
almost used up or if you think you'll be
talking a long time. Domestic long-dis-
tance calls are cheaper at night, on week-
ends, and on national holidays for calls of
distances more than 60km (37 miles).
Toll-free numbers:
Numbers beginning
with
0120
or
0088
are toll-free. Calling a
1-800 number in the U.S. from Japan is
not toll-free and costs the same as an inter-
national call.
To make international calls:
For a collect
call or to place an operator-assisted call
through KDDI, dial the international
telephone operator at
&
0051.
From a
public telephone, look for a specially
marked international and domestic
card/coin telephone. Although many
of the specially marked green or gray tele-
phones, the most common public tele-
phones, accept both coins and magnetic
telephone cards for domestic calls, most in
Tokyo do not accept magnetic cards for
direct overseas calls (due to illegal usage of
telephone cards), except for those in a few
key facilities like the airport and some
hotels. You'll therefore either have to use
coins or purchase a special prepaid inter-
national telephone card that works like
telephone cards issued by U.S. telephone
companies. That is, an access number
must first be dialed, followed by a secret
telephone number, and then the number
you wish to dial. Such cards are often sold
3
