Oh jeez. If there’s one reason I can think of for me to learn Japanese, it’s so I can read all these amazing looking manga comics. I mentioned Garage Restore 251 not long ago, and Auto Otaku has put together a list of other relevant manga titles. We need to get a planet-wide common language, stat! In the meantime, I guess I’m just gonna have to drool over the few shots shown here.

Welcome to Part 4 of our Going to Japan series! So far, we’ve covered the basics of how to get around, feed yourself, find a place to stay, see car shows, meet tuners and buy parts without JDM Tax (phew!). So the next few instalments will be a bit of a wrap-up of all the little things we wanted to include in the earlier articles (which can be found here, here and here) but couldn’t because of a lack of space or other reasons.

One of the glaring questions that we haven’t answered yet is….where do you go to see the street drifting?

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JNC forum member Pecx exposed me today to a manga called Restore Garage 251, and I almost wish he hadn’t!  It looks amazing, but of course I can’t speak or read a lick of Japanese, so if I want to buy a copy, my options will be fairly limited when it comes to reading it!  Nevertheless, on the off chance that any of you can read Japanese, or you have a friend who can, I thought I’d link it up and give you the chance to expand your reading horizons.

Welcome to part 3 of our Going To Japan series! By now you’ll be well sorted for the basics of survival in JDM-land and now we get down to business. Cars.

Let’s face it, when it comes to cars, everyone’s expectations of Japan are pretty damn high. You expect to walk down the street, see schoolbusses drifting and grandmothers pulling burnouts in Supras, you expect to see mint C10 Skyline GT-Rs parked on every street corner, bosozouku car parades on every block, you expect that every corner grocery store will have a special aisle for turbochargers, and they’re on sale, too! Free delivery!

Well….it’s not quite like that. But we can make sure that you get to see some car shows, visit some tuners and buy the cool JDM parts you want. Read on…

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Welcome to the second instalment of our guide on how to survive in Japan. You can find the first instalment here.

So by now you’re a pro at whizzing around Tokyo on a train… but where should you stay, where should you eat, and how do you actually find stuff when you’re on foot? We’ll cover these questions in this instalment.

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Last month, we covered a few nostalgic JDM clothing brands which embrace old school cars and bikes:  Samurai Motor Club and Neighbourhood.  And yet there is still more….Kaminari69, which has the same old-school hot rod influences with 60s cars and vintage graphics. Although Kaminari doesn’t seem to have a cool flash movie on their website like the other two!

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A lot of people we talk to just love the idea of going to Japan for an automotive-themed vacation but the common vibe is always that Japan is a little intimidating. You can’t speak the language, you’re worried that it’s expensive. Well, it is expensive in the sense that you will blow lots of money on car-related stuff, but the other things like food, accommodation and travel are surprisingly inexpensive….which of course, leaves you more money to blow on car-related stuff! Can’t speak the language? Hey, neither can I, and I’ve been there 9 times!

So from us here at Grand JDM, this will be a series of articles to help demystify the wonderful country of Japan, and hopefully get more of you guys on a plane and onto JDM soil. We’ll also put together some suggestions as to how to plan your trip to take in some car shows, how to buy parts, visit tuners and other stuff. And along the way hopefully bust some of the myths about our favourite holiday country. Obviously, we can’t cover every destination in Japan so we’re going to focus on Tokyo.

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