Tokyo is an expensive city. But it's nothing when it comes down to transports, incredible amount of cash is spend in subways, trains, taxis... I don't have a driving license and second hand 50cc are cheap in Japan but i've heard that you need to get a license to drive one of these here. Has anyone got information about this, engrish possible ? fares ? Difficulty ?
Never had a 50cc license, actually, so no story. A roommate did, but that was 10 years ago. AFAIK, it is a written test and a very easy, if any at all road test. You can take it in English, but don't be surprised when you see quadruple (yes) negatives, mispellings, really shitty grammar and improper punctuation that changes the meaning of the question. The up side? There's only one English test and you know what you missed so passing on try 2 is pretty much guaranteed. Just be warned of the downsides of a 50cc scooter. You can't take right turns on streets with more than 2 lanes. If anyone hits you, you will probably die. EDIT: I will spare you my story, but get the fucking license before driving.
You can't just have a story about this sort of thing and NOT tell it. I've often wondered how good parking/lockup/whatever for cycles is? Lets say you just want to ride to location X, be it work or Hard Off or whatever (why would you go anywhere else?). Will you be able to securely park relatively close (on average), or a 10-20 minute walk away, or? And by this I mean in a heavily populated area.
No right turn? Well not like you can wait on the other side and wait for the traffic coming across to er start... Being a cyclist (and riding a moped in Taiwan) that is how you would turn across the road. Hard Off stores aren't normally near a heavily populated area... Still you'd be fine, I've left a mountain bike unlocked outside a hard off for 45 minutes and it was still there when I got back. Still I have a moped license in the UK but I've found no information to find out if I can ride a scooter in Japan with just a international drivers licence.
I figure turns and crossing the street would be easy. In China at least, all you do is wait for the ridiculously large mass of people waiting to start walking across the street. Once they start going, you just follow them. And if it looks like an accident is abound, all you need to do is make sure someone else gets hit and not you (^_^);
It's been told here before I'm sure. I was on my scooter waiting for my international license to come in. I rode to work. Bump into some lady in a brand new Mercedes on the way home. She had dialed the police before we had pulled over. What a paranoid cunt. Anyways, the cops took me to the station b/c I had no license. Gave me a massive lecture on how this wasn't America, blah blah blah, and that the only reason they didn't arrest me was b/c they figured I had a decent job (3 cheers for the business card). Had to pay for the damages out of pocket since the insurance was null & void. In 2009 I left my bicycle unattended & unlocked for 24+ hours in the shopping strip of my neighborhood 3 times. I've never heard of motorized bikes getting stolen here.
I never locked my bike when I went to the supermarket, and when I got home drunk I usually forgot it as well (it was a difficult lock). Never had any problem whatsoever. In fact, when I left Japan I left my bike unlocked at a friend's house and he told me it took 3 months before it finally disappeared from his front door.
