captain murph

I'm not sure if this is the right forum to post, but if not kindly tell me where.

Ok, my problem is a little complicated, but I hope that you folks here can use your experience to help me out!

I'm moving to Tokyo very soon (from NYC). However, I don't have any sort of visa to allow me to stay there. So I'll be going on a 90 day tourist visa. The situation is apparently that as long as you leave before 90 days, you can come back and stay another 90 days. And that when you enter Japan, you should have a valid ticket out in <90 days.

My problems are that:
a) I don't know when I'll be returning to the US, let alone NYC, so I easily book a round-trip ticket (and it's likely to be 6+ months out)
b) I don't know where I'll be going for my first mandatory trip out of Japan (thought it will probably be somewhere in east asia).


My current plan is to:
-buy a cheap-as-possible roundtrip NYC->NRT, and only use the outbound half.
-buy full-fare (ie fully refundable) tix from NRT to somewhere outside Japan for somewhere in the next 90 days, so when I enter Japan, I have a valid tix out.
-when it comes time to take my first trip out, buy a cheap round trip from NRT->somewhere, and change the dates on my full-fare, so when I renter Japan, I've got a valid tix out again.
-when I'm done with my Japan adventure, get a refund on the full-fare tix.

Anyone have some better ideas?

Btw, I'd prefer to fly on AA for the miles, if possible.

Thanks for any advice you've got for me!

moondog

I suggest you look into getting a real visa. I don't know exactly how Japan handles successive use of visa waivers, but I know that the US isn't too kind to those that try to game the system and can only assume that some sort of reciprocity exists.

jpatokal

As moondag the wise says, if you have a legitimate need to be in Japan for a long time, then there's probably a legitimate visa available for it (work, teaching, studying, whatever) and you should start applying for it now as the wheels of Japanese immigration bureaucracy grind very slowly indeed. If, on the other hand, you're planning to travel in Japan as a tourist for over half a year, then maybe you should allocate 1% of your travel budget to buying a flexible ticket whose return date you can change as needed.

That said, I do know a number of people in various dodgy professions who couldn't get legit work visas in Japan, and they did "visa runs" to neighboring countries to renew their 90-day visas. A single renewal this way is unlikely to raise any eyebrows, but if you keep it up for over a year Immigration will start to go "hmm".

I also wouldn't sweat too much over the return ticket, I've never had mine checked and I don't believe it's even a legal entry requirement; on both occasions when I immigrated to Japan with a study/work visa, I didn't even have a return ticket, and one of these times was at the insistence of Monbusho (Japan's Ministry of Education)-- when on their scholarships, they only buy your flight back when you've completed your studies!

captain murph

Thanks, but AFAICT theres no visa for me. I'm a wrtter, and I'd like to spend a year in Japan working on my own writing. So no work visa (no sponsorship), and cultural visa is a long shot (not writing about japan). I have no need for a work visa, so at least I won't be breaking the tourist visa.

Yeah, I looked at that, but the prices are so much higher. 2x cheapest roundtrips is still much less than a 6 month open ticket (AA's K class)

What I've heard is that they don't often check. However, the rules are clear:
http://www.mofa.go.jp/j_info/visit/visa/05.html#a
Temporary Visitor
1. A ticket for boarding an airplane or a vessel to leave Japan, or a written guarantee issued by a transport company.
2. A valid passport which enables the foreign national concerned to enter foreign countries out of Japan.
3. Documents certifying that the person concerned can defray all expenses incurred during the stay in Japan.

Given that I may be raising eyebrows as you said, I'd like to have everything in order!

mosburger

Please remember that most ex-Tokyo flights to China and Korea are not exactly bargains. The cheapest way out of Japan and back would be the Fukuoka ( Kyushu ) - Busan ( Korea ) ferry. Japanese mass tourism destinations including Guam, Saipan and Hawai might be reasonably priced?

Why don't you enroll at a private Japanese language school for the year? They can fix you a visa and you'd have less worries alltogether. I don't know how much Japan experience you have but it can be a tough and depressing country for the uninitiated.

moondog

that's what miles are for

i was going to suggest the same thing

captain murph

Hmm, is that so? Any tips on getting cheap flighst from Tokyo to China, Korea, etc?

I've been to Guam and Saipan, and would rather explore new places if I've got to get out of Japan.

I've got a 1 year+ on my Japanese and have been there several times - I'm not too worried about toughness. I do plan on stuyding Japanese while there, but I think you basically have to be a full time (=20hrs/week) student to get a visa, and that's more than I really want to commit. I think something like 6-8hrs/week is more my speed.

Thanks for all the advice on the visa stuff people - no, really I appreciate it. But I don't see any way around my current situation, so my problem is really to optimize the flight travel plans...

RichardInSF

If you go over to the Lonely Planet Thorn Tree forum, there are periodic threads on people who were doing this 90 day visa run thing. Apparently if you do it 2-3 times, nothing is likely to happen. But after a while, like 4 or more, they can pull you aside without any prior indication that it's going to happen, and then all hell breaks loose.

So it seems like your chances are pretty good if the total stay is less than a year, beyond that, it can become problematic depending on whether you are lucky or not!

The shortest run (and a good one to do on miles when it is expensive to get a consolidator ticket) is Japan-Korea.

mosburger

Regarding mileage use: I have used JL miles several times for NRT/KIX - ICN/PUS flights. Only problem is if you are registered in a mileage program outside of Japan they will normally insist on printing the tickets at your "home" office and then send them to your Japanese address, on your expense.

I'm not sure if AA has a similar policy to JL, though.

moondog

1) on jl/nh, you can switch your registration to a local address
2) i redeemed aa intra-asia once and it was a pita, but i can't recall all the details
3) nw and ua a breeze to use (both on their own metal and partners)

mosburger

moondog:

In my case this was when on a short ( five week ) visit to Japan and suddenly needing to fly to Korea. Had too many other things to think about to bother changing to Japanese address before requesting the award...

RichardInSF

UA did the ticket for me as an E-ticket, nothing to pick up, but the negative was it was Narita-Incheon. Next time I was looking to do this route on a UA award, I'd do a *A ticket on ANA that was Haneda-Kimpo and it's good to see moondog's comment that this one can be done easily too.

Doing the close-in airports sure seems like it would be a huge win at both ends.

jpatokal

Which would be why Fukuoka ferry terminal immigration has a reputation for being particularly mean sonsabeeches. (Naturally the self-selected sample set using this will also tend to increase the apparent odds of getting busted.)

mosburger

Don't have personal experience of travelling between Japan and Korea by boat, always relied on JL and OZ. But I guess the immigration staff at Fukuoka must be tired of hearing the same stories year by year.

To think of it, that would make an interesting train trip. Let's say fly to Tokyo, then by Shinkansen: Tokyo - Hakone - Kansai - Hiroshima - Fukuoka. By ferry to Busan,then train again: Busan - Jinju - Gwangju - Mokpo and from there the KTX to Seoul. Two weeks trip? Shouldn't be too expensive with the respective rail passes.

Q Shoe Guy

It's not just the ferry/port immigration...........the airport immigration (same bunch of people just move between jobs)can be worse ! (IMO, YMMV)