Inside my postbox: Hotels, Ryokan and much more in Japan.

This is a Western-style hotel which is usually called a “Comfort Hotel” in Japan. As tourism becomes more popular in Japan, more of these hotels open up. These types of hotels are not often found in Japan when compared to traditional Japanese-style accommodations such as Ryokan and Minshukus.

There are more than 110,000 accommodations in Japan. The breakdown is about 10,000 hotels and less than 80,000 ryokan. The remaining are small inns with less than 4 rooms, minshuku (small ryokan), capsule hotel, and so on.

Minshuku is the Japanese equivalent of a guest house or bed and breakfast. Most are run by families who rent rooms out their home to a building attached to their home. They are also commonly found in smaller countryside cities and towns or by the sea.

Left: Minshukus Right: Inside a Minshuku

Unlike a hotel, the atmosphere at minshuku is like that of a home. Guests, for example, are expected to fold up their bedding and put it away in the closet. There are more than 3,000 minshukus nationwide.

Capsules are tiny pods with just enough room for a single bed. These little rooms usually have an outlet, light, and alarm above the bed. Bathrooms are shared with other guests, and luggage is kept in a locker.

Capsule Hotels are often found in city entertainment districts usually clustered near train stations. Most of them are in Tokyo. They are used mostly by business people in a tight budget who find paying ¥4,000 for capsule more attractive than ¥7,000 for a room in a business hotel.

A Ryokan is an authentic Japanese-style hotel where long-held traditions are still observed. At the entrance, a woman welcomes the guests in a Japanese way and ushers them in. Shoes are removed and slippers are put on before stepping on the tatami (woven mat) floor. The floor inside is slightly raised to create a clear distinction between the outer and inner areas. Guests are also provided with a yukata, a kimono-like outer garment, and geta, wooden clogs used for walking outdoors.

Each traditional Japanese-style room has a paper sliding door. During the day the room serves as a living and dining room, while at night, it is transformed into a bedroom with a futon (Japanese-style bed).

In the case of hotels, most services are provided at an entrance and front desk. Meals are basically provided at restaurants. So staff do not enter guest rooms so often.

In contrast, at Japanese ryokan, especially ryokan of providing meals at guest rooms, staff visit guest rooms very often, thus customers have more chance to communicate with staff at their rooms.

Ryokan have large common baths for guests to use. In most cases, private baths are not provided in each room. Ryokan located near hot springs often are equipped so that the hot spring water flows directly to the baths.

Top class ryokan that have been in operation for many years often have a large traditional Japanese garden. A late-night stroll down the narrow garden paths which twist past ponds and ancient stone lanterns is a unique speciality offered by such ryokan.

The origin of Japanese ryokan is traced back to the Nara period when Nara monks mainly built accommodations for free in order to protect travellers’ safety. After that, inns were born, then Honjin, where the Daimyo stayed, along with roads and the Hatago, where common people stayed, increased dramatically in the Edo period.

In contrast, Japanese hotels were accommodations for Western people from late Edo period to Meiji, when entire Japan changed a lot from Sakoku (seclusion policy) to opening the country, because they were trying to obtain Western cultures aggressively. The origin of Japanese hotels is said to be the “Yokohama Hotel” in Yokohama, Kanagawa, that opened in 1860.

The 8-yen stamp commemorates the International Letter writing week and is a part of the series of 6 stamps, one of which I had mentioned in a previous post of mine.

The 62-yen stamp shows the blossom of the Yoshino cherry (Somei Yoshino) tree, one of the most popular flowering cherry trees grown in Japan. Cherry blossoms are a symbolic flower of the spring, a time of renewal, and the fleeting nature of life.

'Somei Yoshino' has been widely exported from Japan and planted extensively in places like Washington, D.C.’s Tidal Basin (Potomac Park).

The postmark reads "Utsunomiyahigashi" and "Tochigi". Tochigi is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Utsunomiya is the prefectural capital city of Tochigi Prefecture.

Utsunomiya is famous for its gyoza (pan-fried dumplings). Following the Second World War, Japanese soldiers who returned from Manchuria brought home to Utsunomiya gyoza recipes which originated from China. Soon after, the soldiers began to open dumpling (gyoza) restaurants around Utsunomiya. The gyoza's popularity attracts many tourists, as well as brings in a significant amount of revenue into the city.

Although Emily stated that she sent this card from Tokyo, the postmark is that of Utsunomiya, which is almost 100 kilometres far from Tokyo. My guess is that she lives in Utsunomiya and travels to Tokyo for her internship given that one can easily travel between these two cities using the Shinkansen (bullet train) facility.