does anyone kno info about sapporo?
 

kinnichiwa,

When im older i plan on moving to sapporo japan.I'v googled sapporo information but iv come up short .Does anyone who's been there or live there know about sapporo life and people ......and some other interesting facts(exspensise/apartments etc).I would also want to find out about jobs for gaijins(foreigners) besides begin an english teacher.:marusmile:

domo arigato:pinkclap:

Considering being an English teach accounts for 95% of the jobs for foreigners, and one of the very few jobs in which you don't need to be fluent in Japanese and have special skills or talents, you shouldn't count it out too quickly.

Why do you want to go to Sapporo? I mean, it's a beautiful city, but it sounds like you don't know that much about it.

Are you sure if you're ready for the long, severe winters in Sapporo or in Hokkaido in general? If that's no problem, Sapporo would be a good place to live in. It's not exactly cheap there as it's a city of a million residents. But rents can be 30-40 % lower there than in Tokyo. Other prices aren't very different, though.

One last note. You may want to know that the economy in Hokkaido and Okinawa is and will almost always be worse than in the rest of Japan. Those are the prefectures with the worst unemployment rate in the country. Both are excellent vacation destinations. No doubt about it. That's why I keep going back to Hokkaido. But to live there might not be the same.

I'm planning on applying for JET, and one of the places I was going to request, was Hokkaido (or someplace close to Sapporo, not necessarily Sapporo [I'm interested in Ishikari]), and my main reasons for it, is for the climate and the recreation. Granted, I don't know too much about Hokkaido's history.

I had no idea that Hokkaido was bad economically. I guess working there through a program or something like that would work out better, but going there on your own for the sole purpose of working/living there without the help would probably be very difficult for a foreigner.

Q for Nagoyankee
 

Just out of interest Nagoyankee, would you say the feel of Sappparo is simlilar to other large cities in Japan or would you say that it's more provincial, owing to the fact that Hokkaido is a popular holiday destination, as you rightly mentioned.

Exactly how cold does it get there? -20C?

There isn't much in the way of jobs around Hokkaido so you might want to reconsider...

i love cold weather and i have my heart set on sapporo.maybe i will have to be a teacher ....if so its fine becuz its my dream to live in sapporo.

That is a good question. If you go directly from where you are to Sapporo, I don't think you will feel anything so special about the city. But if you go there after having spent some time in larger cities on Honshuu (the main island), I'm pretty sure you will feel that you've come a long way.

Sapporo doesn't exactly feel 'provincial' because it is a large city and it does have some skyscrapers. But if you go just a little outside of Sapporo and start seeing the huge ranches and corn/potato fields, then you will start wondering if you aren't actually in Idaho or Iowa.

Hokkaido is in a sense like the Wild West in North America. Many people there have been living there only for a few generations (that is a short time by the Japanese standard). They are the descendants of the pioneers who had moved from other parts of Japan. If you're interested in Japanese dialects or in linguistics in general, you will be fascinated to find that in Hokkaido, people speak very much like Tokyoites despite its location, which is nowhere near Tokyo. This is the result of those pioneers trying to communicate with one another better by dropping the most distinct features of their own dialects that they had once brought to Hokkaido.

Sorry I went off-topic. I'm very language-oriented....

If you ever go to Sapporo as a tourist, make sure you go to the near-by Otaru. You will see very attractive old brick buildings, excellent souvenir stores, lots of big Russian sailors/fishermen, etc. Otaru once was the center of Hokkaido before airplanes replaced boats as the main shipping method in trade between Hokkaido and the rest of Japan.

Nightlife
 

Thanks for the reply. How would you say the nightlife is there compared to other cities?

The night life is crazy in Sapporo! There's an area named Susukino in the center of the city. If you go anywhere near there, you will see girls standing on the streets handing you discount tickets with a map to their bar. But don't trust these bars, period. Some if not all will really rip you off. I recommend that you drink at hotel bars. If you want to go to other places, at least don't go to those places that try to get customers on the street. This can be said about those kinds of bars all over Japan, too. You will end up paying not only for what you consumed but also for what all the ugly girls that sat on your tables consumed. And they all drink like fish.

ok so now im worried sapporo might not work out for me.Is there really good places close to sapporo that i might be interested in.....and wat jobs could a gaijin get(not neccisarily in sappporo)besides teaching in the Hokkado region.:confused: so confussed.......

What are you talking about?

99% of gaijin who live in Japan are hired to teach. If you can't do that, I am not sure what to advise.

...............

If you want to work in Japan as an American/Canadian/European, you're either A) An English (sometimes other language, although rarely) teacher, B) Owner of an English School, or C) A professional with approximately 10 years experience within an industry Japan has a high demand for and also speak fluent Japanese.

One of these things is easier to achieve than the others.

In rare cases, there are IT positions which do not require Japanese, but you really have to know your stuff to get those. And already be in Japan.