Cindy Liu
Yokohama hits different. It’s a waterfront city just thirty minutes from Tokyo, but very much its own world. It’s easygoing, free-swinging, even a bit decadent. Yokohama received Japan’s first foreign influences, and it started everything from Japanese jazz to the fashion of Plastic Love. At the same time, Yokohama is a throwback to an older Japan. Sleepy 1960s soda shops that simply couldn’t stay in business in Tokyo still thrive in Yokohama, as do the octogenarians who patronize them. And for the price of a capsule hotel in Tokyo, you can stay in a nice three-star place in Yokohama. Yokohama is a perfect introduction for a first-time visitor to Japan. It’s a lot more manageable (and affordable) than Tokyo, but it’s still a city of three million people with its own techno-urban vibe. It can also be an experienced visitor’s level-up to a city where tourists seldom tread. Yokohama is a beyond-the-obvious city, and I’ll show you the beyond-the-obvious in Yokohama. Yes, there are the ramen museums and shopping malls that every guidebook knows. But I’ll take you farther: to local shopping streets and markets, secluded gardens, secondhand handbag shops, jazz clubs and listening bars where you’re almost forced to make new friends, tiny sushi spots and izakayas, unmarked coffee shops, and under-the-radar attractions that only locals visit. Every place mentioned includes a Google Maps link and QR code. You can scan it with your smartphone when you’re on the go. We’ll explore the local Yokohama. The one that’s not in Tripadvisor. The one my Japanese friends and colleagues have described and shown to me over the years. The one that made me fall in love with this city: My Yokohama.
