I have just had the most frustrating experience getting two phones and a Pocket Wifi in Ishigaki-Shima.  I must have spent about 10 hours in total!  The end result was one 3G phone for me, a Kid’s phone for my wife, and a Pocket Wifi for data for both of us.  It cost more than $500 for the three.  Of course, we couldn’t buy them ourselves, we needed a Japanese friend to actually take out the plans and guarantee the monthly payments with her credit card.

The Kid’s phone was $120, but the calls to and from are free.  It can only call 3 set numbers, and can receive calls from up to 20 numbers.  Naturally, being for kids, it is simple to use, but all the menus, etc are in Japanese of course.  You do have the choice of Kanji characters or hiragana syllables.  We will use it for between ourselves and Greg and Janise on Windchimes.

We already had two smartphones, two Android tablets, and Pocket Wifi.  But the phones and pocket wifi were of no use in Japan.  Why?  Because you cannot buy a SIM card!  Unlike the Philippines, where almost every 2nd corner store can sell you either a voice or data SIM for $1, Japan tightly controls the mobile phone system. (Criminals, you know!)

The phones came from Softbank because our friend had her account there.  When it came to buying the Pocket Wifis, we hit a snag.  We wanted two (Greg and I), but because she already had one, and other mixtures of phones, she could only buy one.  This meant that we had to go to DoCoMo to buy ours.  It was much less frustrating than Softbank, but even so, the deciding of the plan, the color, setting up, finalizing the plan, etc,  took nearly two hours.

The 3G phone I got has TV, but as it’s all in Japanese, so not much use.  The SIM will work in my Samsung smartphone for calls, but there is no data on the plan.  The 3G phone won’t work without a JA SIM card in it, so I can’t take it home to use there.

Paul and Judy Rodenhuis

SY “Meridian of Sydney”

Miyakojima, Japan