[Tutorial] "How I made it to Tokyo and Arena Tour 2006" =P

[Marquez]

Originally Posted by ShadeKeiko

Haha, they only told me row 8. I think we're just going to have to wait until we get our tickets to find out completely. Though I'd guess you're in either B or C block. How much did you pay?

Yeah. That's what I guess too.
FDJP said they were 30 000yen / ticket.

[Marquez]

Originally Posted by ShadeKeiko

Well, I received my tickets today! They don't specify which block I'm in, though. Just are Arena Row 8 no. 1 & 2. Guess I'll see when I get there, lol! (though I'm guessing A block to the side).

Are you going to the one in Nagoya by any chance? Perhaps the lack of block listing has to do with the tickets for Nippon Gaishi Hall.

Yap. Nagoya on 17th. Yeah, that may be the reason.
And 'cos my seats are 1 & 2, I'll propably sit 24 rows behind you.

I just checked the tracking service and my tickets have already arrived in Finland. They are in the airport right now.

EDIT (28.1.): Yay. I received my tickets this morning. After the postman gave the package to me, I almost crashed with his car because the road was slippery of ice.
Damn, the EMS is so fast. It took only 3 days to get the tickets. o_O

[_Eria_]

I have a question about seat locations. I got my ticket for Yoyogi, and it says my location is arena, block A7, no. 83. I get the arena and block parts (I'm assuming I'll be in the closest block to the main stage, all the way to the right), but does anyone know how the seats are numerated? I mean, do they start counting horizontally the first row, then the second one and so on all the way from block 1 to 7 or do they count separately each block (A1, then A2, etc.)?

[makie_7]

I'd like to know if anyone can help me with this information

http://www.sakura-house.com/
I'm interested in the apartments. Anyone knows if is reliable to stay there 1 month? and how does that work? I mean, who gives you the keys? is it a building like a hotel but with apartments instead of rooms??

thanks!!

[JinHamasaki]

Originally Posted by jonneh

Okie dokie, thanks. What does TBC stand for? And is the "ASK" telling me to call and ask, or does that stand for something as well? Obviously, I only understood the numbers (prices) ones, which were in the minority, and $880~ was the cheapest listed, haha.

edit: Actually, I just called the Atlanta office because I wanted to see if there was anything cheaper yet. She picked up and spoke japanese (all I made out was a final "arigatou gozaimasu!", haha. I have very bad japanese skills right now), just like you mentioned. I asked if she spoke English and then told her I was trying to see if I could afford a trip to Japan - once she heard my departure date though she said it was too far ahead. For some reason (I assume because I was a little nervous, doing all this for the first time of course), I didn't mention that I had just looked at their website and it lists some deals for my date. I just said "okay" and thanked her for her time, because she had told me to call back about 2 months before the departure date, at the end of march. So, what do you think?
I guess right now, our trip plans are kind of on hold - because we won't know if we can afford the most expensive part - flight tickets. And until we know the complete and total cost of the tickets (with fuel surcharge and tax), I guess we won't know if we're going or not.

Well I wouldn't call every week, maybe at the end of Feb. End of March seems too late O.o If you have some flexibility around your dates, you should use orbitz and select however many days you can be flexible with to get the best rate. June is a big season for traveling, so you'll be really lucky if u can get it for $1k.

So tempting, I got my tax return check and was looking to go to the Yokohama concert .

[JinHamasaki]

Originally Posted by makie_7

I'd like to know if anyone can help me with this information

http://www.sakura-house.com/
I'm interested in the apartments. Anyone knows if is reliable to stay there 1 month? and how does that work? I mean, who gives you the keys? is it a building like a hotel but with apartments instead of rooms??

thanks!!

Yeah its basically like having an apartment for yourself. You do need to abide by some rules (just read the FAQ) but in general you'll get a cheaper rate since you will stay there longer. The catch is that you MUST stay there min one month (or at least, pay for a month's worth of rent).

[makie_7]

Thanks a lot for the information!! JinHamasaki! They look very nice and the prize for one month is like 15 days in cheap hostels (twin room).Is it really safe to leave all the luggage at the apartment? I mean, if they are serious about security and privacy?

[jonneh]

Originally Posted by JinHamasaki

Well I wouldn't call every week, maybe at the end of Feb. End of March seems too late O.o If you have some flexibility around your dates, you should use orbitz and select however many days you can be flexible with to get the best rate. June is a big season for traveling, so you'll be really lucky if u can get it for $1k.

So tempting, I got my tax return check and was looking to go to the Yokohama concert .

So are you saying I shouldn't rely on this special agency, and just try Orbitz some more? Or what? lol. I mean, I guess I'll call them again at the end of Feb and do the same thing, and see what she says this time.
Anyway, thanks for the help again


Edit: also, I probably don't have flexibility around my dates since I'm trying to squeeze that concert in, remember? =) I graduate high school at the end of May, so leaving any earlier than like...June 4th would be very hard.

[immel]

Originally Posted by _Eria_

I have a question about seat locations. I got my ticket for Yoyogi, and it says my location is arena, block A7, no. 83. I get the arena and block parts (I'm assuming I'll be in the closest block to the main stage, all the way to the right), but does anyone know how the seats are numerated? I mean, do they start counting horizontally the first row, then the second one and so on all the way from block 1 to 7 or do they count separately each block (A1, then A2, etc.)?

Unless they changed something each horizontal row of the block in question is 20 seats, which means you are at row 5 far to the left in block A7, which is to the far right.

Originally Posted by makie_7

Thanks a lot for the information!! JinHamasaki! They look very nice and the prize for one month is like 15 days in cheap hostels (twin room).Is it really safe to leave all the luggage at the apartment? I mean, if they are serious about security and privacy?

If you have a key and can lock the door I guess that's as safe as it gets. And yeah, you'll have a key and the door will be lockable. You worry too much, they rent out apartments and have been doing so for years, they know what they're doing. Staying at a hostel room, like at Yoyogi Youth Hostel, you'd live a lot more central and it'd be for 3000yen per night.

[makie_7]

hehe thanks a lot immel to you too. I've never been there and don't know anything about it and I'm very exited about the trip and I worry too much

[JinHamasaki]

Originally Posted by jonneh

So are you saying I shouldn't rely on this special agency, and just try Orbitz some more? Or what? lol. I mean, I guess I'll call them again at the end of Feb and do the same thing, and see what she says this time.
Anyway, thanks for the help again


Edit: also, I probably don't have flexibility around my dates since I'm trying to squeeze that concert in, remember? =)

Yeah I wouldn't rely on them 100%. You never know when an amazing deal will suddenly just *POP* up on orbitz. Farecast.com and Asia.com are good sites that allow you to search many others at the same time.

[jonneh]

Awesome, thanks again. Will check out all those sites and see what pops up, hopefully a good deal. =P

[SunshineSlayer]

pasting from another thread:

I wouldn't recommend people using fdjp. They are reliable, but they way overcharge for average seats at best. Also, I got completely turned off by them the last time I used them. (actually them is just one guy I think.) He got mad when I dared to question if my $600 Namie tickets were really fanclub tickets and he threatened to destroy the tickets.

The easiest way of course is that you know someone in Japan. BUT there is another way that I used that is pretty easy as well.

Sign up at eplus.jp They are like ticketmaster in Japan. They will not ship tickets overseas, but they do have an option where you can print the tickets from 7-11! (you need to make sure you select the 7/11 option for delivery when you register) You buy the tickets from them with your credit card and you will get a page that you need to print out with a bar code. You then bring that page to Japan and go to any 7-11 store. They will scan the barcode and print your ticket right there at the store! I did this for A-nation and it worked well. The seats were good and I paid the original amount, not some exorbant price. The only catch here is you need to have some knowledge of Japanese writing in order to sign up at the site and order the tickets. The only reason I even found out about this is because my boyfriend is Japanese and signed up for me and explained the whole process. If you can take the time to figure it out though, this is definitely the most cost effective way for foreigners to get tickets.

Originally Posted by shidesha

Aww man, those look like horrible seats.... That's really disappointing.
Thanks for your help though!

Has anyone here who has been to Yoyogi know if you can see anything from that far back??

Yoyogi actually looks a lot smaller once you are in there. I think you'll be fine.

[Neo Daydream]

this was so informative ^^ thanks to everyone who contributed in it ^^
now i REALLY wanna go this year! >.<

[Melrose]

How do you guys pay for airline tickets? zOmg 1200 dollars for a retour ticket to Japan is crazy. That's 1/3rd of the money we make in a month. 0_o

[polka-dot-jewel]

^ Well...you save. For a long time. XD Unless you win the lottery.

[jonneh]

Originally Posted by Melrose

How do you guys pay for airline tickets? zOmg 1200 dollars for a retour ticket to Japan is crazy. That's 1/3rd of the money we make in a month. 0_o

Originally Posted by polka-dot-jewel

^ Well...you save. For a long time. XD Unless you win the lottery.

Yeah, my girlfriend and I are having this problem right now actually. We can afford everything so far except flight tickets - we haven't found affordable tickets yet, so our whole trip is called off unless we can.

[polka-dot-jewel]

^ Have you tried looking for tickets that will fly from a bigger city (Chicago, Houston, LA, etc) to Tokyo? I find those tickets to be a few hundred dollars cheaper than tickets from other cities (like Nashville). I know Atlanta has a big airport, but from all the searches I've seen, none of the ones (that go from Nashville to Tokyo) have a connector flight in Atlanta. Plus, country-side tickets are actually cheap (depending on when and where you go), so flying from Atlanta to Houston or Chicago or whatever shouldn't be too expensive; you just need to worry about flying from that bigger city to Tokyo.

[jonneh]

Interesting suggestion, thanks for helping out! While doing some searches, I've actually noticed most of the results have connector flights - I especially see Chicago. While having stops could be extremely annoying and long, not to mention boring, it may just be what we'll have to do.

[polka-dot-jewel]

Yeah, even bigger cities have connector flights. (Believe me, I've seen some go from LA to Houston, Las Vegas, Korea, China, Hong Kong, Philippines, Boston, DC...) I know sometimes having a connector flight (or two or three) can make the price cheaper, but since oil prices are going up, probably not. =( And distance affects the price - cheaper the mileage, cheaper the ticket because of less gas used.