Tokyo, Kamakura, Hakone, Yokohama
English
3 hours on average
1 day ago
Hi! Welcome to Japan. My name is Shoji Kitamura, a licensed English-speaking tour guide. Please call me Shoji that is the same sound as a sliding screen made of wood and paper you may have seen in a traditional Japanese room.
I was born and raised in Yokohama next to Tokyo but lived for work in several beautiful and historical cities such as Nikko, Hiroshima, and Ise which have world heritage sites and/or national park. I fully enjoyed the nature, culture and lives in each city where I lived.
I retired after 36 years with a national research institute of fisheries in 2016.
During my career, I visited 5 continents except Antarctica, more than 20 nations for attending international scientific conferences, conducting collaborative research or teaching some technologies, etc. In Japan, I often took foreign scientists and government officers sightseeing. I had great times in these opportunities.
Such experiences made me decide to become a licensed English-speaking guide interpreter after retirement to introduce Japanese nature, culture, foods, etc. properly to many tourists coming to Japan from all over the world.
For more than 20 years I’ve been living in Nikko, which is located about 150km north of Tokyo, and designated as a World Heritage site and a National Park. If you consider a day trip from Tokyo, I strongly recommend coming to Nikko by 2-hour train ride from Tokyo. I am looking forward to showing you around in this historical and beautiful town.
Besides Nikko, I can also guide you in Yokohama, my home town, and in neighboring city such as Tokyo and Kamakura.
I can guide you in Hiroshima if you pay my transportation fee.
“Reliable guide”
Shoji expertly guided us through the city showing us the top sites for our brief 2-day stay. He was very good in arranging our tour in advance and met us at our hotel early each day.
“A one day tour with a little bit of everything”
Shoji san was wonderful, he made sure we had the best experience we could and ensured we got the most out of the day! We had the nicest sushi we could have and even entertained my attempts to speak Japanese!!
“Don’t go to Hakone with Shoji.”
Unfortunately Shoji is not a guide. He showed no interest in anything. He hardly talked to us. He acted as the fourth person of our group. He never explained anything about any places we visited. We believe he never visited Hakone open air museum since he had no idea of the place.He did not explain the story of the Hakone shrine except it was from the 8th century. We had to google everything to get information. Very disappointing. At the end of the tour he was about to walk off into the station without even a farewell ‘goodbye’!