News

'For English, press here'

Not all ATMs abroad accept U.S. cards. One traveler in northern Japan learns that the going-hungry way.

By JOSHUA K. HARTSHORNE
Published July 17, 2005

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[Photo: Joshua Hartshorne]

This wall guards against tsunamis and also serves as a temporary home for backpackers.

WAKKANAI, Japan - For someone used to crossing through Immigrations and Customs checkpoints in a spacious airport hall, I thought the small, white-tiled room in Wakkanai's port authority building seemed cramped. Though the ferry I had taken here from Russia had not been full, the line was long.

The border patrol officer looked at my U.S. passport suspiciously and asked me something in Japanese that had not been included in my one year of night-school language study. I asked if he spoke English.

No, he replied.

How about Russian?

No.

I didn't bother asking about Spanish, and in any case I didn't remember the Spanish words for visa, passport or anything else relevant.

I eventually gathered this official wanted to see my ticket to my next destination. I didn't have one - it was waiting at the airport in Sapporo, the main city on this northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.

I could only say in halting Japanese, "My ticket in Sapporo." I'm not sure if he followed, but in any case he asked me how much money I had. This was not a bribe; he was checking to see whether I had enough to purchase an onward ticket.

As it so happened, I did not have any cash on me. I had planned to use my bank card to get some here in Wakkanai.

Despite the long history of waiting in lines in the former Soviet Union and current Russia, my fellow passengers now behind me were getting impatient. The official asked me to wait on the side until everyone had passed.

While I watched the other passengers, who were all either Japanese citizens or had visas, I suddenly remembered that I had the plane-reservation e-mail on my laptop. I booted it up, found the e-mail and presented that to the official. He finally nodded and let me through.

As it turned out, he was right to worry that I might get stuck in Japan and be unable to leave.

Modern technology

At first, though, I had no inkling of what was about to happen. I had just finished a year living in Siberia - a year of fighting through bureaucracy for miserable lodgings, subsisting on Snickers and instant soup because of the dearth of restaurants, and once being stranded on a deserted lakeshore. So I was ecstatic to be in Japan.

Wakkanai ultimately proved to be a village to love. Nestled along a thin strip of shore between the sea and the mountains, this town of 40,000 is brimming with cute cafes, charming shops and tastefully arranged botanical gardens. Speakers along the neat, quiet streets softly pipe Benny Goodman recordings.

Even the mountains look as if they have been tended like gardens and, this being Japan, perhaps they were.

I settled into the nicest hotel I had seen for months, at what in Japan is a bargain rate of less than $100 a night. The room was airy, the robe soft and the slippers warm. I was in heaven.

But I was hungry, so I headed out for food. Not knowing whether I could pay by credit card, I stopped at a bank I remembered passing, to use its ATM.

I am used to ATMs having a handful of buttons and a number pad. But this one was some science-fiction gadget with touch-screens, animated characters and speaking voices. The only thing it did not have was a "press here for English" key.

There was, however, a telephone next to the machine. I picked it up; a voice answered. The voice either understood what I said or figured he'd better figure out what the crazy foreigner was doing to their machine, because shortly a man in a bank uniform arrived.

I said, in my best Japanese, I want money, and showed him my card. He put it in the machine and pressed a bunch of buttons. The machine spit it out.

No good, he said in Japanese, you can't use it here.

Where is use good? I think I said in Japanese.

He shook his head. He either didn't know, didn't understand or couldn't explain it to me.

I went back to my hotel. The man at the desk seemed friendly, and though he didn't understand English, he was patient with my Japanese.

I showed him my bank card. I want money, I said. On my city map, I pointed to the bank I'd been to, trying to say, There, no good. Where are banks?

He pointed out several other banks on the map.

Within an hour I was back. My failure had repeated at each ATM. I had come to understand that none of the ATMs here took non-Japanese cards.

Doomed to pancakes?

I asked my perplexed concierge, Where American card good?

He shrugged. I suddenly remembered seeing a couple of convenience stores. Had the debit card's cash-back-with-purchase system reached Japan?

In America, I began in Japanese, I buy at store. I pay too much. They give me money. I do that here?

The concierge looked as if he understood, but he had not heard of such a system.

That night, I took stock of my situation. I had $20 in Russian rubles, which no banks in Wakkanai would exchange. I had five days before my flight left - from another city. What was I going to eat?

I had found a pancake place that took credit cards, but that was going to get old quickly. Could I buy my train ticket to Sapporo by credit card? How would I then get to the airport?

Perhaps I could get a relative to wire money, but I didn't know how to make an international phone call, much less arrange a wire transfer to a tiny, if lovely, port town on an island known for its pastoral beauty, not commerce.

The next day, wandering the town dejectedly but gazing at the buildings, I recognized a few characters on the side of one: Post office, I read, and suddenly I remembered hearing that post offices in Japan are used for banking.

From the doorway I saw gleaming ATMs. Closer, I saw the godsend "for English press here" buttons. Moments later, I was strolling Wakkanai a liberated and wealthy man.

I have traveled many places in Japan since, but none compare to the idyll of that seaside town. I hope and plan to return, but next time, I'm bringing yen.

American freelance writer Joshua K. Hartshorne now lives in Taiwan.

IF YOU GO

GETTING THERE: Wakkanai is most easily reached from Sapporo by train, plane or bus. There are also direct flights from Tokyo and Osaka.

I arrived from Korsakov on Russia's Sakhalin Island by ferry.

STAYING THERE: Hotels are numerous, but few take credit cards (hah), so bring cash. I stayed at Hotel Miyuki (in Japan, call 0162-22-5866), which is two blocks east of the train station.

[Last modified July 15, 2005, 09:28:03]

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