My 20-Year Japanniversary

Twenty years ago today, I stepped off a plane at Narita Airport and began a chapter of my life that I assumed would last two or three years.

I was wrong, in the most amazing way possible.

The humidity hit me the moment we landed. I travelled into central Tokyo, collected my keys from the Sakura House office in Shinjuku, signed up for an awaordori festival in Nakameguro happening the next day that had me dancing in the streets 30 hours later, made my way to my 13-square-metre apartment in Sangubashi and promptly passed out – jetlagged, dehydrated and wondering what, exactly, I had signed up for.

There was no time for a gentle introduction. I had to reach Shibuya City Hall before 17:00 or risk delaying everything that followed: my phone, my bank account and the basic administrative machinery required to begin a life here.

Stumbling out of my place with barely enough time, asking for directions in a foreign language – I spoke no Japanese when I got here – I arrived at 16:57. Then I grabbed a beef bowl from Yoshinoya and travelled to Akihabara, the electronics district, to buy an iron. 

That was day one.

Tokyo was overwhelming, exhilarating, sometimes incomprehensible but always incomparable. Every simple task felt like an expedition. Buying the right train ticket, deciphering the buttons on an appliance, working out which piece of paper belonged at which counter (and there is a lot of paper) – all of it required concentration, effort, time. Yet the thrill of being somewhere so completely unfamiliar, surrounded by a city whose rhythms I did not yet understand but was desperate to learn, drove me to keep expending those resources and persevere.

When I arrived in 2006, 2,084,919 foreign nationals were registered as living in Japan. The latest official count, at the end of 2025, was 4,125,395 – an increase of almost 100% in two decades.

Back then, JNTO recorded 7,334,077 visitor arrivals during the entire year. In the first half of 2026 alone, Japan welcomed 21,084,800 – nearly three times the total for all of 2006. The government’s target remains 60 million annual visitors by 2030.

These are enormous numbers, but statistics alone cannot express how profound the change has felt.

I remember the ‘gaijin nod’: that small, almost conspiratorial acknowledgement exchanged between two non-Japanese residents who happened to pass each other. I remember the genuine surprise of seeing another foreign face in the same carriage on the Yamanote Line. Today, conversations about managing unprecedented international demand have become part of the national discourse.

I have lived through every year of that transformation: Sangubashi, Yoyogi, Shibuya, Ebisu – always in Shibuya-ku, from a Japan that few had visited to one the world seemingly cannot stop talking about.

The country has changed, and so have I.

I could never have conceived of any of this when I arrived. I remember meeting people who had lived here for three years when I had been here for only three months and thinking of them as something close to demigods. They seemed to possess impossible knowledge.

Twenty years later, I occasionally realise that I have become that person for others. That thought still feels absurd. I have to pinch myself and ask: was it all a dream?

Of course, it was not. It was thousands of ordinary days. Days spent learning, working, getting things wrong, trying again, meeting people, building relationships and gradually understanding that belonging somewhere does not happen in one dramatic moment. It accumulates quietly.

A familiar station announcement. A neighbourhood restaurant where you no longer need to order. A seasonal change you anticipate before it arrives. A city that once seemed impenetrable becoming a place whose streets carry layers of your own memories.

Somewhere along the way, Japan stopped being the place where I was living and simply became home. The place where I had built a life… and businesses!

Maction Planet is now nine years old and counting, with more than 350 five-star reviews on TripAdvisor. Kanpai Planet, my YouTube platform dedicated to Japan’s drinks, celebrated its fifth anniversary this year.

Both grew from something simpler: a belief that experiences are the most valuable things we can pursue, because memories are the only investment that compounds forever.

That conviction continues to shape everything I do. It is why I have always wanted to go beyond the superficial, fetishised version of Japan – beyond ticking off landmarks and repeating received wisdom. The real privilege lies in helping people understand why a place matters: its history, its rituals, its contradictions, its craftsmanship, its humour and the people who give it life.

The moments that move me most are rarely the obvious ones.

The amazing reviews – I am grateful for every one of them. 

The guests who, years after travelling with me, send a photograph of a sake menu from their local Japanese restaurant in middle America and ask what they should order.

The young traveller who invites me onto their podcast because something we experienced together changed the way they see the world.

Meeting someone who has watched Kanpai Planet for years and visits Japan with a deeper appreciation of what is in their glass.

These things still stop me in my tracks.

It is easy, when building something, to focus relentlessly on what remains unfinished: the next tour, the next video, the next idea, the next standard you want to reach. Moments like these force me to pause and recognise that the work has travelled further than I can always see.

None of it would have been possible alone.

The colleagues I have had the privilege of working alongside, each of them someone who cares about this country and its culture as deeply as I do, are as much a part of this story as anything I have done myself. Their knowledge, generosity, judgement and commitment have made Maction Planet what it is.

So too have our guests. They keep me on my toes. Their questions force me to examine what I think I know. Their curiosity pushes me to learn more, craft more and create more. Every tour is an exchange, and I have received as much as I have given.

The same is true of everyone who has watched, shared, or supported Kanpai Planet. A channel may have one person standing in front of the camera, but it becomes meaningful only when a community forms around it. A special mention to members of the Kanpai Planet Club for their generous contributions to keeping the platform alive.

Twenty years is long enough to understand that a life is shaped not merely by the decisions we make, but by the people who choose to walk alongside us. In a period when it can sometimes feel as though the forces pulling us apart are louder than those drawing us together, I find myself more convinced than ever that travel and cultural exchange are among the most quietly powerful things we can do.

Done properly, travel is not simply consumption. It is an encounter with another way of living. It asks us to listen, to observe and to accept, however briefly, that our own habits are not universal. At its best, it leaves both visitor and host with a wider understanding of the world.

Japan, incredibly, has now been my home for two decades. Sharing it, properly, carefully, authentically, in depth and with as much fun as possible, is the privilege of my life.

The person who arrived at Narita in 2006 could not have imagined the life waiting for him: the friendships, the work, the risks, the mistakes, the businesses, the adventures or the thousands of people with whom I would eventually share this country. He certainly could not have imagined writing this twenty years later.

Twenty years!

I wonder what the next twenty hold.

We continue, and Kanpai!

Mac
Founder, Maction Planet | Creator, Kanpai Planet
4 August 2026

Maction Planet runs bespoke Private Tours and Experiences in Tokyo, and beyond. To book yours, or to purchase a gift card, contact us at info@mactionplanet.com

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