If you are in Japan for a reasonable length of time, it is definitely worth learning some Japanese. This will make your daily life easier, and people will greatly appreciate the effort. The biggest difficulty with learning Japanese is the very complicated writing system (though this will be less of a problem if you know Chinese). The good news is that the pronunciation is not too difficult, and the spoken language is much easier than the written.

Before committing yourself to learning the language, you should be aware that Japanese is a very difficult language to become fluent in. In fact, there are many foreigners who have lived in Japan for years without ever mastering the language. That does not mean, however, that you should make no attempt to learn the language. It is not hard to learn the basics, and it will definitely make your life in Japan easier.

If you would like to study at a Japanese school, check this online database of Japanese schools. If you want to get started before you come to Japan, you could try these online lessons. Be sure to check the Useful Tools + Websites too.

Learning Japanese at RIKEN

RIKEN provides free beginner-level Japanese lessons for people who work at the Wako and Kobe campuses. Family members are also welcome to join these lessons. The Yokohama campus has on-campus lessons for 2500 yen/lesson. If they can find a partner, it drops to 1500 yen per person, with 2 partners (total of three people), it is 1300 yen. Japanese lessons are offered by many local governments, language schools, and other organizations.

In Wako, ICO Room has some survival Japanese booklets available to borrow. If you do not know how to pronounce Japanese, you can just point at the phrases. There are English, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, Thai, French, German, Russian, Korean, and Italian versions of this booklet. If you want to buy a copy for yourself, you can get one from Saitama International Association. Please feel free to use the many Japanese textbooks in ICO Room.