Capsule Hotel: What is the point? (カプセルホテル) [pt 1]

Tokyo nightlife has all the elements of a 24-hour culture except one - transport. The public transport system, largely trains, in Tokyo (and most of the major cities in Japan) are things of wonder with highly effective and quick transit available around most of the individual "cities" that make up Tokyo. An equally interesting facet is the transport utilisation over a day of the trains and that there is really no evening peak^[1] as people return from work and socialise fairly evenly over the evenings. I am not sure I ever really noticed the evening rush hour and it continues into the night - but not through to the morning. Many services stop at about midnight (often earlier) making the journey home a little earlier than it would often be in other major cities. The vast scale of the city means that it will often be a long time before you reach home even if you do leave at half eleven. The scale of the city also means that it will often be a hugely expensive last drink if you miss your last train. This makes the last train quite an amazing experience in many ways as I discovered on one of my first nights in the city. But what about if you don't have one of those amazing experiences and miss the last train? Some of the more common sleeping options are:

   (Business) Hotel

There are, of course, many hotels that can be found quite easily and there is even a common class of hotel which are simpler but still quite comfortable with decent service and beds called business hotels.

   Internet Cafe/Manga Kissa

The internet cafe in Japan is often booth based rather than “open” as in most places. Each booth is often quite dark (so you can choose the level of lighting) and separated away so you get your own space. There is often a set of headphones so the whole room is often fairly quiet and the pricing is usually available for quite long chunks of time - including overnight. Drinks are available from vending and on a drink bar basis so you can get refreshment as you want it. At the point of booking, there is usually a choice of seating and this will regularly include a flat reclining seat option. Many Internet cafes will also have a shower room within the cafe too as well as an extensive choice of manga to read too.

   Love Hotel

In many parts of the city, there are a number of Love hotels where you can rent a room for the night or for a “short stay” during the day. As the name suggests, the resting part of the stay is not often the prime reason for a stay here. There is a lot to be said about love hotels but they allow an easy stay in often convenient locations and so are an option whether a couple or not.

   Capsule Hotel

Sometimes, you just need to get some sleep so all you need is a bed and not many amenities so why not pack people into the available space. These will often be very conveniently located near stations and allow sleep in a lying down position - an option not always available at similar prices.

   Karaoke Box

A somewhat counter-intuitive example but there are Karaoke boxes everywhere and they are open late and allow you to book a room that will hopefully be soundproof and have room service. Japanese karaoke rooms are also paid for per person rather than per room so this can be surprisingly cost effective and you would normally get a room which has space to stretch out. The option for a sing isn’t too bad either.

Of these options, I think the one that hits the sweet-spot for me is Capsule Hotel which is a surprise for many -and that many is usually made up of people that don't quite understand why. And in part 2, I'll explain why [link to come later].

^{1. The morning peak in Tokyo is a thing of legend with begloved station attendants helping pack the high capacity, high-frequency trains that little bit more than would be otherwise possible. If you go, be wary when you see those gloves.↩}