The License, or the Japanese Art of Patience

Torii Japan has mostly been about the way of looking at things — neighborhoods, seasons, curiosities. But living here isn't only that: it's also a healthy dose of paperwork, patience, and small administrative victories you never imagined celebrating. Here's the first in a series telling that other side of Japan — less photogenic, just as real.

Anyone settling in Japan more or less permanently will, sooner or later, run into the question of the driver's license. It's true that life in Tokyo works perfectly well without a car, thanks to a public transport network that's as dense as it is efficient — but the moment you step off the beaten path, being able to rent a car becomes a real comfort.

In short, for anyone planning to stay in Japan for several months or years, the question of translating your license, and then getting it recognized by the authorities, can turn into a proper obstacle course — even for someone with a decent grasp of Japanese.

The initial translation is generally fairly simple: it's done on request through the JAF (Japan Automobile Federation), or through your embassy depending on your country — for French nationals and most countries with a reciprocity agreement with Japan. For everyone else, it's a whole different story.

But be warned: this translation alone isn't enough for a long stay, and it's advisable to move fairly quickly to getting an actual Japanese license — which you obtain at the driver's license center (menkyo center) of your prefecture. Good news for French nationals and residents of reciprocity-agreement countries: this first conversion (the famous gaimen kirikae) is actually fairly straightforward — no written exam, no driving test. You just need to set aside several hours for the paperwork check, the eye test, and the queue — the real difficulty is mostly patience and paperwork. If a single document is missing, you may be forced to come back another day, which will seriously test your love for Japan.

The day you finally get the license, it'll be the green version.

It doesn't stop there, that would be too easy. At renewal time, you'll need to go through a number of checks again, pay another stamp fee, and above all sit through two hours — in Japanese, if you please — of road-safety lectures. These are probably the two longest hours of your life in Japan, tied perhaps with the ones spent in public hospital waiting lines on a weekday (an experience I obviously wouldn't wish on you). That's how you get the blue license.

If your stay goes on even longer and you renew again — provided you haven't had any serious incident or fine costing you points over the past 5 years — you'll be entitled to another round of lectures, a bit shorter this time (a short hour, in case you hadn't had enough the first time), and you'll get the famous gold license. This one comes with several perks: it's renewed more simply, directly at a local police station (no more thrilling trips to the menkyo center and its hours of lectures), and above all it lowers your insurance premium.

To make it all clearer, here's the full journey at a glance:

This final step still requires one last visit of about 4 hours (I got into the habit of taking a half-day off each time), and you'll want to double-check the opening hours — these depend on your license type, and showing up at the wrong time can get your renewal turned down.

I'll skip over the point-loss stories, which force you into a remedial course — a half-day spent watching a video that will probably finish off any love you had left for road-safety lectures (but will at least encourage you not to break the rules again, just to avoid another round of torture).

And a little bonus that has caught out plenty of residents, myself included: renewing the gold card. Normally, it works off a notice sent by mail warning you the license is about to expire, usually about a month ahead. Sounds simple enough, right? Except when you never receive the notice, or you set it aside (who really wants to read a Japanese administrative letter?), or you happen to be visiting family back home at the time. The catch is that missing this renewal exposes you to losing the license outright, and having to start the whole process over — back to green. In some cases, you even have to retake the license entirely, and you'll bitterly regret those two little hours of lectures you once found so tedious.

In my case, I found out the hard way through a failed car rental attempt, which kindly pointed out that my license, having expired, no longer let me rent anything at all. I went in before the 6-month mark — the grace period beyond which things get seriously complicated — and I happened to get a sympathetic clerk, who must have taken pity on my thoroughly pathetic expression at the thought of starting the whole thing over from scratch.

That said, there are also fallback options for those not quite ready to tackle it. Carpooling, through platforms like Noritomo — no 2-hour lecture required. Or hitchhiking, more of a gamble, but not without its charm.

For everyone else, arm yourself with patience and follow these few rules, which I hope will make your life easier — and might even give you a few good laughs and stories to tell your friends.