I’ve talked at length before about some of my experiences living in Japan, but I think one of the more interesting things that comes to my mind is the weather in Japan during the summer. This is something that honestly surprised me a great deal when I first arrived in Tokyo. Because I’m originally from a place that does not typically get very hot at all and where there is typically snow on the ground in significant quantities by the middle or end of October, I am not typically fond of hot temperatures. It’s now mid-August, so it has been quite hot recently in Tokyo.

I wasn’t really aware of it at the time, but Tokyo is located approximately 35 degrees north. This places it somewhere around Georgia in the United States, so I should have perhaps expected the weather to somewhat resemble Georgia’s, and some research shows that Atlanta’s and Tokyo’s average temperatures are generally somewhat similar. I have found that Tokyo’s summers are quite hot. They are also very humid, as well. This is something that I find to be rather different from many other places that I have lived in. In Alaska, it doesn’t really get too terribly hot at all, of course, and that’s still my preferred type of weather in general. Florida is much closer to Tokyo’s weather but lacks an actual winter season. Basically, Florida has two seasons: hot and extremely hot, both with relatively high degrees of humidity.

One of the other places that I lived in for a number of years is Okinawa. I have long had the feeling that Okinawa’s summers are actually not as hot as Tokyo’s are. Something that surprised me after I moved to Tokyo were several conversations that I had when I met several Okinawans in Tokyo. I asked them about the weather in Tokyo, and they agreed with me that yes, Tokyo is actually hotter than Okinawa.

Aside from Tokyo, I have been to several other places in Japan, as well. I have visited Sendai and Osaka one time each. When I went to Osaka, it was April. I don’t really recall it being very hot, as I was only there for several hours before I returned to Tokyo, but I do clearly remember what the weather was like in Sendai. Like when I was in Osaka, I was only in Sendai for several hours. Unlike Osaka, however, I do distinctly remember getting off of the Shinkansen and exiting Sendai Station to discover that Sendai was actually relatively comfortable. The day was June 14th, and although Tokyo was rather hot on that day, when I arrived in Sendai, one of the first things that I remember thinking was that the climate somewhat reminded me of how Alaska is in the summer. Some research later showed that June in Sendai is not all that much hotter than it is in Anchorage in July, the hottest month in Anchorage, which is likely why I felt this way. I rather liked the overall climate in Sendai during the few hours that I was there, but I know that it does typically get hotter in later months.

I feel that every time I have gone to a different place, even if only for several hours, I find that one of the first things that I notice about that place is the climate. I’m sure that most people that have traveled to different places will likely agree with me. This is one more aspect of living in or traveling to another place that might surprise someone upon their first arrival. Reading about the climate of a location and then actually going there and experiencing it are definitely two separate things.