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Shinagawa ER Wait Times?
honestly the wait time thing is way overblown online. shinagawa hospital's ER is fine for a big city hospital, you're not gonna be waiting overnight for a sprained ankle or anything. the real bottleneck is if you show up with something that's clearly not an emergency, they'll triage you down and you could sit for a bit while they deal with actual critical cases.
one thing nobody mentions is that the paperwork and registration can take 20-30 minutes even if the doctor is free. they need your insurance card, passport, and they'll make you fill out a health questionnaire in japanese. bring a pen and have your hotel address written down somewhere, saves a ton of hassle.
honestly if you're just worried about jet lag or a cold, hit up a drugstore instead. there's a matsukiyo right across from the station that's open til 10pm and the staff usually speak enough english for basic stuff. way faster than any ER.
the online horror stories are mostly from people who went to tiny clinics at 2am with a cold. shinagawa hospital's ER is a proper urban hospital, they handle the shinkansen station crowd daily so they're efficient. if you show up with something obvious like a fever or a cut they'll process you within an hour usually.
one thing that catches tourists is they don't do walk-in prescriptions at the ER. if you need meds after hours you'll have to go to a separate pharmacy, the one on the ground floor of the hospital closes at 7pm. the 24h pharmacy is a 10 min walk west on the main road past the family mart.
pack some basic cold meds from home and you'll probably be fine. the conference center itself has a clinic on the 3rd floor that handles minor stuff without the ER wait.
Ugh, yeah, those stories are everywhere. The reality is...it depends. A minor injury? Probably not too bad, maybe a couple of hours on a busy day. Something serious? That's where things get dicey. Expect a much longer wait, possibly several hours, even overnight in extreme cases.
Shinagawa's a pretty big hospital, so they're probably better equipped than some smaller places, but still... Japan's healthcare system is different. It's not necessarily bad, just... different. They prioritize based on severity, not first-come, first-served. So, yeah, it's stressful, I get it.
Try to get travel insurance with good medical coverage; that will help ease some of the anxiety. And honestly, packing a decent first-aid kit wouldn't be a bad idea either. Better safe than sorry.
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Where can I find crispy, pan-fried bacon similar to a certain international style?
if u have a costco membership the kirkland thick cut is the move, 4 packs of 500g for around 2500 yen and it crisps up proper in a cold pan. for smaller runs, precce in azabudai hills & the basement at isetan shinjuku both carry imported US & danish brands in the chilled case, just read the label for "thick cut" or "smoked" and not "loin". also worth knowing japanese bacon is often wet-cured so pat it dry before frying or it steams instead of crisping
kaldi coffee farm is hit or miss but their smoked bacon from denmark shows up pretty regular, the 200g pack runs about 600 yen. what actually works better for me is asking the butcher counter at peacock or life to slice the block bacon thick, like 5mm, they do it for free and it crisps way better than the pre-packed stuff. also fwiw cheap bacon crisps faster, the fatty supermarket kind at 300 yen a pack works fine if u cook it from cold in a dry pan and pour off the fat as it renders.
tbh the gyomu super store brand bacon is surprisingly decent for crisping up, its not thick cut but if you cook it low and slow it gets pretty crunchy. the key is the dry cure vs wet cure thing, wet cure steams. also check hanamasa if you have one nearby, they sell big packs of american style bacon thats actually smoked and firm.