Bills, bills, bills....

Gas bill - meter reading on left, bill on the right

Paying utilities in Japan is interesting. We pay our electric and water bill at 7-11 convenience stores, and we pay our gas bill at the post office. Our rent is unique as well. In Japan, if you pay rent, you always have a real estate agency be the middle man - the tenant never directly pays the landlord. Rent must also be paid in cash, so no checks or card.

The water and electric bills are pretty simple. You just take them to 7-11, hand the bill to the cashier and pay. The gas bill is a little more involved. It comes in two parts. The long slip on the left is the reading of your gas meter and shows you how much the bill is (in this case, 7077 yen). The paper on the right is the actual bill that you take to the post office to pay. But there's a twist - the bill on the right must be filled out by you. The Japanese handwritten on there is done by the meter reader, but you must fill out your name, address, and the bill amount in the correct areas. This took me a couple of months to get down, and the first few times I needed the post office workers to guide me. Normally this would be no big deal, but when you can't read anything on the paper and you don't want to write in the wrong place, you need to ask for help. This is second nature to us now though, and I know what it looks like on a form when it's asking for my name or address. Everything is an adventure - even paying bills!

Gas bill

Electric bill