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Subways and trains in Japan are extremely easy to use, as they almost always have signs and announcements in English as well as Japanese. But buses can be a bit trickier for our students, who are still learning to speak Japanese. We just noticed a new entry in Apple’s App Store that could be perfect for Japanese students: a bus timetable app that includes real-time bus locations. To find it, search for “バスを探す 福岡” in the Japanese App Store. It’s completely free, and really useful for finding your way around Fukuoka! It’s entirely in Japanese, but you can enter text in hiragana, and stop names have hiragana shown too, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to use.
To start finding buses, open the app. Then, press the のる (“noru”, get on) button to select the bus stop you will start from. If you know the name of the bus stop, or part of the name, you can enter that as hiragana. Alternatively, press the 現在地 (“genzaichi”, current location) button at the top right of the app to show a map of your current location with all close bus stops marked. Choose the bus stop from the list. Then do the same with the おりる (“oriru”, get off) button for your destination, press the red しらべる (“shiraberu”, search) button to display upcoming buses. The app lists all the coming buses you can use. Be careful, though: buses with orange text at the end of the name have passed already, and buses with red text are running late.
The bus stop nearest to Genki Japanese School is 大名二丁目 (“daimyo nichome”). Don’t get lost!
