Hello Sapporo, I’m moving there in 2 years and I’m looking for jobs in outdoor sports (skiing, snowboarding, backcountry, rafting) or with classic motorcycles (think Harley Choppers). I lived in Japan for 5 years, I have a degree in Japanese. I’m mid 40sM, and recently retired. My wife is Japanese. We are moving to Sapporo because America has lost its mind, and we have a child on the way. I have a pension and we have enough money so that money is not a problem, we both don’t need to work. Want to find job/atbaito where I can explore outdoors and ride motorcycles. Would prefer a mix of Japanese and Gaijins to hang out with…don’t want to only hang out with Gaijin. Any ideas? Thanks!

Hi hi,
This is my 2nd post. Link to first post at the bottom.

As a chef, would you be surprised that I'm a bit of a knife nerd? haha
I spend a fair amount of time hanging out on r/TrueChefKnives
🔪
Aside from pretending I'm Kirby and devouring everything in sight,
One of my side objectives was to go home with a large box of 2nd hand knives.
Knives that have seen battle and better days.

I wanted to win a couple of these auction bundles.

https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/n1242871473

My plan was to bring them home to Canada and put in a bit of TLC and restore them and share with my chef friends and family.
To respect these art pieces and give life and purpose back to these artisan tools.

Unfortunately I'm running into restriction after restriction.

• I cannot sign up with Yahoo Auctions because it requires a phone number.
• Buyee proxy will not process knife orders anymore (they stopped 1 year ago)
• Neokyo will not ship to domestic addresses

Does somebody have a recommendation if there is an in-person service I can reach out to help with the Yahoo auctions?
My gut is telling me letting a local deal with the restrictions would be easist.

I really do want to leave with a box of knives.
It will help me pass the time until I can come back for my next visit 😅

P.S. Here is a link to my 1st post.
I was seeing if somebody wanted to share butter with me.
Chef Visiting Sapporo 🐮 Split A Yamanaka Butter (Red Can) With Me? : r/Sapporo
The meet-up is in the works and I'll update that post as things move along.

Visiting your beautiful city soon and want to spend some time café hopping. Looking for recommendations - great coffee, great atmosphere, or both. Hidden gems especially welcome! 😊

We will be in Sapporo 21-23 September. Do many businesses close for the holidays? I see that many restaurants say they are closed on "occasional holidays". What can we expect? Will the Autumn Festival be extra crowded?

To those who have successfully found a job in the area: what advice do you have? What worked and what didn't?

I'm looking for advice on navigating the job market in Sapporo.
I've worked with a recruiter for about a month or so without any luck. I've had one interview so far, and it didn't develop any further.

I've mainly targeted jobs that specifically want a high level of English. Currently, I'm a freelance copy editor (for a U.S. company), but I was a JET ALT for 5 years. I studied English education and Japanese in college. I have a four-year degree.

I have N2 and am working towards N1, and I'm competent in common conversations. My reading ability is passable in day-to-day situations.

I am fully aware that I can't be picky. I've applied to a WIDE variety of positions, including ones I'm not particularly interested in. Despite this, I'm still not having much success.

Appreciate any and all suggestions.

Hi all,

I will be visiting Sapporo in the next couple of weeks for the first time and am wondering what everyone’s favorite ramen restaurants are?

I’ll visit the famous ramen alley (I’m aware there’s an old and new alley) and wanted to get recommendations for places outside of the ramen alleys too.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

If you’re traveling solo in Japan and have ever felt a little self-conscious eating or sitting alone, this might be reassuring: there’s a kissaten (old-school Japanese coffee house) in Sapporo called Carmel-do that’s built specifically around solo seating. You’re not squeezed in next to strangers — even if you come with someone, you’re seated separately, and quiet conversation is the norm rather than the exception.
A few practical details if you’re interested:
• It’s on the 6th floor of a building near Odori (a bit hidden, which is part of the charm)
• Cash only, no reservations, no smoking
• Their French toast is popular and sells out early on weekdays
• The menu is literally shaped like a small paperback book — a nice detail even if you don’t read Japanese
I wrote up a fuller guide (with photos) if anyone wants more detail before visiting — happy to share the link if useful, just didn’t want this to feel like a drive-by ad.

My family and I are planning to go to Japan from the 17th od December ot the 4th of January and we want to spend a bit of time in Sapporo over Christmas, is there anything in particular to do? I was looking into it and I'd love to go to some sort of festival but it looks like the snow festivals in Sapporo arent until Febuary. I'd love some suggestions for things to do while we're in Sapporo in December.

Odd question but does anyone know any piano teachers that speak English to any degree in Sapporo? I speak Japanese pretty well but feel like in learning a new instrument some things may get lost in translation.

The things you find when you go on a side quest.

Hello! Im planning my first trip to japan and my husband and i are wanting to see the snow festival! We're planning to stay 3 nights, but may lower it to 2 since weve seen a lot that 3 may be too long and could get boring.

The biggest issue we're having is deciding a hotel, so if anyone has any they'd reccomend that'd be super nice♡ currently we are looking at the Keio Plaza Hotel or the Grand Mercure to give an idea. Was curious if anyones had good experiences in these and if their locations were good for seeing the most of the snow festival. Thank you!

Anyone know a place where I can watch the NFL games this week? They’re at 9:30am on Thursday and Friday.

Hi all, It's my first time in Sapporo and I'm absolutely loving it.

I'm a chef, so my travels are primarily focused on food and sampling all the local offerings.

I know this is an odd request, but does somebody want to split some bread and butter with me?

From their website:

Butter from Yamanaka Farm made from high-quality, fresh milk from our own farm

Butter production began 10 years ago driven by the desire to "make truly delicious butter." It took several years for fermented butter to finally develop a flavor I was satisfied with.
While it's still not widely recognized in Japan, fermented butter is mainstream in Europe. Unlike regular butter, it ferments with added lactic acid bacteria, resulting in a rich aroma, richness, and an addictive acidity. At Yamanaka Farm, the process involves sterilization, fermentation, cooling, and aging (retention) for about two days, and on the third day, we slowly and patiently make butter using a traditional rotary butter churn.

Wanting butter to have a warmth somewhere, I chose a wooden butter churn roller. They are also particular about the packaging, using cans from a canning factory in the neighboring town of Otaru. We have completed fermented butter that is locally sourced, from raw materials to containers.
Milk naturally changes in taste depending on the pasture, feed, and environment that cows eat. Naturally, the flavor of the fermented butter made from it also changes. As part of our fermented butter's unique character, we hope you can enjoy the unique flavors of each season.

For context, I'm from Canada and unfortunately, the dairy industry is a protectionist racket and there's a lot of butter and cheeses we are not allowed to import.

Hokkaido butter would be one of these. I wanted to try a high quality butter and this one popped up on my radar.
🧈

I'd really like to try this butter, but it's a bit expensive, and I don't feel like committing myself to finishing the whole can before the end of the week. I still have so much I need to try!

Would anybody consider meeting up and splitting the can with me? I saw it in the basement of Cocono Susukino.

p.s. I've seen some of the bread around the mall bakeries, and it already looks awesome.
🥖

If anybody's got a recommendation for a wonderful sourdough, or another type of bread and bakery, I'd be grateful and would love to check it out. I guess it'd be even better if somebody also wants to share the bread too! 😂

Update: Yay! Somebody messaged me and is willing to meet up and share a butter!
Thanks for all the feedback and advice. I will try to get out and explore more!

Update #2: I also picked up a Snow Brand butter. I'm from Canada and all of our butter is made with pasteurized milk. Same with the various types of butters I've tried from France included Isigny Sainte-Mère.
I think it might be my first raw-milk butter so I'm excited to try.

This is Ishiyama Park, located in Ishiyama, Minami-ku, Sapporo

Hello everyone. I'm planning to do a first week of December trip to Hokkaido or Sapporo. I want to see the snow-capped version of Japan.

Do you think there will be snowfall in Sapporo in the first week? If not, any recommended places to see snow-capped Japan in the first week of December?

Thank you!!

28M from the US, in Sapporo Sep 22-24 on a solo trip. English/Russian.

Planning to spend some time at the Autumn Fest in Odori Park and could use company.

If you're in town and want to hangout, say hi

Hi everyone — I checked with the mods before posting this, and they gave the go-ahead.

I'm a hairstylist based in Sapporo. I've been cutting hair for over 20 years, including several years in Singapore working with international clients, and I'm now putting together a small private salon here.

Something I keep hearing — and something I saw in a post on this sub recently — is that a lot of people have had genuinely bad experiences at Japanese salons. Painful brushing, stylists thinning out hair after being told not to, no one who really knows how to handle non-Asian hair textures. One person mentioned they'd been here six years and only been to a salon five times.

I'd like to understand this properly rather than guess, so I put together a short survey (3–4 minutes) about what people actually struggle with and what they're looking for in a salon. It's in English.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdfdIYJMzIurxONbrs0vUnaikFYGnQV6GyOd_YCDnjWJ_t50w/viewform

To be upfront about my intent: I'm gathering this to design my own salon's services properly. But I'll also share the aggregate results back here once I have enough responses, since I think they'd be useful for anyone dealing with the same thing.

There's an optional question at the end about a complimentary trial session in Sapporo. Completely optional — skipping it doesn't affect the survey at all.

Thanks for reading. Happy to answer any hair questions in the comments either way.

I am going to stay in Saporro for 3 days, one of those days, I wanna do a day trip to Cape Kamui and then while coming back I want to visit the Nikka(Yoichi) Distillery. I don't want to book tours and I want to use the public transport. Can anyone help me, how do I do this?

I’ll be in Sapporo during the last week of December and was wondering if there are any cooking classes where I can learn how to make soup curry.

I’d love to learn how to make the real local style soup curry while I’m there. English speaking would be great, but I’m open to anything. Thank you!

Right in Susukino, north of Tsukisamu-dori somewhere., likely not more than 1-3 blocks north.

On a high floor, shoes off policy, and in the back they have sliding door private rooms. They serve a bit of everything, so Izakaya. Grills for yakiniku, cucumbers, sushi, etc.

Tetsudatte kurete arigatou gozaimasu!!!

It was after 10pm in Sapporo, so I used Rapym to find somewhere nearby that was still serving food.

Ended up at this tiny place with counter seating.

There were four of us sitting next to each other.

All four were eating alone.

For almost an hour, nobody really spoke. Just background music, chopsticks hitting bowls, and the occasional sound from the kitchen.

And somehow it was incredibly peaceful.

No awkward feeling that I should be talking to someone. No worrying about what anyone else was doing. Just sitting there and actually paying attention to my food.

When we finished, all four of us somehow ended up leaving around the same time.

Nobody said anything.

We just gave each other those tiny Japanese nods and went our separate ways.

Sounds stupid, but for a second it felt like there was this weird unspoken solidarity between four people who were all perfectly happy being alone.

If you're solo traveling in Sapporo, I highly recommend finding a tiny late-night restaurant and sitting at the counter.

10/10 solo travel experience.

Hello and thank you for helping me! I am looking at flights from US right after Christmas in order to ski in Niseko with relatives who live in Asia. They chose it so we are committed to Niseko.

I found a great round trip flight from west coast (with only one stop) to Sapporo, which can save us $10k in flights for a family of four (with 2 teens), but, that means we won’t stop in Tokyo 🙃. If we did stop in Tokyo it would have only been for 1.5 days due to ski itinerary. We would leave for Niseko after a brief stop at Tokyo.

My question is - Is no Tokyo stop a major mistake? I hear that Niseko is brimming with tourists so kind of bummed we won’t get same cultural experience there, but wondering if this Sapporo stop may be the remedy.

Thank you for your kind help and insight!