juicius

juicius t1_j5bz2o9 wrote

Reply to comment by stiveooo in TIL Japan is considered the world's most powerful passport, with visa-free access to 193 countries. Singapore and South Korea are close behind with 192 countries. Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan are the least powerful, all with visa-free access to 30 or less countries. by grandlewis

I misread it. It was talking about Tokyo. There are only 4 passport centers in Tokyo: Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, Yurakucho, and Tachikawa. Sounds like plenty but Tokyo is a city of 14 million people. There are fairly onerous documentation requirements like family register (koseki 戸籍) that I think you have to visit another government office to print and the minimum wait time is 6 days, not counting weekends and holidays. So it takes a minimum of 2 separate trips on weekdays (closed on weekends) because there's no expedited processing option. That inconvenience is one of the reasons why only 21% of the Japanese people have a passport.

2

juicius t1_j59hm3m wrote

Reply to comment by Freak_Out_Bazaar in TIL Japan is considered the world's most powerful passport, with visa-free access to 193 countries. Singapore and South Korea are close behind with 192 countries. Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan are the least powerful, all with visa-free access to 30 or less countries. by grandlewis

I watched a YouTube clip talking about that. One of the reasons is that there are only (I think) 4 passp ok rt processing centers in Japan and they're all in Tokyo and you have to make multiple visits to get one. The bureaucracy doesn't make it convenient even for Tokyo residents to get one. So the people with the passport tend to be business people who need it.

8