If accommodation, shopping, and sightseeing (in, for some, precisely this order of importance) were perhaps the most appealing aspects of a trip to Kyoto, they were underpinned by a range of "basic" services. Some of these, like tourist information booths and tourist guides, directly supported and facilitated the tourist experience; others, like churches and hospitals, were perhaps used only by a small number of short-term visitors.  

Relationships and interactions with one's guide aside, travelogues rarely described these kinds of experiences. Nevertheless, these services were listed in guidebooks and played an important role in (inbound) tourism policy debates and implementation at the national and regional level.

This page picks up a number of the key services on offer to visitors to Kyoto city at various moments over the 1872–1941 period: tourist guides, tourist information offices, rest centres and public toilets, medical care, and church services.

Initially, in the case of Kyoto, tourists were sometimes recommended to hire a "professional guide" via hotels in Kobe so as to help with transportation and arrival there. But "[f]ailing to secure one, the flying tourist may telegraph Yaami to send an English-speaking boy to the train at Kyoto" (Scidmore 1892, 33). 

Into the early twentieth century, however, guidebooks started to advise against bringing a guide to Kyoto: "English is widely spoken and all the best hotels have information bureaus conducted by helpful men who can supply a local English-speaking guide at a moment's notice" (Terry 1914, xxvii). As this suggests, it became common for visitors to hire guides on the spot for an afternoon or day at their hotel in Kyoto, as necessary, rather than traveling for long periods together. 

The need for a guide was further reduced after the opening of Japan Tourist Bureau inquiry offices (see below) at Kyoto and other rail stations from 1913. In addition, into the 1930s, guides and interpreters were stationed by public agencies at popular sightseeing spots in Kyoto. The Kinki Kankō Kyōkai (Japan Welcome Society, lit. Kinki tourism association), for example, dispatched interpreters to Chion-in during the annual Gyoki Dai-e memorial service in April to help foreign visitors (Kokusai Kankō 3, no. 3, 1935).

Still, some guidebooks continued to recommend guides for Kyoto and other large cities, especially for those in a rush: "time and money, in the long run, are saved" (Japan Government Railways 1933, p. xxxii). And, as the above quote suggests, travel writers continued to give attention to their guides, in Kyoto as elsewhere, suggesting they were still seen as a useful expense (and often a memorable encounter) by visitors into the 1930s.

Tourist information offices

At the 1872 Kyoto Exhibition, the organizing committee provided English-speaking staff on site to support foreign tourists, and clearly-labelled "police" (porisu) were instructed to escort visitors in their direction if any problems occurred (Chiyoma 2022). Also, for the Fourth National Industrial Exhibition that was held in Kyoto in 1895, the "Taihin Kyōkai" (Association for the Reception of Visitors) was set up to "render assistance to foreign visitors who may visit the city"; this provided information about accommodation and sightseeing spots, invitations to special sites, and help hiring guides and interpreters, as well as worked to facilitate connections between foreign and Japanese businessmen (Ichihara 1895, 2– 3).

Except for special events like these, face-to-face tourist information was primarily provided by managers and other English-speaking workers in hotels until the 1910s. Some hotels did extra, though. Operating like a travel agent, the Miyako [Hotel] Tours Bureau "cashes letters of credit; stores and forwards luggage and curios; conducts a local express service; secures accommodation on rlys. and in theaters; and buys tickets thereof; charters yachts; hires servants; and [see above] provides guides and interpreters at moderate rates" (Terry 1914, 400).

The establishment of Japan Tourist Bureau in 1912 saw the beginning of increasing oversight, and standardization, of tourist information across Japan and colonial territories. Initially, their Inquiry Offices (annaijo 案内所) were located in transport hubs and colonial capitals: Yokohama, Kobe, Moji, Pusan (Busan), Port Arthur (Lushun) and Dairen (Dalian), Changchun and Mukden (Shenyang), and Taihoku (Taipei) and Keijō (Seoul). These inquiry offices expanded to other cities, as the tourism industry further developed and the empire expanded.  

Inquiry offices did a lot more than just provide free advice. Tourists could talk to staff about accommodation, transport, and sightseeing spots, and get hold of a variety of Bureau-produced pamphlets, maps, and guidebooks — some free (e.g. "Map of Hozu Rapids"), some for sale (e.g. "Map and Guide of Kyōto and Environs," for 30 sen in 1917). But, in addition, at inquiry offices tourists could also get introductory letters to "schools, factories, gardens, private residences, and famous buildings," and book a variety of train, steamer, and boat-train combination tickets, including for colonial Korea, Manchuria, and China (Japan Tsūrisuto Byūrō 1917). 

Tourism-related businesses in Kyoto, such as the Kyoto Electric Railway Company (Kyōto Denki Testudō Kaisha 京都電気鉄道会社) and the Miyako and Kyoto hotels were members of JTB from the beginning. 

Also, Kyoto was a popular topic for foreign visitors to the inquiry offices, especially in Kobe, the first office to open in December 1912 and the closest port to the city. Tourists asked about a range of things, from transport, sightseeing and amusements (including the Miyako Odori), hotel vacancies, and shopping (cf. Tsūrisuto, August 1913).

Most of the users of the rest centre were probably Japanese. However, the city also managed pay toilets in Arashiyama (from 1910), the Imperial Art Museum (from 1924), and Maruyama Park (from 1933) that were specifically for the use of foreign tourists.

Toilets were a long-running complaint among visitors for Japan (cf. Campbell 2014); and, from the beginning of state intervention in inbound tourism, bureaucrats had looked to make reforms. In one of the earliest editions of Tsūrisuto (August 1913), for example, JTB General Manager Shōno Danroku (生野団六) presented a diagram detailing how ryokan owners might construct a wooden seat to fit over a Japanese-style squat toilet for the use of foreign guests. 

The pay toilets built by Kyoto city were, presumably, intended not only to offer physical relief but also to impress visitors with their lack of smell, seats and flushing water, and general cleanliness. The City Tourism Bureau reported on the "keenly felt need" for decent public toilets in the Board of Tourist Industry journal Kokusai Kankō (1934, no. 1), and offered their construction as further evidence of the city's active efforts to improve inbound tourism hospitality at the local level.

Medical services for tourists

As Eliza Scidmore wrote in 1892, "[t]he traveller has little to fear for his health in Japan, where sanitary regulations and quarantine are strictly enforced. There are excellent foreign physicians in each port, foreign and native hospitals and well-equipped pharmacies" (20). For this reason, perhaps, guidebooks rarely listed hospitals outside of Yokohama.

In the case of Kyoto as well, travellers were told that "[the city] is such an exceptionally healthy place that the services of a doctor are seldom required." But visitors, of course, did sometimes get sick. In this eventuality, "a thoroughly qualified English-speaking medical practitioner can be summoned by telephone from the city" through one's hotel (Miyako Hotel 1906, 26).

For prescriptions, the hotel (again) could put guests in touch with local pharmacies such as Oda Pharmacy, which had been in operation since 1796. It was conveniently located on Furukawa-chō, south of Sanjō, between the Miyako and Kyoto hotels, and close to many of the Higashiyama tourist spots.

Church services for tourists

An ever increasing number of Christian denominations were represented in Kyoto over the 1872 to 1941 period, with the number of churches in the city and Fushimi rising from around ten in 1893 to over fifty by the 1940s.

Guidebooks produced by Japanese and foreigners listed churches that catered to foreigners, though visitors were typically advised to seek more details about services from hotel managers.

In Kyōto, Japan (1903, 200), Azumae noted the following options: Doshisha Chapel (est. 1886), which held an English-language service every Sunday at 11am; the Holy Trinity Episcopal Church (est. 1898, renamed St Agnes Church in 1923) on Karasuma, with "prayer and sermon in English, every Sunday at 5pm; and the Kawaramachi Catholic Church (est. 1890), just south of the Kyoto Hotel, with Mass every Sunday at 7am and 9.30am.

By 1914, tourists were also being directed towards the Episcopalian St Mary's Church (est. 1911), as well as Methodist, Baptist, Congregational, Presbyterian, and United Brethren churches (Terry 1914, 400).