Subsequent to learning the language I immigrated to Japan, worked in a Japanese company for a few years (not recommended), married my wife (highly recommended,

Subsequent to learning the language I immigrated to Japan, worked in a Japanese company for a few years (not recommended), married my wife (highly recommended, but sorry, she's taken), and in general built a happy little life here for myself which would not have happened absent learning the language. If you have a little bandwidth to study Japanese prior to coming you'll get the highest bang for your buck from drilling self-introductions and basic conversations ("$ITEM kudasai.", "Yoroshiku onegaishimasu", "$LOCATION doko desu ka?") until you're blue in the face. Knowing just hiragana and katakana is of limited utility for navigation, since the places where it suffices will likely be English-friendly. (They're great to learn for mind expansion, just tough to operationalize as a tourist.)