@Steven:
I like Tokyo, it's my speed and there are a lot of good restaraunts and bars. Kyoto is very beautiful but I Hate how inconveniently it's laid out aside from the immediate major sights.
If all you want is restaurants and bars Kyoto has plenty of those too. But maybe I'm inured to inconvenient city layout because I'm from Boston.
@Aohige_AP:
Kyoto is gorgeous, even the urban and city area are carefully designed to not lose the aesthetic beauty.
There's no doubt about that.
But that being said, if I'm staying for an extended time, I'd rather stay in Tokyo, more places to go and convenient.
Like I said above, although I will give Tokyo credit for it's much larger train/subway system. If you can freaking figure out how to navigate it (and that's for those of us who can read Japanese!).
Kyoto has one big thing over all the other cities though: It was never bombed. You can see all these parts of the city that go back centuries because they have been untouched. My mother and aunt visited me and found an indigo dyer artist who's family had been in the trade for 300 YEARS. She bough a jacket from him. For like $200 but it was worth it.
@Prismeru:
Kyoto and Tokyo are really different and it depends on what kind of tourism you want to make cause they can be radically different. In Kyoto you will contemplate and reflect in the nature, culture and aesthetic of the japanese. That's why you can find a reconstruction of a Heian House there. Tokyo is about buzzing, living and it can fluster all your senses if you want it to. I highly recommend both (heck, kidnap me so i can go to Kyoto. I love it) since they are two faces of Japan to consider.
Let's see if i can illustrate this:
-In Kyoto i got lost and a nice old man kept me company and talked to me about how he had been to México once until the bus came by.
-In Tokyo i also got lost and in the proccess I discovered an arcade on the top of a building where some teenagers where playing and a mom was there with its kid. We were alone like in Kyoto but the city never stopped.
That sounds about right, but I personally never felt the "buzzing" part. I just felt that everything was really stale. Although maybe that's because Kyoto had gotten it's claws into me too deep by that point (I had been living there for 4 months by then).
@Skogstroll:
The first time I was there one of the guys I was staying with cooked me a traditional japanese breakfast once, complete with eggs his family had sent from their farm on the country side. Really wierd, the tea made it worse (still haven't gotten used to that green tea but I'm trying!) but some parts were really nice and it really is something I suppose you should try at least once if you go there.
Blasphemy! Japanese breakfast is delish!