I’ve lived in Japan for one to two year stints several times in my life. One of the first things I do is visit a pawn shop and buy a simple nylon string guitar. There are lots of them because they use them in school music classes and somehow get on the market. Anyway, I love how rough and ready they can be. Edited to add: I forgot the most important thing: in those days the top price was about $50 (5,000 yen).