Kawagoe City Chūō Library

User friendly with foreign language books

The building and its books have been around for quite a while, and you can tell with the faint smell of must and mildew. However, for foreigners living in the area with children it is a valuable asset as they have a relatively decent collection of foreign language books for children. The main foreign language available is English, but they also have French and German. They have some multi-lingual books too. However, their website is Japanese only. If you do read Japanese it is a very user friendly website with apps for phones as well as a comprehensive reference and booking system. The library is free and open to the public. However, only residents of Kawagoe and the rainbow cities* can become a member. You need to become a member to borrow a book, CD or DVD. The form is in Japanese, but the library attendant will show you were to write your name, address and phone number. It is okay to write in English, if you can't write Japanese. They make a library card for you on the spot after you fill out the form. You can borrow 10 books on one card. You can borrow books, magazines, CDs, DVDs and videos for two weeks. They have a small room for nursing mothers. They have a reading area for kids and organise story time on different days of the week. The Kawagoe City Chuo Library is near Kawagoe City Hall, but unfortunately is quite a distance from the Tobu Tojo, JR and Seibu Shinjuku line train stations. You can take a bus from each of those stations to the city hall and walk to the library. By car; it is near route 254. They have outdoor parking and some parking in the basement. All parking is free. The basement parking is quite narrow and when it is full it is difficult to park in a larger size car. It closes Monday and the last Friday of the month. *The rainbow cities of Saitama are Tsurugashima, Sakado, Moroyama, Hidaka, Kawajima and Ogose (and Kawagoe).