New & Old Tourism in Japan

Architecture for Humanity

March 30, 2013

For the Paper Cranes for Japan Challenge, the Architecture for Humanity team provided on-the-ground reports from Japan.

In San Francisco, we have a basic collection of sights we show family or friends when they visit. You know - Go to the Golden Gate Bridge Take the ferry to Alcatraz - Climb Telegraph Hill at sunset - if you are bold, buy a baseball cap at Fisherman's Wharf - etc. You probably have these for your town. (Being from Kansas, I know attractions can get pretty modest.)

Tohoku is, of course, no different.

While I was there, Shogo did a wonderful job showing me the sights that just about everyone in the area frequents - from the natural to the man-made (and replicated), the mythic and the awe-inspiring (which tend to overlap), and destinations inspired by the industries that have called the area home.

The City of Ishinomaki's website compiled a short list of these sights (in English) - albeit how they were before the tsunami. Shogo and I were able to assess the status of these sights, and perhaps even add some to the list. Now returned to San Francisco, I've been working with my colleague Michael on refining this destination list.

Through our discoveries, it's evident there's a new "spirit" of tourism in Tohoku - and no one is yet sure how to interpret it.

I. Kamiwarizaki On my first day in Japan, Shogo took me several places around Kitakami - the high shrine, Okawa elementary school, and here, Kamiwarizaki. At each of these places, we ran into Nobu and her mom, who happened to be making the same touristic rounds of the region.

This rock is a strange sight indeed, a little gem along Tohoku's rugged coast. It is said that the rock was split by an unhappy god - two villages couldn't resolve a dispute over a beached whale. (And so it goes.) Now the sight is a great place to stop for a picnic, or simply enjoy the lapping of the water against the rocks. Catching KWZ at sunset wasn't a bad decision either.

II. San Juan Bautista Replica Oh, it's nothing, really - just a 17th Century vessel destined for the Pope in Rome, rebuilt and somewhat miraculously surviving the tsunami unscathed. You're supposed to be able to board the ship, but the museum wasn't open when we were there.

III. WHALELAND That's right, a theme park dedicated to whales...or...whaling. The sign's playful font here reads: "Oshika Hoee-Rurando," or the Japanization of Oshika Whaleland. At WHALELAND you can board a whaling ship that itself is beached and attached to the museum with a couple ramps.

IV. Kesennuma Ship This ship you could say also survived the tsunami. However, it was carried over a mile inland and deposited in the middle of Kesennuma.

Stories of the tsunami and damage, and incredible sights like this, are scarcely believable to people who live in other parts of Japan. And they're now flocking to things like this ship, or to Okawa Elementary or Onagawa (where I was hardly the only person taking pictures). It's a peculiar phenomenon, which each site is treating differently. The elementary school is being destroyed, with a memorial taking its place; the knocked-over building in Onagawa will be preserved as a memorial in itself; this ship in Kesennuma, it's been decided, will be taken down. The shipowner doesn't want to manage a huge memorial on land. (I guess he has other things he'd prefer the ship to be doing.)

But like it or not - disaster tourism will be a new economic driver for Tohoku. Maybe things will lighten up at these sensitive sites as soon as places like the Manga Muesum and WHALELAND re-open their doors.