Tomioka, Fukushima, Japan, April 7, 2024—As years wore on since the March 2011 earthquake-tsunami-nuclear meltdown disaster, the area around the Fukushima nuclear power station looks tidy and clean, devoid of once-ubiquitous mounds of black plastic bags containing radioactive waster, as the sound of business and consumer activities echo in this small town.
The Japanese government on Nov. 30, 2023 lifted the evacuation and entry ban on what was the remaining zones of Tomioka town that had been cordoned off strictly for high levels of radiation from the nuclear power station. Residents were allowed to return to their homes and people visit the zones freely.
Japanese news reports showed video clips of flower buds of cherry trees that line more than a mile of the town’s main street, Tomioka’s famous tourist attraction. A town YouTube page gave a tour of renovated houses for trial stay for out-of-towners interested in moving to the town. Another town YouTube clip showed school children receiving a pair of baseball gloves donated by L.A. Dodgers slugger Shohei Ohtani from the school master, then playing catch ball.
An abundance of nature, and comfy, affordable living are what those images try to exude to residents that still are evacuating in other areas of Japan and out-of-towners to move into Tomioka, the town that lost nearly 95 percent of pre-disaster population – and still not bouncing back.
Decreasing fish catches
A fisherman and his wife were scrubbing the hull of their 4-year-old fishing boat ashore the Yuriage fisheries harbor, about 50 kilometers north of Tomioka. It was lunchtime and they were munching on ‘onigiri’ rice balls – instead of sashimi raw fish they used to catch in abundance while at sea. That was before the 2011 earthquake-tsunami-nuclear power meltdown disaster. Their life changed dramatically after the great trembler.
The fisherman, who looked to be in his 60s, told me: ‘Everything changed after the earthquake: Fish catch has plummeted. Now I can barely make ends meet doing this that I have inherited from my parents, grandparents and grand-grandparents.’ He thinks his predecessors had been fishing in Yuriage for hundreds of years.
He had to have his Seiryo-maru’ fishing boat newly built because its predecessor was irreversibly damaged by the March 2011 tsunami. He is still paying for the new ship that he bought for close to half a million dollars. If he is to build the same boat now, the cost would be three times, he said.
By regulations of the fisheries gilt he belongs to (a mandate for all fishermen in his area), he can set off to sea only 3 to 4 days a week and the variety fish he can catch is strictly limited. So on a typical day, his catch per cruise is barely a large fishery bucket-full. He is not allowed to sell his catch directly to consumers and local grocers. Instead he takes the bucket to the market in the harbor to be auctioned off by the local fisheries gilt. ‘I have become a salaried worker at sea,’ he lamented wryly.
Tourists are back
Half a mile away from his harbor is the Yuriage Minato (harbor) Asaichi (morning market), its more than 50 tiny shops and restaurants bustling with tourists scurrying about the alleys for local goodies. The market holds twice-weekly bidding auctions for fish to vegetables participated by visitors.
About a mile inland, a similar eat-in and shopping mall, Kawaterasu Yuriage, competes with the Yuriage Minato Asaichi for customers. Both places seem to be drawing increasing numbers of customers despite the COVID pandemic.
The scene challenges the fisherman’s somber mumbling, raising questions as to what he told me was an isolated case and the tsunami-radiation-affected 500 kilo coastal line is drawing residents back. One plausible explanation for the two places’ vibrancy is that Japan is currently in the midst of an unprecedented tourism boom. In 2023, 25 million foreign tourists visited Japan, a 6.5 time surge, though the figure still was below the pre-Covid pandemic level of 32.8 million. Japanese people also are traveling to domestic destinations at a much faster pace than a few years ago. By 2030, foreign visitors are projected to grow to 60 million.
Rural areas
Visit to rural areas of Fukushima show different pictures from the briskness of tourist spots. Iidate village, which was reopened to residents and visitors in 2017, shows little sign of residents coming back after generous subsidies for home repairs and farming had been phased down over years. The village has 1,500 registered residents as of April 1, 2024, which seems to be peak population and decreasing gradually for months corresponding to population aging and small child births.
In Iidate, many houses along major roads look new or freshly painted. Eerie quietness prevails over those houses as there are hardly any parked cars, the only means of moving, and no barking of dogs or people’s conversations.
A middle-aged lady caretaker of Yamatsumi Shrine, the village’s popular tourist spot, said the number of visitors to the shrine with rare paintings of dozens of foxes on its ceilings has been limited. ‘The reason why some visitors come to this place is that television stations showed the fox paintings on the ceiling,’ she said.
Will the foxes beckon residents that still are evacuating in other places and tourists back to this village that has hardly any tourist attractions, tasty food or temples and shrines except Yamatsumi Shrine? One thing the village has to offer: total serenity, the great nature, and nothingness.
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