The Incredibly Shrinking Nation

   In 2004 Japan’s population peaked at 127.8 million people[1]. Because the fertility rate[2] in Japan has remained far below the 2.2 or so needed to maintain a population, the population has been falling steadily. If nothing changes, the population of Japan is predicted to fall to less than 90 million by the year 2055.

   While the nation anxiously wrings its hands, I have to ask what to me seems like an obvious question: is this really a problem?

   Personally, I think there are far too many people in this crowded country and population decline ought to be not only welcomed, but celebrated as one of the successes of a modern society. If you go to nationmaster.com and have a look at the birth rates, you’ll find that Japan is fourth from the bottom, down there with Macau and Hong Kong, two of the worlds most densely populated places.[3] The countries with the highest birthrates are, not surprisingly, poor, less developed, and predominately African ones.

   Now, I realize that with population decline comes a number of seemingly knotty issues, such as how the pension system will be funded, and so on.[4] But, on the whole, I think the demographic change provides far more opportunities than it does challenges. (The same can be said about last year’s massive earthquake and tsunami. I’ll write more about this later.)

   While the population of Japan as a whole has been in decline for the past eight years, you might be surprised to learn that cities like Fukuoka have grown steadily.

   When I first moved to Fukuoka in 1993, the city had a population of 1.246 million people. Since then, the population has increased and stands at 1.443 people today. The foreign community has doubled from 12,621 in 1993 to 24,555 in 2011.

   What is the cause of this growth? One theory (my own) ascribes the increase to the comparatively large number of attractive women in the Fukuoka, the so-called Hakata Bijin (博多美人, “Hakata Beauty”), which has eager men flocking to the city in droves.[5] Others point more correctly to kasoka (過疎化), or the depopulation of towns and villages as people pull up stakes and move to the cities where there are better-paying jobs and more opportunities. 

   Out of curiosity, I looked into the demographics of Iizuka, that oft-maligned (mostly by me) city to the northwest of Fukuoka, to see how the population had changed over the years. I was surprised to see that although the city’s population was down from a high of 140,463 people in 1995, it was still higher than in the decades following the end of the war when the mines were still giving up plenty of coal and jobs abounded. I guess having a powerful politician fighting for your cause—in this case former Prime Minister Tarô Aso—does have its benefits, if not plenty of pork barrel. The city is today home to one of the campuses of Kyûkôdai (九工大, Kyûshû Institute of Technology).

   Fukuoka, though, has much more going for it, which might explain why so many people from throughout the Kyûshû-Okinawa region relocate here. That might also explain why for several years running Fukuoka has been chosen by a number of magazines, including Monocle, as one of the world’s best cities. (Personally, I think that’s going a little too far. It is a nice place, but one of the world’s best? C’mon, who ya kiddin’?)[6]

---

[1] Numbers vary. The Japanese language site gave the above figure. Another English language site had the population at 128.1 million in 2010.

[2] The fertility rate refers to the average number of children born to women throughout their reproductive years. The fertility rate, which was 3.65 in 1950, fell to 1.91 in 1975. It stands around 1.37 today.

[3] Japan is the 38th most densely populated country in the world.

[4] I will discuss this so-called problem in the next post.

[5] Many young women will disagree with this, claiming that the city doesn’t have many men. They’ll even argue that there are eight women for every available man. I don’t know where this statistic comes from, but I’ve heard it again and again over the years. Funny, but the two single women who first told me of this imbalance have moved to Tôkyô where—surprise, surprise—they remain single.

[6] I often joke that “Fukuoka is a nice place to live, but you wouldn’t want to visit it”. There just isn’t that much for tourists to do and see. 

Snow!

Kiri

   And while I'm on the topic of things being shrouded, most of northern Kyûshû was blanketed in a thick fog a week ago Sunday. It started to roll in just after one in the afternoon and by evening most of the city was enveloped in it.

   In spite of Fukuoka's proximity to the sea and being surrounded on all sides by reasonably high mountains, fog is a rare occurrence. I'm no meteorologist, so I won't venture any guesses as to why this is so. I will, however, offer this up as an another example of how oddly the weather has been acting lately.

   We had an unusually chilly, dry April. But just as people started to worry about the level of water in the local dams, the weather changed lickety-split. Within a matter of days, we were soon experiencing weather more typical of the late rainy season in mid July: it was unbearably hot and humid, and, as a friend put it, wetter than an otter's pocket.

   I heard that the Kanmon Straits which separates the island of Kyûshû from Honshû, was closed to shipping as the thickness of the fog made it impossible to navigate the waters safely. Would like to have gotten some shots of it.  

Kôsa

 

   When composing a haiku, a poet must not only write three lines consisting of five, seven, and five on (syllables), but include a seasonal reference, known as kigo. Typical kigo for spring include, of course, the cherry blossoms for which Japan is famous, frogs, the Japanese bush-warbler, and so on. Haiku poets when stumped for a suitable kigo for their poems often consult a saijiki (歳時記), which offers an extensive list of word that give the reader a true sense of the season. 

   Permit me to offer up a new kigo for the times we live in: kôsa (literally, yellow sand).

   Also known as Asian dust, the yellow sands are kicked up by dust storms occurring in Mongolia and northern China and carried by the prevailing winds as far away as Japan where they can turn the sun into an angry white dot in the gray sky and cover everything with a fine yellow dust resembling pollen.

   In recent years, these sand storms have grown both more frequent and more intense. A little over a week ago, visibility was cut to less than five-hundred yards. The mountains outside my office window shrouded behind a thick veil of dust.

   It's believed that desertification in China and Russia as well as an increase in industrial pollutants in China are to blame for the worsening storms which, in addition to bringing dust also carry sulfur, industrial heavy metals, carcinogens, viruses, bacteria, fungi, pesticides, asbestos, and a host of other nasty particles to our shores. Not very encouraging news when you're raising children. 

Tenjin Tremblin'

   This is something I wrote for a local magazine five years ago we we had our own earthquake drama:

   I thought Fukuoka wasn't supposed to have earthquakes. Tectonic growing pains were other prefecture's problems, not ours. That, of course, was until Palm Sunday's M7.0 tremor.

   I was at a friend's condo in Momochihama when the quake hit, and, faithful to my grade school drilling, ran for cover. Oddly enough, I was the only one to do so. Several minutes later, NHK confirmed both the obvious--it had been huge, the largest in living memory--and the not so obvious--it's epicenter was along a previously unknown fault. I wonder how many other seismic surprises are in store for Japan.

   Once the fear of tsunami had been allayed, I started to head home. Here and there muddy water shot up through the ground, making me question the intelligence of erecting so many high-rises on such freshly reclaimed land. Across the Hii River, both the Sea Hawk Hotel and Yahoo Dome had been evacuated. Thousands milled about nervously, many trying in vain to contact loved ones with their virtually useless cellphones.

   With traffic into town paralyzed, I had little choice but to walk. The nearer I got, the more alarming the damage--cracks in the roads and sidewalks, shards of glass and wall tiles everywhere, and buildings rattled violently at their foundation. Though my building in Daimyo appeared at first to have escaped the worst, I was shocked when I opened the front door.

   Everything was in disarray. Cabinets had been toppled, their contents smashed to bits, and a pond of water was spreading across the floor. After locating the source of the leak--my washer and dryer unit had also fallen over, dislodging the hose from the faucet in the wall--I turned the water off and hurried over to another apartment I had in Kego.

   With massive cracks in the walls, an elevator wrenched free of the upper floors and broken tiles littering the halls, the three-year-old building looked practically uninhabitable. Even if it were, my shaken neighbors were too frightened to return, a good number of them would move out entirely.

   Back in Daimyo, it would be another hour before I could finally get through to my niece who was marooned with her boyfriend outside the Tenjin Bus Center. Aside from the self-evident fact that an earthquake had brought the city to a standstill, the two were clueless. Not speaking Japanese, they were also victims of a dearth of information accessible to them. They were not alone. Apparently, in the hours following the earthquake when accurate information was critical, Love FM was flying the airways on auto-pilot. For a radio station established ostensibly to serve as a reliable lifeline for foreigners, broadcasting canned music during such a crisis is a sobering reminder of how conditional love can be when it's needed.

   Later as I was putting my home in order and taking an inventory of the loss, the battle-ax who had a room below mine came to my door and ordered me to follow her downstairs.

   In her apartment I was greeted a group of humorless old biddies who glared at me. Above their heads was a ceiling that was leaking like a sieve. They wanted to know something that had also been on my mind: was I insured?

   "Yes, yes, of course, I'm insured."

   I had no choice in that matter when I rented the apartment. But, covered for earthquakes? Well, like 85% of Fukuokans I would learn later that afternoon that I wasn't. I should have known better. The insurance business is a not-so distant cousin of the protection racket. Those friendly insurance salesmen peddle confidence and security, but when you try to get them to actually pay up, they become suspiciously self protective. The lucky 15% of people in the city who were indeed covered might expect to recoup a measly five percent of the damage. While I've managed to be philosophical about my own loss, the battle-ax downstairs hasn't been as magnanimous.

   Sleep was out of the question that first night, fitful at best that entire week, thanks to the aftershocks which did a splendid job keeping me sharp. The nausea and migraines influenced by these not so subtle reminders that the earth was indeed alive and kicking made me feel as if I were paddling across the Pacific in a leaky swan boat.

   The next afternoon, an army of police with the media in tow descended upon Daimyo and began cordoning off the streets and evacuating tenants from their buildings. When I asked an officer why, I was politely told to shove off because it was dangerous. Not very helpful. A sign at the entrance of my building issued a dire warning: an unspecified building was threatening to collapse. All tenants were ordered to take refuge at the local elementary school. Not wanting my miserable puss to be broadcast on national TV like those unfortunate residents of Genkai Island, I chose to camp out at a friend's instead until the evacuation order was lifted several days later.

   All in all, I'd say Fukuoka got lucky this time. Inclement weather and timing alone could have made the situation far worse. With a large earthquake along the Kego fault no longer a question of if but when, let's hope that the public and private sector will then use this opportunity to prepare for future catastrophe.

Yoko

After a dessert of chilled amanatsu, jelly served in the half peel of the summer orange it was made from, Abazuré says she has to return to the office. Several others take the opening my boss has given them to say they, too, have to hurry home before their children come back from elementary school. So, I'm left alone with Shizuko and our hostess, Yoko. As Shizuko fills my choko with reishu sake, Yoko brings in a basket of cherries she says arrived from Yamagata just this morning.

"Did you try the sashimi, Peador?" Yoko asks placing a handful of cherries on my plate.

"Uh, no, I didn't."

"It's out of this world," she says. "Very fresh."

"I'm sure it is," I say.

"Where did you buy it, Shizuko?"

"I didn't. It was a gift from one of my husband's patients."

"You really must try it, Peador," Yoko insists, reaching for a fresh plate behind her.

"Please, I'm fine. I . . . I've really had quite a lot to eat already."

"Mottainai. What a waste. C'mon, just a little."

"It's, um . . . It's just that . . . " Should I tell her I'm allergic? That I am a vegetarian? No, that won't work; I've been eating meat all afternoon. On a Friday, no less. Religion? Nah, the only religious bone I have in my body is the asadachi (morning woody) I stroke reverently every morning. "I'm afraid I'm not that crazy about sashimi."

Yoko wags her finger at me. "Tsk, tsk. You'll never be able to marry a Japanese woman, Peador."

"Oh? And why's that?"

She takes a long sip from her wine glass leaving a dark red smudge on the rim before speaking. "I don't think two people can be truly happy together unless they grow up eating the same food. I know a couple. Oh, you know him, Shizuko, what's his name? The Canadian . . . " she says snapping her fingers as if to conjure him up.

"John," Shizuko says. "John Williams. Works at Kyûshû University."

"Yes, well, John married a Japanese girl," Yoko continues. "When he met the family for the first time, they served him sashimi. They asked, 'John-san, can you eat sashimi?' And of course he says, he loves sashimi, but actually he couldn't stand fish. Like you, Peador."

"I didn't say I . . . "

"So, the poor girl's parents think 'Yokatta, he's just like a Japanese!' After the marriage, though, this John won't eat a bite of fish and, yappari, now they're getting divorced." Keiko takes another long drink, leaving another red smudge on the rim of the glass. "No, if you don't eat the same food, you'll have all kinds of problems. And that's why foreigners and Japanese don't get along well. I mean, if they can't eat the same food, how do they expect to be able to do anything together, desho?"

She concludes her argument as she often does with a smug look and a broad sweep of her hand slicing through any disagreement.

After all I've eaten and drunk, I don't have the energy to argue. Besides, people like Yoko, who love dominating conversations, tend not to listen to anything but their own sweet voices.

"I really like these hashi oki," I say to myself. "I didn't know you could see fireflies around here."

"You know, international marriages are bound to fail because the cultures are so different," Shizuko says. "You know that JAL pilot, Barker-san, don't you?"

"Oh, yes," Yoko says putting her wine glass down. "I had him and his wife, the poor girl, over last week." You get the feeling Yoko's home is in a perpetual state of hospitality, inviting and feeding guests, then assuring them to come again. Once gone, however, they become the fodder for that red-lipsticked, tirelessly booming cannon of hers.

She picks up a cherry, removes the stem with her long bony fingers then sucks it into the venomous red hole in her gaunt face. "I didn't tell you, Shizuko, but while Barker-san and my husband were out getting a massage, I talked with his wife. The poor girl said she didn't know what to do with him. 'He always wants to do something on his day off . . . go out, jog or hike . . . All I want to do is stay home and rest.' And just as the poor girl was sighing, Barker-san and my husband came back. And Barker, he went right up to his wife, gave her a big hug and kiss and said, 'We're so happy together!'" Yoko fills my choko with more sake, and shakes her head. "I felt so sorry for her."

"So, the fireflies,” I say. “Know any good places I can see them around here?"

"The problem with young people today," Shizuko says with contempt, "is that they want to marry for love."

This surprises me enough to bring me back into the conversation, and I ask Shizuko if she loves her husband. The two women laugh at me, making me feel foolish for asking. I didn’t know the question was so silly.

"Love," Shizuko scoffs. "Tell me, Peador, why do half of all Americans get divorced?"

I could offer her a number of reasons. Many really. But, I'm really not in the mood to go head to head with these two half-drunk, half-bitter housewives.

"It's very important to know the person you're marrying," Shizuko warns. "Love confuses you."

"Do you want to marry a Japanese girl?" Yoko asks me.

"I haven't given it much thought, to be honest. Anyways, marriage isn't the object. It's the result. If I find someone I love, who also happens to be Japanese, who knows? Maybe I'll marry her."

"You'll never be able to marry one," Yoko says refilling my choko. "You have to eat miso and rice and soy sauce as a child."

Maybe I'm blind or a sentimental dolt, but, somehow, I just cannot accept the idea that what went wrong between Mie and myself was rooted in my dislike of sashimi.

"Everyone wants to marry someone funny and cheerful," Yoko continues, spilling a drop of wine onto her linen tablecloth. "Tsk, tsk . . . She's cheerful but she couldn't cook if her life depended upon it. She buys everything from the convenience store and puts it in the microwave. Ching! Boys want girls that are fun, but they don't understand that what they really need is a wife who can cook real food and take care of children. Young people these days!"

 It was almost as if she was speaking specifically about Mie. My Mie who woke early in one morning, and walked in her pajamas to the nearest convenience store to get something for our bento. She wasn't as hopeless as Yoko might contend; she fried the chicken herself, then packed our lunches and bags before I had even gotten out of bed. When I finally stopped knitting my nightly dream, put down my needles and woke up, everything for our day at the beach had been prepared.

"It's a shame what some of the mothers fix for their children at the International School. My daughter used to trade her tempura that I woke early to make because she felt sorry for her friends. They were eating sandwiches!"

It was an outrage.

When I woke, Mie was gently stroking my head. I pulled her into my arms and kissed her soft lips. She laid down upon me, legs to each side of me, then punched the remote to invite Vivaldi into bed with us. As the hot morning sun began to brighten up the room, we made love, made love throughout the Four Seasons.

Later that morning, we drove with the top of her car open, windows down and music blaring to Umi-no-Nakamichi, a long narrow strand of sand and pines that continued for several miles until it reached a small island forming the northern edge of the Hakata Bay. Pine, sand, and sea lay on either side of the derelict two-lane road. We arrived at a small inlet, which had been roped off to keep the jellyfish away and paid a few hundred yen to one of the old women running one of the umi-no-e beach houses. Passing through the makeshift hut with old tatami floors and low folding tables we walked out to the beach which was crowded with hundreds of others who had came to do the same.

By eleven the sun was burning down on us, burning indelible tans into the backs of children. The only refuge was either the crowded umi-n0-e hut or the sea, so Mie and I took a long swim, waded in each others' arms or floated on our backs in the warm, shallow water.

Although I'd eventually get such a severe sunburn that I'd lie awake at night trembling in agony, it was one of my happiest days in Japan. On the way back to Mie’s apartment with my lobster red hand resting between her tanned thighs, I sang along to the Chagé and Aska songs playing on her stereo, making her laugh the whole way.

"I love you," she'd tell me with a long kiss when we arrived back at her place.

"What men need," Yoko repeats, "is a woman who can cook and take care of the home. Someone like your Yu-chan in the office."

The absurdity of what Yoko has just said snaps me out of my daydream. Yu, grayest of gray, as cold and bitchy as they came, may make a suitable Eva Braun for an Al Hitler, but suggesting that she'd make a good wife for me, why, that was insulting.

Yoko, reading the disagreement in my face, says, "See, Yu-chan's gloomy and, well, she isn't much to look at, but she really would make a very good wife for you, Peador. You just don't know it yet."

Excerpt from A Woman's Nails. To read more here.

© Aonghas Crowe, 2010. All rights reserved. No unauthorized duplication of any kind.

注意：この作品はフィクションです。登場人物、団体等、実在のモノとは一切関係ありません。

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

A Woman's Nails is now available on Amazon's Kindle.