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Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

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Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#361

Post by EasyMark »

pj_mukh wrote: post #217
4fterd4rk wrote: post #4

It's like The Bear. Ohhhhh no I've opened a restaurant and now there are customers aaaaahhhhh this is horrible ahhhhhhhh

Yea this was major de-growther vibes to me. A couple of small businesses getting swamped just means you don't have enough small businesses. It's true that generally there aren't enough small businesses. I'd like our productivity gains to free up people to pursue their weird jazz-coffee bar fantasies and start more businesses. That's a better world to me than the the one OP is trying to get us to retreat to. There's l…

I kind of assumed "tourists are crowding me out of my favorite spaces so this must be true everywhere" which is a lot easier to assume than prove.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#363

Post by raincole »

gtowey wrote: post #245
timr wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about the Ramen place (I can't believe that they wouldn't take cash?), but I agree with you that more places are doing this kind of "two markets" stuff -- it's even becoming official, in that now there's officially sanctioned "foreigner pricing" for certain temples, shrines, and parks. There's also Google Maps and Yelp vs. Japan's local version (pretty much any review on the former two are useless, and h…

I think it's worse than that. I'm starting to think that there may not really be an ethical way to be a tourist in a foreign country. Especially coming from a high cost of living area to a lower one. Just being there puts you in economic competition with the locals. You can spend more on everything than everyone else and that raises their costs too. Especially housing and food. Those fancy resorts take all the prime…

What a ridiculous statement... so applying for a remote job is unethical if you live in a lower cost of living area than your employer? It's only natural that people want to make money from higher cost areas and spend it elsewhere.

And this article is about Japan, a freaking island where the government has a total control over how many people are getting in...

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#364

Post by paulryanrogers »

slaw wrote: post #314
jorvi wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It literally is quite that simple. I can tell you from experience via friends and acquaintances that tourists are crushing the locals out of Barcelona and Amsterdam. And I expect the same to be true of Warsaw or Berlin. And its not just tourists. ASML has completely destroyed the housing market in the Brainport region. They're planning to hire 20.000 more people, but with The Netherlands currently being in one of the…

Barcelona has immigration problem, not tourists. The same with Warsaw and Berlin.

Meaning they've become gentrified by rich foreigners?

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#365

Post by diggan »

BobaFloutist wrote: post #249
diggan wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ok, but you're a citizen, which is a higher status than a "permanent resident." That sounds like a immigration/social hierarchy/importance rather than something that matters in discrimination contexts, what exactly you mean with "higher status"? If a bar bans non-US residents, if a US-citizen+Spanish-residency tries to enter, then it shouldn't matter if they're US citizens or not, because the criteria is residency,…

Now that I think about it a better quibble is that you probably can't get around anti-discrimination laws by posting a sign that says "No Canadians or Americans that have spent too long in Canada."

As I understand it, it'd be illegal even with just "No Canadians" because that's a "national origin" right? Instead you'd post "No Canadian Residents" and you'd be in the clear :)

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#366

Post by jacobgkau »

impendia wrote: post #200
timr wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I agree that it's a better way to travel if you can do it, but most people can't [1]. That said, even for short-term tourists, Japan used to be kind of a miracle in terms of the quality and service you would get for the money. I know it sounds like hipster whining, but that time is in the past. [1] My snobby hot-take is that if you can't travel this way you shouldn't do recreational international travel at all,…

I used to live in Japan in 1999-2001, and I was just there again for a month this summer. Anyway, I disagree with you: Japan is still a miracle in terms of the quality and service you get for the money. I saw this many times over. Perhaps not in Kyoto, or in the most touristed areas of Tokyo. Or in whatever random place got featured in some anime, or whatnot. The article mentions Yamaguchi, Toyama, Morioka, etc., and…

> Perhaps not in... whatever random place got featured in some anime, or whatnot.

When I went last year, two of the random places I went because they got featured in some anime were some of the most authentic-feeling experiences I had.

One was a small town on the east coast near a beach; a lot of it felt like a ghost town (I barely saw any locals, let alone tourists). I was able to go and respectfully visit a really nice shrine while being able to keep my distance enough that I knew I wasn't bothering anyone. I also found a cool aquarium I didn't know was there, and I'm pretty sure I was the only foreigner I saw/heard while visiting it.

The other was a less-deserted but still small area outside of a less popular city. There was an island I wanted to go onto that I couldn't, but I improvised and found a beautiful hike to a summit overlooking it instead. While I was walking up, I had at least two elderly folks say hello to me in Japanese, and a pair of young children walking with their mom say hello in English (way more unprompted interaction than I got just walking around in any of the cities, aside from employees advertising things).

So just because a place was featured in an anime doesn't mean it's necessarily a tourist trap. Just don't go in expecting the place to be entirely defined by that (and it also helps if it's been at least a few years since said anime was popular).

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#367

Post by jancsika »

paulgerhardt wrote: post #14

Missed opportunity to talk about the locals creative responses to this. One cafe in Tokyo is asking customers to leave negative reviews on Google and Trip Advisor to prevent over exposure (it mostly works but made me curious enough to visit). Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physi…

> Another specific $10 Michelin guide ramen restaurant only lets you order from a vending machine outside using a payment method you can’t access as a foreigner (one needs a physical JCB card or QUICPay - EPOS/Suica/Pasmo/Cash etc wouldn’t work).

It must be quite the character who has the discipline and drive to get a Michelin star and takes pleasure in putting giant roadblocks in front of traveling foodies. Reminds me of this elderly couple who despised kids and ran a successful toy store.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#368

Post by BlarfMcFlarf »

the_af wrote: post #350
timr wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anyway, I disagree with you: Japan is still a miracle in terms of the quality and service you get for the money. I saw this many times over. I assume you mean "relative to other places" here, and in that sense, I agree. Japan is not yet entirely Epcot Center. > Perhaps not in Kyoto, or in the most touristed areas of Tokyo. Or in whatever random place got featured in some anime, or whatnot. Right, exactly. Except th…

So is the advice "do not visit Japan, learn about it from books and the internet"? Or just pretend it doesn't exist? Maybe do the same with all other countries? The Japanese in turn do a lot of tourism abroad, to the point the "Japanese tourist" is as much a stereotype as the American one. Should they stay put and not leave their home towns?

Do what Japan desperately wants people to do, and visit any of the 95% of the country that isn’t Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Fuji, or Nara.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#369

Post by anigbrowl »

VWWHFSfQ wrote: post #70
bryanlarsen wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And a few more of the seedier bars just have a “no foreigners” sign out front. Those have existed long before tourism to Japan became common. Those signs were there when the vast majority of foreigners in Japan were English teachers and soldiers. Many tabehodai (all-you-can-eat) and most nomihodai (all-you-can-drink) places had them.

> no foreigners It's such a contrast to USA, where I doubt that such a thing would even be legal. And also the bit about no tattoos. That's lawsuit city.

You could totally bar people with tattoos from your business in teh USA. You'd be unpopular given their prevalence, but you would be on oslid legal ground.

Re: Overtourism in Japan, and how it hurts small businesses

#370

Post by typewithrhythm »

m_a_g wrote: post #239
cedws wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My home country, the UK, has already been through this cultural erosion which is why I respect Japan's right to defend its own. London in particular has become a place for everybody and at the same time for nobody. It's a city of people of different values and wavelengths with very little shared strata compared with Tokyo.

London isn’t an example of cultural erosion—the pie has simply grown. The same applies to New York. Diverse cultures enrich London; they add to it rather than diminish it.

Absolutely absurd. Why is it people feel the need to make out that western cities are somehow magically immune from the exact same detrimental effects that they happily accept about everywhere else?

"Enrichment" is a buzzword for the insulated elite happy that they have new things on their lunch menu, somehow ignoring all the negatives that come with it.

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