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Travel News 2021 saw record low in foreign visitors

thomas

Unswerving cyclist
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In 2021, the number of foreign visitors to Japan dropped to 245,900, the lowest ever recorded since 1964, when relevant data became available.

Not that I mind, but compared to pre-pandemic days, encountering other foreign residents has turned into a rare occurrence. :)

The figure plunged 94.0% from 2020, the sharpest fall on record, the Japan Tourism Agency said. Compared with the pre-pandemic level in 2019, it dropped 99.2%. Monthly arrivals were highest in July at 51,055 due to visitors related to the Tokyo Olympics, held from July 23 to Aug. 8. As the Paralympic Games were held from Aug. 24 to Sept. 5, a total of 25,916 travelers entered the country in August. The events were held without spectators to prevent coronavirus infections. Since then, the figure has been on a downward trend, falling to 12,100 in December, down 79.4% from a year earlier. By country, the largest number of travelers came from China at 42,300, down 96.0%. Those from Vietnam came in second at 26,500, down 82.6%, followed by 20,000 from the United States, down 90.9%, and 19,000 from South Korea, down 96.1%. The government had aimed to welcome 40 million foreign visitors in 2020 when the country was originally scheduled to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, but the Summer Games were postponed for a year due to the pandemic. The government has maintained its target of attracting 60 million visitors from abroad in 2030. But Koichi Wada, who heads the agency, said during a news conference that he could not predict at the moment whether that is an attainable goal. The number of Japanese traveling overseas in 2021 also decreased 83.9% to 512,200.

 
In 2021, the number of foreign visitors to Japan dropped to 245,900, the lowest ever recorded since 1964, when relevant data became available.

Not that I mind, but compared to pre-pandemic days, encountering other foreign residents has turned into a rare occurrence. :)



Have any foreign Japanese residents noticed any changes in the attitudes of Japanese people toward them? I've been getting more of the dumb and parochial "nihongo ga o-jozu desu ne!" comments recently when I've been doing such mundane feats as writing my own address. The last time it happened was at a small post office I regularly go to and where the staff must know I do business with Japanese people and have a kid going to a local Japanese school from the content I send. I ended up snapping "Do you think foreigners can't write their own address?", which caused a lot of hasty backpedalling by the clerk with a look of panic in her eyes. Perhaps I shouldn't have, but it gets too much now and then.

It does increasingly feel that I'm in an isolated backwater of the world, even though I'm a 20 minute train ride from Shinjuku.
 
Have any foreign Japanese residents noticed any changes in the attitudes of Japanese people toward them?

Just a bit more curiosity and astonishment than pre-pandemic. I have never been bothered by the nihongo ga jozu comments because I am painfully aware that they are just flattering, lol.
 
Just a bit more curiosity and astonishment than pre-pandemic. I have never been bothered by the nihongo ga jozu comments because I am painfully aware that they are just flattering, lol.
Maybe the people mean well but, really, the idea of praising an adult with normal cognitive function for demonstrating basic literacy is ridiculous.
 
I have never seen it as an insult to my intelligence. To me, it's mere politeness and perhaps a clumsy way of striking up a conversation with someone they fear might not have the conversational abilities of a toddler. I am more offended by those train passengers who deliberately choose not to sit next to me when given a choice (though I appreciate the extra space :) ).
 
Have any foreign Japanese residents noticed any changes in the attitudes of Japanese people toward them? I've been getting more of the dumb and parochial "nihongo ga o-jozu desu ne!" comments recently when I've been doing such mundane feats as writing my own address. The last time it happened was at a small post office I regularly go to and where the staff must know I do business with Japanese people and have a kid going to a local Japanese school from the content I send. I ended up snapping "Do you think foreigners can't write their own address?", which caused a lot of hasty backpedalling by the clerk with a look of panic in her eyes. Perhaps I shouldn't have, but it gets too much now and then.

It does increasingly feel that I'm in an isolated backwater of the world, even though I'm a 20 minute train ride from Shinjuku.

I can understand the irritation. Chances are, though, that many of the foreigners she comes across in her job actually can't write their own address. Anyway you should have taken the opportunity to inform her that you are able to use chopsticks as well. Just so as to leave no doubts. :D
 
Lothor said:
It does increasingly feel that I'm in an isolated backwater of the world, even though I'm a 20 minute train ride from Shinjuku.
I'm a 15-minute train ride from Shinjuku, and honestly, I haven't noticed any difference at all with the pandemic. If anything, I feel like I get less of this, which makes sense because any non-Japanese in Japan at the moment is likely to be a long-timer/permanent resident rather than a tourist. (Though honestly, I feel like haven't gotten much of it in the past ten years or so, which I attribute mostly to me getting comfortable in my own skin and showing more confidence in my interactions.)

Lothor said:
Maybe the people mean well but, really, the idea of praising an adult with normal cognitive function for demonstrating basic literacy is ridiculous.

thomas said:
I have never seen it as an insult to my intelligence. To me, it's mere politeness and perhaps a clumsy way of striking up a conversation with someone they fear might not have the conversational abilities of a toddler. I am more offended by those train passengers who deliberately choose not to sit next to me when given a choice (though I appreciate the extra space :) ).

I agree with thomas. It's annoying but rarely mean-spirited, just a conversation filler. I haven't really gotten the train thing either, lately. Compared to when I came to Japan in 1999 for study abroad and I remember people at an izakaya actually rearranging their seating positions when I came in (e.g. nervously muttering to each other that the person with the highest TOEIC score should sit next to the foreigner) I feel like there's a lot less of this in general in Japan these days, because Japanese-speaking foreigners are less of a curiosity.

That said, I don't necessarily blame people who do react this way, because to be honest, there are a lot of foreigners in Japan (especially tourists, but including some long-timers too), who can't speak/read Japanese particularly well.

Not to get too dismissive of it, but compared to the actual discrimination that minorities face in the United States, for example (being told to "go back to their country" despite the fact that many of them were born and raised in America, etc.), whatever "racism" white people face in Japan is both (1) extremely mild, and (2) not actually baseless, as many Japanese people (especially older types) have definitely met foreigners who can't communicate meaningfully in Japanese, refuse to eat certain types of Japanese food, etc. etc.

When I do come across more ignorant types, rather than getting all offended by it, I just do my best to demonstrate that I don't fall into whatever preconceptions they might have, and it's worked pretty well for me. The (rare) individual who is so closed-minded that they can't get around that at all probably isn't worth my time.
 
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Thanks for the comments. Even as I was writing the posts, I was conscious that what I have experienced is nothing on what, say, many Black people have experienced in my own country.

However, the drip feed of 'othering' by government policies, the media and people in places like the post office has been getting me down and I felt like venting a bit.
 
Oh, don't get me wrong. I didn't mean to imply that you were overstating things (just making a general point), and I certainly don't blame you for wanting to vent. When particularly egregious examples of that sort of "othering" happen, it's only human to get frustrated.

I just try to remember that some people can't help themselves, and take solace that my presence is helping (at least in some small way) to open minds by providing evidence that not all foreigners fit into certain stereotypes.
 
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