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A sea of people are coming towards me like a tsunami. Fashionable young girls in miniskirts and platform boots wobble along the crowded crosswalk. High rises illuminated with flashing multi-storey billboards blast advertisements through the air.
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This is Tokyo’s famous Shibuya Crossing, which is one of the busiest pedestrian crossings in the world. It feels like the heartbeat of the megacity. Being here is exciting and overwhelming, but this isn’t why I came to Japan.
“Every year, more than 800 people leave Hagi. Young people want to go to the big cities for job opportunities,” said Miyazaki Takahide, who moved to Hagi nine years ago to work at a travel agency. “Some people are moving back, but it’s an aging society. Every small town has the same problem.”
Due to the rapidly aging population and limited income opportunities, many people have had to leave Hagi and other rural communities in recent years, creating socio-economic and social issues. When Takahide moved from Kawasaki City to Hagi, the town’s population was around 50,000 people. Now it’s dropped to around 43,000.
Like many people in the coastal community known for farming, fishing and pottery, Takahide is concerned about Hagi’s shrinking population, but some residents are embracing a unique way to create purpose and income by welcoming international travellers into their homes.
According to Takahide, 22 families are currently participating in Hagi’s homestay program, where travellers stay with local farmers or elderly hosts for a cultural immersion. This is the reason my mother and I joined the G Adventures Backroads of Japan tour, which includes the two-night homestay, along with other destinations that are often overlooked by Japan’s famous cities.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I learned my mother and I would be staying with the Sasase family, who describe themselves in a one-page handout as a lively family of five plus two small dogs that start barking the moment we pull into the driveway.
“This is my rice terrace,” says the mother, Kaori, as we walk towards the single-story home located in the countryside that’s dotted with rice terraces.
Inside the home, she gives us some slippers, then takes us to the guest area – two sparsely furnished rooms lined with sliding doors that have glass on the bottom and paper on top. The floor is covered with traditional tatami mats. It’s a peaceful retreat from battling waves of people filtering through train stations in the world’s biggest city.
The Sasase family also had enough of the city when they decided to move from Shiba to Hagi in December 2023 and start a new life as farmers. Kaori’s husband Tomo wanted to “work to live, not make money.” He didn’t know how to farm before moving to Hagi, but he’s learning the necessary skills with the help of the Internet and his neighbours.
“We love nature and we are more with nature here,” says Kaori, as we feast on the pork dumplings we made with the family.
We talk about various topics, like farming and wildlife in Canada and Japan, and laugh about the differences. I show them photos of a chinook salmon I caught in a river, which causes their eyes to light up with excitement. Even the kids, who are glued to their cell phones and video games, run over to see the photo.
Learning about each other’s countries and cultures is the kind of experience every traveller craves, but can be difficult to find. A homestay in Hagi is an opportunity to see another side of Japan that isn’t easily accessible without the help of a guide.
“Local people are very friendly, but they can be hesitant to have a foreigner because they don’t know what to do. They want to welcome you; they just don’t know how,” said my G Adventures guide Takae Suzuki. “For them, it’s a good opportunity to know how you feel, how you think and your customs. It’s important to have mutual understandings.”
Tour group members Nicky Mason and her father Peter stayed with an elderly couple who couldn’t speak any English, but that didn’t matter. They passed the time drinking sake, eating sushi, trying on kimonos and learning about cultural traditions like the process of making matcha tea.
“I was a bit nervous about the homestay because I was worried about the language barrier, but once the ice was broken it was quite easy,” said Nicky. “We showed them pictures of family back home in England and they showed us pictures. There was a lot of gesturing and a lot of laughter. I feel like we really understood what was going on.”
As we leave the train station in Hagi, where our host families gathered to say goodbye, I gaze out the window and watch the repeated scene of villages, rice fields, and rugged hills whizzing by. Tiny box-shaped cars that look like toys move slowly on the roads, setting the pace of life in the far west of Honshu Island – a place that feels off the beaten path, making it one of Japan’s best-kept secrets.
If you go:
The 11-day G Adventures Backroads of Japan tour starts in Tokyo and ends in Kyoto, and includes several places in between such as Nagano, Matsumoto, Otsu, and Tottori. Highlights include Matsumoto Castle, Japanese macaque in Jigokudani National Park, and the Tottori Sand Dunes along the Sea of Japan. Transportation on the trip mainly involves trains, which provides a chance to travel like a local.