“What’s it like now?”

After our trip, when I’ve mentioned to people that I’ve been in Japan recently, they often express surprise and curiosity. Since Americans tend to think of Japan as a very small country (which is true, speaking in relative terms of geography) and since the media was flooded with images of the destruction caused by the earthquake and tsunami, perhaps it is easy to assume that the entire country is dealing with the catastrophe. This is untrue in some ways–in the ways that people are probably thinking–but true in other ways.

The damage from the earthquake and tsunami was widespread, unprecedented, catastrophic, and tragic. It will take many years to clean up and rebuild the affected areas, many communities will never be the same; some are gone altogether. However, not all of Japan was damaged. This Wikipedia article has a good deal of information, including detailed maps, but the point is that much of Japan was simply not affected by the seismic events. Kyoto, located far south and west of the epicenter, is undamaged.

I’ve heard from friends, NHK, and our travel agency that Tokyo is basically back to normal also. There are of course lingering concerns with the situation at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, but the plant is more stable now than it was in the first few weeks immediately after it was damaged, and the odds of it posing a health risk to anyone in Tokyo are extremely low. The U.S. State Department reduced their advisories on April 14; now the advisory essentially says it’s probably smart to not get closer than 50 miles to the plant, but other than that there’s no reason not to travel to Japan and all U.S. government employees and their dependents are free to return. In retrospect we probably could have stuck to our original itinerary and started our vacation in Tokyo, but we had only a narrow window a few days after the quake in which to change our plans, and at that time things were less stable than they are now.

However, it would be untrue to say that the areas of Japan that were not directly damaged are unaffected. Japan is facing a huge economic challenge as a result of the disasters. The direct costs are obvious. Quoting Wikipedia, “estimates of the cost of the damage range well into the tens of billions of US dollars”. The indirect costs are harder to calculate: lost jobs, lost employees, lost family members, and so on. The loss that was most immediately visible to us was the loss of tourism. Japan is a popular tourist destination and with tourists comes money. We’ve seen reports on the news that some shops in Tokyo–shops that we recognized and have visited–are reporting a drop in business of 70 to 90% relative to last year. (It’s important to consider that the disaster hit right at the beginning of the sakura season, one of the favorite seasons for visiting Japan.)

Kyoto at first seemed just as busy as ever, but Tracie soon pointed out that there were very few Westerners to be seen. Our friend Sid works as a private guide for English-speaking tourists; that’s how we met him in the first place. He is retired from his career and works as a guide because he enjoys showing his country to visitors. He told us that all of his engagements for this year have been cancelled. While this is not a problem for him financially, he observed that he knows many other guides for whom the loss of business is a serious hardship.

I spoke to one of the hotel employees, a young woman who helped us with our bags, on the day we left. I mentioned that the hotel seemed fairly busy; she said yes, it was busy right now because it was springtime, but compared to previous years business was much slower, and that there have been many, many cancellations for the year as a whole. She reflected that, while the hotel was “doing okay”, she would probably not get her yearly bonus.

If you think for a minute about the ripple effect of a hotel porter in Kyoto not getting her yearly bonus, and hence not spending as much money as she might normally, or a private guide being put out of work, and then think more broadly about all of the employees at all of the hotels, and all of the other people who are employed at least partly by tourism, you can see how a decline in tourism will have a much greater effect on the nation’s economy than can be measured easily.

It’s a great time to visit Japan, because Japan needs your help. If you’ve been considering a trip but are now unsure in the wake of the disasters, don’t be afraid. There is plenty to see and do in Japan in areas that are physically unaffected by the disaster. Japan is just as beautiful and welcoming as it was on our previous four visits. (Putting it to a fine point, the areas that are damaged are areas we’ve never visited at all.) You will be welcomed as warmly as always, and maybe even a bit more warmly because your presence will be appreciated even more than usual. Sid told me this in email after our return: “Please tell your friends that Japan is strongly endeavoring to restore and other parts of Japan are as safe as ever.”

To answer the question, “what’s it like now?”: it is beautiful, magical, fascinating, just as it has always been to me, and always will be.