Inside Japan’s War on Tourism…
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Japan is fighting back against tourists.
Small towns across the Japanese countryside are being overtaken by foreign visitors who discovered them through TikTok and Instagram, and the results have been chaotic. In Fujiyoshida, a quiet residential city at the base of Mount Fuji in Yamanashi Prefecture, the tension between tourists and locals has reached a boiling point. The city built a giant net to block the famous Lawson convenience store Mount Fuji photo spot. They cancelled their beloved cherry blossom Sakura festival entirely. And still the tourists keep coming.
But the reality on the ground is more complicated than the internet would have you believe. Yes, tourists are jaywalking on narrow residential streets, loitering in people’s front yards, and seemingly ignoring basic social rules that Japanese locals take seriously. But are foreign visitors really the villains here, or is this a deeper failure of the Japanese government to distribute tourism evenly across a country that has hundreds of equally beautiful, equally worthy destinations that almost nobody visits?
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Stay home you fools Japan is sick of your mindless antics🎉
They could've built some useful anti-tourist architecture (to help the local residents around that lawson), but instead they built useless 0.5 meter guardrails. Japan and it's usual half-hearted measures. lol
I love it, and am traveling around here again, but I avoid these garbage places like the plague. It's just…wank. Selfish people that want to put it on social media, to say and feel like 'they did it too'. Bad parents with kids in these clips, too. Unlike you Paahtis, I'm fine throwing the tourists under the bus. 😀
The owner of that Lawson is making bank too. So it's obvious he doesn't want to do anything to change that.
Good vid, man.
I lived in Japan from 1986 until 2022. Good times. Now I don't think so. It seems also the Chinese tourists are the worst offenders for littering and generally behaving like morons. I think the only way to reduce these problems is for the police to more proactive in cracking down on the most egregious offenders
Hiton makee! Täähä on kunno dokumentti-tasosta kamaa! 💪🏻💪🏻💪🏻
The problem is too many tour groups going to the same places at the same time.
Japan needs to limit how many tourists can visit small towns a day and they need to promote spreading tourists around, especially to places where local infrastructure is better equipped to handle that many tourists.
ゴミを捨てるのはまだマシな方で、中国人が民家にトイレを借りに来たり、酷いと庭で排尿したりするのだぞ
The problem is that the government is completely inept at actually promoting places and has no idea how to direct consumer demand. This tourism boom is happening DESPITE their best efforts…
Amazing video ❤️ If I ever travel to Japan I will go where there is the least tourists that is for suuuure! I hate making others uncomfortable and i haaaate overcrowding
From a fellow Hikkikomori with Asperger's I feel your awkwardness and discomfort at being around thousands of people in these kind of places.
Photos already exist online of these locations. What’s the point of the asking your own photo?
the whole situation around japan makes me feel bad about wanting to go and I just shouldnt have to feel like that :/ I wish other tourists werent so ignorant
Yuppies are awful.
Entitled people are parasites.
Thank you, social media, for ruining yet another great thing.
11:39 "cayoto"??? is this muppet referring to kyoto??? my god. get your fucking pronunciation right. and that "bamboo forest" is arashiyama FFS. at least know how to pronounce the places you're going to.
The biggest problem with tourism in Japan isnt neccesarily the number of tourists, but rather the number of inconsiderate tourists that think they are the only ones in existence!!! There were a number of good examples of such fucking idiots in your video.
Wasn't this place always popular, the problem is probably the overtourism ?
ok, Japan wants all this tourism money but they don't want to add trash cans and toilets so the tourists can even TRY to do the right thing, such as putting trash in trash cans and not defecating in people's gardens. Japan knows there are millions of people passing down that street. Even A.) prohibit non-residents from using the street at all, or B.) add basic human dignity features like trash cans, toilets, water fountains, etc. I have been to this Lawson in the off season and the only available (and findable) toilet for any tourist to take a dump was at Lawsons, and that is obviously not sustainable. Then there's the train station restroom, but Japan is definitely not trying to make peace with the tourists whom they seem perfectly happy to take tourist dollars from.
So are most of the tourism domestic or foreign? It's hard to tell. I'm guessing mostly from China but I might be wrong.
Congrats, they inconvenienced and pissed off dozens of locals, to take a shitty picture, that's just like every other picture of that spot. Social media did irrevwrsible damage to our frontal lobes.
Cultural differences is no excuse for having basic human decency. Culture is no excuse to act like dick, trespass or juts be rude in general.
Some cultures are better than others, that is just a fact.
When you are the center of your world with a lack of regard for those around you, one needs to question if it is the fault of your upbringing or culture.
Great video and as lovely as the views are, I would rather visit somewhere not over populated by tourists.
I was just here for 3 days, 2 nights last Dec 22-24, 2025 in this Kawaguchiko Station and Shimoyoshida Station area in Mt Fuji and everything that has been documented here in this video in these areas are exactly the same situation I experienced. This is not the Japan I fell in love with last 2009. This is why I am now frequently traveling to the Tohoku Region, Gunma etc, and later this year Tottori and Wakayama as well… as other least known areas in Japan still maintained its sanity. Actually I was in Iwate last April 1 before the Sankiru Coast earthquake and forest fires happened.
When we visited in September it was quite relaxed
Taiwan is the Japan you were looking for.
I understand the frustration, but to try and shut it down without providing a spot for the tourists to do tourist things doesn't make much sense. Just seems a little like getting the middle finger instead of "Here's a solution to the problem".
Tourists will always be like flock of sheep. And if you are going to Japan or to any country, just respect and follow their rules and ways – that's the thing about being a guest. Genuinely good journalism Paathis, hyvää! 😀
11:40 "We went to, umm. Kayoto.. to that Bamboo forest..". weirdest way I have ever heard someone say Kyoto.. and thats after they were there…
Wow it's almost as if they should build facilities to handle the amount of tourists that want to visit the most famous and popular place in Japan. Not like puting up a black screen is going to stop anyone flying 10 hours to see Mt. Fuji and the iconic Lawson and take their photo there…
To give people an idea of how locals view this, practically everything about Japanese etiquette is designed to eliminate inconveniences for others and maintain harmony for all. So imagine what Japanese people think when they see masses of tourists breaking all the social norms that are ingrained since childhood.
Love the boots on the ground journalism! Subbed