All over the world there's movement from the countryside to the city

Wait! Is that true?

I've heard about it so many times but is this really a trend?

Okay, after a bit of searching, yes!

the world is increasingly becoming urbanized

Meaning, people are moving from small villages and towns to cities

In the 2000s, for the first time

more of the world's population lived in urban areas than rural ones

In fact, all projected population growth from here on in will happen in urban areas

while growth in rural areas is set to peak soon

And then slowly decline.

There is no other large developed country

that is as far along the path to urbanization as Japan,

which has 92 percent of its population living in urban areas

And this is only set to grow in the future

Works predicted that by 2050, 95 percent of Japan's population

Will be living the urban life

To me, this begs the question - what happens to all these rural areas as populations decline

What's it like to live in the countryside or even the small cities of Japan?

With that question in my head,

I was on my way to Ehime, a small Prefecture on the smallest main island of Japan, Shikoku

Well, I actually landed in Okayama which is across the inland sea

but that's the story for future video

In this video, I talked with - My name is Sherry and I live in Matsuyama, Ehime

I'll just stop her right there

Technically, she doesn't live in Matsuyama, but in a much smaller city right on the outskirts

but that's not even the most shocking thing she was hiding

Should I say Sherry or my real name?

Yeah, your real name

Real name? Ok

Never said that on the camera

(Greg) Oh really? Okay ^

こんにちは、栞（しおり）です! (Hello, my name is Shiori)

Anyways, Sherry, or Shiori was right next to Matsuyama population five hundred and sixteen thousand

It's not exactly a tiny place

But when you're comparing it to the mega city, that is Tokyo. It feels downright provincial.

I thought it was a good starting off point for this series on rural, or in Japanese, "Inaka Japan"

For starters, let's locate Matsuyama, in relation to Tokyo

Tokyo is up here. Matsuyama is down here

Matsuyama (松山), whose name means "Pinetree Mountain", is big enough to have all the amenities of city life

But small enough where we can get to the mountains,

or an untouched beach with just a short car ride

At a lovely Park in Matsuyama

I asked Sherry about why she chose to live in Ehime

and then asked her to tell me what she thinks are the pros and cons of life in Ehime vs Tokyo

I was born in Ehime

I was raised in Ehime until 16 and I moved to America for three years

So when I decided to come back to Japan, I was like well

I was a student back then

so I didn't really have any money so I couldn't go to just like move to Tokyo

or big cities so my initial thought was like, oh well, you know

I'm gonna go home, see my family, and spend some time

Do maybe like part-time jobs and stuff like that?

And I'm gonna figure out

And I started my own company and it went pretty well

So I was like I'm gonna like living in Matsuyama

I like this atmosphere

Um, I'm used to living Matsuyama because like this is my hometown

that's actually an important point when it comes to

why people decide to live where they do

In a few studies I have read

the vast majority of people who choose to live in the more rural areas of Japan

are usually from the area to begin with

but let's move on to those pros and cons

Alright, so for Ehime, I guess it's quiet and fewer people of course and you have your personal space

You got like lots of nature

like if you have a city

but also like mountains, parks, and like beaches

Those are accessible for like only 30 minutes by car

Like everyone has a car

so when we go to those places we have either free parking lots

Or we have like 100 yen for 30 minutes

So it's really cheap

I think people are really friendly

Like when you like you don't feel like you want to talk to somebody when you're in Tokyo

Like hey

(In a slightly amused tone) I don't know what she's talking about

These people in Tokyo look super chill and ready to chat

But

in here

Like even if you get lost or something like you can easily talk to people

who are like it's like walking down the street

It's very comfortable and safe to live...

for long term, I think

While checking out the more rural side of Japan

I only got to spend a half day in Matsuyama

but I asked Sherry to show me a few local spots as well as some local food

So this it's called Nabayaki Udon and this is one of the local food in Matsuyama

(Greg: Now I will just eat for a few...)

(I'll do it ugly)

You get to learn how to eat beautiful(ly) for the videos

Yeah.. Maybe...

Like do the hair back nicely and then

Ahaha

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Sherry also makes YouTube videos

where she talks about living in Ehime

and she does indeed eat a lot more beautiful(ly) than I

Emmm! So tender!

I don't have a smooth segway into this

so let's just get to what Sherry thinks the pros of living in Tokyo are

You can get many job opportunities

That's one of the good things

and also like you have many education choices for your kids

Like you can put your kids into like international school or get private school or public school or anything you want

To add to this, university education is the other big reason young people leave the countryside for the city

For university grads, their best chance at a good job with room for growth is found in cities

The rural to urban brain drain is a real thing

It's very convenient like you have trains, subway, Shinkansen, airplain

like you have everything

This is a double-edged sword

Public transportation is very convenient but private transportation,

having your own car, is not nearly as great

It's very international

So that means they have many opportunities obviously

And I'd even brought in the international point in say cities have more diversity more culture

You can find people not only from all over the world, but from all over Japan living in the Tokyo area

Bringing with them a wide variety of experiences

And with the concentration of people and ideas

There are a lot of things to see and do that you won't get in rural areas

And... everything is really fast (in Tokyo)

Yes

except when driving in a car

But I know Sherry's point is that the pace of life is fast

If you want to do something, if you have some idea and if I pitched the idea to somebody

and then like I feel like

You can make a dream come true like faster than like you live in countryside

like if it's the countryside

Like you don't have anybody around that you can share your idea with

Even though Matsuyama isn't Tokyo,

it is a city and has the sort of conveniences one would expect

So this is Dougou Shoutengai Shopping Street and this is one of the

traditional most traditional shopping street in Matsuyama

All right, before we get to the downside of living in non-Tokyo

let's take Tokyo down a few notches

Too many people...!

Crowded! Long lines!

Ahahahaha..

And expensive!

I think this partly depends on your lifestyle

For example, employers pay for your commute so you don't need to own a car

and have that expense

But yes, overall Tokyo is more expensive,

housing probably being the largest expense where you get less and pay more

And like I said,

Like people are a little cold and mean - they don't really care about other people

and this is a big thing

It gets dark too early in winter

like it's still like 4pm and it's dark outside

That was kind of crazy for me

Oh, I should point out

I asked Jerry to compare Ehime to Tokyo

So this is not as straight Urban versus Rural Japan comparison

Obviously climate mostly depends on geography, and daylight hours on latitude

There are too many buildings everywhere tall buildings

No nature, it's hot and windy

Yeah, that's an issue with all the buildings and concrete

You get an artificial heat island that's a few degrees warmer

In comparison... We have very calm weather

Winter is not that cold. We have like little snow and that's it

And Summer yeah is hot. It's not that bad

Another con to Tokyo depending on how you look at it is the amount of tourists in certain areas

Interestingly, Matsuyama has found a way around this

In case you didn't know. What you're looking at is Dougou Onsen,

which is famous as the inspiration for the bath houses in Spirited Away!

So lots of tourists... However,

And so this one is called Tsubaki no Yu (Bath of Mahogany)

And the lots of locals go in here

instead of going to the actual Dougou Onsen that we all know

But we built a new one since Dougou Onsen was going to shut down for like seven years

Yep, so they're always making sure to have one for the locals and one for the tourists

Now onto the cons of life in Ehime

I think one of the biggest thing is that we don't have Shinkansen

So that's why we don't have lots of tourists or guests. That's one of the reasons

Not just Shinkansen, but we don't have good public transportations

we have some like trams and buses and stuff, but

Not that good compared to Tokyo

but you said we all have a car so

And the second thing is like job I think

If you want to, if you want to work for a particular company

Or if you want to do some like particular job

like you ever gonna be an actor

but you can't really be an actor in Ehime

And this is generally true for most rural areas of Japan

It can be difficult or impossible to build a career in certain niches

there's just not the same confluence of industries and people

This is something that I've been feeling lately because like

I'm trying to promote Ehime to the world

because like we have lots of nature. We have tons of good stuff

But

Ehime is not really

globalized yet

so not so many people speak English, of course

People are not used to seeing non-Japanese people and

So I guess a lot of people who are involved in tourism got kind of like lost - like what should we do?

And I got a chance to talk to a lot of them

And we discuss - oh we can do this we can do that, but

What can I say like?

They want to make change(s), so that we can accept a lot of tourists from outside of Japan

But it's hard to find people who have those skills that we need

because we have fewer people and

Even if we do, some people want to stay in the same Ehime style

They don't want to make any changes

So there is a huge argument about that

So like everything is super slow

It's like in Tokyo, if somebody has a great idea and it maybe happens in like next year

But like Ehime, it might take like 10 years, 20 years or maybe never gonna happen

Like they know that that's gonna be good

But we have less competition. We have fewer companies

So we all can survive without competing with other companies and

Not creating new service or new products?

So if you want to do something new in the countryside, it might be a little difficult

Except for these automated traffic controllers during construction

I haven't seen this in Tokyo. I like this innovation

I think the big issue in rural areas we've yet to mention is the aging and decreasing population

Because for all, except well, a few exceptions

Rural areas in Japan are rapidly aging, as young people move to the cities and the old remain

But that's another story for future videos in this series about rural Japan

For now, thanks for watching. See you next time!

Bye

What are the pros and cons of rural versus urban life where you're from?