A couple of the Wakayama port towns we’ve walked through in the last week, Yuasa and Kii-Katsuura, have been remarkable for their stillness. As towns go, they’re purported to be functioning. Yuasa is famous for the discovery and manufacture of soy sauce; Kii-Katsuura for its tuna fishing. But when we wandered the streets, nothing was observably going on. Yuasa in the late afternoon was hushed, and if we hadn’t run into a woman turning down an alley carrying a grocery bag, I might have been convinced it had been abandoned. Was everybody inside streaming their favorite shows, or were they all at work in another city? The Japanese love ghost stories, so maybe they favor the mysterious ambience of a ghost town.
In Kii-Katsuura there was some traffic going to and from the port on the main drag, but on the side streets there were no signs of life. I had this image of everyone leaving town early in the morning to fish for tuna then coming back after dark. During the day they let the ghosts of their ancestors roam at will placated by offerings left at the various shrines.
Maybe a consequence of having so few children? We notice in Spain that the rural towns are pretty much deserted, although they are typically smaller than the towns in your photos.
They saw you coming 😳