Living in a Sleepy Town in Fukuoka Japan

 My husband and I live in a small town in Fukuoka prefecture, Japan. When I was first placed here two years ago I was a little hesitant, however, after being here for some time I’m delighted with my placement. We are about 1.5 hours from Fukuoka city which is the largest city in Kyushu and about 1 hour from Beppu, the famous onsen city.

When I say small town, there is actually 25000 people living here. This is a huge population in comparison to the small town in Ireland (Boyle, County Roscommon), that I grew up in, which has a population of 2500. Despite this the town seems so much more rural than Boyle.

The main signs of life is from the schools in the area. Large amounts of students can be seen on their commute to and from school every day, but outside of this the town is in a quite slumber. We have two convenience stores, a Family Mart and a 7/11, a 100 yen store, a few grocery stores and a couple of small restaurants dotted around the town.

We live on the second floor of a small apartment complex. In the summer months we can hear the cicadas screaming outside the front of the apartment. At night time we are lulled to sleep by the sounds of the chirping of the crickets. At the back of the apartment there is a small pond so we can hear the low vibrations and croaks of the bull frogs and the general chirps and squabbles from the birds.

When I moved here first the sounds of the wildlife were distracting rather than peaceful. I remember the cicadas were so loud that they woke me from my sleep. I find the croaking frogs very entertaining and they still put me in a fit of giggles most evenings.

One of my favourite things to do is to take a wander around the outskirts of the town. There are a couple of small shinto shrines hidden around which normally have some cats hanging around eating some food that locals have left out for them. When I find them I feel like I’m in a studio Ghibli movie.

There are plenty of beautiful rice paddies scattered around the landscape. Coming from Ireland I have little knowledge of growing rice so it is nice to see the stages during the four seasons. It reminds me of Irish bogs and the steps you have to take when cutting turf.

I enjoy looking at the different types of architecture around the town from the traditional kawara roofs ( clay tile roofs) to western style houses that look like doll houses taken directly from the set of the Truman show. Some of the houses are very worn down and look like they have been abandoned, however, much to our surprise we have noticed that most of these homes are actually occupied.

This town has many similarities to rural towns in Ireland. The majority of the population appears to be from the older generation or young families. Most of the youth in this area finish school and move to larger cites. I suppose there are little job opportunities which causes many to leave the area. Also most people living here can drive and prefer to do their shopping and to socialize in the larger neighbouring towns and cities.

Despite it being a sleepy town, we are both really happy with our surroundings. Most foreigners that visit Japan only get to experience living in big cities and have very little experience of living in a more rural location. The people that live here are extremely kind and patient with us and our extremely poor knowledge of the Japanese language. More importantly we feel that we have experienced a different side of Japan, not the Japan that can be found in holiday brochures.