Covid Robbed Kyoto of Foreign Tourists

Above, our 2015 Kyoto tour group at Kiyomizu-dera. 

Back before the pandemic struck, people of Kyoto, Japan were complaining about the hordes of foreign visitors clogging up the streets and temples, many of them ill-mannered. It was called overtourism.

Today, many vendors in Kyoto are missing those hordes from different countries, especially their spending money.

The Guardian has posted an article on how some in Kyoto are missing the free-spending foreigners, while others are enjoying the more quieter times of today.

They begin with:

Until a couple of years ago, negotiating the hill leading to one of Kyoto’s most popular temples would have tested the patience of a Buddhist saint. The arrival of yet another coachload of sightseers would send pedestrians fleeing to narrow paths already clogged with meandering visitors on their way to Kiyomizu-dera.

That was before Covid-19. Today, the cacophony of English and Chinese, and a smattering of other European and Asian languages, has been replaced by the chatter of Japanese children on school excursions. Shops selling souvenirs and wagashi sweets are almost empty, their unoccupied staff perhaps reminiscing about more lucrative times.

Two years into the pandemic, some of the ancient capital’s residents admit that they have learned to embrace life without foreign visitors, who were once welcomed for the money they ploughed into the local economy and resented for their cultural faux pas and, in some cases, staggering bad manners.

Above, Kyoto before the pandemic. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

To read more, go here.