New Delhi: Long queues, even longer waiting times for everything from luggage at the airport to ordering food at restaurants, understaffed hotels and streets teeming with tourists — this was the experience for anyone who visited Japan in 2023 chasing the cherry blossoms. It was a stark contrast to the commonly believed Japanese ‘preparedness and efficiency.’
“Japan was not prepared for the season,” said Jupiter Ishida, a freelance tour guide from Tokyo. He went on to explain how post-Covid-19, the experienced members from the tourism industry had moved on to other jobs and had not returned in time for the season in 2023.
Cherry blossoms, also known as Sakuras, are light pink flowering trees that have become emblematic of the country. Their picturesque value has drawn tourists to Japan for years.
The Japanese government reported a 27-time increase in tourists visiting the country during the month of March this year in comparison to March 2022. The total number of reported tourists stood at 18,17,500 for March 2023. The largest number of visitors came from South Korea, followed by Taiwan, the US, Hong Kong and Thailand. 14,900 Indians made the trip to Japan during the month.
The largest number of tourists in 2019, the year before the pandemic, were from China, which accounted for roughly 96 lakh visitors out of 3.1 crore visitors for the year as reported by the Japanese government.
In 2023, China excluded Japan from ‘packaged tours’ due to the discriminatory requirements for Chinese travellers to visit the country. Despite this, Japan struggled to keep up with the traffic that arrived for viewing the cherry blossoms in 2023.
The cherry blossom season in Japan normally begins at the end of March and carries on through April. The Japanese government finally lifted Covid protocols and opened its borders for tourism on 11 October 2022. This meant that 2023 was the first year since the pandemic that tourists could catch a glimpse of the famed Sakura trees, found across the innumerable parks dotting the cities of Japan. This led to a surge.
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Unprepared for the surge
Tour operators told ThePrint how this year’s surge was unexpected. “Hotels, coaches and guides were booked out and unavailable and we had to turn down requests for groups wishing to travel for the cherry blossoms,” said a leading tour operator from Mumbai who did not wish to be named. They added that their agency had to start informing potential tourists that there simply was no way for them to travel to Japan in these months.
In a survey conducted by research company Teikoku Databank in January, 77.8 per cent of over 10,000 hotels and inns stated that they did not have enough full-time employees. 81.1 per cent of the hotels and inns surveyed also reported that they did not have part-time or irregular workers.
According to data released by the Japan Student Services Organisation (JASSO), nearly 40 per cent of international students’ part-time jobs in Japan revolved around the hospitality and food services industry in 2021. The number of foreign students in Japan fell from 3,10,000 in 2019 to 2,42,000 in 2021.
A premium hotel in Osaka, one of Japan’s largest cities did not have enough staff for portering guests’ luggage to their rooms. In the same hotel, breakfast that began at 7 am witnessed guests queuing up from 6:30 am to get a seat. At times, guests had to queue for up to 45 minutes before being allowed inside the restaurant.
Japan’s famed transportation infrastructure was also bogged down due to the crowds. Group coaches would find themselves stuck in traffic jams for 45 minutes to an hour at designated bus parking lots.
Ishida recalled an incident from Kyoto in April when a tour group could not make it to their next destination due to the traffic. “The group had been dropped off for dinner, and the coach had to be parked at the designated parking lot 15 minutes away. After dinner the coach could not make it, as the driver had to wait 45 minutes before exiting the parking lot due to a jam,” he said.
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Long lines and wait times
“When I first visited Japan in 2009 during the cherry blossom season, the only crowd we saw were Japanese families picnicking, and enjoying the views of the sakura flowers.,” said Rathi Nilakantan, who’s part of the Duchess Travel Wing, a group of avid women travellers.
There was a stark difference in her experience this year. “I often found only one or two staff at restaurants leading to long waiting times for food. Hotels struggled to offer services such as portering of luggage, all of which was seamless in 2009,” she said.
Long lines and wait times were constant everywhere you went. It took anywhere between 15 to 30 minutes to enter the Tōdai-ji temple in Nara. Other famous sites such as the Kiyomizu-dera temple which houses the Otowa Spring said to have ‘wish-granting’ powers saw long lines of people attempting to catch and drink the water.
“Kyoto was extremely crowded in 2023. I do not know whether they were prepared for the post-COVID surge. Coaches were caught in jams, the parks and old city streets were teeming with people,” Nilakantan said.
Ishida was extremely grateful to see tourists arriving again. “I handled four different groups during the month of April, with each group spending at least five to 10 days in Japan and enjoying all that my country has to offer,” he said.
A tour operator from Chennai said that she will still recommend Japan despite the hiccups seen earlier this year. “Japan is surreal. The culture, the food, the sites, all of it are the reasons why I will keep promoting people to visit the country. In fact, I have another family travelling to Japan this week,” she said.
The Japanese government further relaxed its Covid requirements on 29 April. A traveller does not have to carry a valid Covid vaccination certificate or a negative RT-PCR test. They have also eased restrictions on Chinese tourists.
“Things are changing now. I think people are returning to the tourism sector in Japan, and we are now better prepared for the surge,” said Ishida, who is leading another group across the country.
Even those who endured the swarms of tourists could not deny that the cherry blossoms left a mark. “Nothing has changed in Japan, except the crowd,” said Nilakantan.
The author was in Japan from 2 April to 11 April 2023.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)