I’ve been traveling Japan for well over 25 years and with each location there are always creative, kind, and interesting people. However, in Kochi prefecture you’ll find the percentage of ‘unique’ Japanese people to be higher than anywhere else in the country. In Kochi it’s almost ‘normal’ to be different.
Kochians are very confident and comfortable with their personal weirdness. Folks from Kochi value a one of a kind person and hence if you’re a bit different in Kochi, in most cases, you’ll fit right in.
Papersky, being a ‘unique’ magazine, felt very much at home in Kochi – most folks didn’t blink twice when they were confronted with the ‘Gaikokujin’ editor-in-chief making a magazine about Japan for Japanese people that subtly espouses such ideas as ‘more leadership for women’, ‘more importance placed on the outdoors and environment’, ‘blending the old and new to create a better lifestyle’ and ‘valuing both local & global cultures’.
Our ‘unique’ mission for the Kochi issue was to live for one week as ‘modern nomads’ hunting and gathering our own food and then to set up camp both Seaside and Mountainside to cook it all up in scrumptious perfection. Our two guests were fishing professional Bun Chan (Ayana Ishikawa) and ‘traveling chef’ Nao Mikami.
It was important for us to accomplish our mission ‘Hachikin’ style. ‘Hachikin’, in Kochi dialect means a strong an independent woman. For this trip our guests were golden ‘Hachikins’ as were many of the wonderful people we met during our ‘modern nomadic’ adventures. The path to ‘modern nomadism’ we feel will no doubt be forged by Japanese women and the result of ‘modern nomadism’ will be a more sensible lifestyle that combines freedom of movement and time as well as a chance to deeper enjoy our lives on earth via human’s intrinsic desire to hunt and gather. Modern Nomadism is all this while simultaneously living with the modern comforts of transportation, technology, guest houses, local sake, surfboards and a never ending quest to stay curious.
