This Japanese Town Replaced Humans With Scarecrows

i heard of this japanese town that replaced humans with scarecrow-esque dolls known as kakashi hundreds of them naturally i had to go and see it for myself this is nagoro village tucked into a valley on the island of shikoku the village has developed a bit of a personality it's filled with over 300 of these dolls spread throughout the village they are [Music] everywhere some more obvious than others each one often representing a real person with a name age and a personal history and incredibly nearly each and every one is handmade by a single person in 2002 when ayano tsukimi returned to the village from living in osaka many of the people she knew were long gone and in time she found herself populating the village with these kakashi dolls as these things often do it started with a single doll to stand as a scarecrow and protect a field but more on ayano-san in just a minute as with many places around the world japan's countryside towns and villages are struggling to maintain any sense of appeal to the younger generation who would all rather live in the big cities nagoro village is a shining example of this with only 27 remaining residents all of whom are close to or past retirement age and unsurprisingly there are no children the local elementary school while upkept has been abandoned for over 20 years now [Music] we had the chance to enter the gymnasium [Music] foreign the scale of this entire thing really starts to hit you when you see the gymnasium and when he points out once again that all of this is made by a single person it all becomes vastly more impressive in every way the detail that goes into each and every one of them is mind-boggling in fact the gymnasium isn't even the only building in the town filled with these kakashi dolls it's almost frightening in a way this this is amazing can you imagine being a completely unsuspecting person just driving through here the worn down nearly abandoned feel of nagoro gives the village a creepy enough feel as is we were offered the opportunity to visit ayano's house for an interview and take a look at her in-home display but with the world in its current state we felt it best to limit interaction in smaller spaces and politely decline the offer it was honestly one of the more painful declines that i've ever had to do but i stand by it the locals are very aware of the looming fate of their village and they're actually quite happy when people come out and share their story nobody wants to be forgotten [Music] as interesting as this place is it really serves as a reminder of japan's dying countryside lifestyle i wonder what the country is going to be like 10 20 30 years from now the town is also quite small just around this corner and down a bit is the start of the town and then just around this corner up here is the end of the town i took a bit of extra time to walk the streets and really get a feel for nagoro it's an inspired little village and more than anything this visit simply piqued my interest and made me want to know more i hope i can make it back someday i hope we all can't and she was an absolute pleasure to talk to we talked for probably a good 10 15 minutes and we got so wrapped up in the conversation that i completely forgot to ask her all the questions that i wanted to or perhaps i just gave up because i was enjoying the conversation i thanked her for her work and she said she was looking forward to seeing the documentary and was even kind enough to invite me back when the world returns to some sense of normalcy i'm looking forward to that and it's always nice to have something to look forward to

Channel: Tokyo Lens

Views: 382,157

Keywords: Japan, Vlog, Tokyo Lens, Japan Vlog, Norm Nakamura, Norm Tokyo Lens, Japanese, japanese scarecrow, scary japan, haunted, japanese village, japanese town, japanese scarecrow village, Nagoro, Nagoro village, nagoro valley of dolls, japanese doll, japan doll, ghost town, japanese ghost, japanese ghost town, japanese dying population, japan dying town, japan sad, japan documentary, nagoro town, nagoro village shikoku island japan, scarecrow, crazy japan, weird japan

Id: vxiOdrVreSQ

Length: 6min 46sec (406 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 09 2020