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Just 1500? They could all have stayed in the same hotel. But there are more on their way, right? Well, according to the government, 5467 people have applied to come in August and 1676 have applied to come in September or later, pitiful numbers. In contrast, Thailand is now getting 30,000 tourists daily.
So why aren’t people coming to sample the sights, sake, and sushi? To find out, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK asked an expert.
…foreign tourists can only come on small group tours with North Korean style guides to ensure they constantly wear masks and don’t deviate from a fixed itinerary. Guides are even requested to fix and keep records of seating arrangements on journeys and at meals so that if a group member tests positive for Covid, the guides know which other members to quarantine in the hotel as close contacts.
In London, Kishida had said “By all means, please visit Japan. We’ll offer maximum hospitality.” I think he meant to say “maximum hostility”.
The longer Japanese version of the above NHK report unsurprisingly found foreigners are less than enthusiastic about spending large sums of money for the opportunity to be monitored by a faceless drone to make sure they participate in Japan’s Covid Kabuki.
https://guygin.substack.com/p/tourism-reopening-japan-fails-to