Landscape, surroundings, rows of houses and history itself have long been considered tourism resources. However, the example of my nephew is by no means an exception nowadays. I myself want to do something special whenever I go abroad; go to a barber to have my hair cut, to a supermarket, cafe etc. In this way more and more people do what they are really interested in. It is time for us to review the essence of tourism resources and recognize the changing focus of people's interests.
4. The meaning of travel and tourism
Finally, I would like to tell you about the significance of travel and tourism, in other words, the key elements to recommending travel. If travel is regarded as 'moving curiosity', then it ought to be based on cross-cultural contact. The importance of travel lies in where different cultures meet and interact.
Here let us think about the history of Yokohama and Kobe. Both of them were just traditional fishing villages until around 130 years ago, but this has changed and they have become fashionable cities attracting a large number of young people since they developed into residential areas for foreigners. Foreigners requested the use of Hyogo but as this was already an urban city, the government offered Kobe as a nearby alternative. A similar case occurred with Yokohama which only came to be used as a residential area, following considerable negotiations in which foreigners had first requested to build in Kanagawa, an old post-town on the old Tokaido route, but were refused by the Japanese government. It was at this point that Kobe and Yokohama began to grow into the cities we now know. But how did Kobe and Yokohama develop so rapidly from deserted villages into vivid, fine cities? It is because the people in those cities took in all the new sights and scenes, appreciating the atmosphere and ways of life they saw, and did not hesitate in accepting these. Therefore, in a sense, people in those cities were traveling abroad everyday even though they were not physically doing so; they were remaining in the cities and yet were continually exposed to different cultures and had direct contact with foreign people. In my opinion, the significance of travel and tourism lies in the frequency of contact with different cultures, which I think is the biggest purpose of such adventures.
At this moment, many millions of people must be traveling away from their homes or at least millions of people must be aboard planes. Have we been part of such an era before? Amongst those travelers, are the increasing number of Japanese travelers going abroad, which presently amounts to 15 million or more every year. Even though the number of foreign tourists from abroad is said to be small, a vast number arrives in Japan now compared to the time when Japan had just begun to absorb modern civilization from foreign countries. This is the era in which we live, where cross-cultural interaction and meeting foreign people as a result of travel and tourism is taking place everywhere, everyday.
In Japan such activities were initiated by the Kihinkai. I assume that they are still now principally in the hands of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, even though a long time has passed since then. So, what is seen as the difference between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the travel industry? Just as we saw in the case of the Kihinkai, it is very difficult to distinguish one from the other. There are sections in charge of culture in the overseas branch offices of the Ministry, and their job is to provide local information to Japanese people traveling from Japan. I wonder if such a job should really be done by the Ministry, for all their work is offering is a travel and tourism service.
We have long thought that the services provided by the Ministry and the travel industry are quite different, for the former is public and the latter private. However, it will not be so from now on. A number of so-called international exchange sections are being set up by each local government, indicating that we are in ne6d of innumerable local sections of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs all over Japan. Although we have called them international exchange sections or tourism sections so far, it is unlikely that travel and diplomacy, and human exchange differ significantly.
