Thousands of homeless “net cafe refugees” in Japan risk being turfed out onto the streets as the coronavirus pandemic forces the sudden closure of their uniquely Japanese 24/7 comic book havens.
The ubiquitous all-night internet and “manga” comic cafes offer couches, computers, comics, soft drinks and shower facilities for an overnight stay typically priced around 2,000 yen (US$18).
An estimated 4,000 people down on their luck make their home in such cafes in Tokyo alone, and activists worry that shutting them down could lead to suicides and a spike in rough sleepers.
Photo: AFP
Some local authorities are now opening shelters to accommodate “net cafe refugees” and keep them from sleeping out in the open.
One 58-year-old occasional construction-site worker said his main aim was “avoiding getting wet,” as he found a roof over his head at a shelter converted from a martial arts center in Yokohama near Tokyo.
“I thought of sleeping on a bench at a train station... or subway stairs going underground,” said the grey-haired man, who declined to give his name.
Photo: AFP
His net cafe informed him at the weekend it would be closing due to state of emergency measures in Japan to stem the spread of the coronavirus.
“I used to go to work from net cafes... now I sometimes have a job, sometimes not, due to the coronavirus,” he said, adding that it was nearly impossible to find a permanent job at his age.
Renting an apartment in Japan requires a very expensive deposit and presents tricky administrative hurdles, leaving net cafes a convenient option for many of the country’s hidden poor.
Photo: AFP
“I have nowhere to go to, few acquaintances,” said the man.
‘DISCREET AND QUIET’
The temporary shelters at the judo hall in Yokohama, operated by the local Kanagawa authorities, have been designed by a team led by award-winning Japanese architect Shigeru Ban to offer privacy and prevent infections.
Residents sleep on camp-style cots or cardboard beds partitioned off by a frame of sturdy paper tubes with cloth hanging from the top of the cubicle to the floor.
Ban is famed for other emergency shelters and buildings, including the Cardboard Cathedral for Christchurch in New Zealand after the 2011 earthquake.
The aim is to provide a safe place to those driven out by the coronavirus crisis, said Yuji Miyakoshi, an official at the municipal government.
The free shelter has hosted nearly 40 people since opening on Saturday and one resident said it had been proved invaluable after his “capsule hotel” accommodation closed two days ago.
“I went to work, slept at the hotel and went back to work. I moved to this place but nothing has changed so much,” said the man in his 30s who works in construction.
Miyakoshi said the people in the shelter were “quite discreet and quiet... My feeling is that many of them are obviously not good at asserting themselves.”
‘UNSAFE HOUSING CONDITIONS’
On the surface, Japan appears a wealthy and prosperous society and visitors to Tokyo and other major cities are often struck by the relative lack of homeless people seen in other world capitals.
The Japanese economy bounced back from a recession in the 1990s, creating millions of new jobs, but critics said many of them were temporary and created a new class of urban poverty.
The manga cafes were initially a haven for late-working — or late-drinking — business people from far-flung suburbs who missed the last train home, but eventually became a shelter for Japan’s working poor.
Coronavirus has driven these people into a corner, said Tsuyoshi Inaba, who has long been involved in helping homeless people.
Inaba estimates there are already 2,000 homeless in Tokyo — double the official figure — as public surveys conducted during the day often miss people sleeping rough at night after a day’s work.
Combined with 4,000 net cafe refugees, “some 6,000 people are in unstable, unsafe housing situations” in Tokyo alone, Inaba said.
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government, which ordered establishments such as net cafes closed amid a spike of coronavirus cases in the capital, is trying to find a solution for the hundreds abruptly made homeless.
But activists say not enough accommodation is being provided and that the conditions are too onerous — such as requiring applicants to prove they have been in Tokyo for six months or longer.
Many kicked out of net cafes have no option but to sleep on the street if they can’t find a proper shelter, Inaba said, adding: “This could cause social confusion and suicides are feared to increase.”
If official aid remains inadequate, Inaba foresees a “big problem” that could even contribute to a further spreading of coronavirus.
“Some people could move to provincial cities despite the possibility that they may have the virus,” he warned.
Taiwan, once relegated to the backwaters of international news media and viewed as a subset topic of “greater China,” is now a hot topic. Words associated with Taiwan include “invasion,” “contingency” and, on the more cheerful side, “semiconductors” and “tourism.” It is worth noting that while Taiwanese companies play important roles in the semiconductor industry, there is no such thing as a “Taiwan semiconductor” or a “Taiwan chip.” If crucial suppliers are included, the supply chain is in the thousands and spans the globe. Both of the variants of the so-called “silicon shield” are pure fantasy. There are four primary drivers
The sprawling port city of Kaohsiung seldom wins plaudits for its beauty or architectural history. That said, like any other metropolis of its size, it does have a number of strange or striking buildings. This article describes a few such curiosities, all but one of which I stumbled across by accident. BOMBPROOF HANGARS Just north of Kaohsiung International Airport, hidden among houses and small apartment buildings that look as though they were built between 15 and 30 years ago, are two mysterious bunker-like structures that date from the airport’s establishment as a Japanese base during World War II. Each is just about
Two years ago my wife and I went to Orchid Island off Taitung for a few days vacation. We were shocked to realize that for what it cost us, we could have done a bike vacation in Borneo for a week or two, or taken another trip to the Philippines. Indeed, most of the places we could have gone for that vacation in neighboring countries offer a much better experience than Taiwan at a much lower price. Hence, the recent news showing that tourist visits to Pingtung County’s Kenting, long in decline, reached a 27 year low this summer came
The female body is a horror movie waiting to happen. From puberty and the grisly onset of menstruation, in pictures such as Brian De Palma’s Carrie and John Fawcett’s Ginger Snaps, to pregnancy and childbirth — Rosemary’s Baby is the obvious example — women have provided a rich seam of inspiration for genre film-makers over the past half century. But look a little closer and two trends become apparent: the vast majority of female body-based horror deals with various aspects of the reproductive system, and it has largely been made by men (Titane and The First Omen, two recent examples
RSS