JFOODO hires foreign researcher to study Japanese culture, traditions

The new buildings are being built and the residents are back. JFOODO or The Japan Food Product Overseas Promotion Center has appointed Rebekah Wilson Lye, a researcher, to study Japan's culture and tradition.

Fukushima: After the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, the evacuation orders in the Fukushima Prefecture towns of Okuma and Namie were partially lifted.

The new buildings are being built and the residents are back. JFOODO or The Japan Food Product Overseas Promotion Center has appointed Rebekah Wilson Lye, a researcher, to study Japan’s culture and tradition.

---

I am here “At Manabiya Yumenomori School” to learn about this wonderful project which just started in August this year, Rebekah Wilson Lye said.” A good point is to create a very inclusive community. In this school, many people originally lived in “Okuma-town” and came back from the evacuation area, but there are also people who moved here.

The school slogan is “Here you will start individual personality,” Ippei Nango’s GM, Manabiya Yumenomori said.

As Rebekah Wilson Lye visited “Namie Star-Fallen Farm” to meet organiser Daiju Takahashi.

“It’s been a great experience for me. People who have come back here, the local people, they are amazingly open, open-minded and welcoming for those outsiders like me. We are growing root beets and also indigo dye plants and very rare plants like a juniper berry or agave tequila, which haven’t been grown in Japan ever,” Daiju Takahashi said.

“Well, I’ve spent the day here in the Namie-machi and Okuma-machi area. I’ve met local people, some local children and even some outsiders who have decided to make Namie-machi their home.

And my takeaway from our conversations today. I have seen a real sense of forward movement as though it is a new era, a new dawn here in this small town,” Rebekah Wilson Lye said.

Now, Fukushima is rebuilding an unparalleled community in Japan after overcoming tragedy. Foreign viewers of Japan can easily identify it.