Otaru’s reputation as a “glass city” rests on more than a century of practical necessity, industrial skill, and later artistic reinvention. What began as the production of everyday items for a frontier port has evolved into one of Hokkaido’s most distinctive craft traditions. Origins: Lamps and Fishing Floats Glassmaking took root in Otaru in the …
Musubi began in Japan. Long before it became a convenience-store staple or a beachside snack, it was a practical, portable way to carry rice. Formed by hand into triangles, cylinders, or simple mounds and often wrapped in nori, these rice balls—known as onigiri or omusubi—have roots stretching back centuries. Archaeological finds of hand-shaped rice date …
Read more “From Japan to Hawaiʻi and Back Again: The Full-Circle Journey of Musubi”
Neighbors on Mogami In Mogami 1-chome, on the slope above central Otaru, two high schools sit a short walk apart. Otaru Meiho is a small private school that takes in students who stopped attending school or dropped out somewhere else. Otaru Mirai Sozo is a public vocational school that trains electricians, builders, and accountants. In …
Read more “Six Schools on One Hillside: Otaru and the American High School”
Otaru, the historic port city on Hokkaido’s western coast, rarely sits still. Between its canal-side warehouses, hillside streets, and cultural venues, the city maintains a steady rhythm of exhibitions, performances, markets, and community events. Autumn 2026 offers a particularly rich stretch, with overlapping programmes that blend industrial heritage, contemporary art, traditional performing arts, music, and …
Thirty articles. That’s how long it took to walk through every step of buying a cheap house in Otaru — from browsing akiya banks to filing taxes as a foreign homeowner in Hokkaido. If you’ve read all of them, you know more about this process than most people who’ve actually done it. This last one …
Read more “The Case for Otaru: Why This Might Be the Best Property Decision You Ever Make”
I’ve spent 28 articles telling you why buying property in Otaru is feasible, affordable, and maybe brilliant. Now I’m going to tell you everything that could go wrong. This isn’t the part where I hedge my enthusiasm with a paragraph of disclaimers and then reassure you everything will be fine. Some of these risks are …