Life on a Remote Japanese Island

I spent one month living on a remote island at the end of Japan.

After living in Osaka for 4 months, K (my husband) and I decided to move to the remote Goto Islands, an archipelago of tiny islands off the Western coast of Japan.
We did not know what we signed up for.
But I hope you enjoy watching us try to adapt to traditional island life, and let us know in the comments if you’re from or have lived in rural Japan and what your favourite thing about rural life is!

Join me on Instagram @itssunnyinjapan for day to day stories on our life on the Goto Islands

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Chapters:
0:00 – Intro
2:40 – Where is Goto?
3:22 – Fukue City
4:18 – Japanese rooms
4:40 – I miss convenience
5:24 – Homemade buckwheat soba noodles
6:25 – City kids in the country
7:12 – When it rains…
8:12 – Hospitality
9:10 – Uh oh spaghettios
10:12 – Why am I here?
12:04 – Phone withdrawal
12:53 – We are idiots
13:30 – Office with a view
14:15 – Miracles do happen
15:06 – It’s the climb
16:36 – Baramon
17:03 – Biwa time!
17:45 – Life after one month

These are nice last [Music] [Music] we just got here yesterday and this house is insane as you can see it’s been passed down through the generations and it now belongs to Kay’s Uncle who has kindly let us stay here for a little bit so we can get to experience the GTO lifestyle which is pretty amazing never in a million years would I’ve imagin to have this opportunity to live on such a remote island in Japan in a traditional Japanese house I’m currently sitting on a tatami floor all of the walls are shi shi they’re the paper slide in doors all of the walls are doors essentially because they can all open from every side which is kind of crazy you can pretty much open up the whole Space this whole side is glass doors that can be opened and look onto the Japanese garden that they’ve got outside and it’s so quiet because so many of the walls are either made from wood or paper you can hear everything through the whole downstairs and the smell is that traditional Japanese tatami and the wood smell like who have thought that I’d end up here never in a million [Music] years so much tradition has been preserved here in the lifestyle in the artwork that’s left around the house and in the garden the only thing is it’s so traditional that there’s no Wi-Fi which is such a first world problem but we’ve ordered pocket Wi-Fi to come which I was pretty surprised that you could get delivery here because it’s a remote island so goto is actually a series of islands on the eastern coast of Nagasaki prefecture which I think actually makes this the most eastern point of Japan and this island that we’re on right now is called f Island which is the main island and I think it’s also the biggest one as well there’s no Unico on the island there’s no no 7-Eleven there’s two Lawson and there’s no family more and we’re currently located not within walking distance of anything so if you want anything you need a car to drive into town and they do have like supermarkets Andes and pretty much everything you need is on the island and you can get stuff delivered so it’s really not that inconvenient as long as you have a car [Music] this shop is closed but they have a customer patiently waiting out the [Music] front it’s crazy to me how you literally have this like Ancient Ancient Ancient stone wall with these ancient Gates and then inside it’s an apartment complex what is it supposed to be show here oh this is the oldest vending machine I think I’ve ever seen so Japanese rooms are actually measured using jaw not square meters and I never knew what jaw actually stood for until I found out that this one tatami mat is considered one jaw so for example the size of this room would be considered 1 2 3 4 5 6 6 so we went to the shops yesterday and bought some shampoo I’ve been having a lot of trouble with finding a shampoo that suits my hair here in Japan so I’ve been trying these samples cuz they sell like 100 yen samples at some of thees and the Pantene one seemed good so I’ve gone and bought that for some reason even though the sample was good good after I used it yesterday it felt like I was putting oil in my hair it didn’t feel like I washed any of the dirt out and like it’s it’s super soft now I’ll give with that but it’s so flat and it’s already starting to get oily like and it’s not like I can just pop to the shops to get another one this one of those times where I’m really missing the convenience of City Life [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Laughter] come [Music] by oh ser [Music] [Music] foreign fore fore [Applause] [Music] hi it’s raining today in these houses that are built using a lot of wood and the fact that Japan is such a humid country it’s really important to close all the doors and the windows while it’s raining to stop excess humidity coming in and causing mold so apparently a lot of people don’t like coming in with wet clothes and they also don’t really like when visitors come over and bring wet clothes into the house because that brings in humidity so life kind of stops here when it’s raining but our Wi-Fi arrived yesterday which very happy about although it is a bit slow but I mean it’s a Wi-Fi I can’t complain so loud [Music] so we just went to go pick up some seafood for dinner from a cute little local fish store on the docks and when we arrived I think this I guess the store owners had friends over and they were eating this huge plate of fresh sashimi and when we arrived they kindly offered was so nice but we were like no no we just had lunch I was holding like umbrellas and my phone in my hand and the two lovely women there were like okay okay and they yanked The Umbrellas out of my hand and shoved a bowl of fish soup into my hands instead they made us all sit down and eat some soup and had some sushimi with them which was just so so sweet it was such a lovely like warm and welcoming atmosphere and they had a chat with us and was so pleasant yeah it was just so nice oh my God and this was 200 yen why [Music] that’s so cool so I bought this Samsung t7 Shield 2 TB hard disk right before we came because apparently it’s super sturdy and I wanted something that I could reliably store my footage on that would survive the transport from Oraka to the island so the night before he came I transferred all my data onto this hard dis and this morning when I plugged it in it wasn’t showing up you fool so that’s fun it seems like one of the files was formatted in correctly when it’s being transferred over and now I can’t access any of them so I’m in a bit of a [Music] pickle so this rings at 700 a.m. noon and 5:00 p.m. right but like what’s the point everyone’s got like watches and phon so they can check the time so it’s only been 5 days since we got the pocket Wi-Fi and we’ve already used up all 100 gab Now by this point you might be thinking Sunny what are you doing on a remote island you’re clearly a city girl and that’s a fair question I guess I’ve always been very curious about the Japanese Countryside like obviously it’s very beautiful but I was also really curious about like the way of life here the way it can feel like you’ve stepped back in time by stepping into an old house by the fact that you can grow your own vegetables fish your own fish and make dishes that utilize every single part of them this is the fish that they fished today that I give my and like everybody he is about how healthy you know this kind of veggies and fish diet is so I guess kind of wanted to come and find out the secrets that rural Japan has to offer like don’t get me wrong I love the big cities in Japan like the mega city of Tokyo and all the Innovation and unique experience es that they have to offer but if you’ve ever been to Japan you know that there’s a duality that’s ever present in the mega city of Tokyo you’ll have endless skyscrapers overhead layers of subways and department stores Beneath You shops for every Hobby and interest and every latest technology but then you’ll have these tiny shrines scattered between the buildings you’ll have Japanese Gardens with softly flowing water and quiet buildings serving tea in rooms made with tatami floors with a scent of hinoi wafting through and because you kind of get carried away in that hustle and bustle and the excitement I always felt like I never really got to fully explore that more traditional slower side so yeah this has been a part of Japan that I’ve always just been really curious about and wanted to explore more and I definitely feel like GTO was the perfect place to do it [Music] I’m getting phone withdrawal symptoms every time I open my phone to go on Tik Tok or YouTube I’m like oh that’s right we have no internet this is sshw which is a type of Japanese pepper Kay’s uncle is growing it here much to out delight and behind me this is a bu tree I’m not really sure what be is in English it’s kind of like an apricot but also not at all like an apricot the bags that to stop the birds from getting to the fruit each of these little branches birs like 10 buer fruits but you have to reduce it to about four so that those four get the most nutrients from the tree and then they grow really big and juicy and sweet and then you wrap them in this and you wait until they’re right there’s so much fruit on this tree it’s insane and bu is quite expensive in Japan so it’s a bit of a luxury really so I’m excited oh it’s so cute where or in him in here is it supposed to be a SIM card attached to it we were supposed to order a LCT SIM card to go with this pocket Wi-Fi and we didn’t do that so we can’t use it at all but let’s goad now but then that costs extra money right so and we have to wait another like 3 days for that to arrive so this is the oblin visitor center and turns out they have this brand new view Lou here with an insane view over the coast along with free Wi-Fi so I’ve been using this space as my makeshift office while I’ve been waiting for our um Wi-Fi to arrive and oh my God the way I would have killed for a view like this from my office in Melbourne this is literally a dream come true working from here it’s so peaceful they’re playing ji music there’s not many people coming through here and the wood smells like hinoi just such a pleasant Aroma it’s just such a nice place to be feels like I’m editing in Paradise to be honest [Music] [Music] oh my God you’re not going to believe it so I woke up this morning to find that my t7 shield has popped up on my computer screen screen so I don’t know by what Miracle this has happened but thank God oh my God it’s so early now we have to go this way it’s so dark oh my God not going to lie kind of terrified right now I really hope we make it so we’re on the wrong road we got to go back now oh my God I really hope we make it on time the road kind see [Music] internet used up putting oil in my ha now I can’t access for that to arrive this one of those times where I’m really missing the convenience of city life oh my God [Music] [Music] [Music] go run run run I’m on a [Music] rice this is called B it’s a type of traditional kite this is actually the back of a samurai his head is being bitten by a demon and so this represents that you face your Demon’s head on and no matter what happens you stand up strong and you do your best [Music] M that’s so tast you [Music] [Applause] [Music] I’ve been here for 1 month now and I feel like I’m starting to get used to it here we’ve gotten to know the area and we met so many neighbors who were the loveliest people we’ve started waking up earlier and going to sleep earlier and we’ve even started driving at 30 km an hour like everyone else here we’ve been eating very locally fruit from the garden local veggies and every other day fresh fish I haven’t managed to catch any edible siiz fish myself but I got the opportunity to meet a fisherman and his wife and they showed me how to prepare some local dishes including kib Nago sashimi and mor e which was so wild and kind of terrifying to be honest I even got to meet a family of rice farmers who not only fed me on Airi from rice from their Farm but actually showed me how rice grains are planted which is so much harder than it looks I think I spent about 15 20 minutes planting rice grains that probably make about a cup of rice the beer trees have ripened as well and so we’ve picked boxes and boxes of fruit we sent some to Kay’s family in Ora and of course ate so many they are so juicy if you get a chance to try L quats highly recommend oh and our SIM card finally arrived for the pocket Wi-Fi so we have access to Internet now um which is nice but it was kind of nice having a bit of a detox from being constantly online and on social media like we did have access to 5G which was useful but it’s been nice not like Doom scrolling until midnight so I hope I don’t slip back into that habit too soon at times it genuinely feels like I’m living in a ji movie here some towns look like fishing villages straight out of a movie The Mountain Mountains and the islands in the distance in gradients of blue look like they’ve been painted on and walking through the Abundant nature is so therapeutic the amount of bird songs and the size of the butterflies and I never knew there could be so many different shades of green I’ve also been trying to learn GTO Ben which has been kind of difficult to understand at times ah but I feel like I’ve only just barely scratched the surface of what life is like there’s apparently a a large Catholic population here on who were descendants from hidden Christians that fled persecution in the 17th and 18th centuries when I arrived here I wasn’t super curious about the history of Christianity here but as time has passed and like you see different aspects of Christianity popping up around the island I’ve started to become more curious about it something I want to learn about more and there’s a lot of abandoned houses around which is something that I’d heard about being a challenge in rural Japan but yeah seeing the real life impacts is very different to hearing about it on online and it makes me feel very small and like my problems are very [Music] insignificant ah okay come fig so yeah even though there’s been lots of inconveniences and lots of challenges I’ve met so many amazing people here and had so many amazing experiences it’s hard to not see the charm of this tiny little Island at the end of Japan and I can’t wait to see what’s in store for me for the rest of my time here [Music] dinner [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]