MORIOKA--With a population of under 300,000 people, this city has found itself suddenly in the global spotlight after placing second in this year’s “52 Places to Go” list from The New York Times.

Still, the owners of restaurants and cafes featured in the article say they don’t plan on changing how they approach their businesses, even as more people from abroad are visiting.

Morioka, the capital of Iwate Prefecture in the northern Tohoku region of Japan, followed London, which topped the list.

SURPRISING SECOND

Reporters and writers for the Times annually nominate 52 cities from around the globe for the honor.

In the past, cities such as Osaka, Tokyo and Kyoto were chosen from Japan. This year, Fukuoka city came in 19th in addition to Morioka.

The article gave unreserved praise to Morioka. The city is “a walkable gem without the crowds (of other big cities),” the Times said.

The city is surrounded by mountains and offers several winding rivers.

Morioka also has the ruins of Morioka Castle and is filled with traditional buildings that mix Western and Japanese architectural aesthetics, including the red brick building that was used as the Bank of Iwate’s head office.

The city lies about two hours north from Tokyo by Shinkansen.

Craig Mod, 42, a resident of Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture, recommended Morioka to the Times and wrote the information about the city for the article.

He has been in Japan for about 23 years and has traveled to many places in the country.

Mod visited Morioka for the first time in 2020 and was attracted to the city.

"Along with the residents being so kind, the food is delicious and the historic city is easy to walk around," Mod said.

He traveled back to the city on Feb. 7 after writing the article and talked with Mayor Hiroaki Tanifuji.

Morioka placing second on the list was a surprise to him, however.

“I guess it’s my passion (that got it second place),” he said with a grin.

“We have to focus on not only big cities but also the core cities, so we are confident in the order of that list,” he said. “When people come to Japan, I would like them to explore not only Kyoto and Hiroshima but also the Tohoku region.”

MOUNTAIN OF SOBA

“Hai, JyanJyan.” (Here you go, have more!)

“Hai, Dondon.” (Come on, eat more!)

Three tourists from abroad on Feb. 8 were downing small bowls of soba noodles at Azumaya, a soba restaurant in Morioka.

The restaurant serves all-you-can-eat "wanko" soba, or bowls that only contain about one mouthful of soba each, Iwate’s specialty. In practice, a restaurant will continue giving bowls of soba until diners say they’ve had enough.

The tourists burst into laughter after eating more than 100 bowls each and put the lids on the last bowls, saying, “Too much.”

Angus O'Callaghan, 29, a visitor from Australia, came to Iwate Prefecture to snowboard.

He learned about the restaurant after reading the Times’ article featuring the restaurant. After another restaurant owner assured him of the quality of the restaurant, he decided to try the wanko soba there.

He said Morioka has nice people and nature and that the food was delicious. The trip was a wonderful memory, he added.

Akihiko Baba, 52, Azumaya’s owner, said he is seeing more customers from outside the prefecture and from Western countries.

“(The Times’ article) gave us a great opportunity,” he said. “Many tourists used to leave the city after eating our wanko soba, but we would like to make this into an opportunity for them to spend more time in Morioka.”

‘WE DON’T GET CARRIED AWAY’

Mod’s article featured a jazz cafe called "Kaiunbashi no Johnny" near Morioka Station.

The cafe has a phonograph with a large speaker and is filled with records. It can accommodate only a few people.

The cafe is known as a “beacon for Japanese jazz” as Toshiko Akiyoshi, a Japanese jazz pianist who lives overseas, plays jazz every time she comes to her home country, and the cafe carries mainly records from Japanese jazz artists.

People from around the world were drawn to the cafe following the article, including a young man from New York who visited after reading about it.

The owner, Ken Terui, 75, said nothing has changed, however.

“We just do what we normally do,” he said.

Nagasawa Coffee near Iwate University is always filled with the wonderful aroma of coffee. The store purchases and roasts green coffee beans there.

The article meant an influx of customers.

“People in Morioka are not good at business, but there are many mom-and-pop stores with their own policies,” said the owner, Kazuhiro Nagasawa, 54.

“I don’t want that to change. We don’t get carried away just because we are on the list; we want to maintain the style and quality we’ve always had.”

ON THE DECLINE

Only 1.6 percent of foreign visitors to Japan stayed overnight in the Tohoku region in 2019, according to the Japan Tourism Agency.

The Morioka government office said 65,597 people stayed at the city’s facilities in 2019, which was only 0.06 percent of the figure nationwide.

The city launched a special website on Jan. 16 following the article.

As of Jan. 30, the website had recorded more than 35,000 views. The number of inquiries about relocation to the city also rose from around 15 per month to 26 in the first two weeks after the article was posted.

The number of requests for the city’s sightseeing brochures increased from 19 in January of last year to 65 in the same month this year. Forty-one of the 65 inquiries were made after the article was posted on the website.

Morioka is promoting the use of a digital map of the city--available in seven languages and lists sightseeing spots and restaurants--to foreign visitors to the city.

TAKING ACTION

A public-private partnership project called “Morioka to iu Hoshi de” (The planet Morioka), which aims to solve the problem of young people moving out of the city, was held on Feb. 8.

About 30 people, including restaurant owners and city officials, discussed promoting the project.

Normally, they are involved in activities to encourage people to settle down and move to Morioka, but they see the Times’ article as an opportunity and plan to launch a portal website this spring.