Culture

3. a)What is the population of Japan? How does it compare to the U.S.? Where do most people live in Japan? Urban or rural?
The population of Japan according to The World Factbook is 126,919,659 people. Comparing that to the United States, we have 318,860,032 people. What is even more interesting is that California is roughly the same size as Japan and only has 39,140,000 people as a population. If you thought California traffic was rough then just think about tripling the population of California, and that's the amount of people in Japan.

http://maps.unomaha.edu/Peterson/geog1000/MapLinks/Japan.htm

When looking at a population map, most people are living in Sapporo, Tokyo, Nagoya, Kobe, Osaka, Kyoto, Fukuoka, and Yamaguchi. The extremely dense populations are living in the 'red' areas on the map, which are where most airports and cities are. Therefore, Japan's population is mostly living in urban areas. According to The World Factbook, urban population is 93.5% of all population.
The two cities I chose before were Tokyo and Hakodate. Tokyo's population is  13,500,000 people, while Hakodate's population is only 275,730 people. Comparing this to Oahu, at 953,207 people.

b) What types of agriculture do they have and what type of diet do they have in Japan?
Japan is largely dependent on agriculture. The most important and widely spread crop grown in Japan is rice. According to USDA, farmland is extremely valuable in Japan because it only covers around 12% of the total area of Japan. It also shows that Japan crops include soybeans, wheat, and barley. Also, if you think about the food that is eaten in Japan, it is mostly foods containing or eaten with rice; including rice bowls, sushi, donburi (rice with other food on top), onigiri (rice balls), Kare Raisu (curry rice), Chahan (fried rice),  Kayu (rice pudding), and Chazuke (light fish stock poured over rice). According to The World Factbook the most important agriculture products are vegetables, rice, fish, poultry, fruit, dairy products, pork, beef, flowers, potatoes, and barley. However, it says that agriculture only accounts for 1.2% of the GDP, while industry accounts for almost 27%.

c)Are industry and tourism related to geography and climate?
Tourism and Industries are very important to Japan's lifestyle. Some Japanese Industries include machine work, ships, chemicals, processed food, automobiles, textiles, and has some of the largest technology advancement in the world. Tourism has to do with the industry that Japan has because many people visit from all over the world to see the 'futuristic look' of the skyscrapers, crowded cities, and tasteful architecture.  However, when it comes to tourism a lot of people come for the geography and mild winters. Japan is very mountainous and has amazing backdrops that are postcard worthy. While looking at World Guides, Japan is made up of over 3000 different islands and has access to the world famous "Mount Fiji" which brings copious amounts of people to Japan every year. There are also places in which you can ski through the winter up north, which brings over a lot of different types of people into Japan. Industry and tourism are definitely related to geography and climate.

 d)Are there any notable historical events that add to the culture?
I think that WWII adds a lot of culture and tourism to Japan because when Japan attacked America in Hawaii at Pearl Harbor, it lead to America retaliating with the atomic bomb and having the Japanese surrendering. I think this adds a ton to the culture because it brings many Japanese people to Hawaii and a lot of Hawaiian people/Americans to Japan. It's almost like something tragic that connects the two together, and builds a bridge in which we can understand what happened to each other. On a separate note, Japan has a large number or shrines and temples, which bring many other people from around the world over to soak up the traditional culture and meditating with traditional tea ceremonies and meditation.