Farming in Japan

I want to share what I know about farming in Japan.
First of all, Japan is a small country and there is less space for farming.
So, many farmers don't use machines to grow crops. It is one of the major characters of Japanese farming style.
Actually, farmers are getting fewer and fewer in Japan.
Japan mainly depends on foods that were imported from other countries, and many farmers are have troubles to survive in this situation. Therefore, I would be able to say Japanese farmers are facing serious problems now.

Japanese main crops are rice.　
Almost all Japanese people love rice, I think.
Actually, it is said that there are about 300 kinds of brands of rice in Japan.

My favorite menu using rice is onigiri, rice ball.
You may think this is made by just pressing rice into shape, however, it's not so easy to make a delicious one.
When you press it too tightly or too loosely, you cannot make it good.
It's simple meal but I never lose interest in it.

This is a picture we took today!

COTS shelter

Today, we went to COTS shelter in Burlington.

First, it was cleaner than I thought before visiting there.
The space to sleep seemed to be a little small, but it was organized that a lot of people can stay.
The first impression of homeless people was not so clean, so I could understand how the volunteers and the staffs are trying hard to make a good condition of the shelter.

In Japan, maybe there is no place like this. As a result, there are relatively many homeless people at riverside and on the rode. Even if there are facilities like this in Japan, it seems to be hard for homeless people to stay long. So, I was surprised that COTS have no limits to stay and people can save money for their future housing.

Before I visit COTS, I did not have so much questions about it, but a lot of things came up to my mind when I visit there. It was a really good opportunity to learn and think about new things.