Eric Takabayashi wrote:
> Ernest Schaal wrote:
> 
> 
>>Gifu has certain advantages: It is small enough to get around by bike, the
>>main park is pretty, living is cheap, the scenery is pretty. On the other
>>hand, there really aren't that many resources for Western gaijin. According
>>to a list posted in the city hall, there are very few gaijin from
>>English-speaking countries (only a couple of hundred in a city of 400,000
>>people, most of which are either JETs or kaiwa instructors) and there are
>>limited resources for Western gaijin.
> 
> Fukuyama has nearly 400,000 people, though not nearly as modern looking as Gifu
> City.
> 
> I wonder if there are even 50 western foreign residents here.

I dropped in to the city hall in Okazaki on Friday to update my gaigin
card thingee. Two things caught my eye - one is a chart displayed near
the entrance with the number of deaths/births and arrivals/departures.
The population had jumped another 500 last month - births in Okazaki
outnumbered deaths by 2:1 accounting for 220 of the increase. The rest
was a net increase in internal migration. It seems to average 500 a
month more or less. The other thing was that a fair bit of the increase
was due to the spreading outbreak of gaijinitus, which has spread to
include 2.8% of the 350,000 residents, with the number of Koreans as a
percentage for alien registrations below 1 in 5 for the first time. How
many of them are "westerners" isn't exactly clear.




-- 
"Beyond the Euphrates began for us the land of mirage and danger, the
sands where one helplessly sank, and the roads which ended in nothing.
The slightest reversal would have resulted in a jolt to our prestige
giving rise to all kinds of catastrophe; the problem was not only to
conquer but to conquer again and again, perpetually; our forces would be
drained off in the attempt." - Emperor Hadrian AD 117-138