Just a little post about a 1970s house in Niseko I was lucky to stay at. It's common to have double-glazed windows in Hokkaido unlike the rest of Japan, so one would expect a higher level of insulation, but well, the walls are still made of wood and cardboard so it doesn't really help, it's extremely cold. No matter how many square meters you have at your disposal, the functional space will always shrink into a small life-saving volume around your gas heater or a burning stove. In Japan the concept of getting warm is revolving not around the house, but the body itself. Instead of wasting energy on central heating, people take baths, sit around kotatsu, near the stove, air-conditioner or even use chemical hand warmers. European-style heating systems are not welcomed for several environmental reasons (earthquakes are one of them), but maybe there's a cultural concern, too: when it's warm in just one tiny area, you get closer together with the others and it's just cosier that way?

"Don’t you think it would be wonderful to get rid of everything and everybody and just go to some place where you don’t know a soul?"
— Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood

Photos taken in the train from Niseko to Oshamambe where I didn't know a single soul ~

In four hours I spent in Oshamambe waiting for my next train I only saw two or three elderly people on the streets outside of the station. The town was completely silent: most window shutters were down, shops closed, no taxis. Few cars passing through the central square made less sound than fresh snow crunching under my feet. Nobody cares to clean the snow off the roads; it just piles up indefinitely until some locals start digging out entrances to their houses with shovels. Dragging around suitcases [like I did] is not recommended.