Japan is well known as one of the most aged societies on the planet, with an amazing 22% of the population aged 65 or older, compared with 13% in the U.S, Going about your daily life in Japan, you do encounter a lot of older Japanese, walking their dog or shopping or going on bus tours to various places in Japan. Of course, the older generation of Japanese lived in a very different time from the Japan of today, enduring poverty during and after the war years and working hard all their lives. (My mother-in-law grew up eating Hinomaru Bento, a boxed lunch consisting of nothing but white rice with a single red pickled ume plum in the center, like a Japanese flag.) The other day I saw an old woman whose back was bent over so far she could not stand up at all. I was told it likely came from poor nutrition when she was young coupled with a life of rice farming — planting rice by hand does terrible things to a person’s posture.
Older Japanese people love to take bus tours all around Japan. You have no idea.
