NAHA, Okinawa Prefecture--Following the Fukushima nuclear crisis and fearing the spread of radiation, a number of Kanto residents fled to this southernmost prefecture and continue to live here despite the lack of personal connections.
"The Okinawans are really warm-hearted. I wouldn't want to live in Tokyo again," said Jin Tanimura, 38, clad in "kariyushi" wear, a locally promoted attire that looks like a Hawaiian shirt.
Following the nuclear crisis, more people have moved out of Tokyo and surrounding areas to Okinawa and other parts of western Japan than have moved in. Some well-known figures, including the writer Hitomi Kanehara, have openly said they evacuated out of the region to safety.
No data is available on the number of evacuees from the Tokyo metropolitan area to Okinawa, but local sources suggested there were hundreds.
The evacuees chose Okinawa because "it is far removed from Fukushima, it hosts no nuclear plant, and because Japanese is spoken there," the sources said.
That sense of fear drove Tanimura, his wife, child, younger brother and sister-in-law to evacuate to Kyushu after the crisis began to unfurl at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant on March 11.
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