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Last Modified 25/02/05
What's Kotobuki?
The location of Kotobuki
The area called "Kotobuki" is about the middle of Yokohama city
and administratively consist of Kotobuki-cho, Ougi-cho and
Matsukage-cho. It is close to China-town, Yokohama Baseball Stadium
and the government office building of Yokohama-city. It is only about
5 minute walk from Ishikawa-cho station of JR Negishi-line.
Kotobuki is the third largest doya town after Kamagasaki in Osaka,
San'ya in Tokyo. The area is approximately 400m2. There are
about 90 doya (doss houses) and 6,500 persons are living. Most of them
are day labourers.
Day labourers
Yokohama is famous as a port town. Many labourers have been
working not only as dock workers, stevedores but also as navvies.
Kotobuki is the place in which such labours, who have contributed to
high growth of Japanese economy after the war, have been living. They
are the base of our lives through many kinds of jobs such as
construction of houses, buildings, parks, bridges and wiring works,
dock works.
Day workers are employed in the morning and fired in the
evening. There is no guarantee of their lives. They overwork in the
job so-called "3K", which means "Kitsui" (hard), "Kitanai" (dirty) and
"Kiken" (dangerous). The rate of industrial accidents on construction
sites is much higher than other jobs. But the responsibility about
employer's administration of safety has been left a matter unsolved
because of the multiplex subcontracted system. It appears rare that
injured workers can get compensation for their accidents and
absences. In addition, there are unpaid jobs and concealment of
accidents.
Japanese recession since 1990 let day workers face the
difficulty of finding jobs. Naka Welfare Office, which gives
vocational clinic service, has about 500 unemployed persons asking its
advise everyday (and they are 700 on every Friday). They have to face
to marginal life condition, for instance, they need to form a line and
wait hours in order to get a pan-ken.
The
history of Kotobuki
I would say "Kotobuki" is an ironical name, as it means
"celebration". There is a historical reason why the town in called
like that. After the port of Yokohama opened, the scale of the
urban area became too small and even foreign countries complained
about the problem. Therefore land was reclaimed from
Minami-Hitotsu-Numa, which was a control pond for flooding. But Japan
was unfortunately in a severe recession when the difficult
construction finished. Nobody could afford to purchase the real
estates, so the investors were ruined. By the way, the land was
divided into 7 blocks and the names were Matsukage (pine's shadow),
Kotobuki (celebration), Ougi (a folding fan), Okina (a venerable
sage), Furou (eternal youth), Bandai (eternity), Yoshihama (the
fortune beach). Those names reflected investors' dreams.
In 1945 (the end of the Second World War), Kotobuki became
a burnt-out area. The US forces requisitioned and used there as a
storage space for materials. The requisitioning ended in 1955. There
were many day labourers just after the end of the war in Yokohama
because of war damage, unemployment, demobilization, and the existence
of the US forces. They employed 1000 day labourers as stevedores that
carried military freights everyday, because equipment in dock land had
been destroyed. In addition, they carried food gain (school meals). In
1950s, Korean War caused demand for Japanese military industry and the
export. And high growth of Japanese economy started about 1960. Many
unemployed persons gathered in Yokohama from all over the country
during those periods. The port functioned day and night. Tough
labourers earned decent wages.
It is thought that the
first doya, Kotobuki-so, was built
in 1956 and then 63 doya were built by 1960. Day labourers who did not
have their own houses started to live there. A public employment
security office was moved from Noge to Kotobuki in 1959, and
activities of illegal job offers were also moved later. This is the
story of how Kotobuki, the town of doya and yoseba, was formed.
References - Kotobuki ni
Ikite (The mean of this title is "A life in Kotobuki")
- Kotobuki Kyodo Hoiku -- Kotobuki Doya-gai deno 9-nenkan (The mean
of this title is "Kotobuki Common Day Care -- 9 years at Doya area in
Kotobuki")
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