Clean breathable air, genuine encounters with local people, sauna, shopping and the opportunity to see ordinary life in a Finnish home. These things are of interest to Japanese tourists and they will be seen and experienced by Lohja.
Three years is a short time for such a project. Still we have already seen good results, glowed Shigeyoshi Noto in Lohja on Saturday. Noto has a travel agency called ForesightMarketing. He is the lead expert for the Caito project in Japan and he is also the main partner for Visit Finland on all matters related to the Japanese market. Noto spent the weekend in Lohja with his office staff. A member of Finnair’s Osaka office was also included.
The Japanese were in Lohja because of the Christmas market of the past. Minna Ermala, the Tourism Manager of Lohja, had built a three-day program for them in western Uusimaa.
“We are very impressed by this atmosphere we are completely unfamiliar with,” Noto said. – Here’s a great Christmas atmosphere.
Walking through the market, the party had already come in contact with the Lohja people. “It is very important to us to communicate with the local people,” Noto said, and said he was delighted with the way people have spontaneously come to talk to them.
More than 200,000 Japanese tourists visit Finland each year. Noto said that part of this tourist flow is very accessible here – Helsinki has a lot of tourists, we want to see the countryside.
Full article (in Finnish) can be found here: http://ejuz.lv/6a40