If you’re looking for a career change then this might just be what you’re looking for! Japan, the land of the rising sun that’s famous for their awesome sushi and anime, is desperately looking for people who want to be ninjas.
Source: Business Insider
That’s because they are facing a serious shortage of ninjas, especially in Iga, a small city of about 100,000 people located in Mie Prefecture, Japan. This little city has reportedly claimed that they are the birthplace of the ninja and every year, they actually have a ninja festival to celebrate this heritage.
Usually, about 30,000 tourists will come to Iga to experience the annual ninja festival but the city is worried about depopulation. More and more young people are moving away from the rural countryside and just last year (2017), Iga lost 1,000 people while on the whole, Mie only gained 43 new residents, Business Insider reported.
Source: Japan Deluxe Tours
To counteract this, the mayor of Iga, Sakae Okamoto wants to revive the local economy by focusing on promoting the city’s ninja heritage to attract more local and international tourists. They even built a second ninja museum with funds received from the central government in hopes that tourists will stay longer.
“Right now in Iga, we are working very hard to promote ninja tourism and get the most economic outcome. For example, we hold this ninja festival from late April to around the beginning of May. During this period, visitors and also local people come here. Everybody will be dressed like a ninja, walking around and enjoying themselves – but recently I feel that it’s not enough,” Okamoto told Sally Herships, the host of National Public Radio’s “Planet Money” podcast.
Source: Japan Info
However, they are having some problems with the ninja festival as they do not have enough ninjas to employ. Well, not exactly ninjas but more like ninja performers! As Japan’s unemployment rate is really low, Iga is finding it really hard to find ninja performers, especially ones with the right physique.
“But this job does have a lot to offer. First of all, the pay is quite competitive. Today, ninjas can earn anything from $23,000 (RM93,000) to about $85,000 (RM344,000) — which is a really solid salary, and in fact, a lot more than real ninjas used to earn in medieval Japan,” Herships said. That’s about up to RM28,000 a month!
Source: Business Insider
In comparison, a real ninja earns about $8,000 (RM32,400) to $17,000 (RM68,900) a year after the income has been adjusted for inflation, based on information from the International Ninja Research Center.
“Ninja is not an inheritable class. Without severe training, nobody could become a ninja. That’s why they have silently disappeared in history,” Sugako Nakagawa, the curator of the local ninja museum, told Reuters in 2008.
Looks like becoming a ninja or even a ninja performer is a really lucrative career! Time to start training?
Also read: Meet Kawakami: The Last Ninja Who Can Even Hear a Needle Drop in the Next Room
