Tim Odagiri
The essayist Charles Dudley Warner famously quipped, “Everybody complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.” That changes today. While I can’t fix your crazy weather, I can at least help you identify where weather is happening within Japan, thanks to this post’s handy dandy list of “weather cities.”
Growing up in America, I never thought twice about where Albuquerque was when the weatherman said that today’s high there would be 85°F. I new automatically that it was in New Mexico. Not that it mattered much to me, since I was nowhere near that southwest state. But if I had to fly there tomorrow for some Albuquerque-style emergency, at least I would know what kind of clothes to pack.
Now that I am in Japan, it is a lot more difficult. The problem is that I don’t know all of the cities that appear on the nightly weather report. It’s not just an issue of location; sometimes I don’t even know how to pronounce the names that appear on the TV screen.
To help me determine whether I need a coat tomorrow, I made a list of all the “weather cities” that appear on the national weather map hosted by public news broadcaster NHK. The following cities are grouped by the regions shown in their interactive weather map.
北海道 / Hokkaido Region
| 札幌 | Sapporo, Hokkaido |
| 釧路 | Kushiro, Hokkaido |
| 稚内 | Wakkanai, Hokkaido |
| 網走 | Abashiri, Hokkaido |
| 旭川 | Asahikawa, Hokkaido |
| 帯広 | Obihiro, Hokkaido |
| 室蘭 | Muroran, Hokkaido |
| 函館 | Hakodate, Hokkaido |
東北 / Tōhoku Region
| 青森 | Aomori City, Aomori |
| 秋田 | Akita City, Akita |
| 盛岡 | Morioka, Iwate |
| 山形 | Yamagata City, Yamagata |
| 仙台 | Sendai, Miyagi |
| 福島 | Fukushima City, Fukushima |
関東甲信越 / Kantō-Kōshin’etsu Region
A special note about Saitama City: Although the prefecture’s name is 埼玉, the capital city’s name, pronounced the same way, is officially written in hiragana.
| 新潟 | Niigata City, Niigata |
| 前橋 | Maebashi, Gunma |
| 宇都宮 | Utsunomiya, Tochigi |
| 水戸 | Mito, Ibaraki |
| 長野 | Nagano City, Nagano |
| さいたま | Saitama City, Saitama |
| 東京 | Tōkyō City, Tōkyō |
| 千葉 | Chiba City, Chiba |
| 小笠原 | Ogasawara Islands, Tōkyō |
| 横浜 | Yokohama, Kanagawa |
| 甲府 | Kōfu, Yamanashi |
東海・北陸 / Tōkai and Hokuriku Regions
| 富山 | Toyama City, Toyama |
| 金沢 | Kanazawa, Ishikawa |
| 福井 | Fukui City, Fukui |
| 岐阜 | Gifu City, Gifu |
| 静岡 | Shizuoka City, Shizuoka |
| 名古屋 | Nagoya City, Nagoya |
| 津 | Tsu, Mie |
近畿 / Kinki Region
| 京都 | Kyōto City, Kyōto |
| 大津 | Ōtsu, Shiga |
| 神戸 | Kōbe, Hyōgo |
| 大阪 | Ōsaka City, Ōsaka |
| 奈良 | Nara City, Nara |
| 和歌山 | Wakayama City, Wakayama |
中国 / Chūgoku Region
| 鳥取 | Tottori City, Tottori |
| 松江 | Matsue, Shimane |
| 岡山 | Okayama City, Okayama |
| 広島 | Hiroshima City, Hiroshima |
| 山口 | Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi |
四国 / Shikoku Region
| 高松 | Takamatsu, Kagawa |
| 徳島 | Tokushima City, Tokushima |
| 松山 | Matsuyama, Ehime |
| 高知 | Kōchi City, Kōchi |
九州・沖縄 / Kyūshū and Okinawa Regions
| 那覇 | Naha, Okinawa |
| 福岡 | Fukuoka City, Fukuoka |
| 大分 | Ōita City, Ōita |
| 熊本 | Kumamoto City, Kumamoto |
| 宮崎 | Miyazaki City, Miyazaki |
| 佐賀 | Saga City, Saga |
| 長崎 | Nagasaki City, Nagasaki |
| 南大東島 | Minami-Daitō[jima] Island, Okinawa |
| 石垣島 | Ishigaki[jima] Island, Okinawa |
| 宮古島 | Miyako[jima] Island, Okinawa |
| 鹿児島 | Kagoshima City, Kagoshima |
| 奄美 | Amami Islands, Okinawa |
[Image Credits: NHK]
Harold Archer
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