Hawaii also follows the pattern. After Paris, it's arguably the most popular Japanese tourist destination. It's not uncommon for Japanese to use there golden week vacation to plan a wedding, honeymoon, or general vacation to Hawaii.
A lot of little factors add up to Hawaii being popular unlike France with its huge romantic, foreign, cool European appeal. There is of course the tropical paradise narrative that Hawaii likes to keep up, but they can get that anywhere, even within the country via Okinawa. Hawaii is the right balance of its foreign while being safe and familiar.
To start, Hawaii's tourism industry caters to the Japanese. Lots of advertisement and preplanned tour packages/ wedding packages that the Japanese love. It takes the hastle out of things. In the main tourist areas, the main languages on signs and being spoken will be English and Japanese being tied for first, with a bit of Hawaiian for names/ touristic value, and maybe some Chinese, they're also starting to visit.
Hawaii also has a good number of Japanese speakers for the tourists due to the high demand and number of local Japanese ethnics.
The Japanese in Hawaii also tend to stay in contact with their counterparts in Japan than say compared to Brazil or Cali. This in turn creates a sense of safety in visiting. That and the racial make up of Hawaii makes the Japanese feel a lot safer when visiting. They can also readily get food they can get at home if they are feeling a little less adventurous or homesick.
Shopping for unimported American goods is also a plus. Quite a few malls and outlets definitely have Japanese as their prime or major consumers.
Lastly, I guess there is the shared history, but I feel that aside from ethnic connections, this is a little less relevant.
>>28190928Still writing it up
>>28190909Always a welcome possibility. I'm a little worried that with time, gamefreak will pass up on good region opportunities due to fearing a lack of appeal.
