8 Interesting Facts about Japan

In Japanese, the name “Japan” is Nihon or Nippon, which means “Land of the Rising Sun.” It was once believed that Japan was the first country to see the sun rise in the East in the morning.[20]
2.Japan has the third longest life expectancy in the world with men living to 81 years old and women living to almost 88 years old. The Japanese live on average four years longer than Americans.[20]
3.Japan consists of over 6,800 islands.[8]

Home to 33 million people, the Tokyo-Yokohama metropolitan area is the largest populated metropolitan region in the world.[8]

Japan has more than 3,000 McDonald’s restaurants, the largest number in any country outside the U.S.[8]

Japanese director Akira Kurosawa’s film The Hidden Fortress was the basis for George Lucas’ famous film Star Wars.[15]

Each spring, Japan has a festival that celebrates both the penis and female fertility called Kanamara Matsuri, or “Festival of the Steel Phallus.”[12]

Twenty-one percent of the Japanese population is elderly (over the age of 65), the highest proportion in the world. There are more elderly than there are children in Japan today.[9]