Andrea Horbinski, 40, isn’t that fussed that Japan could face Armageddon in only a few weeks.
Horbinski, who holds a PhD in Japanese history, knows all too well that a 2021 manga has predicted a ‘great disaster’ will strike the country in July.
The complete edition of Watashi ga Mita Mira (The Future I Saw), by Japan’s answer to Nostradamus, Ryo Tatsuki, says it will occur on July 5.
The unfounded claims have convinced some superstitious tourists to cancel their holidays, fearing a ‘mega-earthquake’.
Not Horbinski, though. The San Francisco Bay Area local landed in Tokyo this week – while in the city, she bought a copy of The Future I Saw.
‘I’d heard about it a bit from people on social media,’ she told Metro, ‘and I’m always interested in reading interesting manga.’
What does the manga predict will happen? And has it ever come true?
The Future I Saw, published in 1999, is composed of 15 dreams that Tatsuki had in 1985 when her mother gifted her a notebook.
The cover shows pages from her ‘dream diary’. ‘Boom!’ one reads, depicting the once ‘beautiful’ Mount Fuji erupting as storm clouds gather.
Another has an image of Princess Diana with the words, ‘The dream I saw on August 31, 1995. Diana? What is it?’, while one cryptically mentions a ‘death anniversary’ and the date June 12, 1995.
But the most alarming among them: ‘Great disaster happens March 2011.’
Some readers saw the Tōhoku earthquake in March 2011, among the strongest ever recorded in Japan, as the ‘great disaster’ Tatsuki dreamt of.
The 9-magnitude earthquake set off a devastating tsunami that sent towering walls of water slamming into the northern coast, killing 19,700.
Of the 15 dreams, 13 have come true, more or less, including the deaths of Diana and Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, as well as a pandemic in 2020 – the coronavirus.
A reprint of the graphic novel included the July prophecy and has gained cult status, with more than one million copies sold since 2021, according to the publisher, Asuka Shinsha.
‘A crack will open up under the seabed between Japan and the Philippines, sending ashore waves three times as tall as those from the Tōhoku earthquake,’ the book says, adding that the seas will ‘boil’.
Bookings to Japan tumble in Asia amid ‘earthquake prophecy’
Tourism in Japan has been booming for years. This year alone, more than 10,500,000 international tourists have visited, with nearly 3,500,000 in March.
But airline bookings to Japan from Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea have plummeted in recent months, an analysis by Bloomberg found.
Reservations from Hong Kong fell 50% in April compared to last year, while those booked for late June to early July tumbled 86%.
Hong Kong travel agencies have said they’re seeing fewer bookings because of the ‘earthquake prophecy’.
‘After discussing it with my family, we cancelled our trip to Japan in July and August,’ one spooked tourist told the Hong Kong paper Headline Daily.
‘The earthquake has been widely reported in the newspapers and everyone is saying the same thing, so we decided to avoid it just to be safe. We have chosen to travel to Europe instead.’
Horbinski said: ‘This manga being credited with a decrease in bookings shows the powerful role manga can play in people’s imaginations.
‘But while I’m sure some people are holding off on travelling to Japan due to this manga’s dire predictions, I suspect the overall decrease probably has more to do with increasing global fears of an economic recession.’
Could the ‘great disaster’ be a mega-earthquake?
Some holidaymakers believe Tatsuki’s bleak prediction is one that seismologists have long anticipated – a ‘mega-quake’ hitting Japan.
Government officials say there’s an 80% chance it will happen in the next 30 years, with a death toll of 298,000 in the worst-case scenario.
Stewart Fishwick, professor of geophysics and Head of School at the University of Leicester, said there’s no need to panic – or cancel your holiday – just yet.
Earthquakes happen when two tectonic plates butt heads and one slips under the other, causing a burst of energy.
Japan sits on top of four major tectonic plates, Fishwick told Metro, making it likely to experience tectonic activity.
‘Given the location, and the number of people who would be affected by a great earthquake, and any resulting tsunami, there is a necessity to be aware of the risks and to consider what mitigations (to limit damage and loss of life) can be put in place,’ he explained.
While a monster earthquake could be on the cards for this century, the chances of it are lower than some think.
Fishwick said: ‘Even the 80% chance in the next 30 years is at the very high end of the range of forecasts that have been made for this area – others put it at around 10-30%.’
Dr Ian Stimpson, a senior lecturer in geophysics at Keele University in Staffordshire, said that if seismologists and soothsayers have one thing in common, it’s being unable to predict when a major quake will happen.
Speaking to Metro, he said: ‘There are strong earthquake-resistant building codes and intensive monitoring by networks of seismometers and GPS stations.
‘Whilst knowledge of the geology, the historical record of earthquakes in the region, and seismic monitoring allow the forecasting of earthquakes, suggesting areas with a high probability of an earthquake occurring over the next few decades, the precise time, location and magnitude of a particular earthquake cannot be predicted.’
Tatsuki, 70, agrees. ‘People can think in their own ways, but please don’t get too afraid,’ she told the Mainichi Shimbun, a Japanese newspaper.
‘Listen to experts and stay calm.’
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