UBC October 2026 - Jōhatsu

Photo Credit: Alexander London on Pexels

Yesterday, we followed a German guy down the stairs as he contemplated doing something he had probably dreamed about many times before:

Just keep walking.

But he didn't. He bought the cigarettes, went back upstairs, and settled in for Dalli Dalli with his family.

It left me wondering: What if he hadn't gone back?

What if someone really did walk away from their old life, their job, their home, their family, their debts, their identity, and simply started somewhere else?

It turns out there is a word for that in Japan:

Japan records around 80,000 missing-person reports every year. To be clear, this does not mean 80,000 people deliberately vanish. Missing-person cases have many different explanations, and many people are eventually found. But a small, unknown proportion are what are called jōhatsu.

Jōhatsu (蒸発) literally means “evaporation.” Applied to people, it describes someone who deliberately disappears from their established life, leaving behind family, work, debts, relationships, responsibilities and sometimes an entire identity.

It is probably the word closest to “vanishing and starting over.”

People disappear everywhere in the world for all kinds of reasons. But Japan has something that makes the phenomenon particularly fascinating: businesses that specialize in helping people make that break.

They are called yonige-ya, or “night movers.”

For a fee, they can help someone leave discreetly, move their belongings and relocate to a place where they can start again. Some specifically help people escape abusive relationships or other dangerous situations. Others help people who simply want to disappear from their previous life.

So why would someone want to disappear?

The reasons can range from financial problems and the loss of a job to unhappy relationships, family problems, abuse or simply feeling that the life you've built has become unbearable.

And this is where some other Japanese words enter the picture.

Not everyone who withdraws from society actually disappears geographically.

Hikikomori (引きこもり) describes prolonged social withdrawal. Someone who essentially shuts themselves away from society, often remaining at home for months or years. The person hasn't necessarily gone anywhere. They have simply stopped participating in the world around them.

Then there is ikizurasa (生きづらさ)  roughly, “the difficulty of living” or the feeling that life and society are painfully difficult to navigate.

And seken (世間) is something like “the social world around you” the expectations, judgments and opinions of the people around you.

Put those together and you get an interesting picture: perhaps the problem isn't simply that someone wants to disappear. Perhaps they want to escape the person they have become in the eyes of everyone else.

And disappearing doesn't necessarily mean that you stop caring about the people you leave behind.

Some jōhatsu reportedly keep an eye on what is happening from a distance. Are their families looking for them? Have they put up missing-person posters? Is anyone asking where they went?

I find this part particularly haunting.

If nobody seems to be looking, perhaps it confirms the feeling that leaving was the right decision, nobody cared anyway.

If people are looking, the situation becomes much more complicated. You may not want to return to your old life, but you might at least want the people you love to know that you're alive.

And sometimes, people do make contact again.

The documentary Johatsu – Into Thin Air follows both people who disappeared and those left behind, including searches by relatives and a private investigator, as well as moments when people from an old life are contacted again.

That, to me, is where the whole idea becomes much less romantic than the word “evaporation” makes it sound.

Because disappearing may give you freedom from your old life.

But it doesn't necessarily free you from the people you loved, the guilt you carry, or the question of whether you made the right decision.

There is even a word for a mysterious disappearance attributed to supernatural forces:

Kamikakushi (神隠し) - literally “hidden by the gods,” often translated as “spirited away.”

And perhaps, when there are no answers, all the people left behind can do is tell themselves:

Daijōbu (大丈夫). It's okay. Everything will be okay.

But will it?

If you could walk away from your entire life and nobody could find you, would that feel like freedom, or would you eventually just be running from yourself?