Holding a passenger manifest documenting his father's journey from Japan to Brazil nearly a century ago, Sergio Kohatsu unearthed details of a trip that had remained a mystery for years.
Kohatsu, a third-generation Brazilian of Japanese descent, is among a growing number of descendants of early 20th-century Japanese migrants to Latin America seeking to reconnect with their roots. This trend, known as 'roots tourism,' is flourishing thanks to digital archives and genealogy services.
His father, Kiyoshi, departed from Kobe port in 1928 aboard the Buenos Aires Maru with hundreds of other Japanese bound for coffee plantations in Brazil. Decades later, Sergio decided to trace that journey and found his father's name in digitized passenger lists released by the National Archives of Japan.
'That was the most emotional moment of my life,' Sergio said. 'I saw his name, the serial number, his age — all clear, as if the voyage had happened just yesterday.'
Japan is seeing a surge in heritage tourism as later generations of the Japanese diaspora — especially from Brazil, Peru, Argentina and the United States — return to their ancestral homeland to explore family history. According to the Japan Tourism Agency, the number of visitors to Japan for genealogical purposes rose 23 percent in 2025 compared with the previous year.
Special programs, such as 'Journey of the Grandparents' tours organized by several local travel companies, help visitors reconnect with villages, old schools and neighborhoods where their ancestors once lived. Some municipalities have also set up support centers to help descendants of Japanese nationals access household registration records and old home addresses.
For Kohatsu, the trip to Japan was more than a journey into the past. 'It helped me understand why my father decided to leave, sacrificing everything so we could have a better life,' he said, his voice breaking. 'And it made me cherish my Japanese heritage even more — an inseparable part of who I am.'
