Across from a noodle shop in a Yokohama suburb, Hisayoshi Teramura's inn looks much like any other small lodging that dots the port city. Occasionally, it's even mistaken for a love hotel by couples hankering for some time beneath the sheets. But Teramura's place is neither a love nest nor a pit stop for tired travelers. The white and grey tiled building is a corpse hotel, its 18 deceased guests tucked up in refrigerated coffins.

橫濱郊區一家麵館對面，寺村久義的旅店看起來和散見於這個港都的其他小旅館沒什麼不同。有時甚至被渴望共度春宵的情侶誤認為愛情賓館。但寺村的店面既不是愛巢，也不是疲憊旅客的歇腳站。這棟白牆灰瓦建築其實是停屍間，有18具往生者遺體暫時存放在冷凍棺木裡。

“We tell them we only have cold rooms,” Teramura quips when asked how his staff respond to unwary lovers looking for a room. The daily rate at Lastel, as it is known, is 12,000 yen. For that fee, bereaved families can check in their dead while they wait their turn in the queue for one of the city's overworked crematoriums.

當被問及他的員工怎麼應付那些不明究裡想開房間的情侶時，寺村打趣說，「我們告訴他們我們只有冷藏室。」這家取名Lastel的停屍間每天收費1.2萬日圓（約台幣4600元），付費後家屬可把死者遺體寄放在這裡，等橫濱市大排長龍、十分繁忙的火葬場通知輪到他們將遺體火化為止。

Death is a rare booming market in stagnant Japan and Teramura's new venture is just one example of how businessmen are trying to tap it. In 2010, according to government records, 1.2 million people passed away, giving the country an annual death rate of 0.95% versus 0.84% in the United States, which is also the global average. The rate of deaths is on the increase. Last year, there were an extra 55,000 dead and over the past decade, an average of 23,000 more people have died each year in Japan. Annual deaths are expected to peak at 1.66 million in 2040 as the bulk of the nation's baby boomer generation expires. By then, Japan's population will have shrunk by around 20 million people, an unprecedented die-off for a nation neither at war or blighted by famine.

在百業蕭條的日本，唯獨死亡帶動了罕見成長的市場，寺村的新事業只是商人如何開發商機的一個例子。根據官方紀錄，去年日本有120萬人去世，死亡率達0.95％，相形之下，美國及全球平均死亡率都是0.84%。日本死亡率還在持續攀升。去年死亡人口又增5.5萬，過去10年來平均每年死亡人口增加2.3萬。隨著嬰兒潮世代在2040年大量死亡，日本每年死亡人數預計屆時將達166萬的高峰，日本人口也將萎縮約2千萬人，對一個既未處於戰爭狀態或鬧饑荒的國家，這都是空前高的死亡率。

Although two decades of economic malaise has weighed on incomes, a tradition on splashing out on ceremonies means the Japanese still pay an average of 1.2 million yen on flowers, urns, coffins and other funeral expenses. It adds up to a market worth a whopping $21 billion a year, or twice what Americans spend annually on funerals. “There's been a rush into the market,” says Teramura. Even Japan's second biggest retail chain, Aeon, rail companies and the nation's biggest farmers association, Japan Agriculture are getting into the business.

雖然20年來經濟低迷影響荷包收入，鋪張的葬儀傳統，這意味著日本人平均仍得花120萬日圓（46萬台幣）在鮮花、骨灰甕、棺木等喪葬支出上。每年喪葬市場總值達210億美元（6200億台幣）天價，是美國每年葬禮花費的兩倍。寺村說：「大家紛紛搶占這塊市場。」連日本第二大零售連鎖業者永旺集團、鐵道公司和全國最大的農民協會「日本農業協同組合」也競相跨足葬儀業。

Teramura, 71, decided a decade ago to widen his business beyond graves to funerals and he opened Lastel last year. Behind its flower box framed windows, hidden away from mourners, is an automated storage system. It stores and chills encoffined corpses, delivering them through hatches and into a viewing room, day or night, whenever friends and family come to pay their respects.

71歲的寺村10年前決定，將其業務從陵墓擴大到葬儀祭典，去年才會開了這家 Lastel。在窗台綴滿鮮花的窗戶背後，在遺屬視線未及之處，是一套自動化儲存系統。它可以冰凍存放入殮的遺體，只要朋友和家屬想來致意，不管白天或晚上均可透過艙口輸送往生者到瞻仰室。

Building new urban crematoriums to deal with the surge in bodies is near to impossible because nobody wants the furnaces in their back yard, explains Teramura. That not-in-my-backyard crowd is forcing cities to make do with the facilities they have, even as the body count mounts. In Yokohama, the average wait for an oven is more than four days, driving up demand for half-way morgues such as Lastel. “Otherwise people have to keep the bodies at home where there isn't much space,” says Teramura. It also provides a captive audience to which he can market his other funeral services and wares.

寺村解釋說，想在都會區建新的火葬場以處理激增的屍體有如緣木求魚，因為沒有人希望焚化爐建在他家後院。這些要求「別在我家後院」的群眾，迫使都會區即使死亡人數持續增加，仍只好湊合著使用現有的設施。以橫濱為例，平均得等4天以上才能將遺體火化，這也拉抬了對Lastel這類「中途太平間」的需求。寺村說：「否則人們將被迫把屍體放在空間已經很侷促的家裡。」它還可以順便向那些六神無主的家屬推銷其他葬儀服務和相關商品。

In a recent poll of 2,796 funeral industry related firms, Japan's Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry (METI) found that a third have been in business for a decade or less. It's becoming a wild west market in some ways, attracting the honest operators and the not so reputable too. “People tend to leave things to the funeral director and some people take advantage of that. So instead of a 100,000 yen coffin you may end up with a 1 million yen cask,” Teramura says.

日本經濟產業省最近調查2796家葬儀業者後發現，有1/3業者入行不到10年。在某些方面，這個有如西部蠻荒時代的市場，固然吸引誠信的業者，但也有不肖店家投入。寺村說，「喪家往往請葬儀店全權作主，有些業者就趁機佔盡便宜。因此，本來只要10萬日圓的棺木，最後可能以100萬日圓成交。」

As for Lastel's Teramura, he's pushing ahead with expansion plans. He pulls out his mobile phone and shows a picture of an office building he just bought in another Yokohama neighborhood. When he has finished renovating it will be his second Lastel, with room for 40 bodies, more than double the first. He refuses to divulge, however, exactly where it is in case any NIMBY neighbors get wind of what he is up to and try to kill his latest corpse hotel.

至於Lastel老闆寺村，他正加緊推動擴張計畫。他拿出手機，秀出他剛剛在橫濱附近購置的辦公大樓的照片。整建完成後，這將是他名下第2家Lastel，可以存放40具遺體，是第一家的兩倍以上。但他拒絕透露確實的地點，以免那些「別在我家後院」的鄰居聽到風聲，知道他的意圖，封殺他最新的遺體旅館計畫。

Photo shows an employee of funeral operator Lastel adjusting flowers inside a viewing room where coffins are delivered through hatches whenever friends and family come to pay their respects to the dead.