User:Iropke

Ian Ropke

Ian Ropke (also known as Ian Martin Ropke) is a Japan private travel expert and consultant. Ian is also a serial entrepreneur with more than 40 years of innovation behind him: everything from local social engineering (The Kyoto Connection & The Kyoto Cinema Club) to travel innovation and IT project/idea design and publishing (as Editor-in-Chief of the Kyoto Visitor's Guide, 1994-2009). I am also an avid wood worker, especially sculpture and Japanese fundamental wood process basics. And I like to write a lot. ..

Ian Ropke: Japan travel and culture expert since 1992  Greetings or Konnichiwa! My name is Ian Ropke and I founded and continue to own and run Your Japan Private Tours (since 1992).

I am Canadian and was raised in northern Ontario. I attended the University of Waterloo (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1980-1988). I also have a Masters degree in Applied Linguistics.

I have been active in the Japan tourism/hospitality industry, especially the private travel services sector, for nearly 25 years. I am also an expert on international tourism and its development as the Information Paradigm develops. . . with a travel disruption startup in progress. . . Going international? Think TripGaea!

Ian Ropke: Publications and current interests I know Kyoto (and Tokyo) extremely well. I served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Kyoto Visitor's Guide  from 1994-2009, and the Osaka Visitor's Guide (1993-1997). KVG in its present print form continues to follow my design and content strategies.

I am also the author/producer/editor of A Historical Dictionary of Osaka and Kyoto, published in 1999 by Scarecrow Press an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield:  on Amazon. and on Google Books.

The Historical Dictionary of Osaka and Kyoto is cited as one of 7 reference sources for Kyoto and Osaka on Wikipedia and many other leading Japan culture/history websites, and in key libraries around the world (including the Library of Congress and the National Diet Library of Japan).

Currently, I divide my time between Japan, San Francisco (travel startup) and increasingly Ecuador (eco-development project and a growing interest in chocolate and other South American products and possibilities . . .). I am also an active wood worker (spiritual guardian statues and furniture: pre-Columbian and Shinto motifs, two design lines), travel photographer and blogger, as well as a father and a friend to all those trying to create a better world for travelers and in the end we are all travelers. . . until we. . . and another journey begins. ..

For interesting reading visit my Japan travel blog

 Or follow YJPT on Google+

A selection of Kyoto-related blog entries by Ian, written for the Deep Kyoto can be found.