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Noriko Hayashi

Genyu Daito, 64, the chief priest of Banshoji, a Buddhist temple in Nagoya, prays in an LED-lit ossuary that highlights niches when they are selected by an electronic ID card. Innovative burial options are becoming popular as the tradition of family tombs declines.

Outside her home in a mountainous hamlet on Shikoku, 91-year-old Toshie Ueno takes a stroll after feeding her 15 cats. She’s the last person in the secluded area. “I am alone here,” she says, “but this is where I live.”

A farm in Nakashibetsu on the island of Hokkaido uses a rotary machine to automatically milk its 360 cows. “In the dairy industry in Japan, labor shortages and aging are serious issues,” says Daisuke Sasaki, the farm’s owner. “Adopting these robots is contributing to the economy.”

Tadao Inoue had 50 cows on his dairy farm in Nasu, in central Japan; now he’s down to one. With age, the work became too hard, but he says that having even one cow to milk keeps him going. Still, Inoue, 84, has decided to call it quits soon.

In the dwindling hamlet of Nagoro on Shikoku Island, 79-year-old Shinobu Ogura cleans the vacant elementary school. The last students stitched dolls in their likenesses; Tsukimi Ayano, a 72-year-old resident, made the principal. She has populated Nagoro, which now has just 25 inhabitants, with hundreds of dolls.

Taira and Ichi Katsuta, 89 and 85, who are happily married, have dementia. They live by themselves in a Tokyo apartment, often telling each other stories that only they understand. In Japan, one in five people over 65 has dementia.

Kazuko Kori, 89, talks to Telenoid at Yume Paratiis, a nursing home in Amagasaki, a city near Osaka. A caregiver speaks through it remotely. The android is being studied as a way to stimulate conversations with people who have dementia.

As night falls at the Active Biwa nursing home in Otsu, a city near Kyoto, a robot patrols, quietly opening the door of each room to check on residents. If it detects anything unusual, it sends images to alert care workers. Many nursing homes are experimenting with technology designed to reduce demands on staff.

Visiting Minoru Tanaka, who is 85, Yamanaka checks his health. When his patients near the end of their lives, he not only provides medical care but talks with them about how they want to spend their last days. Sometimes he even accompanies them on outings to fulfill their final wishes. The doctor plans to continue his work for as long as he can. “I have no reason to stop.”