During the 1950s and 1960s, most young people from rural areas of Japan could not afford to go to high school, but went to work after they completed junior high school. It was common for a large group of these fifteen or sixteen year old junior high school graduates from one village to travel together to a large city to seek work, a practice called shūdan shūshoku.Employers were eager to hire young, unskilled workers from the countryside who were accustomed to hard work and a low standard of living. They called them “golden eggs” (kin no tamago). For the young people, finding work in a big city was a dream come true, but many gave up and returned home after a few months. Such groups of new graduates came from remote islands and from as far away as Okinawa, which was still under American Occupation. Click on PICTURES to see them.