The Airin District is an area in northern Nishinari Ward, Osaka City, where simple lodging houses and a day-labor market coexist. Along with Sanya in Tokyo and Kotobuki-chō in Yokohama, it is known as one of Japan’s three major “doya-gai” (flophouse districts). Popular in recent years as an accommodation area for backpackers, the district was formerly called Kamagasaki and was once farmland. Even then, there were “kitchin-yado” (cheap lodgings) where guests cooked for themselves and paid only for fuel costs, but most were destroyed during the Osaka air raids of 1945. Soon after the war, many downtown inns opened, and from the 1950s the area came to be recognized nationally as a major flophouse district. In 1962, the Nishinari Labor Welfare Center Foundation was established to improve working conditions for day laborers by requiring clear disclosure of labor terms. From around 1970, annual events such as summer festivals, the “Yottekki” festival, and winter “Overnight” festivals began to be held, continuing today as community traditions supported by cooperation between day laborers and support organizations. In addition to simple lodgings and standing bars, the area also has many NPO and religious facilities.