*Creeeeeeeeeeeeeep*

Carol, I was half kidding about the Ainu. I think the Japanese have been in most of Japan long enough to be considered 'indigenous' by now. :) As you alluded to, the Ainu are native to Hokkaido, the "Kuriles," and Sakhalin (the latter two currently in Russia, where the Ainus are pretty much extinct). I think there's only about a dozen, mostly elderly, fluent speakers of Ainu today. The rest speak Japanese, unfortunately. :(

I'm not sure about how much control they might have in Hokkaido, but it doesn't really matter much, since they've all given up and gone Japanese.

---Lepus Rex