Words: Dylan Tomine

“A week ago, he wasn’t smoking at all. Three days later, in the midst of our manic search for the native trout of Japan, it was maybe three or four smokes a day. And now, with the clock ticking and time running out, our gracious host, Shin Katsuragi, is lighting cigarettes back-to-back and sucking them down like a Hoover upright.”

above Japan rice paddles at dawn on the road to Mt.Fuji. It’s easy to imagine that little has changed in this scene over the past millennium.

Photo: Jum Klug