Modern Japan is a place of two prominent faiths: Shintoism and Buddhism. While the latter has been ingratiated into and caricatured in American culture, the former is one that evades a common understanding for many average Americans. One of the constructs within Shintoism is ‘YOMI’ (黄泉), or ‘land of darkness’.

Scholars of Shintoism describe this underworld as a ‘shadowy world where suffering exists in perpetuity’, regardless of redemptive actions taken to course correct for past transgressions. This construct loosely parallels the Christian idea of purgatory in its resemblance to limbo, and as an idea, serves as an interesting lens to observe San Francisco’s Japantown through. The six-block enclave that mirrors the aesthetic and architecture of the Ginza District of Tokyo, for the purpose of this series, introduces yomi as a concept to explore.

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