Japan

“Karoshi” in Japanese means to work oneself to death. In Tokyo a traveler can watch a white-collared automaton nodding on after his metro stop, only to wake up and hurl himself onto the platform as the closing doors nip his briefcase. And while the extreme work ethic and obedience to a higher authority are all-pervasive, it rubs a raw wound in a culture that before the war was profoundly spiritual and agrarian.

For now at least, discipline and a set of very precise rules prevail. The length and depth of a bow have endless meanings, there is a perverse conscientiousness over shoes, and the intricate wrappings of a kimono are either correct or end in embarrassment. It’s a constant veering between Shingon Buddhism and the more ancient Shinto faith, a culture where cartoons, geishas, and gothic dolls somehow coexist side by side with the most sophisticated brands in the world. The culture is deliciously inscrutable, all the more so because as an outsider you will never decipher it.

Japan is the be all and end all for a traveler, the ultimate destination with the ultimate price tag where one can encounter a graciousness of hospitality unknown anywhere else in the world. Memories linger more powerfully, whether the scalding waters of Yamanoyado Bekkan, the intimate treasures of the farm at Kuruminoki, or the perfections of the personal garden of Mirei Shigemori.

A stay in a temple at Koyasan is an absolute must, where you can fill your cedar-bound notebook with red-and-black goshuin stamps and calligraphy carefully entered by a resident monk at any of the 50 temples there. Just remember the rules: a fake stamp or blemish in your notebook will result in immediate refusal, and you'll wish you were on the next bullet train back to Tokyo.

Here’s my photo essay on Japan.