Japan: The Basics contains many photographs (all taken by me) to help with the discussions in the book. I have previously done individual posts on each of the photos that were in the first edition that are not in the second edition (a list of all the photographs in the first edition can be found here). This is the next post in a series that I will do on each of the photos in the second edition of Japan: The Basics using the tag Photo in Japan: The Basics 2 (all of the photographs can be found here). I’m starting with those that are in both editions of the book and this is the next in that category.
While the photo below was part of a collection of photos in Figure 5.2 in the first edition of Japan: The Basics, in the second edition it is Figure 5.3(c).
The photo shows a rope with signs saying no entrance and that there is CCTV (despite no visible signs of any, or even electricity) block a track into the woods. The photo works with the discussion in the book about where people seem to go to take their life.
As noted in the post Favourite Photos: Aokigahara (Photo in “Japan: The Basics” (2nd Edition)), as well as discussing Aokigahara in Japan: The Basics, I have previously discussed the forest in two posts (Blurring the boundaries between research and fiction: Aokigahara and Aokigahara in Manga – And Does Aokigahara Still Have a Place in Academic Writing?) and, as inferred in the first of those, Aokigahara appears in my second novel, Tokyo 20/20 Vision.
Christopher P. Hood 