Historians are not all in agreement, but over the centuries, Japan continued to use tattoos to indicate social rank and to create a visual record of criminal behavior that would follow a lawbreaker more persistently than a Google search ever could. The tattoo as a mark of hereditary status certainly had its place.

  Japan never had slavery or a complex caste system like India, though it did have a class system, which was regimented by occupation and closeness to the Imperial line. There were always the hinin, “non-people” — this would include jailers, executioners, and gravediggers — who did distasteful tasks and also dealt with criminals. As Buddhism flourished in Japan, it created a new underclass known as the burakumin (“people of the village”). They engaged in tasks considered sinful under Buddhism, such as the slaughtering of animals and making leather products. They also did filthy and dangerous work that the Japanese upper class would not do. They were called “people of the village” because they lived in separate communities from the rest of the Japanese (and, in some isolated parts of Japan, still do). These two groups were often marked with crosses or lines on their upper arms to keep track of them, and to keep them away from the greater community.

  The Nihon Shoki, another of Japan’s earliest written historical (and sometimes mythical) records, has a note about a man named Azumi No Muraji who had been tattooed across his face as punishment for treason. Ichiro Morita, in the book Irezumi: Japanese Tattooing writes that in 460 AD, geimen (tattooing the area around the eyes) was one form of punishment. The punishment was later replaced with branding the flesh of a criminal. These “flesh punishments” included cutting off fingers, ears, and noses. The eye tattoo was revived in 1672, and, in a great humanitarian leap forward, in 1720 most of the “flesh punishments” were replaced with tattoos being inked on the body. Being punished with a tattoo was considered getting off easy. There were good and bad things about this system. It definitely made it clear to the public that the tattooed individual had a criminal record. However, it made it hard for such individuals to reintegrate into society.

  After 1720, malefactors were marked with symbols indicating they had been found guilty of past crimes, and the area where they came from. In the Tama region, a man might have the kanji character for dog tattooed on his forehead. In other areas, the markings would be different — two stripes on the arm, or something else. However, the enterprising marked men found a way to game the system. According to Morita, “The (tattooed) men began to hide their markings in elaborate artistic tattoos.” It’s quite possible this influenced the early yakuza and their associates to get tattooed. Eventually, some of them used these tattoos to intimidate others for acts of extortion and other crimes. The tattoos that were carved on the criminal for punishment were used in “reverse for profit.” In other words, the tattoos became the futile equivalent of a yakuza daimon — something to strike terror into the hearts of peasants and townsmen, and make them cough up money. On September 25, 1870, the Meiji government abolished tattooing as a form of criminal punishment.

  However, despite the government use of tattoos to classify people, punish felons, and maintain “living” criminal records, the popularity of tattoos among Japanese commoners grew steadily in the Edo period. After 1750, perhaps due to the popularity of a Chinese novel translated into Japanese as Suikoden, which depicted the tragic, honorable, and heroic lives of 108 outlaws, tattoos became the rage among the lower classes.

  The novel was tremendously successful, going through many translations and editions — it was almost counter-revolutionary. Several of the heroes in the book were tattooed Robin Hoods fighting against corrupt government officials, and the books were lavishly illustrated. They depicted these heroes in all their dragon-tattooed glory, and they became inspirational figures for Japan’s emerging middle class known as chonin (townsmen). Among the chonin emerged small groups of vigilante law-keepers known as otokodate (street knights) and participants in a new occupation — firefighters. In Japanese, they were called hikeshi, literally “extinguishers of fire.” Both the firefighters and the street fighters embodied modified warrior codes and worked on behalf of the commoner, not the feudal lord. If you wanted to discuss Edo-period Japan in Star Wars terms, the samurai were the Storm Troopers, fearlessly flying into battle at the will of their lord and master, Lord Vader, and dying anytime — while the street knights and the firemen were the champion of the little guy, the Rebellion. The samurai were the arm of oppression; they wore armor and were clean-skinned, with no tattoos. The street knights and firemen were heavily inked and unruly, but sworn to protect the weak and to fight injustice. It’s not surprising that they were the most celebrated figures of popular culture.

  The firemen of the era didn’t quite possess the skill sets you might imagine. The only way they knew to put out fires was by knocking down adjoining buildings, to create a gap so that fire couldn’t spread. Their heroic and highly visible exploits earned them a great number of local fans, and they flaunted their status and solidarity within their group with colorful tattoos. The firemen were often separated into kumi (groups), just like the modern yakuza, and it was not uncommon for members of one kumi to share similar markings. However, these Japanese firemen were so rough and aggressive in doing their duty that writers of the day question which did more damage: the fire or the firemen.

  These burly firefighters, who favored tattoos with water symbols such as the carp, and who had a fearless proclivity for dangerous work, are considered by some to be the antecedents of the modern yakuza — or, at least, many yakuza would like to believe as much. In a short time, perhaps emulating the fictional heroes they read about, it was not just firemen and street knights, but gamblers, construction workers, and artisans who were getting adorned with elaborate pictorial tattoos. The tattoo artists decorating the bodies of their newfound clients often made the inkings with one eye on the woodblock prints illustrating the Suikoden.

  Some of the techniques being used to make wood-block prints, ukiyo-e, and other artworks of the time were simply applied to the human body. The tools were often the same, although everyone knew that the human body is much softer than wood.*

  [* Ian Buruma, in the book The Japanese Tattoo.]

  Of course, the government, sensing that fun and rebellion was always dangerous, banned the practice in 1812, but it continued quietly among the lower classes. Tattoos were an assertion of individuality and liberty that the government found disturbing. The anti-authoritarian tone of the Suikoden did not charm them either. Tattoos were an inkblot on the face of Japanese morality.

  Evidence of the popularity of tattoos despite the ban can be found in the Tempo era (1830–1844), during which public tattoo contests were banned. Japan underwent a rapid modernization phase in the Meiji era (September 1868–July 1912), but the ban on tattoos was still formally in place — for Japanese citizens. However, visiting Westerners found the traditional Japanese tattoo to be a thing of remarkable artistic beauty. Foreign sailors had them done — even the Duke of York, who would later become King George the Fifth, and his older brother, got tattoos. The Duke of York had a full dragon carved on his forearm by the famous tattoo master Horicho, who hailed from Kobe — where the Yamaguchi-gumi would later start up. Future tsars, European royalty (including Queen Olga of Greece), and many more happily bought the services of Japan’s tattoo masters to put some color and oriental mystery into their lives.

  However, in the build-up to the World War II, tattoos were discouraged — they were frivolous and rebellious. Among the yakuza, certain artisans, and some laborers, the practice continued, but it was only after the war ended and the yakuza numbers swelled in the postwar chaos that the tattoo made a huge comeback.

  Saigo was ready to get an irezumi: the Japanese form of tattoo that means “the ink that is put in.” It was to the yakuza what a white shirt and necktie were to the Japanese salaryman — an indispensable part of the uniform.

  When Saigo arrived at the tattoo studio, he already knew what he wanted: a carp, cherry blossoms, and a dragon. He’d seen those on other yakuza, and liked the way they looked. He had little to no idea of what the symbolism meant; he just knew they looked cool.

  Some tattoo artists would look at the man they were going to ink and decide on their own what was the best tattoo for the individual. Saigo’s tattoo master let the individuals choose. Although the ink used in traditional Japanese tattoos is black, it appears blue when it goes under the skin. The tattoo master told Saigo that it would be much more impressive to have a carp shaded in hints of blue with a splash of color, rather than a gaudy burning-red rendition. Saigo agreed.

  The carp is one of the most loved symbols and tattoos of the yakuza. It’s a manly fish. It swims upstream against the current, even bravely climbing up waterfalls, and when it gets caught, it sits quietly on the cutting board without flapping and flailing, bravely awaiting its death. It is the most stoic of fish. The Japanese word for carp is koi, a homonym for “love,” and in that sense, it is also auspicious.

  The cherry blossoms are a symbol of transience and, in some respects, freedom from the fear of death. The cherry blossoms only bloom for a short time each year before withering and falling, or being blown off the branches by the wind as they weaken. In this way, too, the cherry blossom is shorthand for the yakuza ideal of living fast and dying young — and acknowledgment that life as a yakuza can be very short and that death can come any time.

  Saigo had opted for the traditional tattoos done not with electric needles, but with a combination of blunt instruments, sumi (Chinese ink), and awls that dug into the flesh — a style known as wabori. It is probably the most painful method of getting inked up you can choose. A small series of triangular edged awls and gouges are used to push the pigment under the skin. His tattoo master would use a complicated technique to add subtle shading to the whole of the tattoo, and brute force to give the scales of the carp on Saigo’s back a three-dimensional aspect — which was exactly what Saigo wanted.

  He wanted the cool-looking tattoos, but was not quite prepared for the immense pain and the blood. While he was waiting, he watched others being tattooed, and it looked a little painful. The master was working primarily on the outer epidermis of the man before him, going over an outline that he had drawn on the body with a felt pen. Some of the best tattoo masters don’t even have to draw an outline. (Horiyoshi the Third once said that he could see the outline on the body as though it was projected there — as clear as a children’s coloring book.)

  With one hand, he stabbed into the flesh, holding the skin with the other hand, constantly wiping away the blood. It didn’t look much more painful than getting a shot — but, admittedly, a series of flu-shots one right after another didn’t seem pleasant.

  The tattoo parlor was fairly spacious but poorly lit, slightly grimy, and held a strange scent in the air. It was the smell of blood, sweat, fear, rust, steel, stale cigarettes, and something musky, almost erotic as well. The master would sometimes light a stick of incense before carving up a customer; the scent of sandalwood didn’t drown out the numerous odors in the room, but simply complemented them. It smelled as if someone had opened a brothel in a locker room next to a coffee shop. It wasn’t a place where you felt like staying for longer than you had to.

  When Saigo lay down on the floor, the master asked him two questions: How much pain can you take? How badly do you want the three-dimensional component on the carp scales?

  Saigo answered that he was a man, he was ready for pain, and he wanted a tattoo that told the world that. The master grunted. Normally, the process of creating a tattoo was divided into four parts. First, there was the drawing of the outline: sujibori. This was done using a sharp-edged tool and pigment to press the lines into the skin. This carving of the outline involved sticking the needle deeply into the skin, again and again. Then came bokashi, the shading and coloring of the areas already outlined with the needle. Finally, there was gakubori — digging a frame, which decorated the surrounding area outside the component parts of the tattoo with a pattern. Sometimes, enso, a background comprising waves or clouds or other decorative patterns, was added to give the composition a sense of harmony.

  The master wanted Saigo to understand what the full process would entail, so he began with the scales of the carp, doing a few to the point of completion. The initial carving of the outline stung and was painful, and Saigo didn’t flinch, but when the master began the bokashi, Saigo felt pain like nothing he had ever experienced. The master drove the needle in so deeply that it hit the bone; Saigo had to gnaw on his cheek not to scream. The master poked and dug; Saigo could feel his skin stretch. He grunted; he sweated, he clenched his fists. He lasted ninety minutes, and only blacked out once. But just for a second.

  Five hundred dollars for a ninety-minute session — the first of many sessions he would undergo over the next four to five years. It seemed like a fair price — unless you broke it down into a per-centimeter scale. He didn’t care. Fuck it, it was worth it.

  He drove himself home that night and went to bed. The scales tattooed on his skin were bumpy and inflamed. The pain was immense. Yet he was happy. He’d started down the path of being a real man and dealing with real pain. As time went by, he would gradually notice that the deep penetration that was part of the traditional tattoo methods was destroying his pores. His flesh was cold where the tattoos had been carved. By the time he was done with the full-body tattoo, his normal body temperature had been permanently lowered — it was as if his entire body was covered with a permanent first-degree burn. He had trouble sweating and adjusting to slight temperature changes. He found it hard to deal with the cold and the heat; his body always seemed to be out of sync.

  At the time, he wasn’t thinking more than a few weeks into the future. He had no idea of the damage he was doing to himself. Tattoos, he’d later tell his son, are pretty damn impressive, but in the end they amount to self-inflicted punishment.

  There has not been a great deal of scientific study done on the extent of physical damage caused by traditional Japanese tattoos. Here’s what we do know: the traditional tattoo needle penetrates the dermal-epidermal junction and goes deep into the dermis. This totally and terribly disrupts the function of epidermis as a barrier, causing a wound and lodging the ink openly into the dermis. The way the wound heals affects not only the quality of the tattoo, but also the quality of the skin function after the wound has healed.

  The ink stays in place for years by tricking the body’s complex immune response. The immune system is structured to defend the body against a wound, and the ink is taken as an infection about to occur. The immune system responds to the invading ink by generating certain types of cells, which serve functions such as healing wounds, and detecting and destroying foreign substances, cellular debris, and pathogens.

  The healing may leave scar tissue that affects the sweat glands. The needle or awl may also damage sweat glands as it stabs through them. There are about 100 sweat glands in every square centimeter of skin, so it’s not surprising that some damage is done.

  The master gave Saigo a choice of which ink to use in dyeing parts of the tattoo red. He could use tattoo pigment imported from America, which was cheap and safe, but faded quickly, or he could use tattoo pigment from Germany, Cadmium Red, which could only be applied in small doses because it was poisonous. Although a highly toxic compound, Cadmium Red was brighter and lasted longer. Saigo chose the dangerous dye. He wanted the scales on his carp tattoo to have a red luster.

  Even if he had understood the risks he was taking, the damage he was doing to his body, and that it would eventually cost him an amount equivalent to the purchase of a top-of-the-line Mercedes-Benz, he would have still done it. Why?

  Because the tattoos on his body would become Saigo’s way of charting his rise up the yakuza ladder — a permanent and unchanging record of his successes, his income, his failures, and his loyalties.

  CHAPTER NINE

  How to make 50 million yen with a fistful of yen and some pussy

  His debts paid off, his body tattooed, Saigo was now making good, steady money, but he wanted to pull a big score.

  It was a cold day in February 1991. Saigo was sitting on his sofa, practicing the guitar, when Mizoguchi burst into his office, very excited. There were a bunch of burakumin outside the Daiwa Bank making a scene. Mizoguchi had seen three or four of them arguing with the manager.

  Saigo had an idea. He ordered Mizoguchi to gather some guys, drive the van up to the bank, grab the guy in charge of the burakumin, throw him in the back, and bring him to Saigo. He wanted to talk to him.

  Saigo didn’t have anything against the burakumin, but he wasn’t fond of dealing with them. Saigo suspected that many of his fellow yakuza, and even one of his soldiers, were burakumin. The yakuza were a meritocracy.

  Mizoguchi dropped off Akihito Morita at Saigo’s office thirty minutes later.

  In addition to being the leader of the Burakumin Liberation League, Morita was a fastidious undertaker who worked in a poorly run crematorium. He arrived dressed in a black suit, white shirt, and black tie. He carried a brown leather briefcase. His short-cropped hair was dark black with specks of gray, and he was wearing his trademark tortoiseshell glasses.

  From behind his cheap metal desk, Saigo motioned Morita to come into the main office and sit down. They exchanged business cards. Both were rejects from society, so Saigo thought they should get along.