I give you my life
In 2013, Chloé Jafé moved to Tokyo with the ambition of meeting the women of the Yakuza.
But no one enters this mafia, one of the most legendary in the world, without being invited. After spending a year perfecting her Japanese, immersing herself in the codes of a culture miles apart from her own, having been a hostess in a bar and combing the city’s red light districts, the lock finally broke, thanks to a lucky encounter and her sheer temerity.
Inducted by a boss, she was able to approach these untouchable clans, their official rituals and gatherings, the taboos and tattooed stories hidden away beneath their kimonos, and through them, their wives, daughters and mistresses.
These are the women lurking in the shadows of the men to whom they have dedicated their existence, their skin marked by this level of dedication which automatically excludes them from society.
The ‘gift of one’s life’, or inochi azukemasu in Japanese, constitutes the first part of her trilogy.
