Kodokushi

Kodokushi is the kind of death that falls upon someone who has lived an exceptionally isolated life in Japanese society; his passing only becomes known to others when his corpse begins to smell. It is a social issue unique to Japan – and far removed from my own reality. I am a Filipina who has lived her entire life in the Philippines. Total isolation is rare in our way of life. Even if one lives alone in an apartment, it is normal for the neighbours to want to get to know you. I first learned about it from a news magazine article I read years ago. I started to empathise with the sense of isolation it embodied when I realized that my grandmother is in her way, living in isolation – even though she lives with her extended family, myself included. Her eyesight is poor and she only has one hearing ear. She has trouble remembering and we have a challenging time talking to her. To the aged, that is the inevitable isolation. It got me thinking about what living really is. Consequently, I became more afraid of that time – should I get to the age of my grandmother – when I would lose my faculties, my freedom; when I can no longer live my life. It is easy to conclude that kodokushi afflicts the large old population in Japan. But in fact, many of those who died a kodokushi were middle-aged. Did they just give up on life and wait for death? I talked to Japanese photojournalist Soichiro Koriyama who recently exhibited eight-month worth of documentation of apartments left by kodokushi victims and he told me that many of the stains left by the corpses were pointed towards the door. Perhaps this was a last attempt to reach out to others, we reckoned. He also noted that in some cases there were no eulogies; no commemoration of the person’s life. This film is my way of rewriting the life of someone who seems doomed to such an end. Yoji, a middle-aged Japanese salary-man will attempt to escape this fate by moving to the Philippines, where happiness is supposedly easy to find. Indeed, many Japanese men of Yoji’s generation do come to my country to look for a second chance in love and to have a family; many Filipinas settle for a marriage to a foreigner who may not be a love match, but could be a good provider. But what if the escape plan does not work out either? Through Yoji’s journey, I also want to understand and show why, despite living with trifling and stifling living conditions, many of my fellow Filipinos find the will and reason to live.