| Surrounded by dangerous currents and without a drop of fresh water, even local fishermen rarely land on Sotobanari island in the remote west of Japan's Okinawa prefecture. But all alone for two decades, 76-year-old Masafumi Nagasaki has made this desert island an unlikely retirement home -- with an unusual dress code. Braving typhoons and biting insects, Nagasaki is a hermit in the buff."It must have been about the second year I came here, and there was this typhoon that smacked into the island head-on. For about a year there was no shade, I just scorched under the sun. It was at that point I thought this was going to be an impossible place to live," Nagasaki told Reuters in an encounter on Sotobanari island, which translated from the local dialect appropriately means "outer distant" island. After a brief career as a photographer, and a longer one in the murkier side of the entertainment industry, Nagasaki says he wanted a place to retire away from it all. For the first year, he still rushed to throw on clothes when boats passed his way. But slowly the island stripped away his embarrassment. "I don't do what society tells me but I do follow the rules of the natural world. You can't beat nature so you just have to obey it completely. That's what I learned when I came here, and that's probably why I get by so well," Nagasaki said. But he does puts on clothes once a week for a trip to the nearest settlement, about one hour by skiff, to collect 10000 yen (120 US dollars) his ... |
