Though there is no mention of it in the Reuters article, I wonder if “Yakuza Moon” reveals anything about North Korea’s connection to the drug trade in Japan (there is a known connection with reports as recent as March 2007):

The elaborate dragons, phoenixes and a medieval courtesan with one breast bared and a knife between her teeth are a symbol of Tendo’s childhood as the daughter of a “yakuza” gangster and her youth as a drug-using gang member.

The author of “Yakuza Moon,” a best-selling memoir just out in English, the 39-year-old Tendo says that police efforts to eradicate the gangsters have merely made them harder to track.

“The more the police push, the more the yakuza are simply going underground, making their activities harder to follow than they ever were before,” she told Reuters in a recent interview.

Police say full-fledged membership in yakuza groups fell to 41,500 last year, down from 43,000 in 2005, a decline they attribute to tighter laws against organized crime.

[. . .]

Descended from medieval gamblers and outlaws, yakuza were long portrayed as latter-day samurai, bound by traditions of honor and duty and living extravagant lives.

Tendo’s father, the leader of a gang linked to the Yamaguchi-gumi, the largest yakuza group, led a “classic” yakuza life replete with Italian suits, imported cars and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.

Raised with strict ideas of honor, she was both spoiled and scolded by the tattooed men who frequented her family home.

But she also faced prejudice and bullying because of her father. In response, she joined a gang, took drugs and become the lover of several gangsters before near-fatal beatings and drug overdoses convinced her to change her life.

Now a writer and mother, Tendo has distanced herself from the yakuza world, which she feels is rapidly losing its traditions.

Being a gang member is not illegal in Japan, and until recently the gangs were known for openness. Their offices even posted signs with their names and membership lists inside.

Gangs cooperated with police, handing over suspects in return for police turning a blind eye to yakuza misdemeanors, but this broke down after organized crime laws were toughened in 1992.

[. . .]

“They think being a yakuza is like joining a company,” Miyazaki said. “There’s a joke about a young man going to a gang office and asking what the salary was, and would he get insurance.”

But while today’s yakuza are eschewing tattoos and amputated fingers — cut off to atone for mistakes — in favor of more mainstream lifestyles, they are unlikely to disappear altogether.

“Fewer people want to become yakuza,” Miyazaki said. “But those who do will be very logical, very scary — and much, much more dangerous.”

Read the rest here.