“The war has begun again.” An anonymous woman from Gaza Strip in Palestine.
For his ongoing series I miss the smell of jasmine in Palestine, Japanese photographer Kai Yokoyama has been photographing the daily life of an anonymous Palestinian woman living in Tokyo.
On November 12, 2019, 34 people were killed by Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip. She says that she doesn't want to be connected with being a Palestinian anymore. Two years ago she left her homeland via Israel and Jordan and arrived in Japan to start a new life. Although she told her family that she would return within two months, she intends not to return to Palestine. She hasn't seen her family since the day she left.
“My father died of cancer due to the banned chemical weapons in Gaza. He asked me to cut his nails, It was just before he died and he found that it was difficult to cut them by himself. I haven't told my family about my life in Japan, as I don't want them to worry. I miss the smell of jasmine in Palestine."
Kai Yokoyama is a Japanese photographer based in Tokyo, Japan. Starting out as an architecture student at Saitama University, he switched his major to photography and completed his studies at Tokyo College of Photography. After working as an assistant to contemporary art photographer Izima Kaoru, he has become a full-time freelance commercial photographer. In 2020, he received the Yumi Goto (RPS’s) one-year mentorship program to make photobooks in Tokyo.