Mako is a slim middle-aged woman who does volunteer work, but people might be surprised to see her missing pinky finger and large tattoos.
Missing fingers and tattoos are telltale signs of a yazuka member, a member of Japan's notorious criminal organizations.
The world is male-dominated, with women taking on informal roles. Bosses’ wives, known as anesan (“big sisters”), often look after younger members and act as go-betweens with their husbands. Some may manage yakuza-owned nightclubs or run drug trafficking operations.
But Nishimura Mako went one step further, becoming the only woman ever to participate in the sakazuki, the yakuza brotherhood ceremony that formally confirms the new member's relationship with the organization.
Nichimura Mako (far left) with yakuza members. Photo: Conversation
Mako was born into a family of high-ranking government officials, and her childhood revolved around her father's beatings, she shared with Martina Baradel, a researcher and expert on Japanese crime at Oxford University, UK.
A tough childhood led Mako to rebel in middle school, where she began hanging out with bad guys and then biker gang members. There, she learned how to use her fists on the streets.
Mako's wild personality leads her to meet a young yakuza member who teaches her how to collect protection money, recruit prostitutes, blackmail, and resolve disputes.
Mako's life takes a turn when the yakuza calls her in the middle of the night, asking for reinforcements in a fight. Mako rushes to the rescue, using her baton to turn the battlefield into a pool of blood.
The brawl caught the attention of the local yakuza boss, who summoned Mako. "You have to become a yakuza, even if you are a woman," Mako recalled the boss saying at the time.
At this time, Mako had been in and out of juvenile detention centers many times. Her family was helpless, unable to save their daughter from getting involved. Mako accepted the offer of the local boss, joined a group of rookies with male members, and began her life as a yakuza trainee in the underworld.
Ms. Mako during her time as a yakuza apprentice. Photo: Conversation
After many missions, Mako officially became a yakuza through a sakazuki ceremony in a male kimono, swearing to follow the gang's path for life. As a senior member, Mako ran prostitution, drug rings, collected debts and mediated disputes between rival gangs in the area.
In a mistake, Mako cut off her own pinky finger in a yubitsume ritual to apologize and realized that she had a "knack" for doing it. Since then, yakuza who cannot cut off their own pinky fingers often ask Mako to do it for them, giving her the nickname "finger cutting master".
Trouble began when Mako was 30, when meth trafficking became the gang's main activity. She also had problems with her own addiction.
She outsmarted the organization, ran an independent meth ring, and was eventually kicked out of the group. Mako then had an affair with a rival gang member and became pregnant. This turned the tide for Mako, who decided to leave the yakuza world behind and live a quiet life to raise her child.
Despite her efforts, her yakuza background and extensive tattoos prevented Mako from finding work. She married her lover and returned to prostitution and drug trafficking.
During her second pregnancy, the couple’s arguments became so violent that the police were called in. They divorced. Her husband received custody of their two sons, and Mako returned to her old organization. But drugs had changed the boss she once respected. After two years, Mako left the underworld for good.
Mako sits with former yakuza in the living room of the Gojinkai charity branch. Photo: Coversation
Mako lived like a male yakuza, "washing his hands of the sword" like a male yakuza.
Now in her 50s, she rents a small apartment and lives alone, working as a demolition worker, trying to help her community, hoping for acceptance. Mako also runs a branch of Gojinkai, a charity that provides housing and aid to former yakuza, ex-convicts, and drug addicts.
“My day wouldn’t be complete without coming here every night,” the woman told Martina in the branch’s reception room. They gathered every day to reminisce about old times and share current struggles. Mako was the only woman at the tea table.
She credits her combativeness as one of the things that earned her respect in her youth. "I was very good at fighting, never losing to a man," she said, but stressed that she did not want to become a "feminist icon" or introduce herself as the only female yakuza in history.
Duc Trung (According to Conversation )
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