The Aokigahara

WARNING: Graphic pictures to ensue, that may upset your well being. Continue at your own risk.

First my myriads of anime reviews, then Japanese Host Clubs review and a Japanese movie review. Will I ever tire of my fascination with Japan?

Probably not.

Ah~~~The Aokigahara. Famously dubbed as The Suicide Forest. No, this is not a bad screenplay for a B-grade romance saga. Shit is real.

People go to this forest to pull the plug on their lives. Every year, a whopping 70 bodies will be found on average.

It is said this trend started after a novel published by Seicho Matsumoto entitled Kuroi Kaiju depicted a love story where 2 lovers made a suicide pact by ending their lives in a forest. But here's the hitch...people have been meeting their makers in this forest even before the book was in existence!

The forest itself is located at the base of Mount Fuji, of the woodland vicinities.

If you zoom in really closely, you'd see an army of ghosts waving at you.

You can find dead bodies of many range - from skulls and skeletons to freshly dead ones. Many evidence of method they have used for their suicide had been left behind as well. You can find bottles laying around suggesting the victim had overdosed, knifes to suggest the victim bled themselves to death, alcohol tins[prolly spiked with horse drugs] and of course ropes to prove that hanging and self-strangulation also happened. Some of them also had put up some kind of tents and beds as if to wish they were sheltered and 'comfortable' when they have pulled the string.

On second thoughts, these are probably just garbage. 

Ah, here you go.

Morbidly enough, this had made the mountain a pretty popular place for people who'd want to witness the truth with their own eyes. I bet they're not disappointed.

The victims are of various age range and gender with children also being present. That makes it even more creepy.

Did I also mention that the forest is entirely devoid of life? There are no animals in the forest. Allright, prolly some scavenging bugs and rodents looking for fresh food but really. The eerie quietness of the forest is also one of the reasons it's very fascinating. Animals appear to not want to be there and they've got a pretty good damned reason.

Words on a billboards like this is scattered all over the forest to urge the victim to rethink their decisions.

I have only 2 questions though:

a) If the forest is notorious for it's alarmingly suicide rates and it's reputations as a suicide hotspots, why hasn't the Japanese government illegalize or block the entire forest from further mishaps from happening? I mean they admit to this being a worrisome tradition so why hasn't an official edict been issued to stop the deaths? Could it be this is part of a conspiracy as a population control method by the government? With the site still active as a tourist spot I'm pretty sure the tourism aspect of it brings lucrative business. So I guess in this case, they kinda need people to die.

b) Despite having 'encouraging' phrases raised on a billboard all over the forest urging the victims to think twice about their actions - no other preventative method is actually being executed.

Fun fact for you: right after stumbling upon the Aokigahara fables online, I immediately picked up Henry James' Turn of the Screw. If you know your classics, you'd understand the weird coincidence. =O