Gangsters, geishas, monks & me

the long version

As a young American in a Zen monastery in a small Japanese fishing town and later as that town's only resident foreigner, Gordon Hutchison knows mistakes have consequences. But when he befriends the local yakuza boss, his life takes a dramatic turn into the unforgiving dictates of gangsters and geishas-- where one misstep could cost him much more. Irreverent yet introspective, Gangsters, Geishas, Monks & Me chronicles Hutchison's odyssey through the foreigner-hostile backdrops of Zen, the yakuza and the "water trade" in his trial-by-fire initiation into Japanese culture.