Yoshiko Kodama’s family has run a traditional public bathhouse in the mountainous city of Nagano, Japan, for 138 years.
The business has survived multiple world wars, five emperors and three cataclysmic earthquakes. But the conflict in Iran is threatening to put her sento, as the storied Japanese institutions are called, out of business.
Heating the water that pours out of Kodama’s faucets requires as much as 2,000 liters of heavy oil each month. And the soaring oil prices resulting from the war have left Kodama, 87, unsure how she can continue operating a business she was already struggling to keep afloat.