In a station of the metro in Rio de Janeiro, where both live, illustrator Haruki and artisan Celina meet by chance--and soon decide, however improbably, to travel together to Japan. Their shared destination: the famous Rakushisha, or Hut of Fallen Persimmons, where seventeenth-century haiku master Matsuo Basho once stayed. Their trip to Kyoto provides a context for each to meditate on the past, their feelings for each other, and questions of cultural...