Eiko Yoshizumi has always been affected by Japan’s scorching summers, going so far as to call them a “nightmare.”

“I was always terrified of going through summer in Japan,” she says. “I felt very languid and sluggish. I was as heavy as lead. My head was filled with heat. It caused headaches as well as depressive moods.”

It was only after experiencing a less oppressive summer season in Europe that Yoshizumi realized that Japan’s unforgiving heat could be to blame.