After graduating from one of the nation's most prestigious universities, Keiro Kitagami became a Finance Ministry bureaucrat, thereby joining the ranks of the elite in Tokyo's Kasumigaseki government hub.
Ordinarily, he would have been expected to tread this bureaucratic path before seeking the blessing of the Liberal Democratic Party and powerful business groups to forge a political career.
But the 36-year-old Kitagami is aiming for a Diet seat now -- and not on the LDP ticket.
"The LDP approached me. But I was frustrated with the way things were, and thought it would be the same thing if I ran with the LDP," Kitagami said in his Kyoto campaign office. "So I chose to run with the Democratic Party of Japan."