Advertisement
Published: December 13th 2006
Hachiko
At Shibuya. The Dog that waits for years after its master dies. If you are a fan of Futurama you already know the story.I was sitting in a Starbucks the other day, not because I am a fan of their product but the location of the store provided a great vantage point for people watching. The second story location with glass frontage allowed me to overlook the pedestrian crossing in Shibuya. Supposedly the busiest crossing in the world (why do the Japanese have to be the biggest or best or busiest for all these things? Is there a national inferiority complex?). Every 3 minutes the traffic stops and the pedestrians go crazy walking every which way, I saw it at around 2 in the afternoon, I cannot imagine peak hour. Insanity.
Musings
This land could make me lazy. If you want to learn the language you would really have to try. So many people here speak English or at least understand it enough to be able to point you in the right direction. This is great for tourists like me for whom there will be little benefit in learning more than the basics and who only wants to get around see things. That which benefits the lazy tourist is also a barrier to really being able to become immersed in the culture and
Shibuya Crossing
This is 2pm. Imagine peak hour? understand the people. I can only wonder if it is differrent in the countryside, Tokyo is the land of covenience but a little cold and unwelcoming - like any city I have experienced.
Two Wheeled Terrors
Supposedly it is illegal to ride a pushbike on the footpath. No one rides on the road. I dont blame them - the roads are a tad confronting. Yet I always thought Japan a nation of laws that were strictly obeyed. Beer is readily available everywhere and I am yet to see underagers drinking in a park. A contradiction it seems. It strikes me that since the footpaths are crowded and often massively overcrowded with pedestrians the bikes should be on the road. I have never been to Holland but I can safely say that I have never seen quite so many deadly treadlies about. I also thought about the supposed health benefits of riding a pushbike - I would have to say that in a city such as Tokyo the benefits would be minimal - no one gets up any real pace to work their hearts and even if they did you would have to contemplate all the city pollution the cyclists
Custom Scooter
Yes a Yamaha T-Max with custom seat, lights and full system including a carbon Akraprovic pipe. Why? It's still a scooter. would suck down. It struck me just last night the rediculousness of the bicycle situation when none of the cyclists wear helmets but all constuction workers do even if there is no danger of falling objects on that particular work site.
Fashion Foremost
I am not sure why winter equals mini skirts and boots. I am not sure that I care.
Harajuku. Fashion and Design heaven. One of the things that I enjoy most about travel is the different architecture. I do not pretend to know anything about it but I do know that I like what I saw around Harajuku and Shibuya. For such a Fashion district architecture certainly played an important role.
Motorcycle Mayhem
Helmets may not be a requirement for cyclists but they are for motorcyclists. 99% of the helmets I have seen are open faced and most of them of the skull cap variety- maybe understandable in a really hot place but when it is 5 degrees celcius I do not understand. The wind chill must be amazing. I do not really support open faced helmets but in a land where fashion is foremost it may be understandable. I have seen construction helmets and
Temple Gates
I was wandering along and saw this temple wedged between modernity and serenity. I even saw a Dressage helmet on one bloke the other day. No design standards for motorcycle helmets? The best that I have seen are the open faced helmets with curved tinted screens on them making the riders look like characters from the anime series G-Force.
Motorcycles in the city are smart. They are mostly scooters. Only once have I seen a Litre class machine in the city as opposed to Australian Motorcyclists that believe anything other than a sports bike is not really worth while. I have noticed a large number of SuperMotards here - now there has to be the most practical commuter I have ever seen - what a fun way to get to work!
The prevalence of scooters is cool but what is funny about it is all the custom scooters - I am not talking about chrome and mirriors on a Vespa but Japanese scooters with custom paint, pipes, seats, screens, oh and cupholders too.
The riding behaviour leaves a little to be desired though. I see people riding with one or two feet down all the time and not for a metre or two before stopping or after starting but constantly. One of the
Capsule Hotel
660 Capsules in this hotel cheekier things that I have seen, that could be adopted back home for the person in an insane rush, is jumping off the bike at the lights to push it through with the crossing pedestrians - hilarious, you must gain all of 20 seconds.
Late Autumn
Being from a country where we really have no autumn colours or experience I have been wandering around in a state of constant amazement. The yellows, oranges and particulary the reds leave me awestruck. The images of falling leaves in the wind are so beautiful I find myself picking my jaw up off the ground and unable to adequately describe what I see and feel. I was chatting to some expats and showing them my photos and they commented on how beautiful the photos I have taken are, they have been amazed at the beauty I have seen - I have the outsiders eye, they have become immune to the beauty that surrounds them. I am sure that I am also victim to this, I take for granted the beauty that surrounds me every day. For those of you that are reading this - stop, take out your camera or artists eye and
Capsule Hotel
Me in my fibreglass tube. Way more space than my bunk in the Navy. Positively luxurious with TV radio and a light - even enough space to sit up! take a walk in your own neighbourhood. I am sure that you will be amazed at what you have missed.
Contrasts
I was walking around the other day taking in the sights, sounds and smells of Tokyo. It was a wet and kind of miserable day and a weekend so the crowds were out in force - just to add to the occasion. I went to Asakasa to see the temple there. It was huge, but perhaps because of the masses of tourists it lost some of its appeal to me. A temple cannot create the necessary solemnity for spiritual connection (for me at least) without a certain amount of solitude. Thousands of tourists snapping photos and chatting wildly certainly destroyed that particular temple for me.
I moved on back into Shinjuku to seek out a capsule hotel for a 'real' Japanese experience. My rain jacket had kept my top half satisfyingly dry, yet my feet had become cold, wet and downright uncomfortable. I was walking around Kabukicho in Shinjuku in my search for the the capsule hotel and found a very different and somewhat seedy side of Tokyo. The place is full of pubs, gambling halls, porn
on dvd, porn in magazines, strip clubs, pimps, gentlemans clubs, love hotels and did I mention porn? Interestingly there was quite a lot of female tourists wandering around taking it in. I was approached by several men of African descent trying to push their wares and get me to visit their particular establishment. The place was starting to get me down.
I went and found somewhere to eat. A chain restaurant called Yoshinoya. I managed to point out the meal I was after - thank someone that the Japanese put all their menus in pictoral form. My meal arrived quickly and I realised that I had put myself into a situation where I was not sure how to eat the very meal that I had ordered. I started doing what I thought was right and I could see that I was being laughed at by the few other patrons in the place. I was still not over my cold miserable feet even though I was somewhere warm and dry and this sniggering started to piss me off. Another bloke walked into the place sat down and ordered - his meal quickly arrived and to my delight it was exactly
Harajuku Design
Building Design seems just as important as the fashion carried in store. what I had ordered. I copied what he did and discovered that what I had using a soup spoon for was actually a cup to be drunk from and the raw egg I had been dipping my rice and vegetables in was actually meant to be mixed with the beef stew. It was actually a really nice flavoursome and filling meal and I left the place satisfied that I had learned something new.
This new attitude had me approach my search for the capsule hotel in a different light. I approached one of the million hawkers on the street and with my trusty phrase book asked where the place was. He spoke no English and I speak no Japanese but after some wild gesticulating and a map I was on my way. I gave the best thankyou I could muster and went on my way - he had even included some writing on the map so when I got to the police post (Koban) that they would know exactly what I was looking for and could point me in the right direction. My night was on the up. I finally found the place and went in the front door
Harajuku Style
I am not sure if Droog is the style or not. Cool none the less. only to be confronted by a bunch of confusing signs in Japanese. This little bloke comes and stands beside me and looks at me, I must have had this lost sheep expression on my face but I took the opportunity and out came the trusty phrase book, only for the bloke to reply in English! He was going to the same place so he tells me to follow him, down the stairs and into the elevator we go, straight to the right floor. The bloke gave me a discount voucher for the hotel and shows me where to put my shoes, puts me in the right line. Wow, what a turn around - I was positively beaming by this stage. They even got a guy to the counter who could speak English. I was warmed by the unexpected hospitality and efforts of complete strangers - maybe I just have a great lost look about me. Maybe I should cultivate this?
In the capsule hotel they have the big communal bath thing. Awesome - I was warm and happy. The capsules themselves are kind of small and airless but bigger than my bunk when I was in the Navy and
Park Life
What a beautiful place to escape the harsh concrete modernity of Tokyo. far more luxurious. My head touched one end and my feet the other but you have enough room to sit up and there is a radio, a TV and light to read by. I do recommend a set of earplugs, the little fibreglass capsules act like resonance chambers and the drunk salaryman next to me was snoring. All round I had such contrasting experiences that I went to sleep with a smile.
I am eager to get out into the country side. I am sure that the people will be more friendly there. I believe that cities turn humans into cold heartless creatures and if it wasn't for a few genuinely nice people in this town I think I would go mad. I am not sure that I could live and work in Tokyo.
Park Life.
Tokyo madness had me needing to escape. I went to Harajuku on Sunday because that is when it is at its best. All the fashion slaves were out. There is something disturbing about a Japanese Gothic Lolita, more so than the PVC Kimono wearing wannabe Geisha. Disturbing though it may be it makes any of the fashion 'rebels' in Australia look kind
Photographic Passion
It is something that I have always associated with the Japanese tourist but it turns out that the passion for the image extends all the way home. of tame. Our freaks only come out at night whereas these kids hang around the train station in one of the busiest parts of Tokyo. Cool.
I went from there back into Yoyogi park to appreciate a little open space. I never really appreciated the need for green space in a city before, probably because I have never lived in a busy city centre before. There was seemingly hundreds of the quintessential Japanese photographers out taking photos of gorgeous autumn images, young blokes practicing freestyle BMX, people playing soccer, families picnicing, groups drumming, people snoozing in the sun and soaking what little heat they could from the low winter sun, there were people dancing, in groups or solo, people practicing Kendo and one fella practicing that haunting Japanese bamboo flute. I have a new appreciation for Park Life. What a way to spend a day.
Travel is a wonderful thing. The more I learn about this place the more I learn about me. Things that were always there but I never truly realised.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.1s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 5; qc: 46; dbt: 0.0746s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Matt
non-member comment
Awesome
Woz, Sounds like you are having an awesome time. But you sound a bit down at the same time. Maybe i'll up and take leave and join you. Although I find it highly improbable that I will. I'm loving the photographs. Really capturing the moment. Matt. http://www.myspace.com/hotaussiefireman