Posts Tagged: Tokyo Japan
Let’s English here
A helpful sign in a Matsuya in Kichijoji, Tokyo. Matsuya is a fast food chain specializing in gyudon, a Japanese beef bowl dish of immense popularity…
(Kichijoji 1-chome, Tokyo 2015)
The unwavering jizō
Kozukappara is one of Tokyo’s most notorious Edo-era execution grounds. This beautiful jizō overlooks and guards the place. The grounds are a very short walk from the south end of Minami-senju Station, and so trains are constantly coming and going on elevated tracks on either side of Kozukappara. But despite its unquiet location, the jizō, in its wisdom and patience, keeps calm, unwavering watch, guarding the living from the dead and the dead from the living…
(Near Minami-senju Station, Tokyo 2015)
Greetings from television…
I was bored one afternoon last November, waiting to leave my short-term apartment rental in Nakano 5-chome to go pick up my wife at Haneda. To kill the time, I turned on the television. The TV happened to be tuned to a kid’s program on NHK Educational TV (NHK Eテレ)…
I barely understand Japanese TV, because I barely understand the Japanese language. But Japanese TV is always visually interesting, so I rolled with it for awhile, looking forward to seeing my wife.
I have no idea what the shirtless guy with the obviously oiled skin was advertising…
(Nakano 5-chome, Tokyo 2015)
Bravery
He was smiling his way through Takadanobaba Station on Halloween, a night that’s crazy in Tokyo. The Yamanote Line crowd was a thick slurry of rush hour commuters and partiers in transit. His white cane made his blindness obvious. That and the cardboard mikoshi on his head made him stand out. His face held joy and purpose, and what he was doing took guts. I felt respect for him, and hoped his Halloween was happy…
(Takadanobaba Station, Tokyo 2015)
Yakuza leisure dōjō
In Asakusa at Kamiya Bar (神谷バー) you never know who you might meet. My wife and I were drinking there one night last November with an Australian friend and her Japanese husband. The tables in Kamiya Bar are packed closely together, so we couldn’t help notice that the people at the next table were having a hell of a good time.
I took a chance and asked if I could photograph them. They happily agreed.
The fellow in the hat seemed to be the leader, or at least he was paying for most the drinks. He was particularly friendly, so I asked for his photograph as well. He smiled and agreed. I got up from my chair and prepared to take a few shots.
But as I did my Australian friend pulled me close and said quietly into my ear “Careful, Dan, those guys are dangerous.”
“What do you mean?” Then I thought for a second and it dawned on me.
“Yakuza?” I said.
She pursed her lips and nodded, then let me go about my photographic business.
When I finished I sat at our table and spoke again quietly with my Australian friend.
“How do you know they’re yaks?”
She said “I used to work as a secretary for a Shinjuku real estate rental company. When they hired me, I just thought they wanted a white foreign girl who could speak fluent Japanese.”
Then she lowered her voice to an almost inaudible whisper. Whispers are almost impossible to hear in Kamiya Bar, but we managed.
She said “After a few years, I figured out yakuza owned the company. I was working for yakuza. They were in and out of where I worked all the time. So I know them. Those are low-level guys, but they’re still dangerous.”
She had lived in Japan for 18 years, and I trusted her implicitly. Yet her concern didn’t match the friendly, easy-going vibe I felt from the table next to us. I didn’t feel threatened, but I also didn’t want to keep imposing my camera upon yakuza having drinks. So I shot one last photo of them, thanked them in the best horrible Japanese I could manage, and rejoined my wife and our friends at our table.
After that we drank more beer and laughed, and even had a denki bran or two. I looked over at the yakuza every few minutes or so, raising my glass to them when they noticed me. I was happy I had met them, intrigued when my Australian friend told me what they were, and overjoyed that I was with my wife and my friends at Kamiya Bar.
(Asakusa, Tokyo 2015)
Passing through Nippori…
…on the Yamanote Line as I made my way to Ueno to go drinking with some friends.
(Nippori Station, Tokyo 2013)
Cold stone home
On a warm late September day they had staked out a spot in front of the Shinjuku Station A8 exit. He ate while she seemed to monitor their surroundings and the passersby, like she were guarding him so he could eat undisturbed. Their bags and overall appearances gave the impression that they weren’t just another couple out shopping. The step they sat upon was their cold stone home for the day, and they’d probably be moving on when Tokyo cooled down in the evening.
(Shinjuku, Tokyo 2013)
Questionable
Physically handicapped, or afflicted with cancer, or merely very intoxicated, I didn’t have the chance to discretely ask why this man was in this wheelchair on a Tokyo skid row shōtengai. His friends in the background didn’t want me around him, but I shot this photograph anyway with my camera under my armpit while his guardians were briefly distracted. And I left quickly after taking it. Ethically this is a questionable picture, and I’ve never been entirely comfortable that I shot it. I’ve debated myself as to whether this photograph stole some of this man’s dignity, an issue of justifiable importance among photojournalists and street photographers concerning the destitute and the homeless.
I’ve concluded that this man, in the circumstances in which I encountered him, really didn’t have much dignity in the first place. That does not necessarily justify this photograph’s existence, and I still argue with myself about it. But what this picture shows about a dark side of Tokyo life is inherently important, the kind of thing people wish to ignore but need to see. So I may forever have problems with this photograph, and you may really dislike it, but I stand by it.
(Nihonzutsumi, Tokyo, October 2013)