Tokyo Kills Me: Commuter Train

Trains are a big part of daily life in Tokyo… #tokyokillsme

See more pictures from daily life in Tokyo, world’s geatest megacity, at https://bigsushilittlefishes.wordpress.com/tokyo-kills-me-photos/

Tokyo Kills Me

Tokyo is the greatest megacity in the world.

This frenetic, superlative Ur-City is the place I have made my home for the last 16 years – a three-year overseas adventure which has become a way of life (sorry, Ma!).

As a writer and especially as a photographer, I find the constant (over-) stimulation a daily source of inspiration. Even after all these years, I start my commute each morning with the thrilling sense of a new adventure about to begin.

Whenever I get a little burned out on daily life here in this overcrowded, hyperactive, workaholic city,  all I need do is turn some random corner, preferably with camera in hand, to discover some fresh new angle or view, or to uncover another ugly or delicious *omoshiroi mono* “interesting object” among the everyday, the overlooked, the quotidian.

Interested? You can check out ongoing photographs of daily life and adventures at [Tokyo Kills Me](https://medium.com/tokyo-kills-me)

Tokyo Kills Me 2.0: Photos

I have always felt that the world is an erotic place… For me cities are enormous bodies of people’s desires. And as I search for my own desires within them, I slice into time, seeing the moment. That’s the kind of camera work I like. — Daido Moriyama

See more photos from Tokyo Kills Me 2.0, circa 2009-2010

 

 

 

Tokyo Kills Me: Photos

Ongoing Updates (5.26.18). Snapshots from daily life in and around Tokyo, a.k.a. “The Big Sushi,” at the end of the second millennium and the start of the third.

Check out the most recent pictures posted, circa 2007-2008, at Tokyo Kills Me: Photos

Tokyo Kills Me: Photos

Ongoing Updates (5.23.18). Snapshots from daily life in and around Tokyo, a.k.a. “The Big Sushi,” at the end of the second millennium and the start of the third.

See more at Tokyo Kills Me: Photos

Tokyo Kills Me: Photos

Ongoing Updates (5.20.18). Snapshots from daily life in and around Tokyo, a.k.a. “The Big Sushi,” at the end of the second millennium and the start of the third.

 

See more snaps at Tokyo Kills Me: Photos 

Tokyo Kills Me: Fall, 2017

Tokyo Kills Me: Fall, 2017. Snapshots from daily life in The Big Sushi.

Japan Photo Drift: Niigata Snow Country

Yukiguni “Snow Country”

Tokyo may be generally mild, dry, and sunny in winter, but it comes at a cost to its neighbours: much of the snow that crosses from continental Asia bumps up against the mountains of central Honshu and dump their burden on the Sea of Japan side of the island. Niigata, where R. is from, lies within this yuki guni,”snow country.” In fact, the novel Snow Country by KAWABATA Yasunari is set in the mountain resort area of Yuzawa. Each New Year, R. and I pass through on our way by Shinkansen to coastal Niigata. The change from the balmy Kanto plain to yukiguni is always dramatic as the shinkansen exits a tunnel from Kanto and enters mountainous Gunma prefecture. The photos taken from the train are of Gunma and Niigata, both coming from and returning to Tokyo.

This year, 2014, Niigata has had a particularly hard spell of snowfall. In fact, the day after we arrived blizzard conditions kept us holed up for most of the day at the home of R.’s parents. We did manage a walk later in the day, however, and these are the town and castle pictures in this set.

Tokyo Photo: Takadanobaba Station, Morning Commute

Because of the cold, wintry weather, the morning commute has been even more medokusai, troublesome, than usual. Here are scenes of the transfer from Seibu Shinjuku Line to Yamanote Line on Monday, February 17, 2014. As you can see in the last picture, I sought refuge in the station’s Starbucks. I wasn’t the only one…

Shinjuku Drift: Shinjuku Station “A perfect storm of busy-ness”

If Tokyo is a collection of Edo-era villages held together by a web of rail lines — which it is — then train stations are the village centers, the common, the place everyone goes sooner or later and around which daily live revolves.

And of all the stations in the city, Shinjuku Station is the one by which all others in Tokyo, in Japan, in the world, compare themselves – and come up wanting.