Where are all the Tokyo food posts??

I think I am kind of tired of taking pictures of food. There are millions of food pictures online and, for me, they don’t have a lot of impact anymore. On this trip I am enjoying my meals without documenting them too much. The less I involve my phone in my meals, the more I seem to enjoy the food and the company I am sharing it with. In fact, the less I let my smartphone interrupt my experiences in general, the more I seem to enjoy whatever I am doing. I do miss the engagement with posts on social media a little bit. Writing on a site like this, you sometimes wonder if anyone is even reading it. I guess we are all a bit addicted to our little red heart “likes”. But, for now, I am enjoying the break from it.

Another reason for the lack of food posts is that we have a kitchen in our place, so we have been making most of our big meals at home. Our neighbourhood has many small grocery stores that are full of beautiful, high quality fruits, vegetables and fish. The rest of our meals are snacks on the road. Tokyo is a snacker’s paradise.

Bicycles in Tokyo:

The cycling culture in Tokyo is very different from what I am used to at home. There are bikes everywhere: you can see them in almost any picture I have taken. The sidewalks here are shared by pedestrians and cyclists. Everybody is used to this and it works. Everyone cycles here: old people, little kids, business people with briefcases, moms carrying one on two kids on the front or back. Most buildings seem to have a space dedicated to bike storage. Same with subway stations. Bikes usually have one or two big baskets for carrying stuff around and every bike has a sturdy upright kickstand. Some bicycles have little calliper locks on the frames that go through the spokes on the back wheels but I haven’t seen any “New York Kryptonite U-locks” here. You could pick up any bike you wanted and walk off with it, but many people don’t seem lock them at all and I doubt that any get stolen. Maybe “borrowed” and later returned by a drunk person trying to get home after the trains stop (I saw this once in a movie haha).

Buildings:

Tokyo has all kinds of different architecture from steel and glass high rises to old wooden houses. By far the most common are low rise apartment buildings covered in ceramic tile. To resist earthquakes, concrete is the main construction material because it flexes and can withstand the shock. But, instead of having dull grey buildings everywhere, Japanese achitects have tiled most buildings from bottom to top. There are many colours and designs and I can’t help thinking of fancy vintage bathroom renovations you would see in a magazine. I think they are truly charming and beautiful with their saturated colours in the day and glossy shine at night.

These are buildings in Kappabashi. I like the way they all look different, all in a row, with their whimsical details. Tea cup balconies and giant chef heads.

This was our Tokyo home. A modest corner building of painted concrete:

Night photography:

I love to take pictures at night and Tokyo was a beauty after dark. These are a few shots I like that didn’t really fit into any other posts:

Construction workers dealing with a late night job. All the men from subway drivers to couriers to construction workers have colourful and stylish uniforms. It always makes me think of Lego men.

Akihabara at night. There are many city scapes in Tokyo where you can see all modes of movement mashed together and moving fluidly. Trains, cars, people, bicycles, buses.

Beauty is everywhere:

My overall impression of Tokyo, the largest city in the world with a population of 41 million, is that it is quiet and peaceful. I am sure that it is not without its flaws, but from my point of view, it just works. Japanese society in general seems to value harmony. People are patient with each other. They approach others with respect and understanding. And kindness. I was walking around with my backpack open and the cashier at the grocery store turned me around and zipped it up for me with a smile. My daughter dropped a 5 yen coin under a table at another store and a teenage girl squatted down to pick it up for her. This city is absolutely overrun with tourists but most shopkeepers and people in the street are incredibly patient. More than I could ever be! This makes it an easy and comfortable place to visit and I have really enjoyed my time here.

What strikes me the most about Tokyo is that everywhere I go, I am struck by little moments of beauty and wonder emanating from the most ordinary things. There are a few in previous posts and here are a couple more:

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There are thousands of great pictures of Shibuya Scramble Crossing from above so I wanted to do something a little different. I set up my camera so that it would focus on anything 2 to 5 meters in front of me. Walking through the crowd with my camera against my body, I shot many frames without looking through the camera. The result is a random assortment of crooked and out of focus photos but also a few fun candid shots. They look cinematic to me, almost like movie stills. I like black and white for people photos.

Here is a video I made of Shibuya Crossing with my iPhone today…it is not even that busy, it gets much thicker than this.

These are the best of the pictures:

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