Back in early 2023 I decided that I wanted to visit Japan and Tokyo in particular to take some photographs of the city with all of it’s neon colour and differences to the UK. I’d set up in my mind that early September would be ideal, as it would be before the restart of University in which I’d be moving into the third year of a six year part time degree in photography at the University Of Wolverhampton.
But in June I found myself applying for a new job at the same facility I’ve worked at for the last 35 years. I applied for the role of Maintenance and Site Services Manager which was quite a jump from my role in the IT Department and wouldn’t you know it, I was successful. I started doing some of the new role in July until my holiday with my wife in late July, then I’d pick up the job proper in August.
With this new job starting in August and me just getting to grips with the workload and complexities of the role, I decided that the Japan trip would need to be postponed, but I was certain that it would happen sooner rather than later. I calculated that with the return to Uni in late January after the Christmas break, I would have time to do a week trip in mid January, so that’s what I booked up.
J-Day Arrives
It came around sooner than I’d imagined and the flight was due to leave Birmingham at 6am on the Saturday morning. My wife, who would be staying at home this time, was kind enough to drop me off at the airport at 2am so I could prepare for the check in and have a wander around the airport with my camera.
The next few posts will be about this trip to Japan and some of the photos I made, lessons I learned and experiences I had will feature. I’ll start off with Day One which includes the flight, landing and a wander around Japan’s capital.
I’ve liked the look of Tokyo since watching Bladerunner all those years ago, the neon lit rain soaked streets and countless people rushing place to place under illuminated umbrellas. Ok so I know this isn’t real, but Liam Wong has produced a book of photographs called TO:KY:00 which features images from his journeys around the city after the midnight bell has tolled. The light, colours, feel, atmosphere, vibe, content, and everything else about the images captured my attention and this is one of the reasons I had to go see for myself.
Flying High.
The plane set off from Brum a bit late and headed towards Paris Charles De Gaul airport where we would transfer onto an Airbus A350-900 for the onward journey to Haneda Airport in Tokyo, Japan.
We had a lovely sunrise on the flight to france and when I got there to go through security I then had to dispose of three bottles of coke that I’d bought for the long flight, from Birmingham airport. As well as making me throw that away I also had my entire camera bag emptied out into trays for precision x-rays to take place. I had removed my camera films and asked for these to be passed across rather than go through the x-ray scanners, just in case the film was damaged in the process.
The cameras I took were my Leica Q2, Canon 5D Mk IV, Canon A1, Bronica ETRS and GoPro Hero 9, the Bronica was in my hold luggage where I had all the rest in my backpack. My duaghter told me I was silly to not pack underwear in my hand luggage in case my bag got lost but I had no room with all of the cameras, films, batteries, iPads and other tech.
Haneda or Bust
The flight to Haneda was tricky, it was just over 13 hours long and I hadn’t slept from the day before, I’d been awake at 6:30am on the Friday for a full day shift at work, then got to the airport at 2am, flown to France and left france at 8am Saturday (GMT). Upon boarding the Airbus I was already awake for over 24 hours and thought I’d stay awake for a few hours before switching to Japan time and catching some sleep, waking up just as we were about to land at 9am on the Sunday morning (Tokyo time) this is 12 midnight UK time. I figured if I slept and woke up in the Tokyo morning I’d be set for the rest of the week. Oops. I couldn’t get any sleep on the flight out, I didn’t feel like watching any films but did watch Equalizer 3 to see if that might help, but in the end I sat there with ever larger bags growing under my eyes.
Luckily I had an aisle seat in the centre three seats of the 3-3-3 configuration and I had noone next to me in the centre of the three seats so I could spread out a bit especially with my long legs meaning I can’t really stretch them in front of me, in economy. I’m not paying for premium economy or business, I’d rather spend the money on something good. I didn’t see much out of the window though due to being in the centre of the plane but you can’t win them all and it was dark for a lot of the journey anyway.
Landing in Haneda airport was a bit surreal, as I watched it from the camera on the media system. This was the same airport where a passenger aircraft had collided with a coastguard aid aircraft the week before causing death and destruction so that was on my mind but I wasn’t nervous or anything. Rolling up to the terminal, crossing the skywalk and then onto the moving walkways towards the arrivals and baggage carousels was amazing. The Japanese language and symbols were everywhere, joined by English captions also, helpfully, but it was great seeing this amazing way of writing so widespread in the environment.
Baggage Balls-Up
The whole aircraft was emptied out and pushed through security, customs and immigration control. Some passengers were hurrying to fill out the tiny little forms for customs and immigration declarations, but I’d done this up front on the VisitJapan website after spending some hours researching it online before I left. All I needed to do was show a pair of QR codes, one was yellow banded and one was banded with green. Easy. Next to the carousel and waiting for my single case to appear from the centre and then race around the track to me. I’d been there a while and watched almost everyone leave when a plastic box came onto the track upside down, which looked like a symbol for “that’s your lot”.
This is when a helpful young woman came and asked me if my name was on a list, I scanned down and it was. Oh what is this for? My bag is still in Paris? Ok these things happen I suppose, so I had to then fill out the missing baggage form. When it turned up they said, it would be delivered to the hotel for me, but they couldn’t tell me when that would be. Every cloud has a silver lining so they say and this meant I wouldn’t have to pay the Yen equivalent of £15 to get my case transferred to the hotel. This luggage forwarding is a standard practice and means that I wouldn’t have to manhandle it up and down stairs in a strange country whilst getting used to the transport systems and way of life.
Ticket To Ride
With the forms completed and being free to go out into the arrivals area of the Terminal 3 I had to go and get my Japan Rail Pass. (JR Pass). I had already booked it and paid for it whilst still at home, you can’t buy them in Japan, as they’re purely for foreigners, tourists etc. I found the JR East counter and walked up to the counter with my “voucher”. The young woman behind the counter explained a few things about the JR Pass and then handed me this little green ticket. If I lose it, I’m screwed as I can’t get a replacement so I have to keep a firm grip on it.
With the Bags and JR Pass sorted I head for the Tokyo Monorail and make my way to the platform where I’m informed of how long I ‘ll have to wait. It’s not long enough to go and take a few photos of the monorail arriving anyway. On the monorail I kept my mouth shut as I’d read and seen in youtube videos that this is the correct etiquette on the trains. If i was going to my hotel I’d get to Hamamatsucho and then change to the JR Yamanote line before alighting at Shinjuku station. As it was still early in the morning though I figured I’d wander to a place called Akihabara to have a look around.
I got there easy enough after getting out at Hamamatsucho and seeing my first glimpse of Tokyo Tower, then returned to the network rode the Yamanote line to Akiba as it’s called locally, then had a stroll around taking photos of taxis, drain covers, stations, trains, people and all sorts of goodness. When I was walking around thinking about how quiet it was and bright with daylight I wondered what it would be like at night, I’d find out later in the week.
Local Customs
I went into a 7-Eleven shop and bought a bottle of Coke and a banana, paying in Yen at the counter. From what I’d heard before coming, I knew that you’re not supposed to walk around the streets drinking and eating, so I ate my banana stood outside the shop, had a little swig of coke and then went off to find a bin for the banana peel, that took ages as they don’t have bins all around the streets as we do in the UK.
As I was thinking about where to go next I remembered that I’d foolishly forgotten to pick up my “Pocket-WIFI” from the airport. Back into the trains again and using my JRPass meant it cost me no extra, so I went back to Hamamatsucho and then onto the airport Terminal 3 again. When I got to the terminal I found the Wifi provider Ninja Wifi who I’d organised it through at the same time I bought my JR Pass. It provides a small phone size device that connects to the phone network and then acts as an internet wireless access point for phones, computers and tablets etc.
With the pocket wifi in my, er, pocket, I headed back to the monorail, Yamanote line and was starting to feel a little warm and sweaty. I figured that I could take my camera backpack to the hotel, and keep it at the counter until I could return to check in later. On the Yamanote line I travelled to Shinjuku Station, the nearest to my hotel. This station is huge, apparently between 3 and 4 million people use it every single day. That is massive. The stations were pretty good at having signage in English and the local language so I was finding it relatively easy to get from place to place.
Hotel Gracery
I popped out of the East exit of the station for Kabukicho as I’d done some Google Street View practicing of the route back over the last few months and looked out for the hotel with a big Godzilla head sticking out from it. In front of me was Hotel Gracery and I walked up to it, tired and sweaty, it was now midday in Tokyo, 3am in the morning UK time and I’d been awake for around 40 hours. I followed the instructions from the website and headed to the eighth floor for reception and asked if they could store my bag, they asked if I wanted to check in early so I said yes emphatically and then after a trouble free check in process I headed to another lift which took me up to the 21st floor for room 2115.
The room was a bit small but it had a bed and somewhere to put my electronics on charge so I was happy, I didn’t need the space yet as my case was still missing but I thought I’d try the shower out as I was still minging from the two days in the same clothes. I would have to put them back on again to go out but at least I’d feel a bit fresher. The shower was ok, the toilet had a warmer in the seat and a built in spray and bidet so it wasn’t as technological as I’d imagined it might have been.
After a shower and getting the pocket wifi connected to my phone and iPad I was ready for a stroll out, I couldn’t connect my laptop to it as that was still in my case , probably in Paris still.
Ramblers, Let’s get ramblin’
I grabbed my Leica Q2 and a shoulder strap then went for a walk to see if I could find some clothes to wear so I wasn’t a sweaty mess. Remarkably difficult to find a clothes shop that didn’t sell premium brand items, ideally I was looking for a sports direct style shop so I could get boxers, socks, tshirts trousers and a jacket. But all I found was an outdoors shop where I bought an Adidas jacket so I wasn’t having to wear my big coat, it was a bit breezy out but mild enough. that was all I’d found to wear that wasn’t Prada, Calvin Klein or LaCoste, and although Air France had stated I could go and buy some clothes, I doubt they’d cough up for a pair of premium sneakers and a sports jacket.
Whilst wandering around I typed GAP into google maps so I could go and take a photo of the area next to the shop. The reason for this diversion relates to a book called Tokyo Nobody by Masataka Nakano, and one of my fave images in the book shows a set of escalators by the GAP store in Shinjuku with nobody in the shot. I wanted to visit the location and take a picture in normal everyday use. The photos can be seen below, Nakano’s and my own.
After this and a further tramp around the Shinjuku and Kabukicho area I went back to the hotel where I hopped into bed to catch a few zzzz. THinking that I might sleep through the Tokyo night and wake up fully acclimatised I nodded off. Only to awake at 2:15am and unable to get back to sleep I grabbed my Canon 5D and went out again.
Shinjuku Morning
Walking through the, still busy, streets of Shinjuku and Kabukicho out into the quieter streets I strolled around making images of taxis, people, shops, lights, streets, buildings and general street furniture. In one of the back streets I checked the time back home and it was 7pm in UK, and 4am in Tokyo, before calling my wife and speaking to her and our daughter who were nervous about me being out and about but I felt no fear and didn’t once feel threatened or at risk. I did walk past a sub-basement with some terrible karaoke blaring out if it, it was an awful racket so I recorded a bit with my voice memos app on my phone.
On the way back to the hotel I walked back through Kabukicho and there were a number of people who were spark out on the floor, fast asleep and one guy even had his smartphone balanced on his chest. Obviously Tokyo is a safer place than the UK because his phone would have been lifted off him pretty soon after he lay down if it had happened at home. Apparently many people do this, it’s not just homeless people, but when the trains stop running at midnight, people just sleep where they drop.
Back into the hotel at 5am (Tokyo) on the Monday morning, and time for a sleep to see if I could kick the jet lag. It is shaping up to be a very busy and tiring week but I think I can cope with it.
In the next part of my Japan expedition I’ll let you know how I got on on the Monday and what adventures I had…
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