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Lee

Dec 16 2020 9 Comments

A retro but abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

Despite Tokyo being a city of ramen lovers, there’s also a seemingly never ending number of ramen shops, so whether the owner of the little eatery below lost the battle of increased competition, or simply lost the battle against time, I don’t know. The wonderfully dated nature of the fittings, however, do seem to suggest it was the latter, and such an ending sadly wouldn’t be the only one I’ve photographed this year. Yet whatever the reason, the place still looks absolutely incredible despite being abandoned.

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

The narrow alleyway on the left led up to a couple of second floor rooms which were interesting enough. Or the combined cassette and 8 track karaoke machine was anyway.

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

But music player aside, it’s without a doubt all about those stunningly retro red chairs.

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

A retro and abandoned Tokyo ramen restaurant

Categorized: Food and Drink, Haikyo, Photography

Dec 14 2020 14 Comments

Solitude and a Pfizer sign set against Tokyo’s hazy skyline

A solitary, rather lonely looking figure, yet that small, and at the same time hugely significant Pfizer sign in the foreground is a nice reminder that more sociable times are finally set to return.

solitude the Pfizer sign and Tokyo's hazy skyline

Categorized: Photography

Dec 11 2020 4 Comments

The tranquil sight of Shinto priests in Tokyo

An unusually quiet Tokyo moment that felt a world away from the world just outside.

Japanese Shinto priests in Tokyo

Categorized: Culture, Photography, Religion

Dec 09 2020 13 Comments

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

With individual rooms and connected parking spaces, the love hotel below has a fairly common design for small, relatively out of the way places.

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

Built in the late 60s or early 70s, the rooms were presumably quite modern at the time, but unsurprisingly they now look incredibly dated to say the least. That said, they can’t have looked that much better in the early 90s when the hotel was somehow still operational. Needless to say it’s impossible to know how many customers they actually had back then, but it’s probably safe to assume it wasn’t many — hence the eventual closure of the business in November 1992.

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

The one slightly odd thing is that lone guests and families were welcome, which is clearly unusual for a love hotel. Not that it makes any difference now of course. Little does after almost 30 years of very visible decay. Dilapidation that admittedly did make reaching the rooms quite difficult, but ultimately it was worth the effort. It always is. The chance to see and quietly take in the slow, unrelenting passage of time never fails to feel special. In fact, so much time has now passed that it’s probably fair to assume that the passion once felt in these rooms has long since fizzled out, and yet love, against all the odds, still lives on.

An overgrown and abandoned Japanese love hotel

Categorized: Haikyo

Dec 07 2020 8 Comments

A Japanese woman in Shinjuku’s shadows

Heading towards the light or into the darkness?

young Japanese woman in the shadows

Categorized: Photography

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