Lee

There are numerous before and after posts on these pages, with the most poignant being this one involving both people and places. The kind of documentation I never really thought about when taking the initial photos. Instead, they were simply scenes and moments that for one reason or another I found appealing. Nowadays, however, I’m very aware that each time I photograph something, or indeed someone, it might be the one and only chance I get.

These then are images along those lines. Quiet frames that give at least some sense of the changes Tokyo is going through.

There are lots of photos on these pages documenting the changes Tokyo is going through, but only a single example from Osaka. It is though a very poignant one. The end of a truly wonderful old coffee shop.

Sadly that doesn’t mean old Osaka isn’t gradually disappearing, because it is — I just don’t get to revisit the same places as regularly as I do in Tokyo. That said, this particular scene caught my eye on a recent-ish walk there. It was the lady I recognised first. Stood in exactly the same spot as when I last saw her. Only this time, the old stationary shop on the corner wasn’t there anymore. The space it once occupied already being readied for its modern replacement.

On this occasion, however, there was still continuity, with the presence of both the woman and her fruit, vegetable and pickle selling near neighbour. The first three photos being before, and the latter three now. A now that will hopefully persist well into the future.

It’s alway rewarding to take photos that tell stories, or at the very least hint at them — the constant hope of which propels me to pick up my camera and head out into the world. Now and again though, some scenes are simply appealing. Sometimes they even produce a smile. And so these then are a colour and transportation themed series of such sights. Several of them are older shots, whereas others are very recent finds taken on my Tokyo Photowalk Tours.