Food and Drink

Due to its colours and fantastically faded old sign, this ramshackle shop has been a favourite of mine for a long time. Trouble is, it had been in the shade each and every time I’d walked by, plus the angle I wanted to photograph it from was always blocked by a parked car. A vehicle (just out of shot on the right) that never, ever seemed to move.

All too aware that the building could be demolished at any time, it seemed like a good idea to head out to it on an overcast day and see if that would work. The car, of course, was still there, but the light was much more manageable, allowing me to get something that seemed half decent.

That said, I still wasn’t sure about the angle, so I let the photo sit for several weeks, and going back to it with a bit more detachment, I now think it works. Maybe even more than the shot I actually wanted.

Photographed over quite a few years, this little Tokyo alleyway acts as a suitably dingy urban beer garden of sorts for the even smaller bar that opens out onto it. The incredibly inebriated state of many of the drinkers, however, is due to the fact that all the photos were shot around lunch time. It’s not that they are all lightweights either, as these are people who rather than having a few midday drinks, were in fact having a few last ones to end the previous evening’s outing.

The bar is actually still there, and still in business, but since the pandemic I haven’t seen anyone sat outside, so it seemed like a good time to put these photos together both here and on my portfolio site. A reminder of mostly forgotten times in more ways than one.

This was one of those moments that I simply liked the looked of, so I took one quick frame when walking by. Quite why it appealed, however, is difficult say, and even now, after editing the resultant photo, there’s not one particular thing I can confidently pinpoint. And yet that said, it somehow, in some way, seems to work.

From Monday, I will be swapping these kinds of scenes for those of my native Britain. A much needed trip back to see family, as well as some time away to try and take in all that has happened in the last 12 months or so. A chance to also start to think about the times ahead.

While I’m away, Tokyo Times will switch to weekly posts every Tuesday. I’ve put together some sets of re-edited and previously unseen photos, along with a couple of posts made up of recent shots. These will start next week and continue until August 23rd. Then, from August 30th, the usual Tuesday and Friday updates will resume as normal.

Some bar owners are naturally gregarious, making them a perfect fit for the job they have chosen. Many more, on the other hand, very likely feel the need to put on a bit of a performance, so this fella’s approach of undisguised indifference seems refreshingly honest. A bold move in the land of customer service, and reading through online comments, it’s one that perhaps unsurprisingly confuses more than a few of his customers.

When looking for some photos the other day, I found this old shot of a distinctly grungy looking Tokyo fruit and vegetable shop. It’s a business that always fascinated me. Partly because of how it looked, and partly due to its location in a dark and dingy Shibuya alleyway.

But that was then and this is now and sadly it doesn’t exist anymore, so seeing the photo again brought back how truly out of place it always seemed. Almost everything was wrapped in plastic too, which is unusual for such a small shop. However, when passing by one evening, that aspect at least suddenly made sense, as I saw the owner frantically trying to shoo away a couple of rats that were clearly not going to give up on a fresh fruit buffet without a fight.

Last year I posted a set of old and no longer functioning Japanese vending machines. From booze, cigarettes and even batteries, those one time dispensers now stand empty and unused — their former necessity usurped by convenience stores and a rapidly changing culture.

Some of those machines I still have a real soft spot for. They look incredible, plus they also have an impossible to describe character. I even went as far as saying they possess a quiet dignity of sorts, which despite sounding a bit far-fetched isn’t all that difficult to imagine.

Since then I’ve been lucky enough to find several more, but the one below deserves a post all of its own. Design-wise it’s not all that different to its more modern cousins, but the decay and rust stains really set it apart. Now whether any of that means it has dignity or not I don’t know, but what isn’t up for debate is how truly unique it looks.