Tokyo Times

Last year I posted several photos of a Tokyo home that has both intrigued and shocked me for over a decade. This is what I wrote and saw:

This tiny building has fascinated me since I first found it over a decade ago. Its size, shape and dilapidated state are intriguing enough, but added to all that is the fact that somebody may actually live there. And even if they don’t, it’s certainly somewhere they spend a lot of time, as more often than not there’s a light on inside and the door, for want of a better description, is open. On top of that, the house behind it was recently demolished, providing a proper look at the rear of the property, although in many ways that has created more questions than answers.

That said, I finally do have one answer, and that’s whose property it is. When walking by alone, I always stop for a little while in the hope of someone appearing, and at long last that happened the other day. It doesn’t confirm whether it is indeed a home or not, but at least I now have a face to add to the building’s incredible facade.

Now, a year on, I actually have some real answers. Bumping into the owner on one of my Tokyo photowalk tours, I got the chance to talk with him for a little bit. He’s a lovely old fella who’d just returned from a spot of fishing, and he had some tiny fish and shrimp to show for his efforts. Something he clearly does quite often, as I’ve seen a variety of aquatic life in those tanks over the years.

When asked about the building, he confirmed it is indeed his home. Not only that, but it has been for the last 75 years. His time there starting when he was just 6. Facts that I did, and still do, find hard to fully comprehend.

Needless to say it’s severely lacking in even the most basic amenities, so for bathing he uses one of the local public bath houses. A common thing in the past, and still a daily necessity for some in the area. His toilet though is the one in the nearby park. That, needless to say, is far from common. A truly extraordinary lifestyle made even more shocking when it’s lived in a city as prosperous as Tokyo, in 2023.

Photographing in the rain isn’t something I do all that often. My camera isn’t fully weather sealed, and so an umbrella is necessary. That in itself isn’t such a big deal, but then attempting to focus manually while also keeping a brolly wedged between my neck and shoulder is far from ideal and similarly uncomfortable.

Inclement weather does have its advantages though, and the other day, with spring very much in the air, the dampness did bring out the colours. Below then are some of them, and even better, a few of the scenes are also old favourites.

Community life in most of Tokyo’s countless apartment buildings is distinctly lacking. People generally keep themselves to themselves, and after over a decade of living in my place, the most I get from the vast majority of residents is the briefest of greetings or a cursory nod at best. That said, one older lady has always chatted, and knowing my wife died she’s made a real effort to check I’m doing ok, offering advice and encouragement from her self-proclaimed role as my Japanese mum, which as you can imagine feels absolutely lovely.

In the city’s older, and more traditional neighbourhoods, however, it’s possible to see much more in the way of interaction. Particularly so with the elderly residents, as many of them have quite possibly known each other their whole lives, or at the very least for many decades. And so below then is one such example.

Last summer I documented this crumbling, and at the time fabulously overgrown old Tokyo hotel.

Needless to say it isn’t one of Tokyo’s regular places of stay, as along with its appearance, the business caters to the city’s poor, situated as it is in an area filled with similarly cheap and visibly rundown accommodation. That said, none of the others look anything quite like this one. Words simply can’t describe its patched up and ramshackle nature. In fact I’m not even sure photos do it justice either, but here at least is an idea of what it looked like last week before that lush summer camouflage completely covers it once again.