Tokyo

Hey, look! This is a Nissan Skyline GTR! The blue car painted exactly like in the movie spills roaring sounds. They are definitely above regulations on exhaust dB. But then, it's almost quiet. And the air is very clean as for a city of 37 million. The only exhaust smelling vehicles are the go karts driven by tourists wearing Pikachu and Mario outfits. This is one of the most crowded areas in the city. I could never expect it to be so quiet here. This sea of stylish teenagers, salarymen, girls with fringes dressed like anime characters, old ladies wearing face masks, and countless tourists is almost still. Everything moves coherently and smoothly. Streams of people are guided by the pavements, signs, and old gentlemen wearing uniforms. Crowds are separated by stairs and escalators leading to mind-bending overpasses and levels. Some lead to metro stations, some to the other side of the road, and some will take you to the shopping centers. Silence is randomly broken by a lorry playing K-Pop but it's a short-lasting disruption. I fall back to the rhythm of the evening in Shibuya and slowly drift to the creeping feeling of loneliness.

Involuntarily I start to see loneliness everywhere. A man is reading manga in Lawson's at 23:18. He finished work long ago and doesn't want to go home. Two girls are luring tourists into the “as much as you can drink in an hour” bar. They wear fake smiles but I guess their sexy outfits would work alone too. Expensive suit is busy on cringy courtship of a woman who shows no interest. We continue to explore this tunnel with neon walls, drunk inhabitants, and occasional cigarette smoke. This area is not very pleasant to be in, but it makes the city feel real. It breaks the aura of an “Instagram house” that looks good in pictures but in reality is a rent-by-hour photo studio. A real kitchen has fingerprints on the surface and dirty dishes in the sink. The vital signs of a living space.