10 Minutes in Harajuku

Before going to the Photography Museum on Sunday, and after my experience in the Manga Café, I figured that I would need some coffee to make it through the day. I spent the morning in the park in Harajuku, and also figured I might need to buy another shirt because mine still reeked of tobacco and beer. I didn’t end up buying a shirt, but I grabbed a coffee at the Starbucks and found a great seat at a corner window. It was about 10 in the morning, so more people were on the streets, while I looked over some of the photos from the previous day. I took a few photos of people through the window, but decided that I was probably a bit conspicuous lifting my camera to my eye every few seconds, so I decided to set the camera on the table and do some time-lapse photos of the sidewalk in front of me. There were times when I was itching to take control of the camera to get the frames that I thought were important, but at the same time, it was nice letting the images come as they would.

Some of the most interesting aspects of being in Tokyo is the people that you see walking the streets. This was in a sense, a random sampling of these people in Harajuku. Unfortunately, this was a bit away from the heart of Harajuku and the interesting people that can be seen there, but I think I managed to capture some of the diversity in character and attire than can be seen on the streets of Tokyo. After my coffee I brushed my teeth quickly in the bathroom and was on my way to the museum.

I had my camera set initially to take photos every 30 seconds and then eventually every 15 seconds. I had the focus set manually to the area near the edge of the building, but in hindsight, I should have put it on auto area-focus mode. Here are a series of photos that represent about 10 minutes on a Sunday morning on the streets of Harajuku.

Tokyo Part II: Faces of Harajuku

Janice got her first experience working as an ALT today. I took her to my special needs school, Taira Yogo Gakkou. There were three stipulations involved in the principal’s decision to allow her to come to the school:

1.) She would be allowed to come to the school only once.
2.) She must assist in the instruction of the students.
3.) We could only refer to her as Bryce’s “friend” – nothing more.

It also turned out, when we arrived at the school, that she wasn’t scheduled to work with the elementary students because if there was any difference in our accents, it would confuse the children. As it turned out, she got to attend another class to help bake cookies instead. As always, the day at the school was full of self-introductions about where we come from and what we like, origami, baking, songs, Christmas decorations, and this time I brought some photos of Christmas back home.

I think the teachers ended up liking Janice much more than they like me, as they showered her in gifts of calendars, tea towels, cookies, and handcrafted bells. The vice principal even made us both coffee – something he’s never done when it’s just been me at the school.

It was a good day – and Janice got to speak with a few English-speaking Japanese teachers.

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I’ve included photos from our wanderings through Harajuku and then on our way to Shibyua. This is the second installment of photos from our adventures in Tokyo.