Dream Theatre

View of Rainbow Bridge

Amazing what you can do with a bit of digital darkroom magic in Aperture. This picture of Rainbow Bridge from Odaiba had originally been rather murky and lacking in colour, after a workout with Aperture 2's adjustment controls I was able to bring out some rather beautiful purple and yellow hues. I like it anyway.

Gundam: Odaiba City

Back in June / July the Japanese Mecha Anime legend, Gundam was celebrating its birthday. I had never been a fan of the actual show, but  as a kid I really did get a kick out of the Gudam designs and remembered trying to emulate them in my own teenage drawings. For the anniversary Bandai have delivered a Gundam Mobile Suit to scale - heck it even has limited movement, lets of heat exhaust and lights up - only in Japan, eh? Below are some pictures I took of this unusual sight.

 

 

Hanami once again.

I gotta say that I really do rather enjoy Hanami. For those of you who are not familiar with the Japanese seasonal festivity, let me explain. Hanami is the name given to the sweet spot of the Japanese calendar when its not too cold, nor too hot. During this time Cherry Blossoms (Sakura) are in bloom for around two weeks. This prompts the entire population to migrate to parks and and river banks with friends, co-workers and family to enjoy viewing these delightful flowers. The Japanese are not just content to stand around and take pictures as is their stereo type. Far from it as most indulge in a combination of drinking, eating and other such merriment. Often it has been known for over excited Hanami viewers to be stripped naked by co-workers, sempeis and even friends for the amusement and embarrassment of all and sundry. My friend call this the most Californian of holidays, thanks to the shallow conversations and mingling with people that you're unlikely to ever meet again.

What's really incredible about this social phenomenon is the lack of drunken violence. Look at it like this, back from where I'm from - The U.K. if thousands of people, most of them young, got togther in Hyde Park to drink all day and night, what do you think would happen? Ever seen a football match before the alcohol bans? You get the idea - utter chaos, there'll be blood on the streets amongst all the strewn cans of Stella and Fosters. Yet here in Japan apart from the odd over excity Hanami-sha there is little or no violence. It gets better, everyone actually cleans up after themselves as well, carefully segregating their trash into burnables and unburnables. That doesn't happen in England even when people haven't been drinking. That's why I love Hanami and Japan, it's easy to be negative about a place sometimes, but this time of you year really helps remind me why I'm here. There's also a He-Man message here too - you can have a good time on alcohol and not be worried about getting knifed or deluged in garbage.

This photo was taken outside on the viewing area of Roppongi Hills. In the distance you can see the illuminated Tokyo Tower, in the foreground there are Sakura trees lit up by strategically placed lights. The building to the right is Fuji TV's HQ.

The picture below is of Tsukishima and Sumida River near where I live. Along the river bank there are some really quite beautiful Cherry Blossoms, its an extraordinarily photogenic area. One word of caution though, if you plan to make a BBQ here, you have to choose the place carefully as some parts BBQs are banned. If you get it wrong, don't worry as Oba-sans on bicycles will quickly inform you of the correct way to enjoy Hanami.

Tokyo Marathon

You know I sometimes like to go for a run, okay, once or twice a year I have a crisis of survival and I decide that I need to go running three times a week. Usually this burst of fitness consciousness or "fitcon" - con, being the operative word - i.e I'm probably conning myself - get it? Lasts usually a month, if I'm lucky six weeks, but rarely do I get beyond that, and as every year passes its looking increasingly unlikely that I'll ever get to the level of these insane brave souls who somehow manage to run for 40 kms in wind and rain. Brave or incredibly stupid? Well, its all a point of a view really when it comes down to it. Nonetheless I bet a lot of them won't be able to walk for a week or so without wincing. Anyway, here are some shots from Tokyo's marathon, which quite conveniently ran past my neighbourhood (Tsukishima, Shintomicho area) yesterday.

 

Akasaka Night View

You know back when I used to live in England I always imagined what it must be like to live in the center of a sprawling metropolis of neon lights. During that time I'd only ever seen that kind of thing in photos and movies - usually Sci-fi Noir films like Blade Runner. If someone had told me at the time that a decade or two later I'd actually have the opportunity to take shots like these, and from a friend's apartment no less, I would have told them they were obviously fibbing. Still, they would have been right on the money, and thanks to advanced digital camera technology and the nifty Ricoh GX200 24mm lens  (just thought I'd get that in here) I was able to take these shots back in December. The first one is cropped and I've used it in a new web project that is progressing nicely.

 

The second shot is uncropped and gives you an idea of the density of the urban sprawl at the heart of this man made environment.

 

Chuo-Ku View

A few weeks ago I was in touch with a relative of mine that I hadn't spoken or seen in possibly over twenty years. One of the joys of Facebook is its seamless ability to network and reconnect disparate human beings all over the planet. Whether its talent will move from a dream phase to a nightmare phase is anyone's guess. Nonetheless after talking about the  respective places we're living in, I realized that I should perhaps organize my collection of photos of Tokyo in a way where people can see them rather than collecting magnetic dust on my collection of hard drives.

So here we go. This photo was taken from the apartment of a friend of mine, not so far away from my building in the middle left of the photo. Thanks to the incredible height of these apartment buildings around here, it's possible to take some rather nice panoramas of the area.

Chuo-ku is situated to the East of Tokyo, and has been considered a rather unfashionable area until late. However, if you can call Ginza, Tsukiji and Shitamachi areas uncool, well you really should spend less time hanging around Roppongi.

I've lived here for around five years now, that's the longest I've stayed put anywhere in Tokyo, being close to Ginza gives me fantastic access to the widest selection of restaurants in the world, and the convenience of getting to any place in the city within thirty minutes, thanks to the Hibiya and JR lines.

Below is a photo looking northwards. It's a real urban jungle of a shot.

Surfing Chiba

Since getting my life back and not having to work weekends for the first time in my existence.( Seriously, since the tender age of 13 I've always had to work either Saturday or Sunday, sometimes both - its not recommended. ) I've been able to enjoy the simple pleasures of partaking in some of the things regular people get up to. Here in Japan that means surfing. A couple of mates of mine are nigh on religious about the sport. Nearly every weekend they head down to the beach in Chiba to hit the waves, and a few heads as well judging by the crowds of other weekend surfers down there.

Using my friend's mammoth 500mm zoom lens attached to my Nikon D80 I was able to take some shots of them not catching any waves, fortunately I managed to catch a few other guys who did. Please enjoy my humble results.

 

 

 

Roppongi Night Views

Roppongi continues its reimagining this year with the National Art Space and The Mid Town Project. These photos were taken on the 52nd Floor of the Mori Tower, using my point and shoot.

Interview with a war veteran

Interesting article here which contains an interview with a survivor from the Kamikaze division of the Japanese airforce. Its a frank interview and an insightful exploration of the motivations and beliefs of those pilots who's missions have now controversially been compared to modern suicide bombers. The article is rather critical of Taro Aso, the Japanese Foreign Minister, who certainly doesn't seem to be winning friends in the foreign press. Not that seems to bother him considering recent ill informed comments about the cartoon controversy in Europe. Check out the article at The Guardian Website here.

Spring Snow

This is the first book that I’ve read by Mishima. It is the first part of his tetralogy known as The Sea of Fertility. This series was to be Mishima’s final masterpiece, he handed in the final installment of The Decay of the Angel on the day he stormed the Jietai headquarters and committed seppuku. The novel concerns itself with the idea of reincarnation and would chart the soul of a character who is reincarnated three times through the course of sixty years of Japanese history; beginning in the Taisho period and ending in the latter part of the Showa era. Each protagonist would be identified by three distinguishing moles on his body known only to his closest friend Honda who is the constant through the entire story.

Spring Snow takes place shortly after the beginning of the Taisho era, in the year 1912. The plot concerns Kiyoaki Matsugae first born of a Marquis who is among the new elite who pioneered the Meiji Restoration. At its most stripped down level the novel is a love story between Kiyoaki and his father’s friend’s daughter Satoko, who, Kiyoaki has secretly loved since childhood. The novel unfolds with a complicated and for the most part secret courtship beset by hidden agendas, lies, jealousy and desires for revenge. Through the course of the narrative, both characters make fatal miscalculations due in part to their own insecurities and passions, but also thanks to the machinations of envious and bitter servants who manipulate the star-crossed lovers for their own ends. This causes a chain of events that can only lead to tragedy.

The early part of the novel is actually quite slow paced, and I found the first eighty pages a leaden read in places, despite some of the magnificent descriptions that decorate the novel. Patience and perseverance eventually pay off and it soon becomes apparent that Mishima is carefully setting up a very complicated game of chess. In the hands of a lesser writer it could have gone very wrong however the pay off in the final third of the novel does not disappoint.

The turning point in the novel comes when the Marquis, Kiyoaki’s father, explains to his son that an Imperial Prince has expressed interest in marrying Satoko, knowing of his son’s feelings for the girl he asks him if he wishes to marry her before the Emperor gives his blessing to the prince. Kiyoaki feeling contemptuous of Satoko’s manipulations denies these feelings, only to suddenly find they overwhelm him once he knows Satoko has become forbidden to him. It is at this point the novel shifts gear and events begin to accelerate unraveling an elaborate, almost Machiavellian tapestry, as key characters reveal their secrets and motives. According to his biographer, Henry Scott Stokes, Mishima borrowed heavily form a Heian romance of the eleventh century, the Hamamatsu Chunagon Monogatari, a little known work in which the idea of reincarnation is explored in conjunction with prophetic dreams. While reading the novel I couldn’t help think that quite possibly Mishima also borrowed a little from Romeo and Juliet, certainly the protagonists servants play key roles in both stories, although here they much more as real characters rather than just plot devices and expose the harsh reality for lower classes amongst the aristocracy. Apparently some Japanese saw in this tale an evocation of Mishima’s relationship with the wife of the current Emperor, Michiko Shoda, although that is open to debate.

This novel isn’t just about a love story, something apparently the recent movie adaptation failed to grasp. This is an indictable social commentary on Japan. Its common knowledge that Mishima was a believer in the divinity of the Emperor, and although apparently uninterested in politics for the majority of his life, in the mid to late sixties when this book was written he became extremely active, setting up the Rightist Militia group, the Tatenokai. Mishima felt Japan had lost some of its soul since the war; too much attention had been focused on the flower arranging face of Japan, and not enough on its Samurai tradition. There are passages in the novel that depict many religious rites and ceremonies, Mishima comments bitingly how they have become meaningless, carried out without conviction. The elder characters obsession with fashion is almost satirically displayed. One scene in particular with regard to a wig had me actually laughing out aloud something I hadn’t expected from a novel such as this.

Translations are always very tricky things, and with a writer of the caliber of Mishima one cannot but mourn the fact that some of the beauty of his mastery of Japanese has been lost in the translation. Nevertheless the translator has done a remarkable job of creating mood and atmosphere through some exceptional pieces of descriptive prose that frequently blossoms quite magnificently.

Some have criticized the ending as being somewhat unmoving. It’s no secret that Kiyoaki dies at the end of the novel, when it is clear that there is no chance of ever seeing his beloved again. True it isn’t a dramatic death; the character simply becomes sick and loses the will to live. However I feel in light of what was to come next the ending works. This is a story about the obsession of first love, and how it is all consuming for teenage eyes who are so limited in their world view, for me, I was touched by the final scene between Honda and Kiyoaki. The dying noble explains to his best friend how he will see him again under the falls. This is a prophetic line that foreshadows the events in Runaway Horses.