There are events that have occurred throughout history whereby man’s courage was challenged in the face of insurmountable odds: the Spartan King Leonidas at the Battle of Thermopylae, Lord Cardigan’s Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War and finally the Texians at the Battle of the Alamo. In all of these instances, I am sure each of these warriors in facing their potentially pending doom thought to themselves, “What the F#%@ am I doing here?!” On Sunday, I was asking myself the same question when I faced my personal Alamo in the form of Takeshita-dōri (street) in Harajuku.
Over the past few weekends, I have explored Northern and Central Tokyo but I had not yet visited Western Tokyo. This was my objective last weekend. On Saturday I spent an enjoyable day visiting the Meiji (Shinto) Shrine, a samurai sword museum and parts of southern Shinjuku. I’ll blog about that trip separately. I saved my visit to Harajuku, though, for Sunday. Harajuku is an area in Western Tokyo. This Wikipedia Harajuku article does an excellent job describing the place. Basically, it’s what we would call a “Freak Show” and Sunday is Prime Time. The Wikipedia article describes one fashion style that I’ve seen throughout Tokyo but especially in Harajuku called “Gothic Lolita”. I haven’t blogged about this fashion style before mainly because I’ve struggled to find a term to accurately describe it. But this week one of co-workers nailed it. He called it “Cute Punk”. Japanese girls take the typically dark colors and clothes of the 1980’s punk era but then they soften the overall appearance often by dyeing their hair a soft pink or other pastel color. There’s no element of danger of anarchy to their appearance. It’s just funny looking. The only other “Freak Show” place I’ve been to that compares is Venice Beach in California.
Just walking around Harajuku would have been entertaining enough but I also decided to test my nerves and patience. This test was via walking Takeshita-dōri which is a pedestrian only street (alley is more like it) that is primarily filled with fashion boutiques. There are also music stores, restaurants and God knows what other venues were down the side alleys but it’s primarily for the fashion that draws the crowds which is why it was so illogical to find me there. My fashion sense is blue jeans, t-shirt and my Columbia hiking shoes. Most people are there to shop and my wife and family can attest that I hate shopping. Loathe it. If I was given the choice of being forced to go shopping on Black Friday or having my left testicle bitten off by a rabid chipmunk my response would be “Just the left?”
As I stood at the top of Takeshita-dōri about to make the plunge into a crowd of crazed Japanese shoppers, I had to fight back the bile that was rising in my throat. I started down the street wedged into the crowd which was a mix of curious tourists like myself and teens and twenty-somethings all looking for the latest fashion bargains. Katie, my 13 year old daughter, could easily have spent her entire day there shopping. Takeshita-dōri is a little over 200 yards long but it takes a long time to walk as the crowds are shoulder-to-shoulder. It also started to rain on my way back up the street and this further slowed down the pace. I’ve included this small photo album to give everyone an idea of how packed it was.
 |
| Takeshita-dori |
No comments:
Post a Comment