Shibuya is a district in central Tokyo famous for the "crazy crossing" and the statue of "Hachiko, The Dog" both stories I've covered elsewhere in TenguLife and you can look them up if you'd like to know more. It's also now home to an alleyway of a multitude of bars starting with the first one being Okinawa themed and finishing at the far end with the final chapter providing Hokkaido delicacies (you may need a map to figure out why if it's not obvious). And that's where I was last night though "delicacy" would be a little bit of a stretch but Anthony Bourdain style, try the food and meet the people.
Life starts around 11.30am and sitting outside you're just in time to catch the sun and a slew of people carrying luggage from Shibuya Station to their hotels (this tide reverses by mid-afternoon). It used to be a pretty seedy carpark with a mud pile on the roof where the homeless slept, built in for the 1964 Olympics, over a local river. But it's now a fairly cool shopping plaza with a roof garden that breaks all regulations but no one really seems to mind.
And so last night saw me thirty minutes early, iPhone just incase my friends called and a copy of "Slaughter House 5" to keep me entertained. One of the great things about Japan is you can just sit and watch the world go by. The manager knows me though doesn't speak a word of English and my Japanese wouldn't hurt to be a little better, but we've built a friendship over the last couple of years. So if you see a westerner sitting by himself, reading a book, that's probably me. Feel free to say hello.
