How to become invisible

Things, not being there, may be more evident to the eye as they stand out in their absence.
It is the cleanliness of the asphalt here, to the extent that asphalt clean may be, the absence of
cigarette butts, dead leaves and the nondescript dust-coloured aggregates which normally would line a fairly busy road, that may discretely suggest the impression of unusualness.
Still, this being the quite high-end central Tokyo ward of Minato, were garbage strewn along the two lanes, its quantity and nature wouldn't manage to build the complex geography of debauchery my hometown's county roads can manifest.
There the occasional pedestrian daring to make his route by the speeding cars would have,
unraveling along his steps, the timeline of many a satiated and desperate weekends spelled out
in the unambiguous characters of empty beer bottles, boxes of erectile dysfunction drugs and
benzodiazepines, cigarettes and condoms.

Yet no seedy discos and prostitutes by the roadside around this downtown neighbourhood, rather Rolls-Royce and Ferrari's dealerships, plus a scattering of eateries to assuage the hungry
cavalry of white collars on their hectic lunchbreak charge.
Artless local landmark Tokyo tower and, on the other end of Japan's post-war architectural
continuum, the stranded spaceship of the Shakaden temple stand here within sight to point 

out the chaotic nature of the cityscape furthermore.

The eye we left before perusing the asphalt now encounters a pair of worn-off sneakers pattering along the sidewalk's rim. Lifting up from the black surface in the all-encompassing July glare,
can then be seen that wearing them is a gaunt old man, back hunched by age and by the use of one those cruelly, inexplicably short-handled Japanese brooms.
His loose, faded t-shirt and trousers flutter around his bones the way a plastic bag stuck in the branches of a tree vainly struggles for flight.
The sweat dammed from his eyes by a towel tightly wrapped around his forehead, lightly
panting, mouth half-opened in the thick, hot summer air.
By this time of the year the city's air feels heavy on the skin, as though gravity had come gradually increasing after May's heavy rains left. Nights hardly bring any relief and one is left cherishing the memories of winter's dryness, static electricity visible in tiny sparks when undressing in darkness before sleep.

Heat and oppressive humidity notwithstanding the man keeps on steadily striving to accomplish his self-appointed task: palm by palm, the north-eastern part of the crossroad shall be swept clean of all garbage lying there.
Were a sad sarcasm to be used, this could be dubbed a form of housekeeping: the man calls his home the concrete banks of the canal which flows nearby, his roof the highway overpass.
Cardboard and blue plastic tarpaulin sheets, Japan's ubiquitous picnic implement, are what homeless rely on to build their shelters. The abandoned memory of someone's outdoors party repurposed as some destitute one's means to own, though hardly dignified, at least some indoors of sorts.

The ghost of an active role within society still haunting his world view, no matter how long out in the past the trail scattered with the shards of his life does stretch: he took on himself a duty, as unrequired as it may be, by means of which his presence in this city shall be justified this one more day.

As it is often the case for those in such a plight, he is intensely ignored by the steady flow of people who, on wheel or foot, move across this road.
Whether this is a display of insensitivity, or rather the Japanese expression of pity by sparing its object the humiliation of being acknowledged, it is hard to judge for the Western mind.

Mirrorwings

The omen of humidity to come floats in the late spring air this evening, surreptitiously gnawing

 away at this serene lull with flashbacks of summer's scorching heat.

The two of us drift toward this little park by habit, to seal the closure of the day with some beers

and the long-yearned-for relief of native conversation. Foreigners with little more than a year 

spent in the country, the quiet of Tokyo's nights still able to have us stop mid conversation, 

still stupefied by how, once sound asleep, this sprawling concrete titan can shrink its sonic 

presence down to an unobtrusive background hum.

The empty children playground, its jungle gym now unattended, its swings left hanging

 in motionless wait, underscores the tranquility of the setting further more; I notice 

by the way my tone has dwindled: it must have been centuries upon centuries of this soundscape

 that moulded  the sound of Japanese into the gentle murmur it is now.

Hardly 9pm, the sky long pitch-black dark, the adjacent street is all but desolate: on bicycle or 

foot still passersby appear: commuters back from overtime, schoolboys with bats

 or kendo swords, delivery guys on late shift, dogs on walks with their ownees, 

exchange students with mismatched groceries in bulging plastic bags, the occasional 

senior citizen devoted to exercise.

Cats negotiating mating or turf wars, the moon aloof along its nightly commute, park's benches

periodically offer sanctuary to smartphone and tobacco devotees.

Somewhere halfway through her twenties, the girl chooses to sit close to a street light, 

her back to the scant pedestrian traffic. 

The birdcage she brought here being set down on the same bench, it takes some fluttering of 

wings for the parroquet inside it to settle on its perch; then silence can resume.

After some rummaging the girl produces a rectangular mirror from her bag, to be held facing the

cage's unobstructed side. At this unsuitable time of the day, birdsong begins.

The parroquet entertains its illusory host with mellow chirping, the way the lively melody
pauses and restarts paced at an oddly conversation-like meter. The very nature of this
solitary dialogue though only evident to avian logic.
In the meantime the girl's other hand holds a smartphone, swiftly writing messages with the
sole thumb, the restless finger dancing in the upwards aura of the screen.
Be it glass or pixel the source that it is drawn from, ersatz-companionship appears to be
all but a nuisance for those within as well as for those without the cage.

Fishnet and moustache

The evening commute back home is much less of a trudge than its morning counterpart, on 

most of the days.

Nonetheless, besides unrequested physical proximity, a decent share of elbow work may be

needed to get off the train, as the Red Sea of disgruntled passengers won't spontaneously

heed your striving for homecoming.

Having been raised in a different cultural environment one may not, on default settings,

possess the ability to resolutely push a total stranger aside in order to open oneself a

lucrative gangway; neither battle-honed moshpit skills would make significant résumé 

material in this very case: the blastbeat-fueled nihilistic fray hardly ever involved

grannies and babies, at least one may only hope.

Very conveniently though, Japanese etiquette has a tolerant stance towards scrummage-like

conduct in public places: as long as you pretend the other person is not there, it is perfectly 

acceptable to ram your shoulder into the aforementioned individual's back.

A whiff of "sumimasen" (sorry) caressing your lips will suffice for you to be deemed a fine 

gentleman by contemporary Tokyo standards,

no matter how many indented ribs shall mark your trail off the carriage.

Thus, cultural relativism merrily embraced for this occasion, my feet touch ground on the

station's platform and i let the flow of hungry commuters drag me up to the open air.

The city does understand its people's needs: hardly does exist here a train station without 

at least one supermarket in its immediate vicinity. As commuting time is often way 

over the one hour mark no one wants to make a further detour to buy some groceries before

finally heading home.

Neither do i, and so i slide smoothly on the rails of daily routine, over the crosswalk and

into the neighbourhood's discount supermarket: small, convenient, 

cheap but yet not to an undignified degree.

Thankfully, the Akore supermarket chain spares its customers the blaring of the customary

superfluous announcements and j-muzak which oftentimes turn the shopping environment in

a botched dystopian setting of crude, decibel-heavy, collective linguistic programming. 

The expected quiet is though being driven out from its lair amongst 

the aisles by somebody's snippets of angry Japanese. A Japanese person losing his temper will 

very likely end up speaking something which sounds as a different language altogether from his

mother tongue: farewell those soothing vowels, enter abrupt gutturals bursts; one could 

as well call this tantrum-generated language Angrynese.

And so it's the source of these loud Angrynesian remarks, such a one-sided upset conversation 

suggests the scoldee is on the other end of the phone line, I cautiously look for around me.

As much as Japan is one of the safest places on earth, the Japanese are surprisingly volatile

and eye-contact could yield nuisance, albeit hardly of the dangerous kind.

A glimpse of a fully tattooed arm, possibly a lower-echelon member of the local mob feels like 

showing off a bit today?, quite a wide and muscular chest wrapped in a gaudy t-shirt, moustache, 

sunglasses on at 7:30 pm. 

A thug, a lowlife, a hoodlum, signify both apparel and demeanor.

Until fishnets enter the field of vision. Soon to be joined by the orange thong underneath them.

The sight encounters not a single hair to indulge upon, during its fall down to a 

comparatively conservative pair of sneakers.

Since that first sighting I've seen the guy quite a few times around the neighbourhood.

Hardly silent even with no phone in hand: his inner monologue seems to have settled into the

outside world. Not necessarily ranting, on the contrary a self-content ironic tone sets the 

mood of his rather loud soliloquy

Sometimes power walking to unknown destinations in the morning, significantly more 

often standing beer in hand by the traffic lights of the busy intersection, where Taito ward

 invisibly morphs into its northern neighbour Arakawa.

As much as the brisk Tokyo air seems by now to have talked some reason into his lower-half 

dress-code, trousers seem not to have affected his habits that much: beercan and monologue 

are still holding their positions as the staples of his figure.

In a somewhat discomforting way i'm glad it is like that: had the approaching winter witnessed

his disappearance from the cityscape i'm afraid i could have missed him.