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On Friday, New York became the sixth state to recognize gay marriage, and nothing could make me happier. Although I'm straight, I have no use for bigotry. Everyone has the right to find love and happiness however he or she sees fit. Today's parade was a celebration of New Yorkers' right to free choice in deciding how to live their personal lives.
I photographed my best friend Chiemi towards the end of my stay in Tokyo. The shoot was at another Inari shrine in Asakusa. This visit to Tokyo was the first where I'd shot digital color rather than black & white film, and it certainly worked well for my shoot with Chiemi. If I'd shot black & white, I wouldn't have been able to capture the bright colors of her outfit. Chiemi designed the modifications to the dress herself and did a fabulous job coordinating the colors into a true impressionist palette.
After the shoot, Chiemi and I had lunch at the same Asakusa restaurant where I'd eaten with Lira at the beginning of my stay. It was great to have a quiet lunch and talk over old times with such a good friend. As we were talking, we discovered that Chiemi and Lira were both listed with the same model agency, SOS Models, in Tokyo. Small world.
The Meiji Shrine, dedicated to memory of the late emperor and his wife, is one of the most beautiful and peaceful areas in Tokyo. One follows a road through a heavily wooded botanical gardens until one reaches the temple buildings themselves, a faithful reconstruction of the structures destroyed by bombing during World War II.
The shrine is also apparently the location for traditional Japanese weddings. One weekend when I was visiting I was lucky enough to see such a ceremony. I stood on the side with tourists and took these pictures from a distance as the official wedding photographer did his work. I noticed the photographer was working with the best equipment available, including a Leaf camera back.
There was a brief earthquake one Sunday morning while I was still lying in bed in my hotel. The bed shook for a while, but that was it. Afterwards, I left as planned to visit the Meiji Shrine in Harajuku.
Harajuku is a Tokyo neighborhood that tries hard to come across as counter culture, but really is so gentrified that it's high priced beyond any boho's wildest dreams.
At the entrance to the shrine, close to the Harajuku JR train station, a group of drummers were performing a benefit for earthquake/tsunami relief. Aside from the discreet jar in my hotel lobby, to which I'd contributed as much as I could, the was the first sign I'd seein in Tokyo that any disaster had ever even occurred.
Asakusa is the last stop on the Ginza line metro. The station dates back to 1927 when it was built as the end point of "the first underground railway in the Orient." Above is the famous shrine -- the Kaminarion Gate is on the next corner from the station's Gate 1.
But downstairs, in the subway concourse itself, a dilapidated section has been turned into an alternative art gallery and party place. There is a lit sign at the tunnel entrance that reads "Underground" (in Japanese kana, of course). The spirit I saw there was authentic and actually reminded me a lot of the East Village vibe in the early 1960's.
The photo above is of Kosuke, fiance of my best friend Chiemi. He and Chiemi, his parents and his brother (all now Chiemi's family too, of course) were cool enough to invite me to a traditional dinner at their home in Asakusa. It was the first time I'd ever been inside a Japanese house, and the food was great. This was really the high point of my stay in Tokyo, and I'm so grateful to these people who made me feel welcome and treated me with such warmth.
