Tokyo is an awfully isolating city. Feelings of loneliness, disconnection and numbness go hand in hand. There’s something incredibly romantic and fascinating about the loneliness that Tokyo inspires, especially in the colder months.
From late autumn to early spring in the greater Tokyo area, I found myself living in an alternate reality, disconnected from family and friends and normal living. I went days without speaking to another person, floating in my own dreamlike world as though I was looking down at the real world from far away. Looking back at that winter nearly nine years later, I’ve never experienced anything as isolating as that.
I became almost nocturnal, walking the streets late at night with no destination or reason – just walking and thinking and wondering where everyone else was, even though it was 2am on a Tuesday night. I enjoyed rugging up in multiple layers, hiding my face with a thick scarf, feeling the wintery chill of -2 degree air slap my skin. I always listened to music as I walked, looking out for someone but never coming across anyone in my sleepy university town.
Sometimes I would end up lying on the bench outside the convenience store on campus (closed at 10pm because it was part of the university), looking at where the stars should be but there was just darkness and artificial lights from the surrounding apartment buildings. I would always wonder if I would encounter another person as lonely as I was, floating through the deserted university campus. But I never came across anyone.
Another way I would entertain myself was riding my bicycle as far as I could go until my legs were worn out. I had no reason or destination; but I was a student and had nothing but time to waste, even the hours that I should have been sleeping. I couldn’t sleep, though, so I would chase the isolation to the end of the road, pedalling until I’d left the town and the distance between each street light was getting further and I had forgotten what exactly I was even doing out there.
Just pedalling further and further away into the night.