Harajuku

alking after sake, through the winding streets of Roppongi, I found myself desperate for a bathroom. I had spent the evening at Bar Yasuda, Omakase, conversation, and coughing. Desperately coughing between bites of tuna and rice, the leftover remnants of some shit found in the air–my friend Adam having been laid up since we landed four days ago. I was getting over whatever the fuck I had, and he came down with whatever the fuck he had the morning after arriving in Tokyo. I had been wondering the streets of Tokyo alone, and until this moment, had been pretty successful in negotiating where to find restrooms.

Bar Yasuda isn't really close to public transportation. At least not the JR Line, which was the only one I knew. All of the subways are privatized in Japan, so different companies have different routes, but it's really not difficult. I just hadn't done it yet, and I find attempting new things rather difficult. New restaurant? What's wrong with the one I've been to four times and like just fine? New menu? New beer? Fine. I'm in Japan and new shit is the whole point of traveling, but sometimes I still find the fear of a bad experience crippling. I had been walking and taking photographs for an hour, the neighborhood and streets had changed.

I wasn't sure, but this looked like Harajuku.

Every alley, every parking lot, seemed to hold something new. Something strange that I liked. Little moments of time that seem to just dance inside the frame. I was alone, Interpol playing through my headphones, smoking cigarettes and shooting photos of things that to me, a poor kid from Kansas, had only seen in the movies or dreamed about. Everything was perfect. Except.

I wanted to piss my pants.

I'm not sure what trauma beholds me so fiercely that I would rather endure the pain of holding it until I got back to the hotel over asking where I could use a goddamned restroom. It's fucking stupid sometimes, the way my brain works.