Some Home Truths

Presenting pictures photoshopped and hand selected from many might give the impression that the Japan I'm currently residing has a sleek aesthetic around every turn; and in some cases it is. However, I feel obligated to show you a little bit of the alternative vistas available around where I live. You see, for me, there are two things that spoil this land of visual milk and honey. Wires and rundown builds.

From what I understand, Japan doesn't bury it's electrical or telephone wire like we mostly do in the UK. It streams them from post to post, building to building and sometimes it looks like a vast network is running around even the smallest of villages. Ok, it does mean that they don't have to dig up the roads every time they need to amend or fix something and it probably has something to do with the unstable tectonic nature of the ground, but it does have a habit of spoil a lot of the photos I take. I love the view from my living-room but I just counted over 30 (I got bored counting) out my window alone.

The second point would be the state of disrepair of the architecture of Japan. Sure there are some amazing building, with gardens pruned to perfection, looking like a picture post-card, some of which are a stones throw from my door step. But for ever perfect building there is a rundown, shack of a structure, that looks like it would contravene about 20 British health and safety laws. I have a theory for this, although it is just a theory. You see houses in Japan loose value the older they are. It's like a car in that respect. As soon a you drive it out the forecourt it looses a chunk of its value, and the Japanese like it new. If your house is going to loose value, it doesn't make as much sense to maintain it as vigilantly as one might back home. Of course, if you live there, it does make sense to make a nice home, but if you had an old banger of a car, would you both trying to spruce it up with a new engine. Probably not. You would probably sell it for scrap or trade it in and invest in a newer model. And this is what I believe is happening with their homes. From what I understand, it wasn't too long ago (Relatively speaking) that Japan made more of an effort to conserve and protect its older areas of architectural interest and heritage. But even so, while our home back in London has a beautiful characteristic of an original brick fireplace, that kind of 'character' we all desire back in England, doesn't appeal to a larger percentage of the younger folk here. They seem to be fighting a loosing battle to keep it's heritage and when they do preserve it, it's always in danger of become what I refer to as 'Disneyfied' (A cheap plastic representation of the reality).

But beyond all that, I can't help seeing the beauty, even in the run-down shacks and seeing past the wires to the landscape behind. Maybe it is because I'm a foreigner and everything is still unique and exciting, be it a pristine temple or an old, dilapidated dwelling; but Japan is still, in a weird way, very beautiful to me.