The sky was grey when I got up this morning and went down for breakfast at the hotel restaurant, where I had a hot dog and a salad while looking out at the people walking by. The hotel people said they could put me up on a higher floor in a room with a view, so I had to pack up and leave my luggage with them before heading out.

I headed to Ueno Park, where what I thought was a sewer outlet turned out to be water issuing from a well guarded by a huge crow. A light drizzle began as I observed a baseball game, causing the homeless fellows busy sleeping on adjacent benches to sit up. The park is full of cicadas and fresh air, which some of the visitors try to deal with by talking loudly and smoking.

I walked by the Filipino Fair and the art university, which has little glass rooms overlooking trees, presumably for art students to veg out in. The ground trembled every time a subway train ran underneath. At a school next to a shrine the sound of a concert band issued through the windows, and I wondered why they were practicing on a Sunday. Mothers and children on motorized bicycles zoomed around the streets of a temple-laden neighborhood.

I walked back to the park, resting a bit on a bench overlooking ducks and turtles, thinking it was nice to be here when it’s not cold for once. Lunch was at Subway. I’ve been trying to use what Japanese I have, with varied success. I am really, really not used to speaking it.

After lunch I headed south, stopping at a temple of a literary bent, where I took a family photo for some people. Back on the main road, I noted that one of the distinctive smells of Tokyo is a slight hint of diesel exhaust, probably from the subway. That and certain cooking smells.

I stopped at the Kanda Shrine, where statues of horses licking their feet adorn the entrance, and again at the Confucian Shrine, which was rather delapidated. An old man with a mask painted the scene in front…at least I think it was the scene in front. It wasn’t very much like the scene in front, to be honest.

A group of foreigners I passed back on the street were discussing what to do next. “I will talk to the driver,” their guide was saying. I couldn’t help but think to myself, happily, “I don’t have a driver! Ha!”

Just down the street was one of my favorite bits of Tokyo, namely the Shohei Bridge, where several subway lines criss-cross above and below, and a police boat sped by underneath just as I approached. A man was taking pictures on the bridge with the huge, ungainly Sigma Quattro.

I walked over to Akihabara, where the entire street had been closed to traffic. It was rather bizarre. I asked a policeman what time it started and stopped, and he said 1 to 6, and only on Sundays, before he dashed off to blow his whistle at some kids riding their bikes on the sidewalk.

I was really enjoying myself, walking on my own all around the area, stopping to write, or doubling back, or dashing over to take a shot of this or that. It was immensely satisfying, and the weather cooperated, the clouds dispersing, a brilliant afternoon sun illuminating the large white buildings.

I eventually made my way back to the hotel, where they gave me a room on the 11th floor. Sure, it’s next to the elevators, as well as the stairwell of the building next door, but at least it has a view of the outside. I took a shower and then met my friend Louis in the lobby. We headed out for dinner, and after a long walk that got me thoroughly lost, we ate at a Korean barbeque place while discussing politics and photography.

And now I’m back here, listening to the elevators. Fortunately, my apartment bedroom is next to the elevators as well, so it doesn’t particularly bother me.

When I headed out my door this morning, all packed up, it was the first time in a long while that I’ve done so on my own. It was a bit unsettling, in fact. I allowed myself to feel cautiously happy, almost uneasily happy, on the bus to the airport. The weather in Taipei was brilliant and hot, and I wondered if it was raining in Tokyo.

The feeling of happiness grew stronger at the airport, where I lounged around while everyone else lined up to get on the plane. I was happy to be the last one. I’d gotten there in plenty of time, snagged myself a window seat at the rear of the 777, and settled in for a beautiful flight.

It was actually stunningly beautiful…white bits of clouds floating over the blue pacific, their dark blue shadows and white reflections visible in the water. A kid was crying, but it didn’t bother me.

I managed to catch the Skyliner into Tokyo this time, something that eluded me last time I was here, five years ago. Has it really been five years? Man. I was happy again when I walked out of the station into Ueno. I’m staying at the hotel I felt was most appropriately named: the Sardonyx. My window doesn’t do much right now because it’s too low and the building next door blocks any view, but they said they’d move me upwards tomorrow. After dinner at Yoshinoya (oddly one restaurant where the food is much better in the Taipei version), I walked around the area a bit. It’s cool but not unpleasant. So far, so good. No idea what I’m doing,  which, again, I’ve grown unused to, but I’ll think of something.

My weekend was spent turning the Water Curtain Cave upside-down in search of the warranty for my washing machine, which refused to surrender my clothes the last time I washed anything. I suspect it also hid the warranty, as I can almost hear it chuckling out there on the balcony. However, though there is as yet no sign of that particular document, I did managed to go through a bunch of other stuff, and threw out three large garbage bags of various things I didn’t need. This is one of the perils of buying a place and living in it for a long time without moving; stuff builds up, and without moving there’s no reason to get rid of it. But I need to. I’d also like to get rid of a bunch of clothes and books. My DVD collection will go when I can put them all on a thumb drive, which, according to Moore’s Law, will be possible around *looks at watch* Thursday.  My old PC needs to be donated for parts, and even my “new” iMac is getting a bit long in the tooth at the ripe old age of five. It still works, but very slowly, and my view is mostly occupied by the swirling rainbow.

Being back at my old office is still rather surreal. People, staff members who remember me from Back in The Day hail me in the hallways, which is awkward as I’m terrible with names. And faces. And, well, people. Which is unfortunate because I’m working with people; my boss is only a couple of cubicles away, so I’m really going to have to cut down on the LARPing. Instead of the old clunky PC I used for roughly a decade, I’m now using an old clunky laptop with a yellow screen. I tell myself that this will help my eyesight, but my eyes are having none of it. Luckily my cubicle wall only covers half the window next to me, so I can see a bit of sky outside through the blinds.

In other news, the Xingtian Temple, one of Taipei’s most venerated temples, is going green; no more incense, no more tables full of awful junk food meant as offerings. And right in the middle of Ghost Month, too! Personally I think ghost money burning is far worse a problem than incense, but it’s a step in the right direction. Hopefully the trend will catch on.

Theoretically I should be planning my trip to Tokyo next week. Chenbl has been urging me to have a detail plan, hour-by-hour, with subway charges and meals all planned out. He says this because that is the only way he ever travels, and is horrified when he hears that I basically just show up in whatever city and wing it. This time, I’d like to meet some old friends, and possibly with some publishers, but other than that, I don’t really know.

I’m not really sure where I’m going lately, with photography, writing, filmmaking, etc. Mostly because I can finish projects but am allergic to self promotion, so things are done and then just…lie there. But when I look back at my earlier entries, I feel like I’ve really slacked off lately. It would be easy to blame certain other parties for this, but I really should take the responsibility myself, and try to live in a way that is at least worth blogging (and that’s a low bar if I ever saw one), and making my own mistakes, because embarrassing failures are much more interesting to read about than surrogate success.

The concert, such as it was, went ok, I guess. Managing to miss the downpours, I arrived at the school at around 4pm on Saturday so that I could video Chenbl’s flute group, which turned out to be larger than I’d anticipated. I was forced to set up the camera further back to get all 17 of them in, as they were spread across the “stage”. This, however, didn’t work out so well in the actual performance department, as nobody could hear anyone else, and the sound guy was a bit touchy whenever anyone point out any flaw in his microphone arrangement. “If you don’t like it, why are you playing here?” he asked.

Our trio was later, so we went to the basement to practice a bit, and Chenbl’s niece showed up to help video us later. They laughed at me sliding around the room in my socks while the others practiced. It was muggy and hot outside, and I was surprised so many people showed up. It seemed most of them were local elderly folks who lived nearby and had no choice but to witness the cacophony, and they figured they might as well do it right. Kudos for that, anyway.

I set up the camera in the area in front of the stage, and after watching Chenbl try to keep his sheet music from flying off his stand by using an elbow, I dashed in for the third song, “Summertime”. The people seemed to like it. Afterwards we had dinner at a nearby Japanese joint with Chenbl’s parents joining us. Chenbl’s mother grilled the waitress on her braces, while Chenbl asked me if he’s finally ready for the big time, by which he meant playing charity gigs, and I said, “not quite”. It’s impressive what he’s managed to learn in such a short time, but he still has a long way to go.

That was Saturday. On Sunday I spent most of the day at home putting some final touches on a couple of photo books I’ve been working on, so that I can get some samples printed for people both here and in Japan. Re-thinking the sequencing to conform to some concrete ideas and themes rather than going purely by feeling alone seemed to help. Also helpful was reading and looking at a book I borrowed from my friend Brian Webb: Tales of Tono by Daido Moriyama, the text of which seemed to have been written by a long-lost twin, especially the parts where Moriyama expresses his joy at setting out for the hinterlands after a long period of stewing in Tokyo. In the meantime, my book has five reviews on amazon.com now, mostly positive. I haven’t asked anyone to review it, or promised free copies or anything. I’m sure my lack of SEO awareness is not a good thing in this case, but perhaps things will be different when the print version comes out.

Dinner was at Evan’s Burger on Dunhua. I’d never been there, so I dragged Chenbl there to give it a try, for which he got revenge by telling me things like, “You can’t help but like the food you ate before you were 19. You will only like that food more and more as you get older. It’s biology.” This was his way of saying he doesn’t like hamburgers. He had fish and chips.

I’ve been looking back at some of my older entries, and I have to admit I’m rather shocked at how much I wrote back in the day. And when I say “back in the day,” I mean before around 2008. After that, I mostly spent my time tooling around on Facebook, etc. and feeling sorry for myself.

But Facebook isn’t terribly good at looking back, and it feels a little cheap and mean. I kind of miss babbling on about my day on here, just me and maybe a couple of readers. They say blogging’s dead, but my keyboard still works. So here goes:

So my job is moving again. I’ve spent the last couple of years at a particular office that reminds me of an old, slightly seedy hotel that was once grand. Chipped wooden doors, musty old carpets, formerly high ceilings now covered with tiles, tarnished brass fittings, faded lacquer…that kind of thing. I’ve enjoyed it, as my friend Guo-xi is in the next cubicle, and it’s fun to chat about stuff sometimes. Also, we’re on the first floor, and there are nice things like trees and birds just outside the tall, barred windows. There are also not-so-nice things, like when the cleaners brush up all the dust in the carpets, or another co-worker’s daily fight with the printer.

But now we’re moving back to our former digs, more or less. In fact, everyone who’s going has already gone. I’m the only one left, because my computer, an ancient PC dating from the Bush years if carbon tests can be believed, isn’t going with me. Who knows what awaits me there? I’ve been in this position for over ten years now, so perhaps a little variety wouldn’t hurt. Fortunately there is lots of wood around here to knock on as I say this.

In addition to becoming tired of Facebook, I’m also getting a little tired of Flickr. I’ve administered HCSP for years now, and I have to admit I’m somewhat frustrated with the whole thing. It’s repetitive, dealing with wave after wave of people coming in to knock down some Aged Pillar of the Street Photography they’ve imagined is Blocking Progress by Not Recognizing Their Genius or something. It’s just a flickr group, after all, and to be honest I was never actually solid in my commitment to street photography, which I personally think is not even a real thing, or shouldn’t be, as all of the definitions of it that mean anything describe what it’s not. It’s mostly become an excuse for bad photography for the great majority of its practitioners.

In any case, I’ve made most of my photos private, and I’ve parred down the groups I belong to as well. Too often I feel, in the context of “real” photographers I encounter there and on FB, that I am just faking it. I’m not really a photographer, because I can’t bring myself to be interested in most of what they’re talking about. I enjoy good photography. I enjoy the emotions I have when I see good photography, and I enjoy taking photos. That’s about it. Everything else just seems…extraneous lately.

Or perhaps I’m just tired; it’s just been a long, hot, muggy summer full of record temperatures and seemingly frequent disasters, including plane crashes and exploding cities. I need a break. Fortunately, I will be doing just that at the end of this month, embarking on a trip to Tokyo for a week. Why, you ask? To be in Tokyo for a week. To do what? To be in Tokyo. That’s it. Oh, I’ll walk around, and perhaps take a photo or two if I see anything, but mostly just to see what it’s like in warm weather. Oh, and I also plan to meet some people I know there, such as my old film school classmate Yas, my friend Louis, and some other friends I met who are in the publishing business there, and possibly Daido Moriyama, if he’s around and up for it. I wish my attempts to pick up some Japanese had stuck, alas.

I’m also going to Paris in November, but that will be more business stuff, because we’ve been invited to exhibit at Paris Photo. We’ve also been invited to the MAP festival in Toulouse as well as the Brighton Biennial, but I only have so much time off, so Paris it is. Also, Chenbl and Ewan are tagging along, so it’s probably going to be a crazy ride full of touristy travails a la our last trip to Osaka. Also, it will be cold.

The Ramblers are once again on the scene after David came back from his six-month-long journey around the world, so we’ve been busy with shows lately. It’s good to get back into that scene; I was getting a little tired of just playing along to Spotify playlists at home, worrying that my neighbors would complain. In fact, Chenbl’s been inspired to take up not only the flute but also violin, and I’ll be accompanying him and a fellow student this weekend for one of their student concerts. The venue is a horribly echo-ey school atrium area, and it’s bound to be both swelteringly hot and cacophonous, but, well, it’s just another one of those things I never talked about. Until now.