Sunday, June 05, 2005

Shibuya

There is a massive intersection in front of the train station in Shibuya (one of the neighborhoods featured prominently in Lost in Translation) that somehow stays orderly in a way that only the Japanese (or perhaps the Swiss, if they had that many people) could manage. Traffic flows relatively smoothly through a tangle of wide streets, and pedestrians wouldn't dare try to cross. Then all traffic stops and hundreds of pedestrians cross simulataneously from every direction. Then it starts all over again. It's supposed to be amazing to watch from above, but the best I could do is a before and after shot from the curb: