Hey, there, guys! Topic: the visible homeless in Tokyo, Japan.
Now, I say "visible homeless" because there is a lot of homeless people.
There are people who might be living in shelters, they might be staying in the homes of friends or relatives,
or they might be staying at capsule hotels or internet cafes.
So what I'm going to talk about today is just the homeless that you might see out on the street.
Now, what street am I going to? Well, I'm going to go to the streets of Shinjuku,
which is a major business and government district in Tokyo.
By the way, this video is not gonna delve too deeply into homelessness,
it's simply going to take a look at what you can see on the outside.
Homelessness is a complex issue. I still have lots of research to do, and I have people to talk to.
I wanna talk to homeless people. I wanna talk to the people who support them with various services.
What I find interesting about Shinjuku is that there's this "upper level" and "lower level" to it,
at least in this government district.
On the top you'll find every day people. They're -you know- eating their lunch, they'll walk around their pets,
they are hanging out with their kids... And the place looks nice!
You have public art, you have well groomed parks, you have very nice architecture and buildings...
It's a really nice space and it's bright.
Now, if you go down below, as you walk down the stairs and go down below, that's were you'll find some homeless people.
And you'll find them in the tunnels or under bridges.
Now you may be wondering: did people push them there? Why are they hanging out down below?
Are they forced there?
It all seems too perfect that -you know- the wealthy people are up above
and the not so wealthy people are down below.
So the time of the year I went was the winter/spring time, so it's still relatively cold outside.
So I'm told by my father in law that the people congregate down below not because they're forced to
but because it's warmer down there. And it's also more sheltered from the elements.
He says that, in the summer time, you'll actually see them move their belongings from the underground and into the parks.
I can attest of this because I did go to that area a couple of years back, in the summer time,
and sure enough, there were a lot of people in the parks.
That being said, where the homeless do congregate? I think it's fairly structured or organized.
You just won't see homeless in certain parts of the city.
You'll rarely see homeless right in front of shops, sleeping out right on the streets.
You're more likely to see them were they'll be less in the way.
So these are bridges (sometimes I've seen them on top, but a lot of the times below),
or in parks, or in the river banks, actually,
because the river banks have a lot of cover, whether it's trees or long grasses,
and you often see this blue tarp homes there.
Now walking through the underground you'll see these blue tarps and their frames are mostly made of cardboard,
and you'll see other things like their bikes, and you'll see trolleys,
sometimes suitcases, but it's fairly organized.
If you go out onto the river bank, what I noticed is that the structures seem to be more permanent,
so I'll see stuff built out of wood, sometimes corrugated metal or corrugated plastic and the blue tarps, of course.
This is a really long pan, by the way, people. I didn't have the steadiest of movement,
but I'm quite proud that I could keep the shot moving for so long.
But, hey! It's a really long shot, so I'll just speed it up
And here is an example of some of the only homeless people that I saw out in the open.
And again, here's another shot that almost seemed a little bit too perfect,
that you have this huge government building, you know, the seat of power,
and then you pan down below and that's the most unfortunate people in society.
What struck me about the homeless I've found in Tokyo was that they don't tend to be out in the open,
like I saw in San Francisco or in Vancouver.
And I noticed that you don't really see them beg. They don't have cups out there asking for money.
I'm sure there might be some, but it's not a very common thing.
They do keep to themselves. They're quite quiet.
It's fairly organized, so I found myself wondering:
do they have any mental health issues or drug addiction problems?
I know that some of them do drink.
In Vancouver, in Canada, I know a lot of the homeless have mental health issues and drug addictions.
I didn't quite see that in the visible homeless in Tokyo.
So I want to investigate that.
But what I can gather is that they seem to be mostly middle aged or senior males.
Even though this is a major district, Shinjuku, they're not in the busiest parts of Shinjuku.
So here you'll see here is some pretty busy major areas, and there's the every day people walking on about.
So you don't really see homeless set up amongst these streets.
But if you go over to a quieter part of Shinjuku, then this is where you see the homeless congregate.
One of the good reasons I could think of, for the homeless to congregate in the parks or green spaces,
is because these places tend to have both running water and bathroom facilities.
While the public bathrooms aren't as nice as the ones found in private homes,
I find most of them are clean and orderly.
I found that the public bathrooms in Shinjuku are relatively cleaner than most.
So that's just a brief view of what the visible homeless look like on the streets of Shinjuku,
just a small area in Tokyo.
I have to do a lot more research on this, so I look forward to bringing you some more videos.
But what I would like to know right now is:
What does the homelessness on the streets look like where you're from?
And as always, thank you very much for watching. And I'll catch you on the flip side.