A moment of calm, as well as a chance to cool down, before the cooking and general conviviality commences.
Ban’ei, Hokkaido’s unique form of horse racing
Japan boasts a whole host of conventional racecourses, but Hokkaido’s Ban’ei Tokachi has just the one. With an origin in agricultural work, ban’ei involves huge draft horses pulling weights of up to a tonne along a 200 metre gravel track. An already arduous task that’s made all the more difficult by a couple of hill-shaped obstacles that slow proceedings down even further. In fact the race often comes to a standstill, as readjustments in direction are made, or the horses are braced before taking on the mounds — the sheer effort of which is hard to capture in a photo, especially from a distance, so for something of a taster, there’s a race video here.
This unusually slow pace also means that spectators can jog along at the side of the track to keep up with the race, although they are, somewhat half-heartedly, encouraged not to.
Starting out as an event at local festivals, the popularity of ban’ei grew to such an extent that in 1953, four racecourses were built. A business that eventually turned out to be unsustainable, and in 2007, the courses at Kitami, Asahikawa and Iwamizawa sadly closed down, leaving just the one at Obihiro.
Spending a good few hours there, it was interesting to see the number of punters ebb and flow. Visitors to the area clearly help enormously in keeping the enterprise viable, but like most forms of gambling, it has its hardcore fanbase. Old fellas mostly, who, like gamblers the world over, are there through thick and thin. Each and every time hoping, against all the odds, for that one last hurrah.
Tokyo’s grittiest subway entrance?
Several years ago, a fresh coat of paint sadly spruced up this subway entrance. Time and the elements, however, have thankfully started to take their toll again, meaning that for me at least, it’s almost back to its gritty best. Scenery that in this case was made all the better due to the added extra of a similarly time-worn stare.
Tokyo urban art head to head?
A young Japanese woman passed out drunk on the street
It may well be September, but summer in Tokyo shows no sign of letting up, with temperatures still getting above 35 degrees. Heat that, when combined with the similarly unrelenting humidity, is a hard climate to contend with at the best of times. Then on top of that, throw in a long night fuelled by a gargantuan amount of booze, and even the simple pretence of managing is clearly surpassed by the far more pressing desire to simply pass out.
Japan’s Respect for the Aged Day in pictures
Today is a national holiday in Japan. Respect for the Aged Day to be precise. So having taken lots of photos of elderly Japanese over the years, here’s a selection of shots to mark both the day, and this ever-growing, ever-resilient section of modern Japanese society.