ホムレス京都
Just south of Shichijo Dori along
Kyoto's Kamo River, we saw a homeless man transporting his load of crushed cans.
On recycling days in Kyoto, a small army of middle-aged homeless men on bikes rush to the collection points to take the cans before the official city trucks come for them.
The load he has, while large, would not be heavy. However, he clearly labored to keep the hundreds of crushed and packed cans balanced.
He had carefully stuffed the two blue tarps, tied them, and then with separate rubber chords fixed both to his old bike.
© JapanVisitor.com
Yahoo Japan Auction ServiceJapanese FriendsTokyo Apartments SearchJapan Job SearchRough Guide To JapanTagsJapanHomelessKyotoRecycleJapanese
リサイクル
A common site in the early mornings near where I live in
Nagoya is a man on a bicycle festooned with tin cans. Each area puts out its plastic, cans and bottles on a different day to be picked up by the city's recycling trucks.
Before the truck arrives, a homeless person on a bicycle will come and gather all the beer and other aluminium drinks cans.
The cans are sold to a recycler for 30 yen (about 33 cents) a kilo. I reckoned the man had about 30 kilos of cans attached to his bike. That's 900 yen for a morning's work, enough to buy some food and maybe a
cup of sake but little else.
© JapanVisitor.com
Yahoo Japan Auction ServiceBook a Japanese Hotel with BookingsJapanese FriendsRough Guide To JapanTagsJapan recycling homeless Nagoya Japanese beer
上野公園のホムレス
On a recent walk through
Yanaka Cemetery and its environs, we came out at Tokyo University of the Arts. It was festival day at the university, so the campus mood was festive.
Outside of the campus walls, though, just inside Ueno Park, the sight of hundreds of homeless men was a depressing reminder that all have not enjoyed equally the benefits of Japan's rise - and recent decline - among world economies.
A stone's throw from the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, which is currently exhibiting the collection of
Egyptian artifacts from Turin, the men were sitting on benches or on the ground in the early fall heat.
© JapanVisitor.com
Yahoo Japan Auction ServiceBook a Japanese Hotel with BookingsJapanese FriendsRough Guide To JapanTagsJapan Tokyo Ueno Park Kyoto Homeless Japanese
