Category: Photos

Yesterday I joined a volunteer group called “Yokohama Spring Homeless Patrol” for the first time.

My dad’s friend, Elena, is an early co-founder of the group. Elena looked after me a lot when my dad was in hospital. And I hadn’t seen for quite a while so I was very happy to see her.

Patrick Curtin and Elena started this group about one and a half years ago. They get food and beverage donations and give them to the unprivileged  and homeless people of Yokohama(City in Japan).

When Elena and I got to Kannai station in Yokohama at 17:35 we met Patrick, the founder of the group. There were a few people that came to the patrol meet up for the first time. They were all very talkative and kind. There were 14 of us altogether.

We were split into groups to give out food and drinks. I was in charge of handing out some Cherry Coke and some vegetable juice drinks. There were around 100 people queuing for the food and drinks. They were very patient and I was amazed. Some of them had been waiting there for  over 3 hours to be the first to get the food and drinks. This is because sometimes there is not enough food and drink for everyone.

After that we went into the station to meet some people living in cardboard boxes. We handed out crackers and chocolate biscuits.

It was basically what I had expected except that almost all the volunteers were non-Japanese. I wonder why there weren’t many Japanese people helping other homeless Japanese people.

It was a very good experience and I would love to join more of these events. They do these twice a month on Saturdays. Why don’t join or donate some time?

You can get more information about this group, the people in it and see some photos here:
https://www.facebook.com/mutualaidsolidarity/

Recently my dad and I walked from Ebisu to Shibuya. Most Japanese people don’t explore the city and go to places by train. There were a lot of low planes. There was a lot of graffiti. We saw train super close up around 50 cm. It was so scary there was only a fence between us and the train. I took a lot of photos. We went onto a viewing lobby on Hikarie Deck in the Hikarie building.

 

Last  Saturday I got a new bike. It’s called the Trek SLR 6700. It’s a mountain bike with 3×8 gears and disc brakes. The frame is aluminium and it has front suspension. It’s really easy to cycle up hills and it’s quite comfortable even on bumpy ground. I need to get a mud guard and lights so it’s safe. I bought this bike on Craigslist, my dad had to ride it from the middle of Tokyo to our home and it took 4 hours! I went home by train.

I want to cycle on my bike to my friends’ houses and places where you can’t get to by train. I would also like to cycle to the sea one day.

This is a photo of a view from my balcony. I took this photo using my PowerShot G11. It’s quite a nice photo. You can see my sister’s kindergarten. This is in Japan and it’s in Tokyo. The kindergarten is very good.
I really like the area around my house and all the nice trees. I climb basically all the trees around my house.