Nagoya 3: 4:30am

Last night we stayed at the funeral home and kept my grandmother company all night for the last time. (We had to greet visitors from the neighborhood who wanted to pay respects. About 40 people came to the wake.)

I got up at 4:00am as usual and went across the street to the convenience store. I had seen yakuza in Tokyo before on a few occasions, but this was the first time I've seen one in my grandmother's neighborhood. He was with his girlfriend and a chubby drag queen. There's not much to do around here and it looked like they had been out clubbing, maybe they were coming back from the city...

Here are some pictures of the neighborhood in daylight:


This is the playground where I hid from my mom whenever we got into a fight.








There are a lot of rich farmers like this one around here. They opened up a cafe in their old storage building next to their fields. A lot of them pave over their fields and live on the monthly parking fees they charge other residents.







This is the inside of the cafe.






















These are signs inside the local subway station warning customers to watch out for muggers and rapists. I guess it's an issue because these signs keep increasing.