All aboard the J-train

The public transport system in Japan is without a doubt the most efficient I have ever encountered. Like clockwork one might say. The train is also where you will meet the strangest of individuals, sweet old ladies, drunken salary-men and glittering J-teens. It's where any person who can speak even two words of English will strike up a conversation with you in an attempt to practice their language skills. This usually results in an unintelligible hybrid Jap-glish charade about the weather. I find if you just nod and say ok a lot it generally makes them happy. The other entertaining fact about riding the J-train is that everyone, absolutely everyone falls asleep on the train. Its not uncommon to have a salary-man on either side of you sleeping with both their heads on your shoulders. What amazes me the most, is that they all seem to know when to wake up and get off. It's an intrinsic reaction. Little robots waking up just in time to step off the train and wander home. As a henna gaijin in this country, I don't have this ability. Which is why on several occassions now I have woken up in the middle of no-where, dazed and confused, wiping the sleep out of my eyes trying to work out where the hell I am and the best way to get home again. I took this picture of Andrew on our way home from a big night out in Shibuya. We really wanted to capture the moment, so Drew pretended to fall asleep on old mates shoulder. Old mate woke up the instant the flash went off, realised our caper and hit Andrew, sending me into total hysterics. I roared laughing the rest of they way home, but the J's didn't mind. They just slept right through it.