Heaven's Ceiling

Under the Expressway.
As everywhere in the world, even here are people of nomadic existence.
Often people too muddled to live an ordinary life.

Shirokane
In playgrounds that often are abandoned as result of the ageing of society.


On a bench on Odaiba beach.

Akasaka
In a fully paved park.

Bunkyo ku
On the riverside.

Ueno park
Besides that we mainly see orderly homeless who try to live as good as possible with a minimum of means. A church celebrates a special Mass.

Ueno park
Remarkable are those blue sheets. Each respectable homeless has one.

There are several stories on the backgrounds of these homeless. A popular one among westerners says these people have become jobless and cannot bear the disgrace under the eyes of their family. Although many people serve in lifelong employment in one company, even when they do not perform satisfactory by any standard, Japan does have a labour market.

Another story deals with finance, of course. There are people in desperate deep debts, think only of the addicts who are one of the family in the Pachinko parlours. Loan agents do not hesitate to hire gangsters to collect debts. Yakuza (organised crime) threatens your family, comes banging on your door at night or calls you in the office twenty five times per day. As a result ten thousands of people disappear every year in a process known as Yonige, ”Midnight Run”. They leave their homes, change identity and move to another city, all to hide from the enforcers of Japan’s consumer loans.
Traditionally people must clear all debts by the end of the year, so New Year’s Eve is the premier time for Yonige. The 80.000 who fled in het night of 1996 had nearly doubled by 1999, to 130.000.
So popular is the Midnight Run that it has spawned a new business, Benriyasan (Mr. Convenient), facilitators who help families flee their homes and who take care of their possessions while they are on the run. In 1999, Japanese television featured a new drama, “The Midnight Run Shop” , whose hero devises schemes for people to evade gangster lean enforcers. It’s a Mission Impossible for debtors,...
Source: Alex Kerr, Dogs and Demons, 2001.

Ara river

And it is clear we are not dealing with muddled people here. The improvised dwellings are neat. They sit on a wooden platform and everything is tidied up. The gray shelter even has an overhead door on a rack.

Sumida river

Read more about the homeless in Tokyo on http://unhoused.livejournal.com/22478.html