A quick hit and run post here folks!
It would be a shame, nay a sacrilege, to come to Tokyo and not take a walk across the famous intersection outside Shibuya Station AKA the Shibuya Scramble!
Rumoured to be the busiest intersection in the world (and definitely in Japan), Shibuya Crossing sends literally hundreds of people hurtling from side to side each time the lights turn red.
On sunny afternoons or clear evenings, the surrounding shopping area is packed with students, young couples and commuters.
When the lights turn red at this huge, busy junction, they all turn red at the same time in every direction.
Traffic stops completely and pedestrians surge into the crossing from all sides, like so many marbles escaping from out of a box.
Despite the multitudes, people somehow many to negotiate the swirling chaos without seeming to even look up from their phones. We weren’t quite so slick – video evidence is somewhere, but I appear to have lost it temporarily!
You can observe this moment of organised chaos, as we did, with a bird’s eye view from the second-story window of the Starbucks in the Tsutaya building on the crossing’s north side.
You’ll have to be patient to get a window seat as it’s one of busiest branches in the world and everyone wants to get a glimpse of the throng below.
The intersection is a popular location for movies and media taking place in Tokyo. It’s appeared in the films “Lost in Translation” and “The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift,”
It’s also a popular place for photographers to grab snaps of contemporary Tokyo in all its colourful, frenetic glory.