The ‘Ooooh’ of a ty-phoon!

People here think I’m mad for going to shoot in a typhoon. But you just dont see ‘em in England very often.

In a week when various parts of Asia had been ravaged both by earthquakes and tropical storms, part of me felt a bit odd getting excited about the coming typhoon; I was in effect getting my jollies out of extreme weather, when similar weather less than two thousand miles away had laid waste to people’s lives.

Still, it’s all relative I guess and rain and extreme weather does make for some good shots. With this in mind, I donned my mother-in-law’s pink waterproofs and headed out to catch some wind and rain.

The trains were already a bit of a mess by the time I left home. But the Keikyu Line, which passes my house, was still running and I jumped on at my local station, getting only two stops – as far as Shinagawa – before everything ground to a halt.

This brought photo-opportunity number 1: commuter mayhem, which ended up as Picture of the Day on the Japan Today news website [below].

Bored with shooting people who were having a hard time and staying dry, I went outside to shoot some people having a hard time getting a thorough soaking! I am such a vulture. Still, it’s all in the interests of people’s photovisual delectation.

I stationed myself on the overpass by the station with a large lens and watched the crowds, which were substantial. My pink waterproofs were by this stage attracting a little attention. Still, I was dry.

Here’s a couple of shots from the overpass:

[He won't buy those 100Yen umbrellas again]

[Little bit of a battle over the taxi]

[Not a happy chappy]

It was all over pretty quickly and Tokyo definitely escaped the worst of the typhoon. Other parts of the country were not so lucky. I kind of wished I’d got deeper into Tokyo and not stuck at Shinagawa but, still, it was worth the trip out.

See more pics of Tokyo in the rain at the link below.

Shots of Tokyo in the Rain.