Harajuku

Weekly Photo Challenge: From Above

My inspiration for this weeks photo challenge once again comes from Harajuku, Japan where, as I walking over Harajuku bridge I spotted a calligraphy artist painting and selling his artworks to passer-bys… the perspective “from above” was certainly different to the usual view one encounters when passing street vendors at pathway level.

You can see more entry to this Weekly Photo Challenge here:http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/05/03/weekly-photo-challenge-from-above/

Street artist under Harajuku bridge, Japan

© Dawn Whitehand 2013

Weekly Photo Challenge: Culture

This weeks photo challenge is about culture and, as a challenge, prefers to have only one photo capturing the theme. So …. yikes!! what to choose – crazy traffic-scapes in Asia, fruit people/Lolita  in Harajuku, water produce sellers in Vietnam, wall to wall vending machines in Japan, the list goes on.

Although tempted to post an example of each, I’ve stuck to the “brief” and posted, what I think, is the best example from the mix… I hope you agree…. but it’s all very subjective, isn’t it?

So I have decided on an image I took whilst in Japan in 2009 capturing the growing trend of young people dressing up in defiance of their rigid conservative culture and exhibiting themselves in Harajuku, Japan. This has become a weekly event that is attended from all over Japan by young people as a means to rebel against conventional ‘culture’ – so I guess this image is capturing counter -culture!

This Sunday event also entices a large amount of tourists, and the young gals and guys there love showing off their outfits and having photos taken… in the great tradition of breaking current cultural rules!

If you ever get to visit Harajuku, it is a lovely city, and there is a great market that sells all the Bo-Beep and Lolita outfits you could ever need 🙂

You can visit more weekly photo challenges here :
http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/photo-challenge-culture/