Last Friday, I saw part of a ballgame at Tokyo Dome.
Of course, Tokyo Dome has been closed for weeks now, along with many other places where people used to gather.
When I walk past it most mornings these days, the concrete esplanade around it is mostly or entirely deserted, and the only sound comes from little birds whose echoing chirps are amplified by the metal and glass canopy extending out and down from the edge of the stadium roof.
Walking along, I usually soon hear another sound: the rustle and snap of dozens of long koinobori carp streamers that have been hung from wires in honor of the upcoming Children's Day holiday.
The cloth fishes' many colors are gorgeous against the bright blue sky, where they appear to swim in the same wind that tugs at my hair, which is growing ever shaggier as I refrain from visiting the barber.
It would be a festive scene if there were people around to enjoy it. But most people are staying home (and I'm skipping haircuts) in a communal effort to keep the new coronavirus at bay.
Even so, essential businesses such as newspapers continue to operate. Part of The Japan News staff is working from home these days, but some of us still have to come to the office.
To spend less time on trains and thus reduce my exposure to other people, I've been leaving home early each morning and walking as far as I can. In the process, I have seen little bits of Tokyo I might otherwise have missed.
I've been snapping photos of places I may go back to when business returns to normal, such as a tea shop near Hakusan subway station that I already like just because of its punny French name: Enchan-The.
I've also been enjoying Tokyo's abundance of public art, especially sculptures. I saw a collection of white rods twisted into a see-through image of a colossal bear near Ogawamachi subway station, and a dark metal statue of a chubby, bug-eyed figure who might have been a deity or a sage on a side street near Shin-Ochanomizu subway station.
Beside the latter, there was a sign that I hoped would provide an explanation -- but when I looked closer all it told me was not to feed the neighborhood cats and pigeons.
I've also paused to appreciate works by historically famous sculptors. A copy of "Hercules the Archer" by Antoine Bourdelle guards the lobby of an Ochanomizu office building, and a statue of judo founder Jigoro Kano by Fumio Asakura stands in front of the Kodokan judo facility near Korakuen subway station.
The Kodokan's neighborhood has many martial arts supply stores, all of which were empty and dark as I passed. On one of those streets, a man tried to hand me a coupon from a stack he was holding. I doubted I was in the market for whatever he was selling, so I waved him off even though I felt sorry for him. For at least a very long block in either direction, near the center of Tokyo, there wasn't another soul in sight.
I sometimes get a last-man-on-Earth feeling on these long walks through empty parts of the city, but there are usually at least a few other people around -- even if it's just a widely scattered handful of deliverymen and joggers.
Sometimes, the isolation offers unexpected glimpses into other people's lives. In one, an elderly man in a wheelchair sat expressionlessly behind the large front window of an institutional-looking building while two women on the sidewalk outside bent down in front of the glass and energetically waved at him. Presumably it was a family visit that would have taken place inside the facility in normal times.
In late March, I walked past a group of grinning young men in mortarboards who were taking pictures of each other in front of the main gate of the University of Tokyo. The university held a drastically scaled-down spring graduation ceremony amid the outbreak, but the little group I saw still looked happy to celebrate a once-in-a-lifetime milestone.
And last Friday, as I walked around the curving wall of Tokyo Dome, I saw a young father playing with his son, who looked no older than kindergarten-age, on the otherwise empty esplanade.
The boy stood at the bottom of the flight of steps at the Nagashima Gate, and his father pitched a ball toward him. The boy swung at the ball and missed -- because the bat he was holding was imaginary. The ball bounced off the steps and back to the father, who caught it and pitched again. Another swing of the invisible bat, and another miss.
Now, instead of chirping birds, a new and louder sound was echoing beneath the stadium's metal and glass canopy. The little boy's laughter filled the deserted space.
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