Kei is a funky if kind of mad old guy I met one night on a random photo-walk through Shinjuku’s skyscraper district (West). I was on the bridge shooting pretty city lights and so was he, me with my dSLR and he with some weirdly contrived home-made compact camera. He’d taped a couple of enlarging lenses to both the back and front of what might have been a SONY coolpix, so the back-image was enlarged and the front-lens was zoomed out. It was one tricked out, pimped up compact camera. He let me toy with it for a moment. There were no settings of course, the whole thing duct-taped beyond recognition, but I felt pretty bad-ass all the same.
Kei shows off his bad-ass bike.
Of course, the camera is just the start of the mental unraveling. I hesitate to make light of it because what if he has some disability or other? Well, I don’t think it matters. I’m not mocking. I respect his confidence, his gumption, and the fact that what he’s doing hurts no-one I assume), entertains many, and must surely make him happy. Power to him. He was a very friendly guy, he even gave me his number and told me where I could hook up with him, with the cos-players outside Harajuku station on a Sunday. We had a nice chat, posed for a few photos, then went on our way.
Me and Kei, rocking out.
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Kei shows us how a real man reclines in his portable tripod chair.
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Comments 2
It certainly makes one wonder what goes on in his head. What is his story. What a mystery.
Author
I’ll interview him if I see him again, find out what’s going on in his head.