Shinjuku

When you use the West exit from Shinjuku Station, signs point you in the direction of the "Skyscraper District". This area is the very epitome of modern design and architecture, with paving stones and towering glass at every turn. The fact that the multi-level streets are seldom parallel or straight can leave you turned around, and looking for a landmark, in short order.

The population density is best appreciated from atop a skyscraper, where your view of mixed highrises and lowrises reaches the horizon uninterrupted.

The Tokyo Metropolitan towers (left) are a great spot on a clear day. At right is the view down to Shinjuku station (right) and the border of Shinjuku Garden park (below).

Upscale restaurants claim the top floors of the tall buildings, while a more modest mix of truly international styles can be found lower such as the I-land patio, housing open air tables in the center of its underground circle, ringed by restaurants.

You're never far from good food in West Shinjuku (or for that matter anywhere in Tokyo, but in Shinjuku you can find more English menus). Check out the Tokyo Restaurant Guide - Nishi-Shinjuku Area Listings for more.

The size and efficiency of the road system in this area is a marvel, and severe congestion never localized here. It looks like a pretty intimidating set of roads to drive, with East-West roads literally running above North-South roads by fifty feet for quite long distances – a true basket weave of six and eight-lane streets, but a remarkably open one. Drivers did not exhibit many aggressive tendencies, and the level of cooperation between professional drivers (taxis and buses) was admirable.

Shinjuku Evening

As the sun begins setting on Tokyo, Shinjuku West starts to quiet down (though even as a commercial concrete jungle, its streets and side-streets are more populated with pedestrians than the average North American downtown.

As you're generally only ever a major block from one subway station exit or another, there are 20 or 50 or 100 bikes at a time near every street corner.

Sidewalk restaurants are set up, wrapped in plastic or bamboo, sometime small enough to seat only 2 or 3, sometimes bigger like these ones.

I must admit to some fascination with these street restaurants, especially when they appear in contrasting locations like underpasses or the edge of a luxury hotel property.

East Shinjuku - nightfall

When night falls and West Shinjuku starts to feel a little empty, you're not a long walk from some busy nightlife. As you approach Shinjuku Station from the West you run into some pretty big electronics stores (Yodobashi may be the biggest - and they do a good job on film developing too (click here for photo-op translation cheats ).

Past the station to the East is a flood of neon, multi-leveled restaurant buildings, and designer shops (there are lots of smaller spots between these too). Coming around the South end of the station you cross a wide gallery where music bands set up (complete with PA systems) to gain some renown. You can literally walk for hours on end here - but I don't feel my photos captured my impressions terribly well - neon and night time action, people, activity and hipness are tough to capture well.

As with other pages, some pictures just get left to the end. In this case, it's pictures of a toilet. There are fancier ones, but any toilet that comes with multiple controls and bilingual instructions is sheer intrigue for the average westerner, so here you go.