Twenty or so years ago, I did a casual job painting murals for a new Harajuku restaurant. My friend and I were responsible for ‘aging’ (aka ‘distressing’) it; giving clean new walls and murals etc. an antique patina. We had to spray-distress the high theater-like ceiling, so of course our hair, overalls and entire bodies were also duly distressed.

When we left late at night after doing our best to distress the new place, there was a girl outside about the same age as us, walking along all dressed up and eating something colorful. But we had to walk back to our hotel, as no taxi would stop for such a filthy pair.

Two days into the job, we had the day off when flooring work halted ours. Coming from Kansai, we had no idea what to do in the vastness of Tokyo. As Tokyo had so many high-rises, I’d brought binoculars with the idea of going up a skyscraper and seeing what people were doing in other buildings. So we headed for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building (Tocho). On the observation deck, we used the binoculars to track people working in nearby buildings and toylike cars in motion. The people working inside and the countless square buildings were also toylike. I remember us with our binoculars as a bit like toys ourselves, probably because the city was so gigantic. That evening there was a torchlight performance of Takigi-Noh in the plaza in front of Tocho. The binoculars came in handy for that, too.

I don’t think the building we did our best to distress lasted more than ten years after opening. I must still often pass it but can’t remember where it was.

In those days, I used to advise people visiting Tokyo to take binoculars. I told them what fun it was to look at office workers and cars from a high rise opposite — and sometimes they told me that was a bit pervy.