The Zen of Tokyo Rush Hour

The Zen of Tokyo rush hour is all about your state of mind. When you think of Tokyo rush hour you may have in your mind hoards of sweaty commuters being shoved into already full train cars. This image is unexaggeratedly accurate. However, you may also imagine that is a chaotic, nearly unbearable experience, and that couldn’t be further from the truth.

The morning commute is actually a well-organized, systematic rhythm, where the packed trains that snake around Tokyo take in and give out passengers at every station, like breathing. Akihabara, Ikebukuro, Shinjuku, Shinagawa, Tokyo. Breathe in, Breathe out. The flow of passengers in and out of the trains is like the tide on the beach. The doors open, people rush out, the music plays, and more people rush in.

Often when tourists come to Tokyo they comment on how quiet people are on the morning trains, and how much they seem to ignore each other. Everyone is either reading, listening to music, or sleeping. This is because a certain mindset is necessary to properly experience a Toyko commute, and everybody succumbs to it eventually, even if they’re not aware of it. The key point to this mental exercise is to remember is that the people around you are not people- they are objects, part of the flow. This explains why Japanese, as polite as they are, will never apologize to you if they stand on your foot or shove you in a train. It’s because you don’t really exist. Even people with companions are not talking to them or giving any sign that they are together. It is actually quite a hindrance to commute with someone else, because it ruins the illusion of objectification necessary to survive the experience. If you were crammed on a hot train surrounded by people, and with your face in a person’s armpit, you might very well suffocate, faint, or have a panic attack. But, when you’re mentally absent in a rather small space surrounded by objects, you can be quite cool about it.

The second thing to remember is that, as part of the flow, you must keep things moving in a smooth rhythmic fashion, and not be an impediment to others. This means that when the train pulls up to the platform, you are to stand in two distinct rows on the places that mark where the doors will be. As the train stops, these lines part to either side to let the people off the train. Not everyone who gets off the train is leaving it for good; inside the train it is so crowded that the people standing in the empty space between the doors will nearly all need to exit so that the people behind them can get off. The people who were pushed off the train but are not leaving stand beside the doors as well, and are usually the first to re-enter. When they enter, they go not front- first, but back- first, with any briefcases or purses clasped against their lap. This is so that no one ends up facing each other as they are squashed back into the train, preserving the illusion of non-humanity and also saving strangers from their coffee breath. They stand like this until the next station, when everyone will need to deboard again. Some people try to resist; they stand stock still and grasp the handles futilely- they are like a stick caught on a stone in the water; eventually the current rushes them onwards regardless.

Therefore, people wishing to avoid the ordeal of getting off and on at every station will employ all their strategy and cunning to find the very best places on the train, the wells of tranquility safe from the flow. The best places are of course the seats- however these are always taken by people who look as though they’d boarded the train at 5am when it first began operation, taken a mild sedative, and have been there ever since. They will probably be there indefinitely, but a person who feels lucky may choose to stand in front of one and wait anyway. A savvy commuter knows what sort of person is likely to get off at which station- a knowledge that can mean the difference between standing or sitting for an hour. Every train line is different, but in general, students and housewives are the best bet for people likely to give up their seats fairly quickly.

Those who despair of seating generally attempt to jostle for the prize locations between the doors: either in front of the door that won’t open or the spaces just beside the doors next to the seats. These places are desirable in that they ensure that you won’t have a human being next to you on at least one side. Pressed up against a window or a wall, you can easily pretend you are not where you are, and that of course makes all the difference.

However, the veteran commuter, the one who has been riding the same train for a number of years from the same house to the same job, is no longer interested in avoiding the rhythm and flow of the trains. He removes himself completely from his surroundings, even without the aid of windows, music, or manga. This commuter has a highly developed meditative mindset; he is a leaf floating on a stream, he moves at the slightest push and lets himself float in and out of the trains as it becomes necessary.

And he knows there is something nearly spiritual about the trains when they are properly stuffed, when you find yourself in the very center of a packed car, the air conditioning on your face, and a mass of humanity all around, unable to move or even to lift your arm up to the handles. But you don’t need them anyway; you couldn’t fall even if you tried. Try dropping your purse; I’m betting that when you let go of the strap it stays in the exact same place. There is something about that, about being completely supported and moving en masse at every sway or jerk of the train. Although no words are exchanged, and every single person is doing their best to pretend that everyone else doesn’t exist, there is an undeniable sort of closeness. Remember that this is a culture where people don’t hug, kiss or shake hands as greetings; they could go an entire day at without touching anyone at all. And yet now, perversely, their entire bodies are pressed up against a stranger’s so closely that when he coughs, they can feel it in their own chest. I read once that people have a mental dependence on touch; this could be where the Tokyoites get their fix.

The Tokyo train ride is symptomatic of that feeling of collective isolation that only a big city can produce. Everyone is alone, but they’re alone together. It’s a ramen house at 3am, or ladies day at a Ginza movie house, crammed full of single office ladies. It’s a “snack bar” in Shinjuku where rich businessmen can flirt with young girls over $30 drinks. It’s a spa, it’s a shopping mall, it’s a dance club. It’s Tokyo; it’s a city, it’s humanity in a sometimes un-human place. A ride on the Yamanote line at rush hour should be on everyone’s Tokyo agenda; just remember to keep the flow smoothly and don’t forget to breathe… In Ueno, out Kanda…. In Yurakucho, out Shinbashi. Ahh…