Introduction

It was my first night in Tokyo. Excited to experience the labyrinthine city, I decided to go to the neon and disorienting streets of Shibuya. A brief walk takes me through growing crowds of business men getting off work, a salty aromatic smoke seeping through kitchen windows ,and eventually the train station.

I go through the ticket gate, downstairs to the platform and board the train. As the train weaves through the bridges, tunnels, and buildings of Tokyo, I get flung around only saved by a tight grip on the overhead handles. The train stops and a tune plays “Shibuya, Shibuya” the speakers announced. I exit the station to be met with a cacophony of tourists, street performers, drunks, and a neon blight that consumes the city. I test my luck at a British style bar, maybe there I'll meet an English speaker as alone and confused as I am. I couldn’t have met anyone better than Milos, a Serbian, polyglot working under the table as a tour guide in Japan. “It’s your first night?” He asks “We’ll finish our drinks and I'll show you everything you need to know”. That very first night Milos took me and a motley crew of travelers on a proper tour of Japanese nightlife that defined the entire trip for me.