A week later, another visit to Kokura. This is the second of five posts of photos I took in April and May 2005 in Kokura. They’re a moderately random sampling of what people are wearing these days in this part of Japan. If you haven’t seen the previous posts already, I suggest you read the Introduction and Part 1.

Day 2: Sunday April 24, 2005

Here’s a young couple walking in front of the Riverwalk complex. A standard moderately long (for this locale) jean skirt, and average heels.

Here’s shop worker at the Arnold Palmer clothing shop in Riverwalk. Yes, she’s being paid to straighten out those golf shirts. In the background is Kiddyland—a toy store—where I took the first two photos from yesterday’s post. I don’t know what to say about the dress, but I wouldn’t want to wear boots like that for an eight-hour shift of retail. Heck, I don’t think I’d want to wear those boots for thirty seconds, even if I was a drag queen!

A crowd waiting for the light to change. This view looks between the two Izutsuya buildings into one of the shopping arcades, and was taken from the bridge that crosses the Murasaki River between Izutsuya and Riverwalk.

This is a bit of an extreme case. Most women choose outfits that are at least a little bit chromatically matched.

And lest you think that everyone here dresses like that, here’s an unremarkable young couple emerging from Riverwalk. In the background is the giant sandcrawler.

This is the same crosswalk where we saw the big-haired touts and the parasol lady in the kimono in yesterday’s post. There’s a wide assortment of styles, including a high school student in uniform on the left, and a food service worker on the right. In the middle, behind the girl in the fuchsia shirt is a woman in a white spring jacket and a red-brown leather cowboy hat. But more importantly, the million-dollar question everyone wants to know the answer to: Where’s Waldo?

Some more people waiting at the same intersection. Again, these people are just an example of average clothing choices in Kokura. I figured some balance was necessary.

At the time I took this photo, I was on the raised walkway in front of Kokura Station, looking past the monorail tracks towards the Isetan department store.

These people are walking in front of the McDonalds next to Kokura Station. I took this photo from an overhead walkway. You can see the edge of the bottom curve of an escalator on the left side of the image, next to the yellow bump strip for blind people. Usually there are people handing out flyers and packages of tissue paper there but they’ve probably met their quotas and gone home. I’ll have another shot of this location in the post coming up in two days.

Another blurry view from the arcade. Some layering on the left. And a girl in high heels, socks with decorative elastic, a knee-length denim skirt, and a bunnyhug (that’s a hoody, for those of you not from Saskatchewan). Accompanied by her boyfriend who is dressed in all-white clothes that are about three sizes too big.

Tomorrow we’ll look at these photos, taken on Friday April 29th: