Arm Span Tokyo

My tiny desk holds only a keyboard, mouse, and computer screen. Well, it does hold a bit more than that. I have some papers tucked next to the base of the screen, behind my mouse pad. There's a small calendar card taped up behind the screen, where I usually put my calculator. I don't have a phone on my desk but there isn't really room for one anyway. As it is, the few things I need on my desk seem to fit neatly in place.

My co-worker's desk is attached to mine, at my right side. His keyboard is within my reach. Sometimes I lean over and help him on his computer. My other co-worker, who I don't talk with much, is also within reach, to my left side. If I sit up straight in my chair and look over the top edge of my computer screen, I can see a third co-worker facing me from the other side of a low divider. Of course he's close enough to talk with too, but we don't dare talk over the divider - it might disturb the others.

My desk is part of a double-sided row, with people sitting at most of the 5 slots down each side. Three of these double-sided rows fill my office, extending from the cabinets blocking the windows to the inner wall. My supervisor sits just past the cabinets, and there's usually someone else sitting with him at his desk, both of them talking in hushed tones.

Just past the end of my row, on the inner wall, is the door into our office. When I leave work in the evening, I go through that door and take the stairs down to the building's side entrance. There are 4 floors in the building, 3 of which have two offices like mine in tandem, one in the front and one in the back. In the evening hours, perhaps a hundred people in the building use this staircase.

Outside that entrance is a narrow alley that serves two other buildings. People exiting our building into the alley are joined by others from two adjacent buildings, all walking down the alley in the same direction to the street.

At the end of the alley, the trickle of people merges with more people already walking along the street. The two streams merge and then more people join from the bank building, which is bigger, at the corner. The building stream of office workers head in the direction of the station, a few blocks away. If it's raining, many of us don't try opening our umbrellas - Too many umbrellas and they would all tangle with each other. What umbrellas do open form a moving canopy over the crowd.

Down further, at the intersection of the main avenue, another street merges, bringing another stream of people. After that intersection, accross the main avenue, is the first entrance to the train station. This is where the flow of crowds begin to intersect with each other. Each time the lights change, rivers of people cross the avenue in opposing surges. Rivers of black flow into other rivers of black. Black hair and black suits, rolling into a giant sea on the plaza outside the main station entrance.

This is where outsiders who visit here begin to feel sick. Nowhere to stand still, nowhere to rest - barely even any space for railings or signposts. Just lines and arrows painted on the ground, to show the crowds along our way. The black sea flows into the station, streaming through rows of fare gates set like rudders to guide the rolling currents.

Rivers of black spill onto the platforms to fill the trains. Behind each single car door there are packed as many as 30 people. Each car has 10 such doors down both sides, and each train has at least 12 such cars. Four separate train lines run through the station, each in both directions. Trains continuously interleave each other, carrying people away as fast as the black rivers replenish them. The rivers of sea current surge through the system like black blood.

With each succeeding train packed to capacity, a warning tone plays and 96 doors lock shut all at once. The loaded train accelerates, and another 3000 people quickly vanish down a black hole only 2 human arm spans in width.