Loveletter To Japan is a collection of night photos from my final evenings in Tokyo.

Photograph of a dim set of modern buildings near a city train.Zoom-in to a dimly lit stairway at night.Chaotic frame of power poles, wires, and snippets of concrete building facades.

At first, things were difficult. A language I didn't speak, a half-assed effort to fit into a vastly different society, and no friends.

I realized how varied peoples' values were. It's easy to surround ourselves with the same people in our own bubble. In my case, these were artists, designers, coders.

But in Japan, I met all sorts of other people. Ones that didn't care much for my hobbies or art.
I was used to sharing a portfolio and website as a conversation starter. Now, I was left wondering how to find common ground.

But what began as a social challenge became a great blessing.

Dimly lit set of angularly staggered balconies with a pale green light coming from one of the glass doors.Flat framing of a dimly lit staircase with a net grid in front of it.Single slit of light between two modern buildings.Outdoor stairway with windows on the other side of the building glowing red.

The monotony of productivity is all I cared for. But in Japan, the way of life was simpler. Time didn't quite move the same way.

In my world, all we spoke about were projects, work, and careers.

But in Japan, among the friends I made, I faced a world where prestige mattered as little as it should.
They helped me let go of the burdens and anxieties that plague the world where my worth was determined by anonymous followers and social validation.

Making stuff is still a huge part of my day, but now it shares my time with other forms of fulfillment.
The struggle is never-ending, but each day spent focusing on what one enjoys doing is a step closer to stripping your happiness away from the hands of others and claiming it for yourself.

Outdoor stairway protected by an array of horizontal bars next to which a billboard with blue lighting shines.Red Japanese lanterns hanging in an alley.Dark canal with tall buildings at its edges lit in green.Multilevel complex of distant modern buildings lit from the street below.Blue net covering a set of metal support beams.Dimly lit side of a modern building rooftop with air conditioning units and pipes on its facade.Dark towering modern cluster of buildings dimly illuminated by their windwos.Distant cluster of buildings dimly lit by the street below and their outdoor staircases.Zoom-in to a facade with wooden boards over windows and an array of air conditioning units.

Some memories feel timeless.

The awkward handshakes and shy smiles of new acquaintences.

The late-night konbini runs, evenings out in the park, and nighttime conversations.

The passionate professors who spoke with conviction about syntax, architecture, and games.

The rehearsals and live shows in tiny venues and warm crowds.

The trips through cities and mountains by car, and the exhausting hundreds of kilometers traversed on bicycles.

They remind me of what my time in Japan taught me: to pursue not only creation, but also experience.

Construction scaffolding wrapped in a green net at night.Night time view of a cluster of buildings dimly illuminated from below.Zoom-in to a dark gray building with dark green ceramic tiles and small red lights along its outdoor staircase.Dark foggy modern building with a single illuminated window in red and the dark cloudy sky behind it.Dimly lit modern building facade with many wires and some trees covering the view in the foreground.Side of a train station at night lit in a dark green blue.

To those who made that journey possible, to those who shared it with me, and to those who taught me so much: Thank you.