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Tokyo’s Kabukicho turns into a deserted ghost town during coronavirus outbreak【Photos】

Oona McGee Mar 12, 2020
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Looks like a yakuza fight is about to go down in Kamurocho.

Tokyo is a huge bustling metropolis that really comes to life at night, when the neon signs light up and revellers spill out from pubs and establishments with rosy red cheeks and wide grins on their faces.

While the capital tends to quieten in a lot of areas after the last train out of the city departs for the night, there’s one place where the party continues well into the wee hours of the morning and that’s at Shinjuku’s Kabukicho. Home to a large number of bars and restaurants that remain open until the sun rises, the bustling red-light district is one of the most crowded places in Tokyo, but now photos online are showing that the area is turning into a ghost town because of the coronavirus.

Twitter user @GOLDMAN4160 recently shared a couple of photos of the area after dark, with the message:

“This level of people at Kabukicho Ichibangai is likely due to the coronavirus. It’s currently 2:30 a.m., but this may be the first time it’s seen so few people even though it’s Kabukicho, a city that never sleeps.”

歌舞伎町一番街コロナの影響なのか人いないってレベルじゃないですね。現在時刻2時30分ですが、眠らない街歌舞伎町と言われていたのにこんな人いないの初めてかもしれません。 pic.twitter.com/5IjrwUFeq7

— ゼルダ (@GOLDMAN4160) March 8, 2020

People were surprised to see the area looking so deserted, leaving comments like:

“It’s eerie to see it looking like this.”
“Is this the end of Tokyo?”
“It’s like a zombie is about to appear any minute.”
“This is something I never thought I’d see in Kabukicho.”
“I like seeing it without the annoying hawkers. Wish they could go away forever.”

A number of people also commented on the fact that Kabukicho now looked even more like its fictional representation as Kamurocho in the Yakuza video game series.

https://twitter.com/misawa_1214/status/1236899846176387072

With the government asking schools to close and advising people to avoid crowded areas right now, it looks like the general public is actually taking the advice to heart and choosing to stay indoors.

While it’s a worrying time for businesses who are doing it tough due to the drop in customers, at least they won’t have to serve people who are infected with the virus, like staff at this bar in Aichi had to do recently when a man who tested positive for COVID-19 walked through their doors.

Source: Twitter/@GOLDMAN4160 via Hachima Kiko
Featured image: Flickr/Dick Thomas Johnson
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