Haikyo – Starting Small

A couple of people have recently asked me how I first got into haikyo, and the truth is I’m not sure.

While it’s true that I’ve always had the urge to explore any abandoned buildings I happened to stumble over it’s only quite recently I’ve begun to consider it a real interest and a hobby to be actively pursued.

These were the first haikyo pictures I took back in September 2009, a group of four small apartment blocks about 10 minutes bike ride from my flat. Again it was an accidental find and I didn’t make any attempt to get inside, but I did retrieve a photo album from an outside shed with a half-broken door.

I don’t know if I would do that now as I’ve since learnt that the urbex credo is to ‘Take nothing but pictures’, however technically it was only pictures I was taking… just not my own.

The pictures (which you can see here) were mostly of the women on the beach at the top right of this page and were mainly taken in the late 70s and early 80s. With a few exceptions, like her black and white wedding picture and an even older class picture.

I think it was that find that got me really hooked, it personalised an otherwise impersonal place and brought home that these had been homes.

Next time I went back I went with more intent and managed to find away into one of the blocks. Inside it was bare and empty. Too recent to have started to fall apart, it was just dusty tatami rooms. Seasoned urbexers would probably have never bothered with a place like this, but it was quiet and the light was mellow and calm and I was happy to be there.

And that’s the story of how I became a haikyoist, an urbexer, the first time I deliberately went to an empty building with the intention of getting inside and exploring instead of just doing it because I’d happened to find a place by accident.

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