"May I take your picture?"

Heaven on earth has a name, and that name is Yoyogi-Koen in Harajuku--but is this place really an actual location on earth? Does it exist outside of my mind? I think so.

Every Sunday morning, the entrance to Yoyogi Park, a wide, paved bridge spanning the rail tracks, becomes a circus of sorts; filled nearly entirely with costumed youth, the entire causeway explodes with such a plethora of colors, sounds and energy that it is impossible to remain uninfected by the ambiance resonating from all around.

“Yes, go ahead.”

A red jumpsuit envelopes it’s owner, a young college girl, who made it herself—she insists she is normal, and that she only comes out some Sundays to enjoy the atmosphere. She also painted her face green, all by herself.

She bounced around, from one end of the bridge to the other, conversing quickly, tersely, happily with her friends, also clad in dreamlike attire representing anything from their favorite band’s bass player to an obscure manga character. She and her friends exist for our pleasure, it seems.

“Do you want me to look at you?”

A dream come true. So much beauty, so much oddity, “a daze” hardly begins to capture the feeling that had overcome me. I was in rapture. My hands shook and I tried to control myself enough to catalog at least some of the moment to my memory, but also to my camera.

A girl dressed as a lolita-goth wandered around the bridge aimlessly, bowlegged; completely comfortable with her ultra revealing “French-maid”-esque dress. She would return to classes on Tuesday, she said.

“I’ll move into better light.”

Another girl sat complacently, waiting for someone to approach her—a single neon-orange eye was only visible after I was within a few feet of her, and was also the only feature left after she went to the bathroom and changed that indicated her wardrobe a few moments prior. It defined her as part of the Harajuku crowd.

I was there for nearly four hours, conversing, breathing, living—and I’ll be going back every Sunday.