Naoya Okamoto and comrades hunger strike in Tokyo

Protesting is no longer an unusual sight in Tokyo, which might be why the small sit-in outside exit 12 of Kasumigaseki Station attracts scant enquiry. It’s a common enough scene: a small gaggle of local university students, an array of brightly coloured, homemade placards, a guitar and… pouches of salt. It’s the constant dabbing at salt that seems to draw attention, in fact. One protestor is dipping into it so frequently, he looks like a kid on a sherbet trip. What to make of this, I wonder? How to reconcile this image with the fact that what I’m witnessing is a hunger strike?

Japan's 'apathetic' youth take to the streets. Picture by James Hadfield

As Hajime Matsumoto, organizer of today’s demo, admitted last week, there was simply no way of knowing how the protest was likely to turn out. Japan’s youth had long been considered too apathetic – too politically disinclined – to get worked up about anything, let alone take to the streets. Not that they lacked any precedent, of course. Students across the country united in vast numbers to march during the late ’60s and early ’70s, and there are anti-nuclear demonstrations in the capital every month, though the numbers are in the tens rather than the hundreds. While the figures for today have yet to be officially announced (the organizers are currently claiming 15,000; more conservative guestimates are around 5,000), one thing is certain: this was the biggest march Tokyo has seen in decades.