Running is not some­thing peo­ple usu­ally asso­ciate with night-life or sub-cultures, but the mem­bers of the group Midnight Runners Tokyo (MRT) do. They have been hit­ting the streets of Tokyo at the dead of night on week­ends; a time when the idea of run­ning would be unthink­able to many peo­ple. They see night run­ning as cul­ture in the mak­ing, rather than a sport.
MRT is intended to be a trend for mod­ern Japan that will lead to a run­ning coun­ter­cul­ture. Its attrac­tive­ness does not come from its style or looks, but sim­ply from the state of being free, so it will spread a kind of hippie-mentality for the 21st cen­tury. The point is to express the idea of “being free” through run­ning.
Read more about the MRT run­ning crew and night run­ning as an emerg­ing sub-culture on Global Voices.