Tsukiji Fish Markets
It's a good thing I like fish because Japan is one of the biggest fish-eating countries in the world. Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo is where all the seafood comes after it's been fished from seas from all around the world. The market opens early, and you can get there around 5am to see the fresh tuna being auctioned off to wholesalers. But my friend, Tamra and I thought that a 7am start on Saturday morning was early enough. After almost being run over countless times by motor-carts scooting through and all around the market, Tam and I made our way into the huge warehouse building. Tuna, eel, fugu (the famous deadly puffer-fish), prawns, squid, salmon, abolone, crab - you name it, it was there - dead or alive. We even saw some baby crays which had come all the way from our home country, Australia. It was amazing to see some stall owners hack through the frozen tuna with huge swords or to see an eel being gutted when it was still wriggling in the stall owner's hands.
After an hour of gawking into stalls and taking pictures of anything that looked remotely strange, Tam and I made our way to a nearby sushi store for some well-earnt sashimi and miso soup. It was only 8am, but we had been up since 5am that morning, so it felt like lunch-time to us.
Our next stop was Kappabashi-dori at Tawaramachi on the Ginza line. This is where you can get anything you need if you're setting up a restaurant. Pots, pans, crockery, restaurant diplay boxes, uniforms and most importantly, plastic sushi. Japan is famous for making plastic food displays that look so real, sometimes you can't even tell that they're fake. To ensure that it looks as close to the real thing as possible, some restauranteurs cook up the dish and then quickly run it to Kappabashi to get an exact replica made of it.
I had planned to get a plastic bowl of ramen noodles (one of my favourite J-foods) complete with suspended chopsticks, but my hopes where dashed when I noticed the 6,000 Yen price attached to it - that's around A$90! Oh well, I guess I just had to be content with my 1,000 Yen futomaki roll fridge magnet and 900 Yen sea bream sushi.
