Tsukiji Fish Market Moving A Way of Life

Above, some of the many vendor stalls at Tsukiji Fish Market.  Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Nearly three years ago, I visited the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo. Little did I know at the time that the historic marketplace (78 years old) will be moving to a smaller location, but a better one to accommodate truck traffic.

The New York Times has an article on the Tsukiji Fish Market, "A Way of Life Moves With A Market."

It begins with:

TOKYO — Each day before dawn, the world’s largest fish market comes to life in frantic activity, a last holdout of an older, quainter Japan. 

Workers in rubber boots slosh through inch-deep water, while others dart by on motorized carts carrying plastic-foam boxes with every manner of creature that can be hauled from the sea, from dagger-shaped silver sardines and spider-like crabs to the deflated protoplasmic blobs of mysterious deep-sea predators. In one corner, auctioneers loudly hawk the huge frozen torsos of prize tuna laid in rows on the floor. Nearby, fishmongers in open-air stalls carve the tuna flesh into ruby-red bricks for sale to sushi bars and grocers.  

Soon it will be gone. The city is planning to spend $4.5 billion to relocate the market — nicknamed Tsukiji for the neighborhood that surrounds it — to a modern, climate-controlled distribution center on a manufactured island in three years.

If you fancy a visit to the historic Tsukiji Fish Market and the neighboring restaurants and shops, you'd better do so while you still can.

To read the full article, go here.