When I struggle free from the sheets of my seriously comfortable bed at the absurd time of four o’clock in the morning, I think: “What I do in Tokyo on this trip, I’ll probably never repeat.” So I don’t mind awakening at an ungodly hour just to ensure I make it to the world famous Tsukiji Fish Market in time to see the antics of the global tuna auction. A sacred outing for foodies visiting Tokyo, the market is de rigueur tourist fare, something everybody ought to do once. But that’s the point — once, unless you really love the smell of a concrete ocean of fish, an aroma that will linger in your nostrils for days to come.
There’s something macabre about stumbling sleepy-eyed through aisles of fish mongers before dawn. The market teems with action, and I have to swim against the tide, fighting schools of merchants, restaurant owners, fish wholesalers, chefs, housewives and employees just to get to the tuna auction. Beyond rows and rows of fish vendors, offering every imaginable species, I find the metaphorical ballroom of tuna: blue fin, big eye and yellow fin Here, the caught fish, with bodies almost as big as whales, lie in repose, arranged like so many anchovies in a can.
All around, intense gentlemen, some in chef’s hats, poke them with sticks and haggle over prices. An auctioneer presides and draws some order to the room, before his gavel strikes and fish start selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars each. Though fascinated, I spend most of my time being shoved by fellow onlookers and attempting to keep my balance as I skate helplessly across the floor on a river of discarded fish heads and other scaly parts, guts, and blood. (Gee, I knew I shouldn’t have worn flip flops!)
A wiser person would forego the designer jeans and flip flops for a yellow rain slicker and knee high Wellington boots. Such attire would help, too, as insurance against being mowed down by the mad drivers of mini lorries that race through the narrow lanes of the market. I almost lose my life numerous times while daydreaming in front of baskets of undulating squid or discerning just how many heads certain prehistoric looking fish boast. Once while fleeing for my life, I fall into a vendor’s tower of tiny, wriggling fish and incur her wrath.
photos by JoAnn Greco
I take refuge at one fish stall where the owner and his wife adopt me. As regal as a samurai, the husband brandishes a clam shell and thrusts it into the immense body of a prize yellow fin tuna that takes up the better part of his stall. He digs into its rosy flesh and scoops out a gelatinous chunk of raw meat. His wife drizzles it with wasabi, then hands it to me. Urged on by their enthusiastic gesturing, I have no choice but to suck from the clamshell. My reward is the sweetest sashimi, punctuated by the most explosive condiment notes I have ever tasted.
Next: the sushi for breakfast adventure. No way will I ever again sit on a stool and stare across a counter as sushi magicians artfully make me my breakfast. Never again will I plunge into my personal platter of twenty beautifully rolled sushi at six in the morning. Never again will I plop utterly unrecognizable sushi, some that looks like eyeballs, into my mouth with glee, trusting them to go down easy with the beer I sip like the Japanese friends that surround me. Beer? At 6AM? Never again!
So, what I do in Tokyo stays in Tokyo. That’s fine — because it will all be there when I return.
One good book: Tsukiji: The Fish Market at the Center of the World
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