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Home Archives Archives before June 13, 2001 RSS Feed Adaptive Path (my company!) About peterme Coordinates Most of the Time Oakland, CA Interests Current American history around the time of the Revolution, figuring out how to marry top-down task-based information architecture processes with bottom-up document-based ones, finding a good dentist in San Francisco Oakland Perennial Designing the user experience (interaction design, information architecture, user research, etc.), cognitive science, ice cream, films and film theory, girls, commuter bicycling, coffee, travel, theoretical physics for laypeople, single malt scotch, fresh salmon nigiri, hanging out, comics formalism, applied complexity theory, Krispy Kreme donuts. surf Click to see where I wander. Wish list Show me you love me by buying me things. Spyonme Track updates of this page with Spyonit. Clickee here. Essays [Editor's note: peterme.com began as a site of self-published essays, a la Stating The Obvious. This evolved (or devolved) towards link lists and shorter thoughtpieces. These essays are getting a tad old, but have some good ideas.] Reader Favorites Interface Design Recommended Reading List Whose "My" Is It Anyway? Frames: Information Vs. Application Subjects Interface Design Web Development Movie Reviews Travel		Morning Walk to Tsukiji. Posted on 09/03/2002. Guidebooks all around implore the Tokyo tourist to visit Tsukiji, specifically the fish market, around 6 am any morning. So, today, I did. Exiting at the Ginza Station, I headed south on Harumi-dori. Snapped this oddly tranquil pic. Continuing on, I turned a corner, and came across the first market stalls at Tsukiji. And then into the belly of the beast. The fish market is a massive place, stalls everywhere, little aisles for walking, and various forms of vehicles: bicycles, cars, trucks, and these weird cargo trucks you see here: Excuse the lack of focus... And, well, all manner of fish can be purchased in the stalls... Looking down an aisle between stalls Maybe you'd like some tako? ...or some unagi? Mmmm... massive fish carcasses I love the colors in the market And now, as a special treat, a video to give some sense of the craziness of the motion. There seems to be little rhyme nor reason to how people move in the place, be it on foot, bike, or in a car. And I'm surprised that there seem to be no accidents, at least, no major ones. Somehow, people push right through, creating an amazing emerging flow. BONUS: At the end of the video, there's a near-accident, which, I think, is what prompts my last 5 seconds of shooting of the ground. And yes, I was foolish enough to wear sandals in the watery market. Tsukiji Video(4808k file) It claims to be an "AVI", but I could only get it to work in QuickTime. Blame my Canon digital camera. Tsukiji was the first thing I saw in Tokyo that I really enjoyed. I do like open markets, and I like that this all occurs at a very human level. I find the typical Tokyo neighborhood of stores and restaurants piled story-upon-story to be rather offputting. 6 comments so far. Add a comment. Previous entry: "User Testing in Japan." Next entry: "Today was a good food day." Comments: COMMENT #1 Peter- great photos of Tsukiji! I've been to Japan many times but never to the fish market in the morning. I hope to go sometime myself. Posted by Gen Kanai @ 09/04/2002 12:27 PM PST [link to this comment] COMMENT #2 Great photos, especially enjoy the video - an exercise in fixed-point filming until you are nearly run over and then you hastily walk away, filming your flip-flops. Now that digital cameras have video capacity, I'm looking forward to more of this kind of personal short clips from around the world. Nice example. Like you say, Tsukiji is a great chance to see a bustling market in contrast to some of the modernity of nerdy Tokyo. Here's some other photos, though no video clip - video might be a better way to convey the wild traffic in the place, though I was more obsessed with the immense array of species when I first visited. Posted by Justin Hall @ 09/05/2002 09:31 AM PST [link to this comment] COMMENT #3 Mexico cries out for your camera! Posted by BJMe @ 09/05/2002 10:35 AM PST [link to this comment] COMMENT #4 Sweat was my favorite transliteration beverage when I was in Japan. Haven't been back in quite a while so it was nice to see it's survived. Posted by Jeff @ 09/05/2002 10:35 AM PST [link to this comment] COMMENT #5 My fave part - perhaps fave is the wrong word - was the live flaying of eels - they were nailed to a board, right through the head, and their little mouths would work back and forth in objection, meanwhile, the skinning began, increasing the intensity of their silent mouth contortions. And then it was done, toss 'em into a bucket and grab the next guy. I was transfixed. It was fairly graphic, in a warehouse filled with dead and to-be-killed sea creatures. I took a few rolls of black and white film that I'll have to do something with because they made for quite a vivid document. Posted by Steve Portigal @ 09/27/2002 09:57 AM PST [link to this comment] COMMENT #6 My fave part - perhaps fave is the wrong word - was the live flaying of eels - they were nailed to a board, right through the head, and their little mouths would work back and forth in objection, meanwhile, the skinning began, increasing the intensity of their silent mouth contortions. And then it was done, toss 'em into a bucket and grab the next guy. I was transfixed. It was fairly graphic, in a warehouse filled with dead and to-be-killed sea creatures. I took a few rolls of black and white film that I'll have to do something with because they made for quite a vivid document. Posted by Steve Portigal @ 09/27/2002 10:05 AM PST [link to this comment] Add A New Comment: Name E-Mail (optional) Homepage (optional) Comments Now with a bigger box for text entry! Whee! All contents of peterme.com are © 1998 - 2002 Peter Merholz.