TOKYO, Japan – The grey dawn of a cloudy Tokyo day is still more than an hour away, but in the roads and aisles of the Tsukiji fish market, the activity is frantic.
Frantic appears to be the norm at the world’s largest fish market.
Styrofoam boxes brimming with a dizzying array of fish in all shapes and sizes are stacked two metres high on narrow carts, which fly, jostle, squeeze, cajole, honk and generally infest like locusts the congested passages.
The market on the edge of Tokyo Bay serves 20 million seafood consumers of this Asian metropolis. Served by ships when it was established in 1935, trucks now meet the fishing fleet to deliver the day’s catch to market.
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The public does not shop at Tsukiji market. It serves retailers, restaurants and caterers.
But it seems all of Tokyo is here at 5 a.m. when about 30 Canadians on a trade mission to Japan and Indonesia step off their bus. They don white rubber boots and break into groups of 10. Each is assigned two guides, one to lead, the other to ensure no one gets lost during the two-hour adventure.
At a brisk pace across the damp concrete, our troop leader dives into the first maze of passages, the ones occupied by those serving fish market workers. In cramped stalls, knives, cleavers, hooks, hatchets and other cutting devices show their razor edges gleaming under floodlights.
Standing in frames like baseball bats in a sports store are the indispensable tools of some of those employed here – metal hooks attached to wooden handles about half a metre long. Each buyer uses one of these hooks to prod and poke the bigger fish, such as tuna, laid out by the hundreds.
Producers have consigned the fish to wholesalers who brought them in during the night. Around 4 a.m., buyers equipped with flashlights and notepads begin inspecting the fish, feeling the flesh for oil content and judging the weight to determine their offer.
At 5 a.m. the bidding begins. Auctioneers step up on boxes and ring bells to gather the buyers in a tight circle.
Then, just like a cattle auction in Canada, the process begins. Each auctioneer’s personality is revealed in the rhythm of his patter and the flourish of his actions.
In other sheds accommodating everything from giant tuna to tiny krill across the 55.5 acre site, the scene repeats itself. There are live fish, frozen fish, dried fish. There are fish with spines, with shells and with no bones at all.
Everywhere, the air is filled with the squeak of styrofoam as laborers shift boxes of fish through the market. But blessedly absent for a Canadian’s weak morning stomach is smell.
Many of the fish purchased in the auctions move to so-called jobber shops closer to the street, where they are sliced, diced, filleted, shelled, boxed or bagged.
Taste the wares
Some are presented as a meal to entice the restaurateurs, caterers and retailers who shop at this level of the market.
It is now almost 7 a.m. and the parking lot lightens under a steel grey sky. A Mount Fuji of used white foam boxes piles up at a recycling shed.
The armada of trucks and vans are loaded and soon speed out to the streets and their delivery rounds, just as the Canadians are about to board the bus back to the hotel.
Tsukiji is one of 11 municipally owned wholesale markets selling fish, meat, vegetables and flowers, feeding one of the world’s largest cities. In a year, Tsukiji alone will handle 582,000 tonnes of fish, valued at about $8 billion.
All the markets together handle 670,000 tonnes of fish, 1.65 million tonnes of vegetables, 673,000 tonnes of fruit, 82,000 tonnes of meat and more than 800 million cut and potted flowers.