Food Tours · Tour

From the Kabuki Theatre's Shrine to the Wave-Warding One

Three hours that treat Tsukiji as a place with beliefs attached rather than a row of stalls, with six guests at most. You meet at the top of the escalator at Higashi-Ginza, in front of the Kabukiza, by the small torii gate. The theatre has been rebuilt four times since 1889 and the current one puts a Momoyama-style facade under an office tower behind it. The little Kabuki Inari shrine is tucked into the corner of the building, and the actors still visit it. Your guide starts with kabuki itself, the drama and dance form that has run continuously for four centuries. Then the walk to Tsukiji and through the narrow alleys of the outer market: seafood, vegetables, dried goods, snacks. You eat fresh sushi, local snacks and wagashi, the traditional sweets made in seasonal shapes and colours to be looked at as much as eaten. The explanation running underneath is the point of the tour: how the market connects to Buddhist practice and to Shinto, why a fish market has shrines in it at all, and where the aesthetic that governs Japanese cooking comes from. It ends at Namiyoke Inari Shrine, whose name means warding off waves, built when this land was reclaimed from the bay and kept being washed away. Ten minutes from there to the nearest station. English-speaking guide, wheelchair accessible, child-friendly with under-sixes free. Vegetarian and vegan options exist but the selection is limited. Wear closed shoes: the market floors are wet.