Breakfast at Tsukiji

There can be good things about jetlag, I have recently discovered. Traveling against time is always more difficult in my opinion and while in Japan I found myself waking up at 4 in the morning no matter when I had gone to sleep, since my inner clock had a hard time adjusting to Tokyo time. I would had have to anyways when going to Tsukiji, though. Tsukiji is a huge wholesale market area which is especially known for its fish market which is the largest in the world. Daily they handle more than 2,000 tons of goodies from the sea but everybody told us that the fun would already be over at around 7am, so we had to leave early. Actually we were there at 5am already and the hectic atmosphere was definitely telling us that all these people had been up for longer than just a while. Everywhere there were men in wellies and blue shirts.. in trucks, on scooters, with trolleys.. busy making the logistics happen. I tell you, never in my life have I seen this many polystyrene boxes before! Once we reached the inner market it was like going to seafood heaven, a complete sensory overload. Stalls offering everything from prawns with turquoise roe, the most beautiful clams, multiple kinds of baby sardines (they looked the same to me, though).. and then there were all those I didn't mention (since I don't know their species, I'm not that much of a seafood expert, my apologies!).. Have a look for yourself though.. Doesn't it look utterly amazing?








..However, the main attraction turned out to be the tuna auction. There were hundreds on them in either frozen or fresh condition, lying on the floor and while a man was auctioning them off, they were drawn on with red marker. Do notice how they cut them open by their tail, I guess it's on of the best place to check their quality? In any case, this was highly fascinating to me.







..and afterwards we enjoyed some of those 200kg-each-tunas in a slightly smaller portion for breakfast!