Tokyo / Ueno & Yanaka / Market

Ameyoko market street

アメ横 あめよこ

A postwar black market that became a four-hundred-shop bazaar under the railway — fish, spices, sneakers and shouting.

Worth itLocal life · Food · Shopping · Photogenic

"Candy alley" — or "American alley", depending on who tells the story — grew from the black market under the Ueno–Okachimachi tracks in 1946 and never entirely left the mood. Fishmongers shout prices, spice shops sell by the scoop, there are shops for sneakers, watches, army surplus, dried fruit, and a basement food market where Tokyo's Asian communities shop. It is loud, cheap and honest, the only place in central Tokyo that feels like a market in another country, and it is at its best in the last days of December when the whole city buys its New Year's fish here.

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A hand-drawn sketch for orientation — each place links to an exact map.
Tip
A good lunch is a standing sushi or a kebab here rather than a sit-down restaurant.
Best time
Late morning; the week before New Year for the spectacle.
Allow
45 min
Station
Ueno (JR, Shinobazu exit) or Okachimachi (JR)
Official site — hours, prices, closures
www.ameyoko.net · Map

In this area: Ueno & Yanaka

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Tokyo National Museum東京国立博物館

The national collection — swords, Buddhas, screens, kimono, tea bowls — in six buildings on the edge of the park.

150 min · Ueno (JR, park exit), 10 minutes across the park; Uguisudani (JR), 10 minutes
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National Museum of Western Art国立西洋美術館

Le Corbusier's only building in East Asia, a World Heritage Site, with Rodin in the forecourt and Monet inside.

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