Tokyo

A fishing village at the mouth of the Sumida became a place of consequence in 1457, when the warrior Ota Dokan built a castle at Edo on the bluff above the marshes. Its transformation came in 1590, when Tokugawa Ieyasu took the Kanto as his domain and chose the castle as his base; after he became shogun in 1603, the whole apparatus of government moved there. Rivers were diverted, the bay was reclaimed, and aqueducts were dug to water it. The system of alternate attendance, which required provincial lords to keep households in Edo, filled the high ground with samurai estates and the low ground east of the castle with the merchants and artisans who supplied them. By the 18th century around a million people lived there.

Fire shaped the place as much as politics: blazes were so frequent that Edoites called them the flowers of Edo, and the Meireki fire of 1657 destroyed much of the city. After the shogunate fell in 1868 the emperor moved from Kyoto and Edo was renamed Tokyo, the eastern capital, after which Ginza was rebuilt in brick as a showcase of Western style.

The 20th century twice destroyed the city. The Great Kanto earthquake of 1923 and the firestorms after it killed more than 100,000 people; American incendiary raids in March 1945 killed about as many in a single night and burned out the eastern wards. Reconstruction was fast and largely unplanned. The 1964 Olympics brought the first Shinkansen, new expressways and the modern Tokyo, and the boom of the 1980s pushed land prices to extraordinary levels before they collapsed. The city hosted the Olympics again in 2021, a year late because of the pandemic.

Tokyo still divides between the yamanote, the western hills of former samurai estates and now of offices and comfortable suburbs, and the shitamachi, the flat eastern wards of craftspeople and small factories around Asakusa, Ueno and the river. The shitamachi is where the old Edo character is claimed: plain speech, quick wit, neighbourhood associations and festivals built around local shrines. The standard Japanese taught across the country grew out of the capital's speech.

The performing arts are concentrated here — kabuki at the Kabuki-za, noh, rakugo storytelling in small theatres, and sumo tournaments three times a year at the Kokugikan in Ryogoku. So is the modern culture that draws visitors: anime, manga and games in Akihabara and Ikebukuro, street fashion in Harajuku, live music in Shimokitazawa and Koenji, and a dense club and bar scene in Shibuya and Shinjuku. Tokyo has more Michelin-starred restaurants than any other city, and cooking is treated as a craft with lifelong specialisation.

Manners are precise and largely unspoken. People queue, keep quiet on trains, sort rubbish carefully, bow in greeting and take trouble not to inconvenience others. Service is formal and unhurried, and tipping does not exist. Foreign residents make up a small but growing share of the population, and districts such as Shin-Okubo, with its Korean shops and restaurants, have become destinations in their own right.

About 14 million people live in Tokyo Metropolis, most of them in the 23 special wards at its core, while the Greater Tokyo Area holds around 33 million, one of the largest urban regions in the world. Tokyo is the seat of government, the Imperial household, the financial markets, the broadcasters and publishers, and the headquarters of most large Japanese companies.

The commute defines the working day. Trains carry millions of people from Saitama, Chiba and Kanagawa into the central wards, an hour each way is normal, and station staff still manage crowds on the busiest platforms. Housing is expensive and small, flats are measured in tatami mats, and families often trade space for a shorter journey. Convenience stores, coin laundries and small supermarkets handle daily needs at all hours.

The pressures are familiar across Japan but concentrated here: an ageing population, a low birth rate, long working hours and a slow shift towards more flexible work since the pandemic. Tokyo is one of the few parts of the country still gaining residents, drawing young people from the regions. Earthquake preparation is a constant background — drills, stockpiles, strengthened buildings — and summers have grown hot enough for heat to be treated as a public health issue.

Several national dishes were invented here as Edo street food. Nigiri sushi began in the 1820s as a quick meal of bay fish pressed onto vinegared rice, and the Edomae style still cures, marinates or simmers the fish before it reaches the counter. Tempura, soba and kabayaki — eel split, skewered and grilled with a sweet soy glaze — were all sold from stalls in the shogun's city and became specialist trades. Tokyo ramen is a clear soy-seasoned chicken broth with curly noodles, one style among hundreds served across the city.

Neighbourhood food has its own map. Tsukishima is the place for monjayaki, a loose griddled batter of cabbage and seafood scraped up with small spatulas, and Ryogoku for chanko nabe, the wrestlers' hotpot. Asakusa keeps old tempura and eel houses and sweet shops selling ningyoyaki, small filled cakes baked in moulds. The Tsukiji outer market still sells knives, dried bonito and grilled seafood after the wholesale trade moved to Toyosu in 2018.

Eating out ranges from standing soba bars and canteen-style set lunches to department store basements piled with prepared food, izakaya where dishes are ordered in rounds with beer or sake, and a large number of restaurants with international reputations. Coffee is taken seriously in old kissaten and in newer roasteries, and convenience store food — onigiri, egg sandwiches, hot snacks — is part of everyday eating rather than a last resort.