Tsukiji tuna auctions readmit sightseers – no major rudeness
The Tsukiji fish market reopened its tuna auctions to sightseers today after a 1-month ban:
The move comes as the Tokyo metropolitan government deemed the famous tuna auction, which attracts a maximum of about 500 people a day, an important tourist attraction, and because they were able to gain the understanding of market participants, according to metropolitan officials.
In accordance with the resumption, the local government deployed two security guards to the auction area, marked observer boundaries, displayed a sign at the main gate of the market and distributed flyers in Chinese, English, Japanese, Korean and Russian explaining that flash photography and entering the actual auction site are banned.
No major problems went down this morning, so the new measures seem to have been a success. Here’s a medley of reactions from foreign tourists from the news reports that aired on Asahi/Fuji/NTV/TBS:
All the foreign tourists interviewed were happy with the experience, and the guy in charge of maintaining order at the market was very happy (some tourists even said “Thank you” to him!). The international media was also on the scene, so CNN’s Kyung Lah even filed a report about it.*
Most of the Japanese TV networks included replays of their wild scenes of rude foreign behavior from the pre-ban Tsukiji, and they were on watch for rule-breaking. Here’s what TBS and ATV were able to dig up:
The daring TBS reporter was quite forward in scolding the poor guy who accidentally left his flash on. ATV also captured a guy using his flash, as well as a woman who got in the way of one of the vehicles used to transport fish around the interior of the market. They also got some comments from a Tsukiji market worker about how gaijin get in the way by walking around in such a manner and blinding workers with their camera flashes.
Those scenes aside, the overall tone of the reports on all four networks was positive. Most of the workers interviewed were very pleased with the results of the new measures, and owners of shops and restaurants in the area were particularly happy that the foreign tourists who make up so much of their customer base will be able to continue visiting the auctions. It’s great to see that Tsukiji is back open to tourism and things are going relatively well for both foreign tourists and the fish market.
*Comment about CNN’s report: Quite surprising that their elite team of journalists in Tokyo had to rely on some very familiar low resolution footage instead of asking the Japanese TV network in question to use a higher quality version. I don’t ever see NTV use junky YouTube quality clips when they include footage from CNN in their news reports.
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