Piss Alley (Shinjuku, Tokyo)

Piss alley Shinjuku, Tokyo
This photo story is about one of the most intriguing place in Tokyo, a place where you will find a cluster of eateries (50 or 60) where salarymen gather do drink after work. It's called piss alley or Shonben Yokocho in Japanese. The name of this narrow street (plus a couple of side alleys) speaks length about its nature, it was nicknamed so in a time when you didn't have toilets to relieve yourself, the middle of the alley being probably where all this urine excess would flow a few dozen years ago. The smell reputation of this alley made probably the area a no-go zone for the respectable people of the 1940s'.

The odd thing is that this old-time street has managed to survive in what is the most modern and active neighborhood in Tokyo : Shinjuku. Shinjuku, for starters, is a hot spot of Tokyo's evening life (partly red-light district), a shopping area and one of the major train/metro hubs of the world, and Japan's first : just think that it handles 3,6 million commuters per day... Not really a forgotten stretch of shitamachi like in the vicinity of Minowa or Ueno where it would be less surprising to find remnants of the old ways.

The door to the sinful alley When dusk comes imagine the excitement of the salaryment going in groups for a few drinks in piss alley. You have here on both sides of the lane dozens of narrow venues offering yakitoris and booze and if you want to rub elbows with office workers going out to let the steam off, this is the right place to go.

The gate sign here calls the alley with its other name : Omoide Yokocho or memory lane. In spite of their modernity, the japanese people like to look with nostalgy on long-gone times, that's why this name, which is also more respectable than the other infamous one.

Full with office employees Once in there, you first stroll the alley up and down wondering where to go. You're immediately attracted by the most noisy and lively, they must be good with all these salarymen, it's always better to follow the locals, but as you can see the narrow venues fill up pretty fast withd a few colleagues.
You almost always have the traditional Oden, also called Nikomi (stewed), a sort of pot au feu or soup with all sort of things foating in.
We went there with Anna one evening and this stand was irrestibly attracting us bur alas although we waited a while and walked up and down, it kept being full, these company employees were having fun and were there for long. There would have been maybe a seat in the end of the counter for one person, but not for us three. That's why I think it's good to come with as few people as you can here. The famous Asadachi stand The most famous eatery of piss alley is I think this one in the middle of the alley (I'm not sure I shot the right venue though), it's Asadachi, and the reason it's famous is because they're serving very unusual dishes like pig testicles, grilled salamander, horse penis or __take a seat__ sashimi made with frogs whose heart are still beating... I'm not into with political correctness and would eat without second thoughts some whale meat if the opportunity shows up but this last one is beyond what I can stand. Plus, you may have competition to worry about if you really want a seat there, better come early, it was also full, and with locals. I didn't see a foreigner that evening but I guess that in the warmer season there may be more gaijins strolling there, and they probably all head for this odd yakitori joint. Another hot venue This place at the corner with a side alley was also full, and I wonder if it's not a stand like Asadachi, serving wildly exotic food and animals. There were all these people watching and waiting, and I thing the eatery is also a hot venue of piss alley. You can't miss it, it's the only one at the corner with fixed red stolls all along the counter. Check on this video (The Guardian) what weird things you're offered to eat in these gloomy lanes. Warm behind the pvc strip curtain Some of these eateries don't seem to bother about finding customers while some other look eagerly to fill their seats, often through a charming young woman who invites the passerbys and does her best to have them sit in a row. But this is not Akihabara or takeshita-dori yet, the lane is still remote to the crowds. Really full Piss Alley (or Memory Lane like it's also named) has some resemblance with another block of low buildings and narrow, squeezed bars, named Golden Gai. Golden Gai is located on the other side of Shinjuku, east of the massive train and metro station while Piss Alley is located north of the station and west of the tracks.

The two vintage drinking areas are also quite different by nature, Golden Gai being more into the 1960s' with music bars and so on, and the bill can be pretty high at Golden Gai, while at Piss Alley if you keep with regular yakitoris (outside of horse penis or frog sashimi), you should get a very reasonable bill. We ordered a couple of sake and something to eat and paid some 1200 Yen each (8,4 € or 11,5 USD).

Less attractive but more room I read somewhere that piss alley was a black market drinking area at the end of WW2 but while it really looks like really old, the place burned down in 1999 (presumably from a charcoal grill) and was subsequently rebuilt, intentionally or not with the same sinful looks. The good side is you didn't have the stinky smells anymore after the rebuilding as a few toilets were conveniently built among the small buildings. The name remained though, it was known for ever as piss alley and unrepentant drinkers would rather prefer this shady reputation than the bright and clean streets of Ginza. Charcoal grill Almost all these small eateries had their charcoal barbecue to grill the yakitoris, and I was told that they used the best quality of charcoal, heavy and artisanally made. This view would stirr a lot of agitation if it took place in Paris, with the hygienists probably asking these snacks to shut down their traditional cooking and grilling, or else. In a similar topic, we had recently an atmosphere thick with fog in Paris and a large part of France, the worst pollution level I have ever seen and smelt and it lasted several days. The Greens blamed it on the traffic and particularly diesel engines from cars and trucks going through the greater Paris region, asking for more repressive measures against them. I checked myself this particular friday evening how bad the situation was, riding my bike to the Loire and I noticed breathlessly that the air was indeed heavilly polluted all the way from Paris downtown to Orleans 130 km south, I had never seen that before, and the smell was unusual, but it seemed a wide region to cover with the Paris traffic fumes. News flared up a few days later that actually the origin of this painful situation was elsewhere : The very austere newspaper Les Echos (not really a xenophobic tabloid) pointed in this article that this pollution alert was caused by a change of direction of the winds in France : they usually come from the west and this time they came from the east, bringing a big mass of air from Germany....where the Greens have bullied the government into switching all the power production from N plants to coal. Not very good news for those who wanted to blame the Paris-region drivers for this. But like scientist James Lovelock says in this profile, environmentalism has become a religion and religions don't worry too much about facts... Another narrow eatery Yet another narrow venue with oden pot and yakitory grill, the later having an aeration hose above to syphoon the smoke.
For all these restaurants, I've been wondering how they do when someone seated at the bottom want to get out, do the others in front of him have to leave briefly to open his way ? Maybe not but better not be overweight if you have to sneak your way behind those backs to an empty seat in the back...
The young woman seated on the front is having a cigarette, showing that smoking in izakayas is pretty admitted. Our treat After looking around more than we should have, going up and down the alley with the obsessive and lingering question about which venue was the best and not to miss, we ended up choosing one, even though the most fascinating spots were out of reach because they were really more than full. Our choice was good, because the had reasonably-good yakitoris and the sake was pretty easy to drink (but I'm beginning to think that any sake would do the job in this sort of place).

This venue is named Isuzu and Komatu, they have a menu in Eglish, here are a few prices :
Bers from 400 Y to 550 Y; Sake hot or cold (hakuturu, Kennbishi, Kikumasamune) 350 Y; Sake bottle (300ml) 700 Y; Whisky (Suntory kaku) 350 Y to 600 Y; A few Japanese spirits like Genkai made from barley (300 Y), Dandan made from potatoes (350 Y), Kurokirishima made from potatoes (400 Y), Umeshu made from plum (350 Y). There are also a few soft drinks an tea.
Yakitori side, they had sets with 5 skewels, each set costing a mere 500 Y. These yakitori were made from pork (meat, meat & onion, liver, heart, tongue, intestine and cartilage), chicken (meat & onion, gizzard), or vegetable only (mushroom, small green pepper, green onion, sweet pepper). They had a few other side dishes costing from 200 to 450 Y and more on the other side of this menu.

Fellow customers next to our counter And one thing is sure, the other patrons we were seating near were very friendly, we raised our sake cups with them. It seems like they don't see that many foreigners although it's really well reported on the tourist guides and also you have these menus in English that they take out for you if you stop at their front. Again, it may depend of the season, summer may see crowd of western vacationeers strolling along the alley. Really-friendly bar mate This picture shot on the other side of the counter shows how friendly the people in there were, but I think i understood why, this wasn't because of me and my Japanese friend, but rather because of Anna, she literally electrized the place, the salaryman on the foreground uttered a few words in English which he remembered from his school years, pointing to Anna : very beautiful..... He even payed us a jug of sake, very neat and sincere man. I now know whom I'll hire the next time I explore the drinking spots of Tokyo, not for free drinks but to get these sparks in the eyes of the party, but I'm sure she'll volunteer if she has time, possibly with her boyfriend if he's available...

Piss Alley Shinjuku, Tokyo (map directions) Close-up on Shonben Yokocho's block and alleys

Disconnected (Shinjuku station, west exit)