where's wolmut?: tokyo tuna

anime and emil

emil says:

i have never seen so many creatures of the sea in my life. Largest fish market in the world 700k tons of marine life worth $5.5bn annually. the scene at 5 am is genuine chaos. this is the wall street of the marine world. scores of bluefin tuna up to 200 pounds go for nearly $35K a head (there are 11,000 pieces of sushi in a fish that big) and the auction process is just hysterical to the average outsider. the tuna auction is the highlight but really the amount of stuff that these folks pull out of the sea (and consume) that we couldn't even recognize is also amazing. most of it looks like a good dr seuss book on a powerful hit of acid. there are monstrous sea urchins, buckets of sea cucumbers, dozens of eel types, numerous types of fish caviar, hundreds of sardine types, hundreds of fish i have never seen before, tuna cheeks and eyeballs are sold separately, blowfish and pufferfish and seriously absurd looking fish, and yup they sell whale meat. the noise is intense here and the speed even more so. band saws cutting blocks and blocks of tuna into 5 pound portions to be sent all the way to michelin starred sushi chefs down to pet food companies all over the world (oh and even the tails and heads of tuna are sold to fertilizer companies). there are fisherman, sotheby's type auctioneers, wholesalers, distributors, intermediate wholesalers, and a myriad of in betweeners that are between some other guys that know a guy. even the styrafoam guys are making a killing here. this is a big big business. its an amazing place to come check out. and there's something awesome about eating sushi at 6am right off the dock post the tuna auctions. a must visit for anyone that wants to get a glimpse of the underbelly of the fish industry.