KABUKICHO

Kabukicho, the pleasure and leisure district to the north of Shinjuku station, bustles with people day and night. People go there to shop, play arcade games, go to host or hostess bars. The area is also home to Omoide Yokocho and Golden Gai. You can simply stroll through the streets, intoxicated by the giant screens and pop music emanating from every store.

The "city that never sleeps", as the district has long been known, has undergone major changes in recent years, and its sultry reputation is gradually softening. Even if you have to remain wary of the evening hustlers, the terrifying stories of rackets and the underworld are no longer just urban legends that help to season the visit. From a pleasure district, Kabukicho is once again the leisure district as it was imagined after the^2nd World War, when it was ready to host a kabuki theater (which never saw the light of day).

Tokyu Kabukicho Tower. Reaching a height of 225 m in the middle of Kabukicho, the tower, inaugurated in April 2023, reaffirms the district's undisputed status as the capital's leisure heart. While playing on the image of a red-light district, notably by offering a restaurant area that mimics Kabukicho's flashy aesthetic, the tower also aims to be a leisure center equipped with a cinema, games and sports halls, restaurants and cafés with varied menus, and luxury hotels.

Golden Gai These little streets in the district are a reminder of the end of the Second World War, when all kinds of boui-bouis were hastily built around the big railway stations. Golden Gai resisted the pressure of property developers in the decades that followed, becoming a meeting place for local employees and artists alike. The bars in these alleyways have the reputation of welcoming only regulars, but they are increasingly frequented by foreigners, happy to squeeze in at the counters of these anachronistic sidewalks.

Omoide-Yokocho, the souvenir alley, more prosaically known as "piss alley", is another relic of the post-war period, located on the west side of Shinjuku station (but not far from Kabukicho). In those days, it was a black market, with a simple partition separating the stalls. Today's bistros retain some of this architecture. They serve kebabs (yakitori) and other small dishes, to be eaten on the go with a beer or sake.