s dawn peeled back the city’s neon glow, I weaved through plastic crates at Tokyo’s Tsukiji Fish Market, where the air smelled of brine, crushed ice, and the metallic tang of tuna scales. Sunlight trickled through the market’s corrugated roof, reflecting off mounds of glistening sardines that shimmered like silver coins. A fisherman in rubber boots hoisted a bluefin tuna larger than himself, its flesh ruby-red under the fluorescent lights, as vendors shouted bids in rapid-fire Japanese. I knelt beside a stall where octopuses curled the tips of their tentacles, their suckers clinging to Styrofoam trays. "Touch here—see how they pulse?" a vendor said, pressing my finger to an abalone’s sticky shell. Nearby, a chef in a white coat inspected scallops, his knife flicking open their shells to reveal pearly flesh. A forklift rumbled past, its pallet stacked with ice-covered squid, while a stray cat darted between crates, chasing a wayward shrimp. Sunlight strengthened, warming the m...