Most of Tokyo is a reconstruction. The glitz of Ginza and the neon of Shinjuku are built on the ashes of 1945. But if you head to Bunkyo ward and step through the massive wooden gates of Gokokuji Temple, you aren't looking at a replica. You are looking at survival.

There's this moment right when the plane lands at Haneda where reality splits in two. My body is absolutely certain it's Tuesday afternoon in Toronto. The Tokyo skyline outside the window is insisting it's Wednesday morning. I've always had a rule for this: push through until midnight. This trip, that plan completely backfired.

You spend your whole life hearing about the "order" of Tokyo. The quiet subways, the polite bows, the perfect queues. But tucked under the train tracks between Ueno and Okachimachi, there is a street that ignores all those rules. This is Ameya-Yokocho—a street built on sugar and survival.