Old shops and dim sum counters stand next to each other. The Motomachi arcade holds businesses that have been trading here a long time, and the food shops and dumpling counters of Nankinmachi run into the same stretch without any real boundary between the two. Walk a little further and the streets of western-style houses begin, and there is no gate or sign to tell you that you have crossed into them. You are following a single line through the city, and its origins keep changing under your feet without any announcement being made at any point. A shopping street has become, almost by accident, a cross-section of how the place was assembled over a century and a half. It is a layering that only shows itself at walking pace; from a car it is simply a shopping street with a Chinatown attached.

JR and Hanshin stations are close and the blocks mix homes with retail, so the population does not empty out in the evening the way a purely commercial quarter would. The tourist hours are crowded and the rest of the day is not, which makes the timing of a visit matter more than the day of the week. Prices in the arcade assume regular customers rather than visitors passing through once and never returning.

The particular quality here is that the edges cannot be located at all, however carefully you look for them. On a map the districts have lines between them. Nankinmachi was rebuilt after the earthquake and the gates went up as part of that, so what looks old is partly recent. The arcade behind it has been a shopping street since the port opened. Both facts are true at once and neither is advertised. On foot you will never find one.