OSAKA · MACHI GUIDETsutenkaku & Tengachaya

The first Tsutenkaku was completed on July 3, 1912 (Meiji 45). Designed by Sadao Shitara, its form was described as "the upper half of the Eiffel Tower placed atop the Arc de Triomphe in Paris." An Eiffel Tower sprouting from an Arc de Triomphe sounds outlandish today, but it was a tower that gave shape to the mood of a Meiji-era Osaka determined to "catch up with the world."

It was named by the Confucian scholar Nangaku Fujisawa, meaning "a tall building reaching to the heavens." It stood roughly 75 meters, and at the time was hailed as the tallest in the East.

This first tower no longer stands. In January 1943 (Showa 18), a fire that broke out at a cinema below spread to the tower and damaged it. Yet fire was not its final undoing. Left unrepaired, its steel was requisitioned under the wartime metal-collection order, and it was dismantled from February of that year. A symbol of the city became, quite literally, war materiel.

The tower standing today is the second, completed in October 1956 (Showa 31). Local shopkeepers funded its rebuilding. It was designed by Tachu Naito—the man behind Tokyo Tower and the Nagoya TV Tower, known as the "Doctor of Towers." It stands 108 meters including the lightning rod. In other words, this is a tower that the people of the neighborhood rebuilt out of their own pockets after it had once been lost.

Tsutenkaku is inseparable from Billiken, the god said to grant wishes when you scratch the soles of his feet. This deity, in fact, was not born in Japan. He was designed and patented in 1908 by Florence Pretz, an art teacher and illustrator in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. The name is said to derive from "Billy," the nickname of the era's president, William Howard Taft.

In the early Taisho period this craze reached Japan, and Billiken was enshrined in the "Billiken Hall" inside Luna Park, the amusement park at the foot of the first Tsutenkaku. But when Luna Park closed in 1923, Billiken went missing.

He was revived in 1979, when a second Billiken was restored on the tower's observation floor, and in 2012, a century after the first Tsutenkaku was built, he was replaced by a third. Born in America, lost once in Osaka, then carved anew and returned half a century later—it is a little more interesting to stroke the soles of his feet knowing that is the god's history.

The "town opening" of Shinsekai was on July 3, 1912, the day Tsutenkaku and Luna Park both opened. This land had been the site of the 5th National Industrial Exposition of 1903 (Meiji 36). After an exposition that drew 5.3 million visitors over five months, a vast empty lot remained, and on it an urban plan extravagant for its time was carried out.

The northern half of the town was Paris. A circular plaza was placed at the south-central point, and from it three radial avenues ran north, laid out in the manner of Parisian streets. From the west: "Ebisu-dori (today's Tsutenkaku Hondori)," "Tamamizu-dori (today's Kasuga-dori)," and "Gappo-dori." At the keystone of that radiating pattern stood Tsutenkaku, modeled on the Eiffel Tower—meaning the tower was designed as an extension of the Parisian streetscape.

The southern half of the town was New York. "Luna Park," an amusement park named after its namesake at Coney Island in New York, was placed here. Covering about 130,000 square meters, it was a grand entertainment complex with a zoo, hot springs, a theater, and a motion-picture hall. A ropeway connected Tsutenkaku and Luna Park.

Paris and New York, made to share a single town. Walk it today and it is a retro downtown, but its origins were a giant theme park built by Meiji-era Osaka. Luna Park could not sustain the popularity it had hoped for and closed in 1923; from around 1947 after the war it was reborn as a black market and a district of eateries, gradually becoming the Shinsekai of today.

To the southeast of Shinsekai runs an extraordinarily narrow arcade, about 2.5 meters wide and roughly 180 meters long. Known as Janjan Yokocho, its official name is Nanyo-dori Shopping Street. The name is said to come from the "janjan" sound of the shamisen played in front of shops to draw in customers in the early Showa period (there are various accounts). Kushikatsu, dote-yaki, standing bars, and go and shogi clubs line up one after another—a single street of remarkable density.

What you cannot avoid here is the kushikatsu rule of "no double-dipping." It is the first rule tourists are taught, and the reason is thoroughly practical: the sauce container is shared among customers—it is a hygiene agreement not to return a skewer to the container once it has touched your mouth.

So what do you do when you want more sauce? You scoop it up with the free cabbage on the table and drizzle it over the skewer. That is the proper method. The cabbage is served in the first place partly to offset the richness of the fried food.

Osaka kushikatsu is beef, seafood, and vegetables cut small and skewered one piece at a time. It is a different dish from the Kanto "kushikatsu" of pork and onion skewered alternately. It is said to have begun in 1929 (Showa 4), when the proprietress of a Shinsekai shop served bite-sized fried skewers for the laborers of the neighborhood—though this is passed down as lore.

Right next to Shinsekai is Tennoji Zoo. It opened on January 1, 1915 (Taisho 4), the third zoo to open in Japan after Ueno Zoo and Kyoto Municipal Zoo. It spans about 11 hectares and keeps a collection on the order of about 200 species and roughly 1,000 animals.

Its distinguishing feature is the shift toward ecological exhibits advanced through the "ZOO21 Plan" from the late 1990s. Rather than lining animals up in cages, it turned toward reproducing the environment of their habitats as closely as possible. It has an African Savanna Zone, a Reptile Ecology House, and, at the hippopotamus enclosure, Japan's first underwater viewing pool.

That a zoo of this scale sits right in the heart of the city, looking up at Tsutenkaku, is itself part of what makes this neighborhood fun. It is also an area where families with small children can easily plan the zoo in the morning and Shinsekai in the afternoon.

Walk this area and a streetcar comes rolling down the middle of the road. This is the Hankai Tramway, known locally as the "Chin-den," the only streetcar in Osaka Prefecture.

There are two lines. The Hankai Line runs 14.0 kilometers from Ebisucho to Hamadera-Ekimae, and the Uemachi Line runs 4.3 kilometers from Tennoji-Ekimae to Sumiyoshi. Their origins differ: the Uemachi Line began when the Osaka Horse Railway opened the Tennoji–Tengachaya stretch in 1900 (Meiji 33), while the Hankai Line opened in 1911 (Meiji 44). In other words, it has run the same course through this town for more than 120 years.

Kita-Tengachaya, Nishi-Tengachaya, Matsudacho, Tsukanishi, Shotenzaka—the stops in this area are all set within residential streets. Many of our rooms sit along this Hankai Line, a few minutes' walk from a stop. You end up staying not amid transit for sightseeing but within a scene where the tram runs as an everyday means of getting around.

There is a story handed down about the place name "Tengachaya." In the Tensho era, a man named Kohei Megi opened a teahouse here. Around the time of the third generation, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, stopping by on his way to worship at Sumiyoshi Taisha, took a liking to the teahouse's pure spring and had Sen no Rikyu prepare tea with it—and was so moved by the taste that he gave the spring the name "Water of Blessing." From this it came to be called "the Kanpaku's teahouse" and "the ruler's teahouse"—so the story is told (it is not established as historical fact).

You can reach Sumiyoshi Taisha, where Hideyoshi is said to have been headed, by the Hankai tram. The First Shrine of Settsu Province, known locally as "Sumiyossan," it is the head shrine of some 2,300 Sumiyoshi shrines nationwide, and its four main halls are National Treasures. They preserve to this day the "Sumiyoshi-zukuri" style, one of the oldest forms in all of shrine architecture.

Catching the eye within the precincts is the steeply arched Sori-hashi (the drum bridge). The current bridge was built in 1981, but its stone piers and beams date from the Keicho era, and are said to have been built by Toyotomi Hideyori, or donated by Yodo-dono. Merely crossing this bridge is said to be a purification, and reaching the top opens up the view.

As a shrine long revered for the gods of the sea and of voyages, it draws about 2 million worshippers over the first three days of the New Year (per Sumiyoshi Taisha). Get off at the Hankai Line's "Sumiyoshi-Toriimae" stop and it is right before your eyes.

You can reach Tengachaya with no transfer on the Nankai Main Line Airport Express. Board a train bound for Namba and get off at Tengachaya.

It is within walking distance from rooms near Dobutsuen-mae Station and Ebisucho Station. From Tengachaya it is one to two stops.

Two stops on the Nankai Main Line. It is close enough to get back by train even late at night.

Many of the rooms in this area are in the residential streets along the Hankai Line. Being a little away from the entertainment district, the nights are quiet enough to rest well.

Tennoji Zoo is nearby, and there are many whole-house stays with a kitchen, so families with small children stay here too.

It varies by room, but this area centers on whole-house stays, with many larger rooms suited to groups and families. You can narrow your search by number of guests.

Because you can arrive from Kansai Airport with no transfer, you avoid carrying luggage up and down stairs at transfer points. We will guide you on the route from the station to your room after you book.

The nearest stops are "Sumiyoshi-Toriimae" on the Hankai tram (streetcar), or "Sumiyoshi Taisha" Station on the Nankai Main Line.