Akihabara

Akihabara (in Japanese: 秋葉原) is a district of Tōkyō located in the district of Taitō. It is famous for its very many shops of electronic. It is known in the world under the name of. The center of this district is the Akihabara station of JR Is.

History

After a terrible fire which devastated most of Tōkyō in 1870, the authorities decided to create a zone cleared in the North-East of the Imperial palace to protect it from a new fire hazard. One built there a sanctuary dedicated to a divinity protecting the men against fire. With the wire of time, this vast uninhabited zone ends up being invaded by the trees and with the autumn it was covered soon with dead sheets which gave him its name of “ field of sheets of autumn ” (Akinobohara).

The construction of a subway station on this site in 1890 finally enabled him to develop. The district, destroyed during the Second world war, was invested thereafter by students of the surroundings which settled with same the street or in small gravers to sell radios and other electricals appliance that they worked with the surpluses that the army sold off to them. Thus was born the market from the electronics, which did not cease growing, grace in particular to the boom of the electric household appliances of the Années 1960, then data processing in the Années 1980. Three Kanji (Chinese characters) which composes the name of Akinobohara can be also read Akihabara . It is this last reading, shorter, which was essential at the beginning of the century (accustomed call it also " Akiba").

Today

The success of Akihabara holds in the fact that until now, it succeeded in making cohabit of all small shops ultra-specialized at the sides of the “supermarkets” of consumer electronics. However, since a few years, the large signs of Japanese electronics (Laox…) the small stores in difficulty repurchase to make appendices as of theirs of them. In the small shops located in the markets hall, or the narrow lanes, one can find a whole heap of spare parts and accessories going of the electric garland, while passing by all kinds of electronics components, to miniature cameras to make fade jealousy James Bond. The department stores are, as for them, the kings of the electric household appliances very last thing, mobile telephony, the computers and the Video games. On the main roads, one finds also department stores which sell products out-taxes for the tourists. One can find even there, at handsome price, of the Japanese products intended for the French market.

To finish, there are more and more stores of Manga or of Anime in Akihabara, which takes the place of the stores of electronics. Shinjuku western gradually takes importance like district of consumer electronics, while Akihabara is centered on impassioned more and more.

External bonds

Akiba : Official site
DaiSuki: French site with many photographs of Tokyo & Akihabara

Zh-classical: 秋葉原

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