ABSTRACT
On the surface it is a typical modern city, brash and dynamic, seemingly indistinguishable from other metropo lises. In fact, many of Tōkyō's modern public landmarks are imitations of famous landmarks found in the West. Yet the Japanese make an important distinction between omote (front, exterior, public facade) and ura (back, interior, private space). Tōkyō has a modern facade that covers an older, often hidden interior. Elevated highways crisscross streets that have retained the same pattern for hundreds of years. Behind the broad avenues that contain chic department stores one finds a maze of ancient, winding passageways so narrow one can barely squeeze through them to find the tiny shops within. Corporate obelisks of glass and steel, and chunky, graceless concrete apartment complexes overlook diminutive gardens with precisely spaced bushes, flowers, and carefully culti vated miniature bonsai (dwarf trees). The old and the new, the gargantuan and the delicate, the refined and the shabby are frequently juxtaposed in Tōkyō.
