The yatai of Hakata

Yatai have almost vanished from the rest of Japan after the hygiene campaigns of the 1960s; Fukuoka keeps about a hundred, more than forty percent of the national total. Each owner wheels the cart out in late afternoon, hooks it to water and power, serves fifteen customers at a time, then dismantles everything before four in the morning, pavement washed. In 2013 the city created a public call for applications to award pitches, which brought younger operators in. You eat ramen, oden, gyōza and yakitori, elbow to elbow with strangers.