Higashimuki Shopping Street

This guide to Higashimuki Shopping Street in Nara starts at the mochi shop Nakatanidou, where a bare hand plunges into scalding rice paste half a second before a wooden mallet comes down, a technique called kosoku mochitsuki. You'll hear how owner Mitsuo Nakatani and his staff turned it into a national championship act, and how the resulting yomogi mochi gets wrapped and sold still warm on the pavement. The guide then widens out to the street itself, an arcade built to catch the morning sun that grew into Nara's main covered shopping lane once the railway arrived. Follow the sound of the mallet as you walk the arcade.