In the middle of the city, you can talk to the people who grew it. In Aoyama, Tokyo, on the plaza before the United Nations University, a farmer's market opens every weekend. The sellers are producers from across Japan, offering vegetables, fruit, eggs, honey, coffee, and in most cases the grower sells in person. Where was this daikon grown? How is this tomato best eaten? Ask, and an answer comes back. In a supermarket you never see the producer's face; here you do, and shopping becomes conversation. Just beside the fashionable Omotesando district, a market smelling of earth sets up in a corner of the chic streets. City and countryside connect here, and buying a vegetable becomes a way of supporting a far-off field. It has also become a place where those considering a move meet people from the land itself.