Tsūtenkaku Tower

When Tsūtenkaku opened in 1912, visitors could ride Japan’s first aerial tramway from the 64-meter tower, then the second tallest in Asia, directly into Luna Park below. The tower was designed as an architectural mash-up: Eiffel Tower on top, Arc de Triomphe at the base. After fire damage in 1943, it was dismantled for wartime steel. Luna Park closed in 1923, but locals campaigned to rebuild their beloved tower, which rose again in 1956, taller, eight-sided, and home to Billiken, an American good luck charm recreated from an old photograph after the original went missing.

The neon sphere at the tower’s peak still moonlights as Osaka’s most reliable weather forecaster, glowing white for clear skies, orange for clouds, and blue for rain, a tradition locals still check before deciding on an umbrella. Billiken himself has had a stranger afterlife than the tower he sits in: invented by an American illustrator who claimed she saw him in a dream, briefly famous across the United States, then largely forgotten there while Osaka adopted him as a permanent fixture. Rub the soles of his feet and, depending on who you ask, you’ll get good luck, better luck if someone rubs them for you, or at minimum a decent photo for the trip.