Photos: Tokyo warms up for the 2020 Olympics

The Summer Olympics will return to Tokyo next year for the first time since 1964. The world’s best athletes will be on display, of course, but so will Japan’s sprawling capital - a dense mix of the traditional and the eccentric. Wearing school uniforms, students at Yamano Beauty College bow to a speaker during a ceremony held to celebrate the school’s 83rd year anniversary in Tokyo. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Commuters walk past the Olympic Rings in Tokyo. To mark the year-to-go stamp, the gold, silver and bronze Olympic medals were unveiled on July 23 as part of daylong ceremonies around the Japanese capital. Tokyo’s 1964 Olympics showcased bullet trains, futuristic designs and a new expressway, underlining Japan’s recovery following World War II. Those games were the first seen worldwide by early satellites, sending the Olympics into a new era. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Twins, Kunika and Kuniho, 17, record a greeting for their social media followers in the Harajuku district of Tokyo. Harajuku is one of the most popular shopping neighbourhoods in Japan. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Bruce McCullough, who moved to Japan 22 years ago from Vancouver, Canada, sits in his mobile clothing store in the Shibuya district of Tokyo. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Two men drink beer after office hours at a restaurant underneath a train track. Ticket demand for the Olympics is unprecedented and few Japanese can even get them. Estimates suggest up to 90% of Japan residents who applied were unsuccessful in the first phase of a ticket lottery in June. Ticket prices are sure to soar with scalping a certainty, though Japan just passed a law banning the practice. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

A Japanese dance and vocal group called Banquet performs on the street outside Shinjuku Station. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

A tourist takes pictures from the Kyu Goryo-tei Pavilion in Shinjuku Gyoen national garden. Greater Tokyo has a population of more than 35 million — the world’s largest metropolitan area. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Traditional Japanese footwear called zori are seen next to sneakers and dress shoes during a kendo competition at the Hie Shrine. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

The media tours the new National Stadium in Tokyo. Despite scandals, rising costs and doubts about the economic payoff, the Tokyo Olympics will be a must-see event, if one can find a ticket or a hotel room. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Bukkyo University cheerleading squad leader, Yamaguchi Karin (R) leads the school song in front of the school’s baseball players. Roy Tomizawa, a Japanese American who lives in Japan and published the most definitive book on Tokyo’s 1964 Olympics, said he applied for 16 tickets and got zero in the June lottery. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Pedestrians are seen through an advertisement as they walk along the busy streets of the Shibuya district in Tokyo. Local sponsorship revenue has passed $3 billion, about three times more than any previous games, driven by Japan’s giant advertising and marketing company Dentsu Inc., the exclusive marketing agency for the Tokyo Games caught in a French probe into alleged vote-buying connected with Tokyo winning the 2020 Olympics. (Jae C. Hong / AP)

Thousands of candles are arranged in the shape of the Milky Way to celebrate Tanabata, a Japanese star festival, at Zojoji Temple. The Olympics will be simply a sideshow for some Tokyo visitors, astounded by the cleanliness, courtesy and order. Japan’s sprawling capital is a dense mix of the traditional and eccentric where bowing meets bustle. (Jae C. Hong / AP)