Nankin-machi is Kobe's Chinatown, a compact district south of Motomachi station with red-and-gold gates, Chinese restaurants, and a plaza where food stalls sell steamed buns and dim sum to eat standing up. It is one of Japan's three great Chinatowns and considerably more colourful than most Japanese shopping districts.
The district is walkable in fifteen minutes end to end, but the food stalls around the central Nankinkoji square are the main draw. Pork buns (nikuman), fried dim sum, and fresh fruit juices are the standard fare. The restaurants around the edges of the district are more serious — Kobe has excellent Chinese food, particularly Cantonese and Shanghainese, brought by the port's long trading connections.