How is a city supposed to feel when it has just learned it is no longer the world's most expensive in which to live? Peeved, since there's a certain cachet attached to being No. 1 anything? Relieved, since a reputation for overpricing isn't the kind of cachet any self-respecting city actually needs?

Or should it feel indifferent, since the criteria used to determine these annual cost-of-living rankings are focused more on expatriates' expenses than those of locals?

Tokyo had to juggle all these feelings last week after Mercer Human Resource Consulting announced that Moscow and Seoul had pushed it out of the plush spot it has held for the past four years. Of the 144 cities surveyed, Tokyo now ranks third in terms of the cost of more than 200 items, including transportation, food, clothing and entertainment, with Hong Kong and London rounding out the top five.