00:00:00 John Daub: Foreign welcome to Tokyo After Midnight. This is another midnight snack run. Thanks for joining me on a kind of a warm evening here in February. And this episode is dedicated to a soda battle. This here in my hand is the Pepsi Coca Cola. It's a new flavor that's hitting worldwide, except it just happens to be here in Japan first. I guess it's because we are used to having outrageous flavors.

00:00:32 John Daub: Thanks to Pepsi, Coca Cola has decided to take it a step further. Now, Coca Cola doesn't do that well here with flavored colas. In fact, Coca Cola in itself is not very popular here in Japan. Cola is a little bit too sweet for most Japanese. Most of the Japanese vending machines, they sell tea, and the tea in 500 milliliter PET bottles is a lot more popular. That's half a liter for all of you in the US. So instead of just drinking this peach cola, which I think would be pretty boring, I decided to set up a battle. That's right, in a vending machine just around the corner here.

00:01:20 John Daub: I found Fanta. And they happen to have a flavor that's been around way too long. It's probably been sitting in that vending machine for a year. It's peach flavored Fanta. So we're gonna go test this one out, but it's gonna battle that Fanta. So here's the vending machine right here. Boom. You see it in front of you? That is Peach Fanta. So we've got Battle of the Peaches.

00:01:51 John Daub: And it's discounted to 140 yen. So what I'm gonna do is buy this, but I don't have any coins. I actually have to buy it with a thousand yen note. So here's the thousand yen note, putting it into the machine. Let's get this Fanta. All right. Are you ready to battle the Coca Cola Peach Fanta? This is White Peach Fanta, by the way. Here we go. Nice. Boom. Fanta. This is the White Peach Fanta.

00:02:23 John Daub: And now it begins. Oh, I'm locked in here. They closed the station. They literally locked the vending machine. The station is closed. Did that just happen? If the nice store manager had not let me out, I would have been locked in there. I would have been that. I would have been locked in. In this little one, one meter by one meter place.

00:02:57 John Daub: This is hilarious. The station just closed. That would have been a battle of me trapped in there. And you can see the other side where I entered. It's closed down too. So yeah, anything can happen in these live streams. All right, now I've got the Coke and the Fanta together. These two are gonna do battle. Who will win the battle of the peaches? Coke versus Fanta.

00:03:28 John Daub: Now Fanta is actually — they're both Coca Cola Co. It's not like it's Pepsi versus Coke. This is just a clear peach versus a cola peach. All right, so I'm gonna take you to the other side here. Do battle. Can we do battle at Yoshinoya? What do you think? Maybe not. Yoshinoya would not look like a good battle spot. It would end with a lot of meat on the floor. Two very empty bottles of cola.

00:04:00 John Daub: So we're going to take it right here in front of the station. I think this is a nice, nice enough place. I've decided to glassen this up. Okay, here we go. So I've decided to take this a little bit classier than normal. Hahahaha. In my hand is a champagne glass, only for the finest liquids. And we happen to have two of the finest right here. That's right. Fanta versus Coke.

00:04:30 John Daub: Both of them. Peach fight. All right. Actually, I probably should not have done that. Now they're gonna be kind of fizzy. All right, here we go. Because it's clear and I don't want to corrupt the color of the peach Fanta, we're gonna go with the Fanta first. All right. Oh, whoa. This isn't just — this isn't just peach. This is white peach, which means it's — white peach is famous in Japan from being from Okayama prefecture. That's really, really high quality peach here.

00:05:05 John Daub: That's really, really high quality peach here. So let's take a look at this thing. This is White Peach Fanta. Oh. Oh, very nice. Here we go. White Peach Fanta. Cheers. That's not bad. That's not bad. Actually. That's that is surprisingly good. Oh, Coke. Coke. You're gonna have a hard time beating this one. Coke. This is gonna be a hard one. I'm gonna move it over here because there's a little bit of wind coming in.

00:05:40 John Daub: Sorry about that. Coke is gonna have a tough time beating this. I'm up here. All right. So Fanta, very good. Very well done, Fanta. We're now gonna go with the Coke. You didn't see that. This is Peach Coca Cola. That fizz was a little bit stronger. That means that this peach Fanta has probably been around a little bit too long. Here we go.

00:06:10 John Daub: Peach Coca Cola. Oh, we're making this Coke high class. All right. Cheers. Sorry. Just. All right. This is an easy one. This one is so easy. So which is going to be here? Let me describe the taste, and I'm going to tell you which is the winner. So the White Peach Fanta actually tasted like white peach. It had a really peachy taste to it and it was more refreshing. It wasn't so sweet.

00:06:42 John Daub: The cola — the Coca Cola tastes like Coca Cola. Slight hint of something peachy. Kind of impressive. I mean, they seem to be able to produce the peach flavor a little bit better than Pepsi has done in the past with their remarkably — well, the very remarkably titled colas. But a letdown when you actually drink it. Both of them had really good peaches, so thumbs up to that.

00:07:12 John Daub: When it came to the taste, the peach taste, Fanta is your champion. The White Peach Fanta wins the day. But when it comes to fizz and being fresh, because it was produced probably a couple of weeks ago, the Coca Cola Peach wins that battle because it's just not a leftover from last summer. Actually, this — this was the flavor from last summer. It's really hard to find both of them.

00:07:44 John Daub: So I think Coca Cola has got a pretty good idea here. I used to be — I used to be a big fan of Cherry Coke and Vanilla Coke, and they had that here in Japan for a very short time. But the problem with that is that everything in Japan is a trend. That means it's here today and gone tomorrow. And a lot of the drinks, you might fall in love with them, and then when you start getting used to having it around, it's gone.

00:08:18 John Daub: And that's what's going to happen with the Peach Coke. It's really big right now. Tomorrow it won't be around. But, you know, in general, Coca Cola is not popular at all, like I was telling you in the vending machines. And I'm gonna — I'm gonna take these two colas and take you over to the vending machine and show you — Coca Cola is a very interesting story here in Japan.

00:08:49 John Daub: So we're gonna take this battle, which nobody got hurt, except for maybe that tree which had to drink the leftover Coke. And don't worry, you're actually allowed to drink alcohol outside — really cold and windy. Is there a typhoon coming in? Feel like it's New Year's Eve or something. All right. Yeah, we're gonna make it to the vending machine. It's right there in the corner.

00:09:21 John Daub: Do you see it? There's a lonely vending machine. We're gonna take you right there. All right? This is Sunday night. Everybody who's sane is asleep. Okay? It's after midnight on a Sunday. This is what Tokyo's like. It's absolutely deserted. All right, here we are. All right. This is a Coca Cola vending machine. You see this? All right, how much Coca Cola do you see?

00:09:51 John Daub: The Coca Cola takes up just those top left corner in this vending machine. That's it. That means all of the other drinks here are something else. So Coca Cola. Oh, baby. Coca Cola in general is not — it's not big. And the reason why is because it's too sweet. People don't want to drink 500 milliliters or half a liter of Coca Cola. They want just a little bit because it's sweet and gives you a dessert taste.

00:10:25 John Daub: And that's it. These don't have the same kind of sweetness. Although that Fanta — this is a Blood Orange Fanta. This Fanta is probably pretty sweet. But the other drinks, Aquarius is a sports drink. These two are a hot ginger lemon tea. This is a hot green tea, Royal milk tea, and a cafe latte. These are all made by Coca Cola. This is Oronamin C, a vitamin drink. This is a Chinese tea — [?]. These are two canned coffees. Here's corn soup in a can. And these are more coffees down here. These are hot, only 100 yen, which is about a dollar. And these are sort of like a sports drink. That real gold, AQ, which is a non-fizzy drink, apple juice. And another Fanta, which is interesting.

00:11:27 John Daub: This is — what the heck is this? This is grapefruit flavor. All right. So basically what you're seeing is that Coke, although they have a Peach Coca Cola here, they gotta add stuff like flavors in order to make it more attractive to people in Japan to try and drink it. Now, if you go to other vending machines, other Coca Cola vending machines, just one right here on the corner.

00:11:59 John Daub: You're gonna see what I mean. That one was kind of a poor example. But if they have Coca Cola, they will usually have like five — I've seen a vending machine have five different sizes of Coca Cola. Well, they had a 500 milliliter PET bottle and a 500 milliliter can. And then they had a 333 milliliter can. They had a 250 milliliter can. And then they had these weird-looking PET bottle cans that were, I think, think about 220 milliliters or something like this.

00:12:38 John Daub: And the reason why is because nobody wants to drink an entire big can of soda. In fact, dude, back there — in fact, this may sound weird, but in Japan, the bigger 500 milliliter cans of soda are actually cheaper than the PET bottles, even though you're getting a lot more volume. All right, this is — I'm gonna put this cola down. Very high class here. See, here they have PET bottles and then they have smaller cans because people don't want to drink this, but they'll want to drink this one. This one actually is zero, but it's 30 yen more for the bigger one. This is actually not a — not the perfect vending machine either. Is there another one? All right, you know what?

00:13:40 John Daub: I know that there's another one down the street. Okay. All right, we're gonna go to the last vending machine. Look, I made — I'm making this live stream improve a point. Now this has gone beyond the battle. I'm not battling myself because it's gotten ridiculously cold in the last, like, five minutes. That wind came through and it brought another — I think it's a cold front or something.

00:14:12 John Daub: You can see behind me this — this area. My neighborhood is completely deserted. All right, I see the other vending machine. I'm gonna use my nose to turn the camera around. Come on. Okay, there you go. I'm walking with the Peach Cola. All right, there's a cigarette vending machine. These cigarette vending machines, you need an ID in order to buy it. Called the Taspo. And you have to touch — touch your ID here, you touch your ID there, and it allows you to buy the cigarettes. But we're not into that. I don't smoke.

00:14:43 John Daub: All right, I think this vending machine is a better example. Yeah, this is actually — you see this Coca Cola vending machine? You have the 500 milliliter in the corner, which is only one of them. Nobody buys that. What they buy are these two here in the middle, which is 120 — 10 yen cheaper than the other one. That's pretty cool, right? I mean, that's Coke's market. The actual Coca Cola is only a very small percentage of Coke's market in Japan. There's a beer vending machine. I'm kind of hoping — I'm kind of like wanting one from here, actually. And then here's some sake in a can and amazake too. That's actually — wow. Trying to use my nose to get the camera back.

00:15:50 John Daub: Sorry. So that's the situation here for Coca Cola. Yeah. Thanks for the super chat here from Mix John. Nice to catch a live stream again. Hoping to see a new location from your driver's license. Yes. So a quick update — I'm gonna walk home now. So I haven't gotten many of the — I don't know why, but greetings from Germany. Okay, now I can see the — now I can see the chats.

00:16:20 John Daub: I wasn't seeing the chats. Something with the YouTube app. YouTube app's been pretty, pretty funny from the live streaming for some reason. I don't know. I'm talking like this because I think everyone in my area is already asleep. It's after 10pm — in quiet neighborhoods in Japan, you want to be polite and speak at a low voice. It's kind of creepy, actually. But it's just — it's just us.

00:16:51 John Daub: So I'm actually — the day after tomorrow I'm leaving to go to Hokkaido. All right. My battery is telling me 20% left. I'm actually going to Hokkaido the day after tomorrow. So I'm leaving Tokyo. This is going to be warm compared to where I'm going. It's like minus 10 degrees right now up there. That's the high. So it's going to be three, three and a half days filming in northern Hokkaido.

00:17:24 John Daub: I'm not — I'm even — I'm bypassing Sapporo, just went straight to the north. And you're going to see me live streaming up there, bringing you the stories from the frozen tundra. I don't even know what a tundra is, but it just sounds tough. So I'm going to the frozen tundra of north Hokkaido where there's just ice and, in my mind, bears and people wearing those big fuzzy caps like they wear in Russia.

00:17:58 John Daub: That's my image of northern Hokkaido. And I want to see how wrong I am on Wednesday when I fly in in the afternoon, check into my hotel, and just freeze my butt off. And you're gonna get a live stream. I'm gonna be live streaming the whole thing the whole way. This is gonna be pretty fun. This is gonna be a big week, everybody. We're gonna have a lot of live streams and there's some really cool stories.

00:18:31 John Daub: I'm taking my drone. I don't know if my DJI Mavic will be able to survive the sub-zero temperatures, but hopefully I can get some drone shots. And there's one story that I'm chasing in particular. This is what I — this is for the Only Japan main channel. When I come up with an idea, I chase the story. I'm like a journalist. I track it down and I go there and I try to cover the story as completely as possible.

00:19:05 John Daub: Because I think that's what you want out of the show, right? You want me to completely take — it's cold. I'm setting up for the final scene. That's why. Oh, oh. Did I crack the glass? The wind knocked over my glass. Setting up for the final shot. I heard something. Yeah. You know, I don't know if it's a YouTube app or if it's the iPhone 7 Plus, but the quality of the sound with the wind has gotten — has improved, which is a good thing. You know, YouTube, although I complain about them from time to time, they do — they really do a good job of updating the app and listening to the feedback.

00:19:38 John Daub: All right, so I — thank you, Christopher. Grab some coffee. I think I will. I might get the corn soup. This is a real — like, this is the kind of conditions I could expect up there in Hokkaido.

00:20:10 John Daub: It is literally — the temperature has dropped about — it feels like 10 degrees Celsius in the last, like, five minutes while doing this live stream. Jameson Hibbert — shred some? Shred some air. I don't know if I'm gonna be — I don't think there's any ski slopes where I'm going, but there sure is a lot of ice. If you're a member of Patreon and supporting there, you will see where I'm going.

00:20:44 John Daub: I put a map and it and the temperature of what's up there. So I'm gonna go home. Thank you for the super chat. So to just finish this up for everyone who actually came here to see the battle between the Fanta and the Coke, here's the results. The White Peach Fanta wins and the Peach Coca Cola wins. They both are winners. Except the Peach Fanta wins. Viola. Because it just tastes a little bit —

00:21:16 John Daub: I am a fan of — so thanks everybody for watching this live stream. This reporter is going someplace a little bit warmer. I hope you have a great day or night, wherever you are. Thanks for the support. I'm gonna be live streaming one more time tomorrow. Maybe I'll have a special guest. In fact, I might have two. Hint, hint. You want to tune in tomorrow? It'll be tomorrow.

00:21:46 John Daub: Tomorrow morning either during the Super Bowl, which is crazy because no one's gonna watch that live stream, or it'll be slightly after, but one way or another, I'm going to bring you — should I tell you, or should I just keep it in suspense? I'm going to try to — okay. I'm going to try to get Peter and Jennifer together tomorrow. If you've been watching the live streams, you've been watching me and Peter doing mischievous things around the city, or you've been watching me and Jennifer, like, eating our way around the city and doing things that people who should be dating do.

00:22:31 John Daub: Oddly, our relationship, though, is friendly in that kind of way, not in the dating way. It's just hard to explain. Never — and if you watch the show, you know. Okay, I don't have to tell you. I'm gonna try. Okay. I'm gonna try to get the two of them together. Not together together, but get them together in a live stream.

00:23:03 John Daub: I'm gonna get in trouble if I keep talking. My mind is, like, frozen. So I'm gonna — I'm just gonna leave you with that image. You're not gonna want to — you're not gonna want to miss tomorrow's live stream. That's — that's pretty much the focus. Like the two mystery guests. Yeah, that's it. I'm just gonna leave you with that. All right. Because I'm just gonna mess it up if I keep going.

00:23:35 John Daub: I'm gonna leave the last 20 seconds to the 7-Eleven in my neighborhood that I always go in and stream illegally in. And they're starting to catch on that I'm live streaming. Going to leave you the last 20 seconds staring at the front door and hoping they don't come out and throw an item at me. And if they do, make sure it's warm. Bye, everybody.