00:00:01 John Daub: Hey everybody, welcome to Ginza. Good afternoon everybody. Welcome to Ginza on a beautiful sunny day. And I got a problem and it's one that a lot of people ask me about. It's one of the most asked questions about Japan. What do I do with my garbage? You've just eaten lunch. You've had a bento. You've had a picnic outside. You have a bag like this. Most people have plastic bags. How do you dispose of it?

00:00:31 John Daub: If you look around and we're gonna cross the street in a second, you'll see that there's a total lack of public trash bins. And I'm gonna tell you the reason why and what to do with your trash in this live stream. We're gonna cross the street over here. It's extremely sunny on the other side. This is Ginza. All right, let's cross the street right now. And the reason why I'm doing that is so that you can get a panoramic view of the total lack of trash cans. Now we're gonna be walking this way and you're gonna see not one on the side of the street. And this is Ginza. It's a really high-class neighborhood. So you would maybe not expect trash cans to be here. I mean, it's a high-class area. Ginza is nice.

00:01:21 John Daub: The reason why there's no trash cans, the most cited reason is because in 1995 we had a sarin gas attack on the Hibiya Line. And it was because of this that the city got rid of initially the public trash cans. So yes, Japan did have public trash cans and we got rid of them. But for the most part people are quite responsible with the garbage that they do have. The rubbish, the trash. And what they do is they take it with them in most situations. Japan also has one of the strictest trash laws in the world. Everybody recycles. It's ridiculous how serious people are about recycling here. But it's a very good thing.

00:02:10 John Daub: If you live in an apartment complex in Japan, in Tokyo, your neighbors will make sure that you separate your recyclables, your burnables, non-burnables, plastics, cardboard. It's at another level. And that's a good thing. So people are very responsible, have a personal responsibility for the things that they create. The rubbish, the trash that they create. So many people will take their trash home with them and then separate it in their house. It seems kind of extreme, but that's Japan. Literally, that's what I would do. I take my trash home with me.

00:02:48 John Daub: There are other places though that you can get rid of your trash, especially if you're living in a hotel, if you're visiting and staying in a hotel. You can of course throw your trash away there or the train stations have trash on the platforms. That's also a great place to get rid of the trash. A lot of them now are made of glass or clear plastic. So you can see the items in there because of the 1995 attack. It just keeps the streets cleaner by not having any trash at all. And it's weird like that. People will just carry the trash either in their bag or they put it somewhere else. And then when they find a trash can at work, they'll throw it away. That's sort of what happens.

00:03:35 John Daub: Now, the last place that I'm going to introduce you to is the convenience stores. The convenience stores in Japan are everything. And I'm going to show you why. There's one right there, but before I do that, I have to actually make some trash. I have to make some rubbish. In every single country, the word trash has different meanings. So what I'm going to do is use this post box here as a stand, and we're going to make some trash. I bought at the convenience store 7-Eleven a banana, which is good. And this is an onigiri (rice ball), and I'm going to show you how to open it, alright? Because we've got to make some trash. Gomi (trash).

00:04:45 John Daub: Here we go. So there's a tab on the top of it. Open it like this. Alright? You can go all the way to the end. Boom. And then there's number 2 and number 3. Just take it apart. [Segment appears to describe eating onigiri amid street activity with Mario Kart go-karts; some audio garbled.]

00:05:48 John Daub: This is really good. It's on spicy fish eggs, not bad at all. Mmm, it is good. Now on the right side is a convenience store. This is where you throw your trash away and that's what I'm gonna do right now. I'm gonna show you in 10 seconds or less what do you do with this. Take it to 7-Eleven where you bought it and throw it away properly right here in the corner. There are places for you to separate the trash. I just have burnable so this is gonna be easy. Plastic, pet bottles, cans and glass. Now I'm completely free of my rubbish. It's pretty easy.

00:07:12 John Daub: The reason why is interesting too. If you go back to history and you look at 1995, Japan wanted to do everything to minimize future attacks of terrorism and having the trash cans was just too much of a risk. And anyways people do separate the garbage and take it back. Over the last 25 years since then people have become more and more conscious of recycling. So the reason why they take it home is because of that consciousness of recycling. They want to make sure that the plastics go with the plastics, the glass go with the glass. Supermarkets are also a great place to throw your trash away, your hotel, the train platforms and convenience stores.

00:07:58 John Daub: And convenience stores are also, the majority of them, the public restrooms as well. You'll be able to find toilets in most convenience stores. And you'll also be able to find services like ATM, drinks. Basically, convenience stores in Japan are the one-stop everything for information. Except, yeah, it's not a tourist information. A lot of the staff won't speak English, so that might not be the ideal place.

00:08:25 John Daub: Anyways, one thing I want to point out to you is that if you do drink from a vending machine, which they have right here on the left side, usually there's a place for you to leave your recycled cans. And this is another great thing about Japan. The recycled bins go back a long ways. Here are the recycled cans. There's one from different makers. Coca-Cola has one. Suntory has one. And Kirin has one. I've never seen them separated by company. I guess the companies have a personal responsibility for themselves to make sure that you recycle. So you've got to recycle according to the company. I've never seen that before.

00:09:15 John Daub: But behind me there's three vending machines. So we're going to get a drink and then recycle. That means I have to make more trash. Making trash can be just as much fun as throwing it away. So what do you guys think? Do you have any requests? This is the time where you can help me make some trash.

00:09:31 John Daub: What do we got here? In this Georgia, we have this Italian blend. I've never seen this one before. Italian blend. They have the Coca-Cola coffee, which is interesting. We've drank that. Me and Kanae Daub drank that in a past live stream. Espresso and milk. This is new from Georgia Coffee. The Tansan (carbonated water). We're not talking about Mr. Tan. That'd be me. This is Tansan. Green tea. Over here is a kids vending machine. We have Red Bull. Kids lemon. What do you guys think? Black coffee. Oh, we got some sports drinks up here. Amino Supli. And rich green tea. And then over here is a Suntory machine with bottled water of Suntory. We got lemon in here. We got Asahi Super Dry. The Ichigo milk (strawberry milk) is very interesting, huh? And then there's a Bistro Boss coffee. Wait. Boss coffee usually makes boss coffee, but this is a boss soup. That's weird. What? I've never seen this before. Tommy Lee Jones is probably going crazy right now. He's a spokesman. Tommy Lee Jones for Boss coffee. Yet this is soup.

00:11:00 John Daub: What do you think? Boss soup or Ichigo milk? I guess Suntory is killing it. And then there's acerola drink. I don't know what that is. Acerola. Uh, Exordac Kobayashi says Italian blend. Oh, wow. But there's the soup too. Can I get both? All right. We're going to have to get both, I think. Boss soup and then the Italian blend as a happy ending. We're going to make some trash. We're doing this just to make trash. This is crazy.

00:11:44 John Daub: Here we go. 500 yen. Let's make some trash. Trekaris says Trekaris wants the soup. You got the soup, buddy. Boom. All right. Just what I wanted. A pocket full of change. Let's drink this. Oh, it's hot. Whoa. Hey, Ellis. You can get them all now. Look at Ellis. Get them all. Oh, that's why we love you, Ellis. Just cut straight to the chase. Let's get on with it. This is... I've never seen this before. Special fine soup. Bistro Boss. Delicious soup using special ideas from our coffee making. What the heck? So they use techniques from coffee making to make the soup? What is it? Are noodles going to come out of this or something?

00:12:39 John Daub: All right. Let's try this out. I can't... I've never seen this before. Boss soup using coffee techniques. Brought to you by Trekaris. Ellis. And X or Dak Kobayashi. Here we go. Let's make some trash. Look at already. Oh, you can smell the soup. Oh. This should be illegal. It smells peppery. Like they put pepper in it. And you can see like floating in here. You can see the fat floating on the top. Maybe not the best choice. All right. Kanpai. Or cheers. Or bottoms up. Or itadakimasu (I humbly receive). Interesting. Salty and oily. Taste of pepper. A lot of pepper. I guess the pepper's on the bottom. Salty, oily taste of pepper. Meaty. I can't identify the meat either. Pepper. One more. Good point. No chunks. There are no chunks in there. All right. No chunks in there. Thank you, Ellis. Thank you, Trekaris. This is going in the boss can. Recycle everybody.

00:14:32 John Daub: All right. Let's go in for this Italian coffee because it was requested. Here we go. So we're going to go for the Italian, Georgia Italian coffee. I haven't had this one before either. Is it going to make me wish that I wasn't going to Germany in December? I was going to Italy instead. Perhaps. I'm kind of getting the coins out of my pocket right now. I'm trying to delay this. Okay. Here we go. I got a pocket full of coins. Let's do this. Let's make some trash. This is the trashy episode. Hey, guys. Smash that like button. We can get to 100 likes. I will get this Italian coffee. I'm waiting for your 100 likes. What happened? How long can you wait before just refund your money? Let's get to 100 likes. Oh, that was easy. That was crazy. That took like two seconds. All right. Yeah. More coins. It's just not what I wanted. But what I do want is what's in here. Let's make some trash. Oh, it's hot. Oh, yeah. This is nice and hot. The Georgia Italia blend coffee.

00:15:47 John Daub: So it has the round, the flavor of the essence of the coffee is part of this, basically. Let's try this one. Oh, look at this. Do you guys feel Italy now? I totally want to ride a gondola through Venice now. Thank you, Georgia, for bringing us a little piece of Italy. And thank you for this. I've just released Italy into Japan. Smells like coffee. Oh, Italians like it strong and sweet with very little milk. Slight creamy taste. Espresso. Super sweet. Like they dropped not one, but two, not two, but three sugars. Because just it seems like Coca-Cola had a lot of leftover sugar. They just decided to put it in this coffee.

00:17:03 John Daub: This is the weird thing with this coffee here. It tastes strong, but it has such a weak taste on the side of the tongues. There's very little bitterness. So it makes me think it's more flavoring and less coffee. Very little bitterness. So it doesn't taste real. Yeah, that's not real coffee. There's like no bitterness. It's got a slight coffee taste, but no bitterness, so it can't be real. All right. Sorry, Georgia. Good effort. I love the art. In fact, that might be worth a dollar just so I could say I held Italy in my hands. But I got to say it's not worthy of the name coffee. Actually, they don't even use coffee. Wait a second. They didn't. Oh, this coffee is written right there. Coffee. That's another reason to learn katakana (one of Japanese syllabaries). If you learn katakana, you can start to read things like coffee. But it doesn't actually say coffee on the can. So it just says coffee smell.

00:18:05 John Daub: So let's just throw that in. Let's just throw this away. All right. So you can pour this into the gutter if you don't want it. And then you can dispose of it in the proper can. They all look like they go in the same place, but the small can for... There you go. Thank you, Coca-Cola. Thank you very much. That was fun. We created some trash. But yeah, the vending machines... Japan has a very high rate of recycling. Meaning that they say that the price of canned drinks has not gone up because they get the money back through recycling. But that's what I've heard. I don't know if that's true. For me, greed, I think, would be... I don't see how a can of anything can be more than $1.20 anyways. Just because there's not that much inflation in Japan.

00:19:06 John Daub: Now Ginza, by the way, guys. I just want to take you really quickly through Ginza. If you get off of the main street, you're going to see a lot more interesting stuff in Ginza. This is one street off of Chuo Dori (Central Street). It's so quiet in here. You can see we're in between the buildings. And it's the alleyways of Ginza that have a lot of secrets in them. Check it out. Here's another alley between the buildings. They're clean. Here's another alley, you see. And sometimes you'll see bars and shops in between there. This is the reason why I like Ginza. The main street's cool. You'll get a lot of tourists. And then you'll get all the locals on the side streets. Because they know about these little places that are just so invaluable. Like bars and little shops.

00:19:53 John Daub: You can see a lot of satellite shops from Hiroshima, I think is on this street. There's a shop from Akita Prefecture. You can get lots of goods. I think you can even get decent okonomiyaki (savory pancake). And Kanae and I looked at this dress shop too for the wedding last year. But it was so expensive. But she really liked it. Here's the Yamagata Satellite Shop from Yamagata. Hello. Yamagata. Thank you. Thank you. Let's go to Yamagata. Wow. See, there you go. They're all from Yamagata promoting Yamagata Prefecture. There's tons of satellite shops from all the prefectures. In fact, you don't even have to go to Yamagata. You can get a lot of the stuff from Yamagata here. I do this with a lot of my patrons, the Daimyo. If I know of an item that I really want to share with people and I didn't get them when I was on a trip, I can buy it at the satellite shops here. And that's pretty cool.

00:21:01 John Daub: Like I did that with the shop I'm taking you to right now. I just want to show the Daimyo from Patreon where I got their stuff. And I'm going to end the live stream here. Once again, you can see on the street, no trash cans. There's zero trash cans. Nothing. There's a Rimowa bag. But you can't consider that trash because it costs too much. Rimowa is like the Rolls Royce of luggage. It's true. I mean, I don't know why anyone would want to buy a bag that people would want to steal because it's so expensive. You buy a bag so nobody wants to steal. That's kind of cool art. Look at the way that the... It's like Japan and the West meeting. I like that. It's so cool. There's the chrysanthemums. Nice.

00:22:03 John Daub: And then we're going to end the live stream right up here. Trash can. Left side. See that? Prime target. So, yeah, there's another place where you can throw the trash away. Family Mart or 7-Eleven. Or, you know, I don't go in and there's a McDonald's straight ahead. I don't throw the trash away there because I feel like I should buy McDonald's stuff, but I don't. But you could. No one would fault you. Here's the other shop. And this is where the Daimyo stuff came from this month. It came from the Okinawa Satellite Shop. And it's just something that defines... Look at that. That's Goya Champuru (Okinawan stir-fry), I think. He really likes it. And the Okinawa shop has Okinawa beer and has Okinawa snacks. It's so cool. And they have the purple potato snack. And this month, anyone who is a Daimyo supporter is going to be receiving a box of purple potato snacks.

00:23:16 John Daub: From McDonald's. The McDonald's was giving away and that campaign ended. But you can also still get Beni Imo (purple sweet potato) here in Ginza at the Okinawa Satellite Shop. And inside is just a piece of Okinawa. Ow! And it's shut right in front of us.

00:23:43 John Daub: Can you give a rundown of how trash recycling is separated? Sure. I can do that because we just passed a trash can. That's a great question. Thanks, Ivanj. So basically, everything is separated at the house. And in your home, you will separate the trash. Certain days of the week will have pick-up days for trash. I guess in my community, Tuesday and Friday is burnable trash. Wednesday is non-burnable. If you have big garbage, you can call and reserve. And you have to buy stickers from the convenience store that will... You put on the trash and then they know to pick it up. If they don't have the stickers on it, then you can get in trouble because you're supposed to pay a little tax. And you can get those stickers. I guess they have like Class A, Class B, Class C stickers. So depending on the type of garbage you're throwing away, whether it's like a laptop or a sofa, you have to put a certain amount of stickers. Each one can be like 300 yen or 500 yen. And you write your name on the sticker and you slap it on there. And then you call and then you put it outside your apartment and they'll come and pick it up.

00:25:02 John Daub: There's usually three categories of trash. There's burnable, which is moyaseru gomi (burnable trash) or moeru gomi (burnable trash). There's pet bottles. And then there's cans and glass. Bin (glass bottle) is glass and kan (can) is can. And if you can read katakana, you'll be able to read bin and kan. And you can read here very clearly bin bottle. And you can read in here moyaseru gomi, which is burnable. You have to also separate this in your home. And if you have a bag and you just put all the trash in there, in Japan what we do is we will literally open up the bag and just start sorting it into the proper receptacle.

00:25:52 John Daub: If you ride the Shinkansen (bullet train), when you arrive, you'll see people lined up to throw their trash away. It's kind of a neat thing to see, but everybody has a sense of personal responsibility in Japan. They also have special trash like tatami where they will grind up the tatami at the trash receiving plant and they'll recycle that as well. So everything in a way gets recycled one way or another. The costs are very high. But if everybody does it together, I think the cost of not doing it is greater for the society. So I'm glad that we do have a very robust recycling plan in Japan.

00:26:24 John Daub: And it's a topic that I might be doing for the livestream. I'm not sorry for the main episode in 2019 because I actually have the business card of the guy in charge of the recycling program in Tokyo, which is going to be pretty awesome. And Osaka has a pretty unique trash system. So there you have it. This is Ginza, the classiest city, the Beverly Hills of Tokyo, I guess you could say. And we found trash bins. So I hope this is useful for you. I hope it was fun. I do appreciate it if you do subscribe to the livestreaming channel.

00:27:02 John Daub: I still can't believe that we haven't actually gotten the request to get the plaque for the 100,000 subscribers yet from Google. But hopefully this week I'll be able to apply for it and it should come in by next month. Because I want to hold it up and show you guys. It's been a pretty incredible ride over the last year and a half to see this channel grow. I just did a collaboration with Scotty from Strange Parts. You might want to go check that out. Scotty has a channel in Shenzhen, China where he takes parts and builds stuff. And we went around Akihabara on his channel and it's sure to be a hit because everything Scotty does is pretty cool. And I have three episodes on the main channel coming this month. One of them is a tie-up or a collaboration with Mike Chen from Strictly Dumpling. I'm waiting... He's also got a video of his own where we both ate sushi. And what else is there? I have a scuba diving episode and I also have an episode coming December 3rd. Which is on Vermeer, which is an artist from Holland and why he's so incredibly popular here in Japan. That's going to be a pretty exciting one because I interviewed the biggest otaku probably in Japan on classical art. Yes, there are classical art otaku. It's true.

00:28:21 John Daub: Alright everybody, have a great day. Have a great night wherever you are. Hope you enjoyed this. See you on the other side. Bye from Ginza. Hey look, there's a no rubbish sign up on the corner. Pretty cool. You're a good guy, buddy.