00:00:04 John Daub: Hello everybody, greetings to Shimokitazawa. Shimokitazawa is a neighborhood not too far away from Shibuya and Shinjuku. You can get there on the Keio Inokashira Line, which is right here. And you can also get here on the Odakyu Line, which is right here. They kind of intersect right here at Shimokitazawa. This is an amazing neighborhood to walk around, to stroll around, to see, to have lunch. There's a lot of history here and a good story about why people are actually here, why it hasn't changed that much over the years. We're going to go over this in this really interesting walk and look around Shimokitazawa. This is what you subscribe for. So join us as we walk through going this direction. I get completely lost. I haven't been here in a while, so I had to get my bearings before I started the live stream.

00:01:03 John Daub: This place has changed a lot. As you can see, there's a lot of construction going on, a lot of it to fix the area up before the 2020 Olympics. This will be a very busy place. It's considered to be a hipster town. Some of the words they use to describe it are bohemian. You'll find a lot of craft beer places, those kinds of people. People who wear Keens, maybe Birkenstocks. You know the type. I'm not one of them. I just wear Keens because they're comfortable. It's really close to Shibuya and Shinjuku. You can take the Odakyu Line from Shinjuku, about five minutes, two stops. Then you can take the Inokashira Line also, about five minutes as well. But if you want to walk here, I came by Chōtō Line to Yoyogi-Uehara Station and walked about 15 minutes. You get lost in the winding roads of Shimokitazawa.

00:02:12 John Daub: Let me go over a little bit of the history before we start to walk and get completely lost. I don't know if I'm going to be able to find my way here. This area is famous for being in the Edo period just a farm field. There was nothing here. It wasn't until after the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923 that people started to come over here to live because the city was dangerous. They didn't like the risks of living downtown anymore. There were fires, buildings collapsing. So they came out here to live, and it wasn't until 1923-1924 that this became a residential neighborhood. People started to move here. Thus, there's just chaos. I guess it was because people settled here so quickly. They didn't make a grid system or anything. They just needed a place to live after the earthquake.

00:03:01 John Daub: People started to move here after World War II. This wasn't bombed so much. There were lots of fires in the city, destroyed in the center. Shimokitazawa, which is kind of like the countryside of Tokyo in a way, separated. It would take a good hour to walk here from Shinjuku or Shibuya. This area wasn't so touched by World War II according to history. I wasn't here. After World War II, this was a place where a lot of GIs would come. Very famous for having secondhand markets. You'll find used clothes, even used hats, used everything. Bags you can find here at a really big discount. But that's what gives this place this vibe. It's local. Not a lot of chain shops, although I see a lot right now. But it's changing just like the rest of the city. Not a lot of chain shops which makes this place really refreshing. It is a breath of fresh air if you don't like Harajuku. If you're tired of the center of the city, you want to take a break and walk around someplace that seems more local but still in Tokyo, that is here, Shimokitazawa.

00:04:11 John Daub: This is a place where you can get lost, where you wander the streets. A lot of the GIs after World War II came here for the markets to buy used stuff. In the 1970s, this is when it became a hipster town. All the hippies were here. You see Caldi, Jennifer's chain. The hippies in the 1970s made it what it is today, kind of that vibe which sticks with this town. It hasn't changed much, and I think the locals like it that way. Very trendy. Some of the other words that come to mind when you think of Shimokitazawa: musicians, indie bands, local productions, directors. A lot of screenings for local movies. Little small businesses in the arts are based here. There are also a lot of theaters in this area. So if you want to see plays and stuff with a little bit more edge to it, you're going to come to Shimokitazawa.

00:05:35 John Daub: Again, here we go. Some used clothes out here, or are they new? It's hard to tell. It's just right out here off the road. Hey, Derby-chan, bring something back for Kanae. Photo looks. Hawaii's here. Hey, Austin. Look at this place from Canada. I heard about this place. This is one of the only places in Tokyo where you can get poutine. So Canadians are probably going to not come here, but maybe they should. Taste some Canadian poutine done different. That looks a lot smaller than the ones I had in Montreal. Poutine is like cheese curds on fries with gravy. It's awesome. We had that in Montreal at a meetup last Christmas. It was amazing. So Robson Fries is here. That was neat to see.

00:06:46 John Daub: Here's some more used clothes, used items. A mix of all sorts of things here. But this is not Don Quijote, but it sort of looks like it. This one is called T4. If you look up, you can see used vintage clothing, men's and ladies. And it has every map of the world. It's kind of neat. Let's just take a quick look inside. Wow, that's like a museum of stuff. There's price tags written on it like 300 yen plus tax. I love the vibe here. You can just stroll around. I tell people they always ask me, where should I go in Tokyo? What should I do here? And I say, make a day where you don't plan anything and you just kind of walk around the streets and get lost. And this is the kind of place where you might want to do that, Shimokitazawa. It just feels like you're always discovering something. You turn left and right and there's something new there.

00:08:05 John Daub: Look up here. This looks like a brand new sign, but it's a second street reuse shop. Another recycle shop with used clothing. Tons of these shops. So if you're looking for vintage clothing stuff that might be in a different style or yesterday's style, you'll be able to find it here in Shimokitazawa. Another Rainbow Kitchen serving natural cafe and dining. What do they got on the menu here? Buffalo chicken wings. Hey, now that looks pretty good, 600 yen for that. That's pretty reasonable. They got tacos down here. Beer starts at a reasonable 450 yen for a draft Heartland, Corona's 550 yen, which is like five bucks. Not bad at all. You can see there's some hipsters right there coming towards us.

00:09:23 John Daub: We're going to totally get lost. I'm not going back the way I came, going to keep going to new places. But I love the vibe here. This is a mom and pop shop. You can tell because no chain would use that. It's nice to see because in today's world, everything is shopping malls going out of business because of Amazon and online sales. And here people will still come out and shop from mom and pop places like this. The dream of owning a shop is still very much alive here as a small business. And that's a very good thing. Here's another lunch menu. They have hot cups and drinks, coffee, hojicha (roasted green tea) with less caffeine. They got some good stuff on the menu. It's also a place where you can get a cheap lunch as well. The magic price for lunch is 500 yen, one coin.

00:10:36 John Daub: Look at that. You get this is a cleaning locker. I guess you can put your stuff in here for after hours pickup maybe. You have to pick it up within two days. That's interesting. I did not know that. The hours, you know, I heard here that the hours for places and there's a karaoke place here on the right side. They open a little bit later. Everything tends to open around 11 a.m. So you don't want to come here too early. Maybe sleep in or explore another area or walk here from Shinjuku or Shibuya. It takes about an hour. And by the time you get here, things will be open because it's sort of bohemian. Things open later. People just are kind of more laid back here.

00:11:50 John Daub: Here's another cafe. This is not a chain, Cafe Normale. They got some pretty neat looking burgers. A little smaller, but the price is right. You can get these as takeout. This is namahamu (raw ham) and mozzarella for 399 yen, which is about $4 with tax. The dessert looks pretty good, too. I think this would be pretty neat to chill outside right here in the corner and watch people walk by. Right by the big avocado right there. Ronald writes in, what are the street names? You know what, Ronald? This place, even if I give you the street names, there's just really no way to navigate this. Because of the way this town was set up in this area, Setagaya, a lot of the towns here after the Great Kantō Earthquake are just illogical. There's no way to really navigate unless you just walk the streets here often. And I don't do that. So I expect to get lost. I expect to find cacti on the corner.

00:13:02 John Daub: This is cacti being sold on the corner. But yet it's also a restaurant here. They're advertising bōnenkai (end-of-year parties). All you can drink and eat for 3,500 yen, which is a pretty good deal. Here's a takeout coffee. It's a very stylish looking coffee, Oto Coffee. But inside of Oto Coffee, they're selling clothing. This place here sells cactuses and it's also like a bar. You can sit outside here. This looks like a really nice quiet side street. Lots of alleys just winding all over the place. You can sit outside here, have lunch, have a beer, have a Corona. And then you can buy some cactus, I guess. Take what you like and pay for it inside. I love the way that they write the Japanese here, too. I always tell everybody what's the best way to study Japanese. Learn katakana and hiragana. If you can read katakana, you can read this menu. This says dessert, chocolate waffle, cinnamon sugar waffle. You can read this if you learn katakana. And once you read katakana, the Japanese language gets a lot easier. That's the shortcut.

00:14:44 John Daub: This is a cafe on the corner here, Oto Cafe combined with a shop that sells vintage clothing. Look at that. Is that not awesome? She's selling coffee here on the corner and selling vintage clothes. That combination means that you never really go out of business because you've diversified. This is a vintage place where people are looking for this. Oh, look at this. This is a throwback of a stationary store. Look at this, Kikuya. The sign looks like it goes all the way back to like the 1950s and definitely family owned. You can look at all the stickers and seals on the side of it here. Inside is all sorts of stationery. Stationery is becoming less and less important because everyone's on digital phones. They have some Christmas cards out here. That's nice.

00:15:46 John Daub: Here's a takeaway lemonade stand. You're starting to see a little bit more street food. This is a tapioca place on the corner. And this parking lot has been turned into a place where you can eat and sit and drink. No cars allowed. That's pretty nice. So you can have a tapioca drink right here. Very cool. Hey, Zato71's in the house. Greetings. Shimokitazawa is a place where you walk around and get lost. And you'll discover a lot of things that way. I can't tell you the street names. But I will put a link in the description so you can find a map of where this is.

00:16:33 John Daub: Manhole cover. That's Tokyo's manhole cover, which is a sakura cherry blossom. Alright, I have right here in my pocket a map. I'm going to show you exactly where Shimokitazawa is. Whoa, look at that pink truck. Things are just different here. This is our treasure map. This is Akihabara, here's Tokyo Bay, here's Tokyo Station, here's the Imperial Palace in the middle of it. Shinjuku is right here, and Shibuya is right here. These are the two closest places to Shimokitazawa. And I kind of outlined the entire neighborhood here. Up here is Nakano. So you can walk in about an hour from Nakano, from Shinjuku or Shibuya. Probably Shibuya is a little bit closer. And then down here you can see the intersection between the two train lines. Shimokitazawa is between two train lines. And that makes it pretty neat because it's easy to get here either from Shibuya or Shinjuku. It's a little bit outside of the center. Here's the Yamanote Line. About two or three stops. That makes it countryside.

00:18:01 John Daub: I've walked here from Shibuya before. It's a good hour. Wow, I love the little art here. Kids have drawn on the asphalt here. If you ever really study it and take a look at it, you'll see lots of designs that you wouldn't see. There's always Anpanman. Kids always draw an Anpanman. It's good to know those characters. And then here's some urban art here. Looks like a diverse neighborhood. Lots of different kinds of people. It's changed a lot over the years. Across there you can see a steak place. Again, loads and loads of little restaurants, family run, not so many chains. This is the place where you can get discount tickets for either the theater or for Shinkansen. Oh, there goes the train. Here comes the train. I think that's the Odakyu Line coming in.

00:19:10 John Daub: We've gone around this area of Shimokitazawa. Here's one of the side streets. This will cut back to where we walked across to. We've just gone in a circle around here. Let's go back to the station. We're going to go to the other side. I'm going to show you where a lot of the theaters are. On the other side is, I would say, Tokyo's big theater district. There's a yakiniku place because it says niku. And it's really neat because you can sit outside and enjoy your lunch and dinner. That pink truck is the beer truck. They're bringing kegs of beer, restocking up for tonight. This is a chain right here. So you get to see the station front is changing quite a bit compared to five years ago. Last time I was here, I did not see many chains at all. Maybe just a supermarket, a couple of shops, a few language schools. Here's a supermarket right here on the left side.

00:20:24 John Daub: As the beer man makes his delivery at rapid pace. Somebody really needs to get their beer. Let's see what vegetables are going for. It's nice to see right here on the side of the street. You get a big box of tomatoes for $4. I think these are from Kumamoto. That's pretty reasonable. Mikan season is right now in December. Around the end of November to about February or so, you get mikans, and that's the vitamin C that people eat tons of these to try to ward off sickness. Avocados have become popular. When I came here 20 years ago, you couldn't find avocados anywhere. And now they're just everywhere, all from Mexico. So that's good to see. But yeah, the avocado boom is here. And some mikans you can see from all over. What's a good mikan? I like my mikans from Fukuoka, usually really good. Shizuoka has some good ones. Island areas, Kagoshima down Kyushu has maybe the best.

00:21:37 John Daub: Look at these. Do you know what these are? These are called kinkan (kumquats). Kinkan are super small oranges, citrus fruit. And you can eat the whole thing, you eat the skin. I remember the first time I ate kinkan, I tried to peel it. When some local was laughing at me, he wouldn't tell me why. And then I learned by watching other people, they just eat the whole thing. And it gives a slight bitterness to it with a nice sweetness to the middle of it. Yeah, kinkan are so good. If you do come, you can get a box of these for $3. And just snack on them. Make sure you wash them. Oh man, I love kinkan. They're really good in Shikoku Island. You'll find them all over the place. And of course, it's strawberry season here. Strawberries are going for about 500 yen, 498 for a pack. This one is the Tochi Otome. There's tons of varieties of strawberries. They smell so good here on the street. Ichigo-san. These are so beautiful, these dessert strawberries. And then we have the kaki (persimmons) here. And then apples. It's apple season up in Aomori. So you get some of that. And of course, some La France, which is a pear.

00:23:07 John Daub: The beer guy, he moves fast. On the right side of the supermarket, there's another yakiniku restaurant. So loads of places to get some meat. There's also an Asian flavor restaurant. These places over here on this side of the city, tons and tons of tabehōdai (all-you-can-eat). And it's 1,000 yen. That's ridiculously cheap. This is Indian curry for 1,000 yen or about $9, $10, all you can eat. Oh man, butter chicken curry, spinach chicken curry, green pea curry, keema curry, vegetarian curry, bean curry. There's something for everybody, including the vegetarians. Shish kebabs, cheese naan, naan, biryani rice, vegetable pakora. Set A, set B. Maybe I'll come back here for this. All you can eat Indian curry. Kanae will be mad if I end up eating there.

00:24:09 John Daub: Let's go back this way towards the station and wrap around. Some of you might be wondering, boy, this place is really cool. How much does it cost to live here? Let's have a look. That is small, this apartment. There's a little balcony. It's a two-minute walk. The balcony is so small. It's nine tatami mats. You can see the toilet and the sink and the bathtub right here. It's so small. How much is this? It's a little bit over $700 a month for that closet size. This one looks a little bit bigger, but an older building, built in 1982. It requires one month deposit and one month key money. So you got to pay upfront about $1,700 and you get this place. It looks kind of old though, but it's got a lot more space to it. One room, flooring. That is not big at all. I can't do that anymore. I used to live in a place just like that called Futako-Tamagawa, not that far away from here. I paid $1,000 a month. Actually, the school paid. I was an English teacher. It was a 1K, six or seven tatami mats. But the good thing was it had a Murphy bed. In the olden days, you used to have these beds that would go into the wall and you could pull them down. So it saved a lot of space. But it was just too small. I spent most of my time at the Mr. Donut across the street.

00:26:12 John Daub: Gyoza restaurant. A lot of drinking is going on here. What is this here? A Rakuten shop? I guess Rakuten is now competing with Docomo and SoftBank. And they're also doing cell phone service. Rakuten is like the Amazon competitor. They got their hands in everything. Pretty cheap, 24 gigabytes a month for about $50. That's not too bad. It starts at 2 gigs a month for about $15. Skyhōdai, all you can use. Interesting. I didn't know much about that. Here's a haircut place called Cut Factory. It's about $10 for a haircut. Not too bad. Alright, we're back here where we started. That's the Odakyu Line. Here's Shimokitazawa Station.

00:27:25 John Daub: I was contacted by this guy, Mr. Poo. His associate said that he's such a kind guy and he'd like to meet me. But I never met him. Just wasn't really interested in meeting him. I'm a man who walks around with poo on his head. Not that there's anything wrong with it. This is a local sentō (public bath). I made a video on many of these in this area with the local sentō association. Because a lot of them are going out of business. After World War II, people started to build houses with plumbing. And there was no need to go to the public baths as much. Just the old timers go by habit. I go because it sort of feels like I'm more in Japan. So the Honda Theater is right there. That's one of the big theaters. I think there's six or seven theaters that you can go to here in Shimokitazawa. That's a lot. So at night time, we gotta come back at night because it's gonna be so lit up. Lots of little bars. At night, people come here drinking a lot. The roads are so super narrow here. It's very hard to drive through. It's also quite congested.

00:29:02 John Daub: So we're now on the other side of the tracks here. And we're gonna walk around and get lost and then loop back around. Again, I highly recommend if you do come to Shimokitazawa to just wander. Take a day and just wander. Wow, they call it a sushi go-around restaurant. You can see inside of there the sushi going around. Prices are reasonable, about 100 yen. You'll find weird art. Not just graffiti, but throwback to another era. Look at that. Here's a supermarket down there. Look at that building back there. It just doesn't seem to fit, and yet it really does. This is like the bubble era architecture here, slapped up in the 70s and 80s. And it's still here. See that brick there and then next to it this green building that looks like it's from a different country, right next to an escalator and a little skyscraper. Supermarket with a Uniqlo inside. It just doesn't make sense. The architecture is just so mixed up. That's what makes it really interesting to walk around and look. All the bicycles, all the little detail, all the cracks in the street. It gives this area so much personality.

00:30:44 John Daub: Tapioca. The boom is dying out though. Tapioca is not as popular as it used to be. No longer are the days where people would line up for an hour to get tapioca. Here's a 2LDK, 7 minute walk from the station, $1,000. You can see two rooms and a dining kitchen. Pricey here. And that's a 7 minute walk which means it's probably a 10 minute walk. Whenever they do the measurements for walking, it's some guy who walks really fast. Oh, you see this truck right here? What they do is they go around the neighborhoods taking the bicycles. All these bicycles that are illegally parked, he's come here to take them away. They made a sign: don't park your bike here, go around to the back of this supermarket. But even in Japan, they don't do that. They'll park in the front which is convenient. And this truck is here to take them away. And they're gonna lose their bikes. It's very rare that you'll see personal belongings being taken away by the city. First, they'll give you a warning, they'll put a tag on your handlebar. And if you have a tag when this guy comes around, he's gonna take your bike away.

00:33:15 John Daub: Here's the ticket king. There's another discount ticket place. You can get Shinkansen tickets for maybe $10 off from here. Again, the back area here is more residential. It's a maze. You don't have to buy the tickets from JR at the station. You can get them at places like this and save money. I've never been ripped off or had somebody give fake tickets. That just doesn't happen in Japan, not from a store. They'll get in trouble. Alright, let's go walk a little bit. There's a little cafe, restaurant. Joe Hatab. Where is Joe? Joe is in Russia right now. He left Japan about three days ago. Good friend of mine from the Arab world, one of the biggest YouTubers. It's nice when he calls me and we can hang out for a little bit. Wow, there's a Burger King coming in here. That's kind of rare to see chains coming into this area. But it's inevitable. I guess the real estate has to go or people can't afford.

00:34:20 John Daub: Here's another shop that you can buy used clothes and things from different cultures. Across the street, there's another one, a used clothing store, domestic style. They'll buy it too. If you want to sell something, bring it over here. You never know. You can fill your suitcase with used clothes, come here and sell it, and then buy more used clothes and take it back. Every time you come to Japan, just keep buying new used clothes. It's one way to do it. Interesting. This here is a Chinese tapioca restaurant next to a doner kebab. So it's kind of neat to see all sorts of international foods popping up. I saw the Korean cheese dog too, not too far away. Oh, there's the place that Simon and Martina took me to. I've never been there in 20 years of living here. But I probably won't be going here very often either. This place is called Tori Kizoku. I've never been to Tori Kizoku before. Simon and Martina took me there and said, you've never been to Tori Kizoku? It's cheap, it's decent, it's a chain, it's everywhere. It's alright. I've always been somebody who cooks for himself here in Japan. I'll go to the supermarket and cook. And now Kanae and I, we mostly eat at home. There's another one across the street. How crazy is that?

00:36:16 John Daub: Usually you can order it from like an iPad on the table. And the food comes pretty quickly. Let's look at the menu. Whoa! You can get a mega beer, mega alcohol. It's $3. It's not bad. Dakitori. It's a good menu. Minchi katsu. They don't open until 5pm and 4pm. They close at 4am, last order at 3am. So it's an izakaya. There's Mr. Donuts. Good ol' Mr. Donuts. And then you can look down the street here. I love it. It's so friendly. It's like a walk-friendly town. It's a place where you can stroll around and get lost. Don't ask me where I am. I remember somebody asked me. And just getting off of the street, it turns into residential. You don't have to go far before you hit residential areas. Bike parking is a problem. And you'll see all over the area places that'll guide you where to park your bike. But let's take a quick look at this. What are the fines like? If they take your bicycle, you have to pay $30 to get it back. And if they take your bike or motorcycle, small motorcycles called bikes, it's about $40, 4,000 yen to get it back. It's a retrieval fee. Interesting. So don't park your bike. And they've actually listed the parking spots and places where you can't park, which is right where that truck is. These bicycles are... And then of course there's always young people who'll just park right next to it. Right next to the sign that says don't park. Another thing that you can't do here is smoke while walking. It's pretty strict too. And you'll have an old lady tell you, don't do it.

00:38:32 John Daub: Deadly Ravers here. Love your show. I hope you'll make a video for Yokosuka one day. I was thinking of going down there and visiting some friends. It's hard not to have friends at one of the military bases. Yokosuka is the naval base and there's some really cool places around there. I always miss the friendship day because they put it on in the summer when they have all of the fireworks festivals. I've been there once in 20 years. It's not enough. Again, when a truck does come, you have to kind of go to the side and wait for it to pass through. Konnichiwa. This looks like a really nice coffee shop. Hai, shōkai shimasu. He said, introduce a lot of places. Look at this place. It's a coffee shop. You can smell it out the door. And they serve all sorts of coffee pots and things like this that you would need for coffee. The Melitta coffee pots here. So if you just want to make it at home or in your hotel room, you could pick up something. Oh, look at that old roaster. Wow, that's how you do it. There's just something cool about doing it the old-fashioned way. Because nowadays, everything seems so plastic.

00:40:14 John Daub: Alright, lots of restaurants here. Some discounts. There's another tabehōdai, Genghis-khan like a barbecue. Look at that meat tower. Now I'm getting hungry. Alright, it's time to find some street food. Let's see what we can find here. I like the plastic models. That omurice looks good. Underneath there is rice under all that tomato. That karaage looks amazing. How much is that karaage? Everything seems to be about 900 yen. Alright, there's a karaage teishoku. It's about 900 yen. Very good. All the power lines in Japan are about the same. They're all above ground because of earthquakes. There's a Daiso here. Again, the chains are coming in. So you got the 100 yen shop here in Shimokitazawa as well, not too far from the station. So you can get a blue sheet and things to have a picnic. If it's raining, you can grab an umbrella really cheap or a rain poncho. That's good to know.

00:41:32 John Daub: Here's another used clothing store. Again, if you look up, sometimes they go to third, fourth floor. These look like they could be residential places but sometimes they turn the residential places into little shops too as you've seen. We've seen like hybrid shops where they'll be selling coffee on the corner and inside will be a vintage clothing store. It does a Miller Time, that's awesome. Wow, all you can drink for ten dollars, food is separate, it's about a hundred yen for each yakitori. That's pretty reasonable. Oh gosh I'm getting hungry. I haven't seen any of the street food. I came here from Yoyogi-Uehara Station on the Chiyoda Line, walked here, took about 20 minutes. And I'm now looking for, I passed a bunch of street foods. Whoa, check it out, they're making udon. That would be good for lunch. Getting hungry. It's nice you can see inside of the kitchen while they're making the udon, stretching out the dough. Udon is always made fresh. I don't think people will eat at an udon shop if it's not made fresh.

00:43:11 John Daub: This is the chain from Shikoku, it's quite good. They have everything in English, which is interesting. They didn't have this a couple of years ago but with all the foreign tourists coming, everything is now being translated into English. There's mentaiko egg udon that looks amazing. This is spicy fish eggs on top of a bowl and you can see the eggs tossed in there with the dashi underneath. They're really thick udon noodles, so cheap. Udon is a perfect lunch. Love the eggs on top of it, the mentaiko. Kamatama udon, check that out. Next to the egg is the spicy fish roe and the eggs in Japan are amazing raw. You think if it's not something that you do in your culture, here look at the color of it, they're so nutritious. Raw eggs in Japan are good. This place is Tsuke-men. Alright, tsukemen restaurant. You can get the tsukemen, order it from the vending machine here and then you give the ticket to the owner. That's what you're gonna get. It smells great outside. Oh they got the hanjuku tamago, check it out. This is just slightly congealed egg. Tsukemen is like ramen, I guess it's sort of the noodles are different but you pick it up and you dip it and then you eat it. What's great about it is that the noodles are cold and the soup is hot and when you warm the noodles up it brings out the noodles. So you don't want to eat it when it's hot. It's nice to have the soup warm it up and because the noodles are cold it cools down the soup. It's a win-win. Tsukemen is incredible.

00:45:09 John Daub: Loads of steak places. I know when I came here 20 years ago Japan didn't really eat a lot of beef. Meat was something that was like you'd add it into food as an enhancer, it was never really the main dish. But nowadays steaks are everywhere. You can smell it out here on the street in this area. Steak, more vintage clothes. Someone saw the Uruguay flag, there's the beef smell. This is a net cafe. You're not seeing these as much as you're used to as well as people all have smartphones. But net cafes are also places that are open 24 hours. If you miss your last train, a lot of people hole up here in the middle of the night and get a booth and just surf the net until first train, which is like 5:45 or so and then they'll go home. Oh look at these clothing for little doggies. It's pretty cool, this is a family-run shop as well, Pet Smile. Very cool.

00:46:49 John Daub: So we're just about the end of the street here. Let's walk a little bit around here, we're gonna wrap around and go towards Shimokitazawa station. I'm pretty sure this is the way I walked. There's some street food on the way and then yeah we'll wrap things up. If you want to see me eat some street food let's get to 500 likes shall we. This is the challenge to the community. This is where the thumbnail was taken right here. You see that, I love the little art that you'll find on the walls walking around Shimokitazawa. This one's kind of famous, this street here. Let's take a closer look. That kind of just summarizes Shimokitazawa. Very good, very artistic. Vintage clothing, used clothing but it's starting to lose just a little bit. I don't feel the same way as I did when I was here five years ago and for the first time like a couple of decades ago. It's just always evolving. There's more chains now, even the people they're less hippie-ish and that makes sense because we're so far removed from the 1970s. But it just it's different, it's different than it was.

00:48:31 John Daub: I love that the clothing outside, a bicycle, a mother of two. You can see she's got a baby carriage in the front, a baby carriage in the back. Alright let's go to the intersection here, we'll walk around and wrap around to some street food maybe get there's a ton of construction you can hear it everywhere. This is more used places here, this is a thrift shop, Tokyo used clothing. Looks like the Salvation Army doesn't it. Got to go up the stairs. I like how they use the wall with hooks, you can see what they have on offer. Some Michael Jordan 1980s sweatshirts, look at that bad boy. This is Chicago. This is famous, you'll find this shop in Harajuku. This is the Shimokitazawa shop, they have a pretty good selection of used clothing up here. This one is different and it's worth shopping, it's worth jumping into different Chicagos. You can find different things at each one of them. They typically try to separate things in the categories. If you can't find a size at the one in Harajuku you can come here and find the one here. You'll find it all. Look at that like the 1980s North Face kind of looking color, mustard yellow is not in style anymore is it. These are nice, that's a really thick flannel, that's got to be warm. Oh look at these trench coats, looks like Columbo was here. Whoa this is a Negan jacket. Wonder if they sell baseball bats inside, Negan's whole gang can get their jackets here.

00:50:43 John Daub: Alright let's go down this other street here, yakitori place. This whole live stream just to give you an overview. I think a lot of people before they make the trip here they kind of want to get an idea what's in this area, what's in Shimokitazawa. I think if you watch this for an hour you better know. That's a really cheap Chinese cuisine place, they got good gyoza in there. I would say it's good, it's like commercial chain stuff but it'll fill you up. So I'm gonna pan around here. He's directing traffic because of all the construction. This is a lot of intersections and this plaza here is pretty lively. I bet you at night you grab a couple of beers from the convenience store and just sit around and drink. I get that kind of a feeling like that's maybe what people might do. There's an eikaiwa (English conversation) school on the corner. Neil's place, 15 minutes of kaiwa conversation English for 300 yen, that's pretty cheap. How does Neil stay in business.

00:52:02 John Daub: Alright we're gonna go down here, cars can't come down this road so I'm pretty sure I came down here before. Oh look at this little shrine on the corner here. Hello you found me I'm in the middle. We came all the way from Australia to find you. Oh wow you've given us many videos to look at. We went on the Eizan Line the other day down Kyoto, awesome. We've got some amazing photos. So when you go up there in autumn looks absolutely amazing. Oh are the leaves still on the trees there? Yeah they are. I can show you something right. Oh yeah I heard it's super crowded though. Yeah it wasn't too bad actually it was really really pretty though.

00:52:52 John Daub: Um i'm not hoping you're doing live what was that were you nearby. Uh oh yeah we literally went on a John hunt and we get a card. Yeah here you go thank you. I better give it to you before I forget. Here you go. So this is Kurama Station oh wow. Yeah oh they fixed the nose that's good they had like cables out of it because of the typhoon. And I take a lot of photos of the trees but they were just really really pretty. And that's just the side of station. Uh and coming up you can see all the damage from the typhoon that you mentioned right. Um so and it's really pretty just to walk around as well this was just was recently yeah about three days ago oh good um you know that's just on the walk through yeah that's where i was in a few months ago yeah it was really really pretty and that's it your video that made us go up there um so we had a bit of a walk around up there and then we've just kept exploring and that's some of the damage from the uh yeah from the typhoon uh they clean it up a little bit though that's good yeah that's good.

00:54:01 Tim and Mel: So what brings you down this way?

00:54:07 John Daub: I don't know I haven't I was looking at the map of Tokyo and I said where haven't I been ever in a live stream Shimokitazawa was one of the places and we haven't been here either. Oh really it's down here it's a pretty cool vibe i'm looking for some street food um this is where the thumbnail was taken it's pretty neat right there oh nice so i uh shrine just on the corner here that's kind of neat um when you go on all of the residential train lines you can see all the shrines in the little villages yeah and the differences in the houses this is interesting why is this tree here like this it's like with the color the blue colored building in the background this could be like panama just kind of feels like it feels in australia we dress up our mobile phone towers as trees here i don't know all i know is that it's so green out here our country's on fire at the moment oh oh i'm sorry to hear that i hope everyone in australia is doing okay is it just in uh on new south wales wales and queensland a lot of fires happening there um and it's gonna get worse we're about to go through a heat wave so luckily we're here in 13 degree weather and at home yeah come 43 come evacuate evacuate to japan i'm sorry to hear but we'll we'll welcome you yeah come on up really good ramen here yes of course do they do good ramen in australia i haven't been able to find anything really decent now in fact we came here in may and i've just been whinging to my wife the whole time we need to come back because the ramen is just so good yeah um and there's a ramen place that i went to in singapore that has head supporters in tokyo so we had to find that here did you have the uh did you go to uh ichijoji ramen town no we didn't do that oh that's on the eizan line yeah yeah we we'd come here and we'd go to the eizan line and we'd go to the eizan line i just rode the eizan line i've got to um just went back we made the ramen but there is a ramen making course in osaka okay um not osaka um okay um and we did that you get to punch the ramen out and make it it's really fun and you get to eat it you get to eat it that's the fun part you get to eat it you get to eat it yeah you get to eat it you just have to follow her instructions because she says only one scoop and yeah i'm looking for street food are you hungry i was just gonna walk around a little bit yeah sure yeah um the line did you did you come this direction uh no we came down the street you walked down okay it was part of the john hunt it's like where is he now i know and because i don't know exactly where exactly where i am it's hard to tell anybody where i'm going next whoa what is that a thing john hunting i well there's lots of people that have been doing that's why i made those cards up you found me our friends are gonna be so jealous we'll just send them a photo of that saying we found it yeah yeah and then they'll go in and watch you can write shimokitazawa and the time i i i actually write that yeah i only made 400 of them i guess that's like that's like 200 and maybe that no it's you're yeah you're in the top top 100 let's put it like that oh look at that garlic steak well i'm all for um you love it let's see what we can find i'm all for um i think i walked this way but i didn't talk this way construction they always have two or three people to make sure you're safely patrolling the construction zones all right it just looks a little bit familiar i i have a feeling a tingle of street food somewhere around here i think they have some takoyaki i think they have some takoyaki but uh yeah this is on the french here i think if we make a left over there we wrap around back and forth and then we'll go to the other side to the station but uh do you have any questions we we did not get to 500 likes so technically i don't have to buy any street food but i i will i will like let me fix that we can we can use all the likes we can get so the likes we can get all right all right you can see the um odakyu line coming in from over there wow these look like the osaka oba-chan tiger prince what nico salon oh okay place this looks like street food what is this this is a meat roll i guess we can get this look at that these are meat rolls wow they have all these different kinds all right i'm i'm in i i could do this here let's see what they got here they have uh niku cheese curry that looks good cheese curry with with uh niniku and you can tomato cheese nik oh they all start with niku niku yeah niku there's some vegetables on there some kadokari that one's a little bit crispy all right i'm gonna try one of these here the kimchi looks good too down there and the natto would be the most challenging who wants who wants some natto what are you gonna have you have no idea i'll pass them fermented soybeans anyone why it looks so good doesn't it i think i think the the the cheese curry looks like the most interesting to me yeah the cheese curry but the ryū with the spicy chili oil also looks good taberu ryū all right let's get let i'm gonna go with the cheese curry then yeah yeah let's play it safe all right this sounds like copyright music here and hopefully we'll be okay uh hi cheese curry oh there's a menu right there you can get cocktails here too especially the cocktails starting from 100 yen for non-alcohol and about 300 yen for the alcohol that sounds pretty retro here are you hungry uh i don't know it i don't know if this is copyrighted music so i'm like wanting to get out of here really quickly yeah how do i go over the copyright music that's hard to do it just to i think maybe i can cut the audio i don't know when you get in these live streaming situations there's no way around it all right so i think our friends over there is going to get some i i've rudely not introduced myself properly um so i'll wait for them then introduce myself let's get off the street for a second here i can put the i can put this on a um on a tripod and uh as i said and i started this live stream the hipsters love this area i guess we found away from all of the shopping street there is where you're going to find some really interesting stuff you just walk around because shops in tokyo don't really stick around very often very long i mean every couple of years they'll change hey david kimura thank you i might be putting that to use for kanae's lunch by the way everybody we're going to the german market and putting the tripod on we're going to the german market christmas market in shiba park so if you're in tokyo later this afternoon we'll be there kanae sort of misses the german market we just got back from there but there's that all right let's just take a look and see what we've ordered here it's on a seaweed on seaweed on there i guess so it doesn't soak into the tissue and there's some cheese on there and curry sesame and around the rice in the middle of it is wrapped a piece of meat and smells pretty good there's some seaweed nori inside of the wrapper as well it does look messy it does look a little sloppy it's all right which one did you get the original the original we played it safe i did not as the internet is saying it looks sloppy the picture kind of made it look like an ocean it's like a saucy saucy roll yeah i thought it was a saucy roll yeah i think the rice makes it healthy-ish yeah sure it's meat wrapped around rice is it yeah it's like a meat onigiri guess is one way to say it's not bad i'm not so good at exploring different types of foods tim will pretty much eat anything chicken feet are one of his favorite like meals back home really but yeah that doesn't look too bad can you give me a kiss yeah thank you thank you inside is like a pilaf rice it looks like and the rice has some flavor on it isn't it teppanyaki very interesting isn't it teppanyaki teriyaki oh it's a teriyaki taste is it no this is curry the cheese gives it another dimension i don't think you need to have the cheese with the curry but they did it yeah well that's definitely something we wouldn't have we would have just gone faster not to try yeah we're gonna add two of this now i was gonna take whatever i could see first it just came up first well that's the thing about it trying different things mmm yum pretty good pretty good it's not bad where are you off to next we'll probably head back to iki bukuro now that we've done our stalking for the day yeah arcades it's all about the arcades for me oh did you go to the one in takadanobaba you mean arcades as in video games yeah yeah well the gem pushers the claw machines all that kind of stuff yeah i think they had a lot of retro games in takadanobaba i think it made a show on that retro game center it was pretty interesting yeah my brother would be really into that one one of the things i went to hard off yesterday in akihabara and i'll pick up a couple laptops every time i'm here i picked up one last time i've grabbed two this time i take them back to australia pick some more up they're about as old as him so they don't really thanks yeah but you know i can pick some up and that way i've got a bit of a retro museum wow cool that's a good idea that's why i love coming to akihabara and talking you can get really cool and obscure and weird things yeah that's true well we're going to explore here a little more and then we'll be back right no no i met in march steve wozniak oh really and he was telling me old stories about coming to akihabara in the 1980s wow and all the electronics he would find for parts yeah and he said he bought a nintendo game boy here that he still plays so i'm hoping steve i don't know if you watch but i have his email so if he does come here i would love to hear some of his stories and kind of capture that for the show yeah that would be amazing get an image of what akihabara was like during the bubble era he's got a lot of stories i know yeah untold that would be your dream wouldn't it yeah i'll make sure i'm here for that one but yeah there's super potato there's one in tokyo and one in osaka and there's a couple of other ones there's a couple of other retro gaming shop just littered around akihabara i can pick up a nintendo 64 for 30 australian dollars wow so it might be there depends on how much luggage there is yeah how long is this trip for it ends on thursday okay so we've been here for about a week so we've done a lot of stuff this time we haven't normally done and a lot of it has been good especially the eizan line one that was the one we were just like nah we're done try the economy arcade oh yeah i love the eizan line i was thinking of going back to kyoto next week and do some filming down there but i was just worried about the leaves like how far along is autumn and it looks like we're at the end of it definitely it is but look the deer park was fun i've also got the deer poop oh nara yeah i had to find that yeah they sell deer poop in nara it's true oh it's so funny chocolate-created yeah it was one of the only things i had to buy while we were there so yeah it was like three it said don't take any pictures but the lady said we could take pictures but she wouldn't remove the sign to take pictures if you ask to take a picture it's okay but if you don't i don't know i don't know why it was weird the leaves still is that something you should check before you get into nara yeah nara might be oh yeah and that's one he's standing outside there's the deer you guys want to see the deer the deer there you go that's nara yeah it's deer mating season the signs are saying oh no if you can't believe it's deer mating season they will knock you over do not mess with the deer i don't know if you've seen the episode where kevin riley and i we go down to nara for street food yeah one headbutts you that hurt it hurt my feelings too because i was trying to give it to the smaller deer i like the underdog and then the big deer just you have to pay the big deer in order to get to the small deer yeah we were doing the same thing they would come and they'd munch at you they'd munch at you at your clothes and try and get your feet wet yeah don't touch me just give me more just give me more as soon as they know you have the food they'll just follow you along i had one follow me for a good five minutes did they bow did you get them to bow before they give it to you it was really cool so they just stand on the sidelines and just bow at you expecting the food they do more than bow they'll just imitate you and do whatever you do i go like this and the deer will go like this too and they just imitate you and then they know whatever you do they do it and then i guess because people have seen it on the internet that they bow but you can go like this that's what i did in miyajima that's the only way they freak out so much when you've got the tourists that are really scared with them and then they'll chase after them they really like those people there's so many people little kids they get freaked out and they run away get the little kids right i've seen them chase down little kids i've seen the crows chase down little kids oh the crows yeah they were a little bit like ah ah and the kids are really running away and the crows will gang up on the little kids i've seen it it's awful and so cool at the same time that's what people do there was a little old lady probably about that high that was being harassed by one of them she kept running this way and the two would follow and she'd run back once crows smell weakness they go all over you toby we've got magpies back home do you think it was magpies yeah it's like a kind of a crow yeah and they're just swooping yeah mating season they'll be up in the trees right now they're there and they just fly in your face whoa yeah they'll take a chunk out they're pretty magpies are more hardcore than the crows may be i know we've got that and we've got plovers this little you know bundles of evil that wander around and will attack you on sight and you have this australia's an amazing place no it's not it's like deadly i remember in alice springs drinking a beer and then looking at a wall behind me and there was a tarantula the size of my head just looking back at me that sounds like him he'll be all right he won't even yeah he didn't bother me i didn't bother him but i was still freaked out because i'd never seen a spider that big and i don't even call it a spider it was like it belonged to a zoo behind cages that's kind of how we work you know if you don't bother it it generally doesn't bother you yeah yeah okay well should we hit the road i would think so yeah well thanks so much for finding me yeah thanks so much and i just skipped the cinnamon oh well and actually a bean yeah you're not part of the history of the channel can we get a photo oh yeah sure so here's the meatball shop niku wait hold on a sec nikkuso roll i think it's like nikku roll nikkoso nikkoso roll that almost sounds like an aussie song nikku rolls yeah okay i'll grab a selfie perfect thank you awesome thank you john you're welcome what was your names again sorry tim and mel tim and mel nice to meet you mel thank you we look forward to seeing the next one we made our trip you really have thank you thanks enjoy have a good trip guys that was nice it's always fun to share a little bit of the adventure with people that kind of makes these livestreams fun if you guys can find me we can share some street food and it's a lot better to eat with friends than it is to eat alone all right i'm trying to get my bearings now so we're going to end the livestream in a second we still didn't get to 500 likes i was going to get another street food but it looks like maybe i'll just pass the pasta here looks incredible they put an entire crab in that what it's pretty crazy this one looks like a chain though very nice i guess i can go this way here's a dvd a cd looks like they sell used stuff of course used manga here and then yeah there's some used one piece some other manga i guess if you're looking to fill in a collection you can't find something you might want to come in here used books wow very cool it's quiet back here this is just an alley off of the main road ichiran is that the ramen place i'm not big into the chinese i'm into the chain ramen places wow it looks really crowded too well i wouldn't say really crowded it's just people waiting that's crowded for me it's crowded for me.

01:14:37 John Daub: So I hope this gives you a pretty good idea of Shimokitazawa and you feel comfortable walking around. It's like a big eight. You can wrap around the station, come back to the station. You can wrap around like a big eight or you can just go off road and go even deeper and find unique things. You can find unique things by getting off of that eight and just going deeper into Shimokitazawa. Once again, this place started as like an escape from the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923. People came here and started to turn this farm field into a residential area. I know this guy. He's been twice in our live streams delivering beer. He's all over the place. They drink a lot of beer here. And since then, it's really evolved into hippie town. So you'll see a lot of used clothes, a lot of used books, manga, all sorts of things. People reselling it. A lot of mom and pop shops, not known for chains, but more and more as we get closer to the 2020 Olympics, local business owners because property is high are selling out and you're seeing it right now, which is kind of a shame. It's a little bit sad, but I get it. I just hope that it doesn't turn into Harajuku because Takeshita Street is a pretty good place. Harajuku is a place where I kind of avoid now.

01:16:07 John Daub: Oh, look at these retro games here. Check that out. You don't see these too often. Whoa, that's a House of the Dead. The first game I ever played in Japan was House of the Dead. The first one in 1998 used to play that all the time in Nagoya near the Hard Rock Cafe, which I think is out of business. Oh man, you pick up the gun and you enter the world of the dead. We didn't have this kind of games in the 1990s in the US. At least I don't think we did. It's awesome. And then after a while, we get to know this zombie house inside of House of the Dead. You play the game for like an hour. There's the good old days. Fujisoba. It's another classic. This would be considered maybe Japanese fast food. You come outside, see what you want. There's numbers there. So it helps you. You can decide on the vending machine because you have to order by vending machine. The vending machine is right there. You see inside of the shop. Pick it by the number and that's what you're going to get. So it makes pretty easy to buy and everything is about one coin, 500 yen. So I like Fujisoba. It's nice.

01:17:24 John Daub: And guess what? We're back to station. You see that overhang? There's the station. I hope you enjoyed it. This is what you subscribe for. Live streams from all over the country. Today we're in Shimokitazawa. Thanks so much for watching. I'll put a link in the description so you can see how to get here. I think it's worth exploring. Spend a day in your trip where you don't plan anything and just walk around the streets. And this is one of the neighborhoods I think where you're going to get the most out of your trip. Seeing a better like instead of Harajuku, come here. That's what I would say. And you're going to see a lot of the same stuff. Just a recommendation that I have for you. I like this area. A lot of personality. It's changing though. So when you come here, it might look a little bit different.

01:18:20 John Daub: I'll show you here on the map. I showed you earlier about an hour ago. But we'll take a quick look-see. Shimokitazawa. You can see it crosses two lines, the Inokashira and the Odakyu line. We walked like this, like a circle. And then we came back around and we walked like this. I think we went out a little bit further. So we pretty much walked like a figure eight around the station. Okay, like this. And if you get deeper, you can walk to Shibuya Shinjuku if you like. But it's neat to spend a couple of hours walking around. And eating. And drinking coffee. Cafes. And enjoying the beautiful view and the strange architecture. It's just so weird. You can see the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and even up to 2020 sometimes being built around. So if you liked it, click like. Subscribe if you want to see more. Make sure you get the notifications. Click the bell for always. And I'll see you in another livestream maybe later today at the Christmas Market in Shiba Park near Tokyo Tower. Kanae is going to be joining me. And she's hungry. I'm getting a little bit hungry. This was just an overview. It wasn't like a street food episode. But I bet you if we go to the market at Shiba Park, we're going to eat a lot. So maybe see you in a few hours. If you're in the US, have a good night. Bye bye everybody. Bye from Shimokitazawa.