00:01 John Daub: Hey everybody, welcome! Welcome to Noboribetsu. This is a really special place. This is the Toy and Art Museum. It's a place where you get to see some really retro toys. Now you can't find this kind of stuff inside of Tokyo. Well you can, but it's not the same. Because the owner of this retro toy shop is a personal friend of mine.

00:23 John Daub: Somebody that I met 17 years ago when I was on my first hitchhiking trip in 2003. He's got a heart of gold and I really wanted to introduce you to his collection, which goes back decades. It's amazing. Here's the sign of it in the front. This is an old sign. Now he started this about seven years ago, and the reason why was he just loves toys. And because he was so kind to me 17 years ago, picking me up while hitchhiking, that I kind of want to return the favor. But this is gonna be a treat. This is what you subscribe for. This is a really exciting... Oh manhole cover.

01:02 John Daub: Check that out. Okay, let's go inside. There's Wakaki-san right here. So we're gonna go inside the retro toy museum. Awesome. All right. So it's pretty simple. You can walk to the Noboribetsu station from here. It's about a seven or eight minute walk. And you go in and the admission is 500 yen per person. It's open from 10 to 6. It's closed on Wednesdays [Suiyobi]. No vacation days. That's actually pretty incredible. I put a link in the description for the map. Let's go inside.

01:53 John Daub: Are you ready? You ready to take a trip? Oh wow. It's not what you expect. From the outside. It looks like just ordinary Hokkaido building on the inside. It's pretty incredible. I'm gonna show you the first floor in more detail at the end of this video so you're gonna want to stick around. Some of the collections. It's a little collection, but it's extremely interesting down here the things that he has collected and I'm gonna take you upstairs.

02:25 John Daub: One of the more traditional toys that is here in Japan is these kokeshi (wooden dolls). Which he has an amazing collection from all over Japan including the books and the background on them from the maker. Some of the famous makers. So the [Ningyo?] comes in a 1500 single [hyakuen?], 1500 yen inside of here, which is incredible. Listen battleships. All right, let's go upstairs. I want to show you these retro toys because the second floor is gonna blow you away.

03:07 John Daub: If you're a fan of Japanese toys and collectibles, you gotta come here. This is a gold mine of stuff. Thank you. Okay, hope... wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it. Wow. This is incredible. So I'm gonna walk around and show you some of the stuff in here. It goes all the way up to the ceiling. Inside there is a mask collection. Let's walk around this way.

03:45 John Daub: There's some Pokémon. I think that's all of them. Incredible. These some of these go back a long ways and you can see the division from when things started were made in Japan and when things started to be made in China. So there's kind of a time difference between where the products were made. But Ultraman is a very very big part of this museum. Nani, a Kamen Rider. Yeah. Yeah, this is Kamen Rider. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Look at this. This is incredible. This is a pretty good Kamen Rider collection right here. A lot of these are going back [full so nene?].

04:54 John Daub: What the Bruno? Hey, what the Bruno? Oh. Space it on. I caught it. Yeah. There's a lot of old ones here putting them back together. This is the wow. None of my go to me. Ah 50 years ago. Let's take a look here. I'm gonna take you now to the Ultraman area, but first we gotta get past Godzilla. How could you pass that up? You can't it's just too big. Many of these toys go back half a century. It's incredible. I mean, I wish I had some more time. I have to take a train to Sapporo over this one.

05:48 John Daub: Wow, ah. These are inside of Glico packages of Glico products. Glico are these I guess you've seen these in Osaka the Glico man. This is actually [none don't can a matter]. Yeah, these are little packages of caramel from a long time ago inside the caramel. They would also put oh my get toys like this little teeny toys in the collection from it. They look like little pieces from the game of life but dude wood they put wood pieces and packages of candy a dick you can furnish a dollhouse as all these things. Now I know why people would eat more caramel. That's a lot of stuff you could collect out of those packages wow.

06:42 John Daub: Now we're getting into the ultimate collection if you're a fandom we have a discord server. We're probably gonna be talking about a lot of this of anime manga fandom people who are collectors. It's pretty amazing stuff. There's a lot of Godzilla's throughout the years and it goes all the way from the floor to the ceiling. It's pretty incredible. Here we are in the [Bondi?] Ultraman area and the amount of unopened packages. I wish I was more of a collector when I was a kid, but this is at another level. This is the top level the highest level. I think you could spend about an hour in here looking around.

07:37 John Daub: This is Ultraman. It's written in katakana or a Ultraman and the collection. I believe it gets newer as you go down here, but there's so much in here including a game up on the top look at that. Oh awesome. I don't know too much about Ultraman, but I just know that this is like a dream come true to see all these toys. It's pretty incredible. Over here are the Tomy. Fonda oh these are these are the Tomy car collections and wow, they I think this is the whole collection this is the entire collection.

08:28 John Daub: It's pretty incredible, but I love the way it's all displayed so you could probably find cars by year and model that old Volkswagen bug. Aquarius free, okay, let's take a look here. This is the oldest here Tomica. Whoa 50 years ago these these little matchbox cars were being sold. Not sure [broad does he have any kin Kashi?]. Muscle man kin Kashi Arimasa. Kinkosei Arimasa. Oh, he has them and PC engine. He had a chuckle out of that one. I call God is God.

09:24 John Daub: Whoa, oh look at that. That's pretty cool. Look at those little guys there. Yeah muscle man, you could stretch him. Associmo associmo Arimasa. Check it out here. Kakao Kora Kinkosei I can Kashi. Whoa, that's a whole jar of them. Yeah, that's really cool. You have to you have to be serious collector to fill up a jar like this seriously pretty hardcore to see all of this but oh my gosh, this is a lot of stuff here. Thank you Terry.

10:19 John Daub: It's just you have to spend what I love about this is it's all over the place. You have to spend time and look at the details. Nani mom Miku Roma Miku Roman. Miku Roman is also quite famous here. You could see a collection here collecting. Can collect that is car Miku Roman young genuine grandma young G about 40 years. 40 years crazy and the mask collection is over in the other room. I was gonna take you there last but inside of this room in the back we have a mask collection and I'm gonna take you back to the Ultraman. Let's show the masks here. This is so cool.

11:17 Wakaki-san: These are the old traditional masks from Japan, but you know you you find these when you go to festivals.

11:26 John Daub: Hey. Hey. Whoa. Oh. Hi. Masking come through. So these are all Japanese traditional masks here and you can see he's got a layout again. It's part of the museum. Now what I'll fix that we want to make a museum for him. So I'm gonna come back and film this more slowly but I have to introduce this to you like if you're in the area you have to stop by here just to come and say hi put this place on the map.

12:02 John Daub: This is a famous place. This is Watanabe Kenzo's. This is a shop in Yokohama. They make the ones they make. Yeah, so this is made by Watanabe Kenzo from Yokohama and it's quite famous actually. Hey, he's gonna show us. Here, on the wall there. Yeah, there are a lot of them but I can't find any so I'm not gonna show you. This is art right? Yeah, it's art. It's like a really pretty art that he has here. Hamtaro. I've already seen Hamtaro.

12:55 Wakaki-san: I'm gonna decorate this at the cafe. I'm gonna do it but I'm gonna get it back in 6 months. Yeah. So I don't have any space left so I'm gonna come back here. I feel sorry for the ones I broke.

13:09 John Daub: It's nice to see. Yeah, so much passion for the toys. That sells it for me. When someone has passion for what they do you see so many wonderful things. I'm getting kind of sidetracked here. Let's go back to the if there's something you wanna watch let me know and I'll try to go back there. Yeah, yeah, there's a girl's area for all the ladies that are watching. There's a girl's area.

13:38 John Daub: Can you show me the back part and I'll come back? Yes, please. So that was kind of this is like yeah, this is like virtual reality stuff before virtual reality. No, it's just a visor. But you can see here I just wanna give you an overview of what you can find in here. There's some tanks collectible cars just stuff he's collected over the course of 50 years and it's just absolutely incredible.

14:05 John Daub: But what's more for me, I have a personal history with my friend here. So I definitely wanna I'll be back. I'm gonna film this a lot more slowly. There's some more Ultraman Ultraman goods any Voltes 5. No John Daub anime figures not yet anyways. The world was sealed by the girl's game Tamagotchi. Tamagotchi. It was popular 20 years ago.

14:35 Wakaki-san: It's not open yet. Can you still use it?

14:37 John Daub: I don't know. You could use this. These are Tamagotchi were so big in the 90s. And this one is completely unopened. It's really awesome to be holding this again. My students and I taught children would have these Tamagotchi and they would live their lives based on the Tamagotchi telling them what to do or else it would die and then the toy would self-destruct.

15:02 John Daub: This is a board game before the TV game. Ah. Yeah, here's some board games. Some board games is what we say here. So that's an interesting story. There's an incredible collection of board games unopened board games like what?

15:18 Wakaki-san: It's called Jinsei Game.

15:19 John Daub: Yeah, that's the game of life. The Jinsei Game. That's what I was talking about earlier the game of life but they have a Japanese version of it Jinsei Game. I always lose at the Jinsei Game you know trying my best to live my life. Who wants to be a tycoon? That is not the value of living a life. Happiness, they say helps to have a lot of money but a lot of people who have a lot of money aren't that happy.

16:01 John Daub: So I just want to show you this corner then we're going to go back into the girls area. Hey Danny! Can you tell him from me that his collection is awesome? I wish him a nice day and don't have too much fun with the snow. Thanks Danny. I'm on my way. I'm going to tell him right now. I'm on my way to Sapporo in about 20 minutes. Kanai has already arrived so I'm looking forward to making my way there. But how could I not just take you on a tour of this amazing museum.

16:27 John Daub: I've seen some of this stuff before. Hi. Come around so close. Transformers. Oh yeah, Transformers. How many years ago was this? 30 years ago?

16:37 Wakaki-san: Yeah, over 30 years ago.

16:38 John Daub: This was a huge hit in America. Yeah, a huge hit in America. So Transformers came from Japan and you can see here, this is the Japanese version of it. You don't see them anymore in Japan.

16:45 Wakaki-san: Not really.

16:50 John Daub: Transformers from Jet to Robot to Super Robot to back again. This is old. This is the treasure mark. Well that's that's who is that? Magnus Prime or somebody. I remember having that. My brother had that gun. That's like ancient. Wow. Megatron, yeah. That's Megatron, baby. Ah, Megatron. Wow, and then there's some Gundam as well, of course. Gundam. This one is also very famous.

17:32 Wakaki-san: Oh yeah, that's Maximus Prime.

17:35 John Daub: Yeah, that's the one that turns into a truck. Look at it, it's in Japanese. This is the first generation of the big robot. Yeah. So the Transformers, they all came from Japan and then they became more American. Now Hollywood makes Transformer movies and guess what? Japan's moved on. It's pretty weird. Whoa, that's a whole case of them. It's a Sentry. You got a whole case of them. Whoa. It's the whole collection. This is awesome. Look at this. This is what you come to a museum like this.

18:15 Wakaki-san: So my friend Danny said it's a wonderful museum.

18:19 John Daub: Oh, really? Thank you. Very good, Danny. You don't have time, so I'll go.

18:25 Wakaki-san: You don't have time?

18:28 John Daub: No. Ah, okay. So I don't have as much time as I wish I had. But hope my hope is if you do come to Noboribetsu that you will take a look at this amazing collection of toys that go back about 50 years. And I'm telling you right now if you're going to the onsen spend some time in the city before you make the trip over there. In the summer, it's a lot warmer of course, but this is the Emperor's koinobori (carp streamers).

19:04 Wakaki-san: Koinobori.

19:07 John Daub: So this is from 50-something years ago. Yes. It's a black one. This is a big one. It's a big one. It's only been used once like many many ah, it hasn't been used. Look at that, it's never been used, these koinobori. So actually from famous artists and makers. Unused koinobori can be very very valuable. Yeah. Koinobori, right? You can see it anywhere in 2-3 months. Ah, let me show you the girls area really quickly.

19:49 John Daub: Again, like this museum can change over the next year. I think it's gonna get better and better. But there's not a lot of English translations and the proprietor doesn't speak much English but I think by looking through this tour you can get an idea of what you're going to see here. And for collectors, you probably know. I'm gonna come back here with Kanae in Noboribetsu and do more slowly and give you a better look at this. Ah, Elisa Doraemon. Yes, you did. And give you a better look at this and maybe I'll put this in the description box. I'll put some explanations in English so if you do come next time it'll be a little bit listed. I came here for the festival so I didn't have a lot of time to spend with my friend. But, wow these are beautiful.

20:41 John Daub: How you doing? Doing good? Ah, Furi? Ah, parasol, yeah. It's beautiful. It's a Japanese dog. Ehh. Is that a gibri? Looks like a gibri character. It's a Dundas dog. Ah. This is um this is Rika-chan's old dog. Ah, these are old Rika-chan. How you doing? This is Jenny-chan's G.I.D. Oh, hey, soccer girls. They're soccer girls and now they're soccer moms 30 years later. I don't think you need the play-by-play. Sometimes I get a little carried away. My apologies to the people.

21:28 John Daub: Nosh, I'm gonna come back and do like a documentary on this because it's just too deep. My favorite thing I like them all but, my favorite thing is...

21:39 Wakaki-san: What is it? Peko-chan's mask. Ah, yeah. Peko-chan. Peko-chan. It's Riko-chan. Peko-chan, Riko-chan. It's a girl's room, girl's room.

21:55 John Daub: I'm not Sailor Moon, old. Ah, old Sailor Moon posters. Um what did you like as a kid, Wakaki-san?

22:05 Wakaki-san: What do you mean? I liked everything here. Everything? I liked everything. I liked everything. I said I liked toys. Um just toys and these are some air guns. Just, he loves all of them. There's nothing one that... I think that's why he owns a toy store.

22:29 John Daub: So he collects a lot of these. Oh, I have to go. Let's go. My train leaves in 15 minutes. You know me and trains. Yeah, I'll definitely come again. You know me and trains. I'm always running. He's actually gonna drive me to the station so i might just keep this live until then yeah i gotta pick up my bag at the guest house. you guys want to join me for this oh look at that bowling lady how you doing she's doing fine ellis. ellis i'm gonna ride that i'll be back and then uh on the first floor some amazing collectibles.

23:05 John Daub: oh marilyn monroe you you will not be and i will be back there's even more. let's build a bigger yeah this is a currency from around the world that's pretty cool to see that and through the years the currency changes but it's nice to be able to see uh all of this here too. let's get it let's go all right so 500 yen children are 200 yen so that's pretty good. all right she's checking the oh there's Seico Mart so welcome to Noboribetsu there's the museum definitely stop by there's actually there's no time i know i'm rushing to the station this is what so this is what it was like when i was hitchhiking it's just sort of the same thing um 17 years ago we met and now we're on the way to go to the station.

25:04 John Daub: isn't it fun live streaming it's just kind of uh this is action man he was watching the live stream and brought it out all right watch the live stream from yesterday it's awesome i got wheeled all right let's go welcome to the life of john daub this is what you subscribe for they told me i should try to appeal to get more subscribers sometimes you should say please subscribe i was like okay i'll say that a little bit more uh there's the bus no i'm gonna beat them run run right now no these stinking tourists i'm gonna beat the tourists no way hey bus you back off.

26:33 John Daub: there's a new sheriff in town that's where i camped 17 years ago i camped right over there by that trailer in the middle there's a big earthquake here 2003. i beat the bus is this a train?

27:05 Wakaki-san: yes yes thanks give me a call be careful thank you be careful

27:21 John Daub: it's your wife she's my wife i'll try calling later thanks i'm kind of sad he said tell my wife i said hi i'm one of the nicest people one of the nicest people that i know oh man i'm sad you know in life you're just sometimes thrown them up thrown together by situations and circumstances and that was one of those where he helped me out 17 years ago and was hitchhiking and now he's got a museum that's just an extraordinary person there's the Noboribetsu station and i'm gonna uh make my way to the train which is coming here.

28:08 John Daub: oh there's the volunteer porters those porters volunteer to help tourists hello with their bags isn't that nice nobody betsa has this service oh very cool what's people lining up for what are people lining up for so i have my ticket here oh no this is not my ticket it's a sapporo sapporo minami i'm just gonna go here i don't like to line up i guess you this is more than you bargained for we're now going on a train from toy museum to train that's chinese oh i love the booty but there's such good memories hey gil gil's here how you doing gil sapporo all right i'm waiting here i have a reserved seat.

30:16 John Daub: and i paid i paid an extra 500 yen because i figured there's gonna be a crowd of people oh okay i'm not gonna miss my train so this is the ticket he stamped it um he said non-reserved seat [goshami?] what car this is the goshi here for number two row seat A do you see that and it says here Noboribetsu to Sapporo February 6th and it cost me four thousand seven hundred eighty yen because only the Express train is running right now and I want to go and see can I so I just paid more for the Express train makes it easy right here comes a train everyone's got masks on except for me wait if everyone has masks on except for me I'm safe right I better put a mask on mask here.

31:19 John Daub: I have some information on the masks here when you put the mask on you can see the number on the front of the car and the mask on the glue part should be on the outside not the inside just some information so this should be on the everyone's been doing it wrong for many years but according to the internet this should be on the inside people are doing it the other way so make sure you wear your masks correctly the glue and the is on the outside the glue is where the string is attached to because it's because it's a little bumpy it sticks out but with the mask I can't talk to you I didn't think about that wait how am I gonna talk to you with the mask on.

32:26 Announcer: passengers for the limited express train bound for Sapporo your train leaves from track number one train door positions are shown on the information monitor right after the ticket gate please check your car number and the hanging sign platform to raise in line.

32:53 Passerby: This is your big deal. You're the reason that we... What? I'm the reason that you're here?

33:02 Passerby: Yes, we just went to Noboribetsu Onsen and now we're going to the Snow Festival.

33:06 John Daub: That's because I saw your video. That's where I'm going right now. Did you see the festival last night? No, we just went up at the onsen. We saw you at the onsen. We walked past you. It was amazing. I just wanted to say thank you. You're very welcome. I'll see you at the Snow Festival. Awesome. I think I messed this up. I'll wear this later. I think it's too late. If I got it, I got it.

33:39 John Daub: He was somebody who was watching the show and because he saw the show, he came to Noboribetsu. See? So sometimes live streaming and showing an area can help people make a decision. I make the show because I want you to make a decision and see some really cool stuff. I need a new mask now. That's right, Jason. I know. But pretty cool that we're going on a train ride together. How does live streaming go from toy store to train? Sometimes I can...should I just live stream all the way to the time I meet Kanae? That'd be pretty cool.

34:15 John Daub: I'm a limited express train bound for Sapporo. Don't get Kanae sick. Actually, Kanae's students had influenza yesterday and she said that she still had to teach them so I'm worried about Kanae too. We both had vaccines...we were both vaccinated for the flu about a month and a half ago before we went to Europe. So we should be safe. To wait in line. You like the announcements in English and Chinese? You should do an influenza...hold on a second...influenza live stream. Really? When I catch it, I'll do it. Maybe that's... I always lose my tickets. I know where I'm sitting.

35:06 John Daub: What did you think of my friend Wakaki-san? Super, super nice guy. And I hope you do make it... get a chance to stop at his place. The conditions are shown on the information monitor right after the ticket gate. Please check your card number and the name card. I don't think he gets a lot of people visiting the museum. It's not really marked in English and I think he said he gets about three people a day. So that's not a lot. And I'm gonna come back and... I didn't even pay him but he wouldn't take my money. I did give him a DVD. I did give him a DVD. I wish you could sit down and talk with him about his passion.

35:47 John Daub: Nosh, I'm gonna do this in a longer edited episode. I think with this live stream I just wanted to showcase it because I didn't have a lot of time. But I'm gonna come back in...I think I'm coming back here in June to Hokkaido. And of course I'll stop back here because I want to see my friend. See how he's doing. We're both 17 years older. But it's nice to keep the relationship. And he was kind of...he was sad too. He gave me his business card to make sure I stay in touch. And I'm gonna send him a letter. And I'll probably call him and thank him with Kanae later today. And then Kanae can talk to him in better Japanese than me. Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty cool.

36:34 John Daub: A train is imminent. Oh here comes a train but that's the other side. It's a one man. A one man meaning one man is doing everything. So that means our train is coming from this direction. I didn't get an Eki-ben. I don't think they exist. The Eki-ben's don't really exist. But you can see I love these one man trains. This one's going to Tomakomai. Yeah that's where Narita-san's hometown is. To Muroran I believe. It's hard for me to see. Higashi-Muroran. Yeah. That's a local local train. Just like. It's actually full. I guess because there's only one car that you can sit in. I don't see the train. That's me.

38:01 Announcer: Train door positions are shown. By the information monitor right after the ticket gate.

38:10 John Daub: Busted. Busted. Whoa check it out. It's got like smoke coming out of it. That is not. That's a diesel engine. That is not electric. Please align the car number on the screen and the number on the top. Line up and wait. I saw you. Passengers for the limited express train. Sponsored by Sapporo. Your train leaves from track number one. Alright. It's coming. Now this is like an express train. Hokkaido does. Hokkaido has a Shinkansen but it only goes to Hakodate. They're building the train. It's a long track so it'll go to Sapporo. So I think it's gonna be another four years before you can go directly from Sapporo to Tokyo. That'd be pretty cool. But we're not quite there yet. Ah but the Wanman train is out of sight now.

39:16 John Daub: Alright so suddenly we go into a tunnel. So I'm gonna lose the connection pretty quickly. Yeah. You guys like this? Is this? I love these live streams take on a life of their own. That's what live means. It can go anywhere. Live means that it can go left, right. Something can happen. Something good can happen. Something bad can happen. Anything can happen.

39:46 Announcer: Passengers traveling with small children. Please be sure to restrain them.

39:52 John Daub: So there's actually two trains coming. There's one at 1125 which is the one I'm taking. And then there's one at 7 minutes later. They were the same price. So I took the 1125. Because it gets in a lot earlier. Sort of. It's coming! I can hear the ding ding. Here comes the authority. Okay he's not gonna bust them. You gotta stay behind the yellow line everybody. This is so exciting. Here comes the train. Oh I see it! No is that a car? It's a traffic from the highway nearby. I think we're using the wide angle lens so you can't see it. But says it's on the way. Oh there it is! Wow it's chugging! Look at that! Oh man this is awesome. She's coming in a little hot. Look at that nose on her. It's massive.

41:20 Announcer: Welcome. To Noboribetsu. Super Hokuto. Welcome to the Super Hokuto bound for Sapporo departing at 1125.

41:45 John Daub: Alright guys this is where we say goodbye. This is where we say goodbye. Couple of people. Welcome to Noboribetsu. Alright. So there's a place for my luggage. And then we're gonna go sit inside of here. So. It's all steamed up. Is that fun? Stay safe thank you. I'm gonna put on a mask right now. But everybody thanks so much for watching us. Please do if you come to Noboribetsu. Come and visit. Come and visit Wakaki-san's place. And I know you're gonna really enjoy it. You're probably gonna get a lot of attention from the owner as well. He's so friendly. He'll try his best to communicate with you. Bring a Google Translate or a translator too. I think that might help. But you're also gonna have a really good friend if you come here to Noboribetsu and meet with him. So I hope that you do.

43:02 John Daub: See you soon Wakaki-san. Noboribetsu. I love the guest house that I was at too. It was a pretty exciting stay. Akato ao. Thank you Narita-san. Thank you Sasaki-san. Everybody over there. And that's all she wrote. See you in Sapporo everybody. How do I turn this off?