00:00:04 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome to Toyosu in Koto Ward in the center of Tokyo. Sort of in the center. Toyosu Station is on the Yūrakuchō Line (Yurakucho Line) and the Yurikamome Line. This is all new lands. How you doing everybody? This is an area of Tokyo that's reclaimed land. That means basically this wasn't here 100 years ago. All of the debris from the 1923 Kantō Earthquake was a massive earthquake that took place in the early 20th century, devastated the city of Tokyo. There was a lot of debris after that, so where did they put it? They made this island, Toyosu. And since then, it's become a place with a lot of high-rise mansions. We call them mansions. They're apartment complexes. The population has exploded since the early 1990s.

00:01:01 John Daub: And it's also the location of the first 7-Eleven in Japan. So I thought we would go and take a look and see what it's like today. I'll post a picture on Instagram so you can take a look at what it looked like back in 1974. And there's some history behind it. And that makes all of these convenience store episodes that we do culturally and historically important, because it all started from somewhere. And for 7-Eleven Japan, it started over here. So welcome to all of our new members. We're walking in public. It's a good idea to wear your mask. Welcome to Irvan, another Only in Japan Go insider. Welcome to all the travelers that have signed up over the last few days as well. And welcome to Toyosu.

00:01:50 John Daub: Now this place is a very livable area, but gets a bad rap as being someplace that's kind of boring because everything is so new and so wide and so spread out. Look at this massively wide intersection here. That in the distance is Biba Home, I believe it's called. And that's a massive home center where you can buy anything that you need for your house or for any hobby that you might have. Here's a sushi chain. They have some bentōs (boxed lunches) on offer. Let's just take a quick look. Oh that looks way better than what's in the convenience store. Well I don't know. Let's go take a look. So just... There's the 7-Eleven straight ahead. It's on the same intersection as it was in 1974. The building has changed a little bit. There's been some renovations. And I believe that this is a new building than the original one in 1974.

00:02:56 John Daub: This one might be an original from post-World War II. All made in cement. You can kind of tell by the materials that they use in the buildings. But that right there ladies and gentlemen is the first 7-Eleven in Japan. It's sort of significant. There it is. Super Biba Home. That's also where my bicycle is parked, legally, because this is a famous place for towing away bicycles. So we're going to have a look inside really quickly. And then I'm going to get a... Based on inside information from one of our moderators, Nosh Abroad, 7-Eleven has pastrami sandwiches. So I might try to pick one of those up. Alright. Let's go inside.

00:03:54 John Daub: As you can see there's a lot of space for this 7-Eleven. It's a lot bigger and wider than some of the other 7-Elevens I think. In the city center of Tokyo there's really not a lot of space, but out here it's completely different. I'm just going to pan around really quickly. Get an idea of what Toyosu looks like today. And if you're looking for an apartment, I'm talking to Spencer, it's a pretty nice place to live. Thanks for asking about Kanai. She is doing much better. Alright. Let's go inside and get a pastrami sandwich.

00:04:37 John Daub: 106 yen. Thank you. Oh that looks so good. Jack in the Box. Asahi tea. This is a good one. That looks so healthy. That looks really healthy. Boom. I do love these tamago sando (egg sandwiches). So good. And the blueberry ones are really good too. Oh that chicken one looks good too. Garlic chicken. Here's the classic eki-ben (station bento) down there. This is the classic nori-ben (seaweed rice). Oh no. There's a lot of salmon on there. That's really good. Alright. Let's get this. Thank you.

00:06:40 John Daub: Is this the first 7-Eleven? 1974? Is that right? Thank you. Alright. Just confirming. They're part-time workers. The thing is right now when you're talking with workers, they kind of don't like that. So you want to keep talking to a minimum because people are quite afraid of getting something. I did get a pastrami sandwich in there. You can take a look in there. It hasn't really changed much at all since 1974. The layout apparently is the same. It's hard to tell because I wasn't here in 1974. There's a lot of space in there if you compare it to other... I see some people are fighting the emoji. Alright. Let's go over to a park. And we're going to have the pastrami sandwiches. I want to walk around and show you a little bit of the Toyosu area. We can walk out to the riverside and have a pastrami sandwich.

00:08:13 John Daub: Here we go guys. Loads and loads of shopping malls came here. I'm going to introduce you to the history. Frank the Tank is here. Welcome Frank. I'll tell you a little bit about the history of Toyosu and this area. Now, in 1990, things changed because the government of Tokyo could see that this actually had a very good real estate value. So they started to build apartment complexes at that time in the 1990s. Before that, this was warehouses, freight trains, and so on. Power plants, gas plants, industrial places. That's what Toyosu was. Nowadays, it's a place where a lot of people consider living. You can see here's a... You can see they have layouts for apartments. Whoa! That's $700,000 for that. For this apartment. That's not that big. I didn't know that was so expensive. That's about $400,000 for that. Apple Tower. Whoa! That's pretty big though. So, wow. Apartments are pretty expensive. But you do get more space here than you would...

00:09:34 John Daub: Oh, look at this ramen! What? I want to swim in that egg. It'd be really hard going, but I'd be able to eat my way out. A lot of new restaurants here. A lot of new chains. This is also the place, not just of the first 7-Eleven, but it was the place of the first... One of the first sports gyms in Tokyo. Back in the 1970s and the 1980s, sports gyms were not a big thing. The first one came here because there was a lot of space and it was pretty cheap real estate. And people were starting to move here. The first 7-Eleven catered mostly to industrial workers. People working in the warehouses would go there and get their lunch bentōs.

00:10:32 John Daub: Now, how did 7-Eleven come to Japan? Well... Oh, that looks so good! Gyūdon (beef bowl). Wow. Well, let's get through this intersection off of Harumi-dōri. Now, 7-Eleven's been around since the 1920s, I believe. And it came to Japan in 1974, brought to you by Itō-Yokadō and Southland Corporation. Look at how wide the streets are here. This is what I'm talking about. That's Toyosu. Hey, Big Boss 100, welcome! That's what I'm talking about. It's so wide here. Open.

00:11:37 John Daub: So, 1974, 7-Eleven opened up the first shop here in Toyosu. And now, 7-Eleven worldwide has the most shops in any country right here in Japan. There's about 68,000 shops, 7-Eleven stores worldwide. 68,000! And 20,000 of them are here in Japan. That's massive! In Tokyo alone, there's about 2-3 thousand 7-Elevens just in Tokyo. It's mind-blowing. Alright, there's not a lot of people in this area. So I can take the mask off a little bit. It's mind-blowing how many 7-Elevens there are. 7-Eleven is now, I believe, the third most respected or biggest franchise chain. If you want to have a franchise, 7-Eleven is one of the most popular ones.

00:12:37 John Daub: Oh wow, it's windy. Now, this is the Yurikamome line here. And I want to eat this pastrami sandwich in a second. So this is the entrance into the Yurikamome line of Toyosu Station. And it's a monorail! And it'll take you to Odaiba. And then eventually to Shimbashi. So this is one of the terminus of it. Wow, it's really windy in this area. I don't think this is going to be a good idea for eating. So let's do this right here. You can eat wherever there's whatever you want. You don't have to eat in a certain place. Let's get some alcohol and get the tripod set up. But going back here, after the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923, they put the debris here and made a man-made island. In 1937 they opened up the Toyosu Island. Warehouses, gas plants, industry, freight trains, freight warehouses were here on this island. And in the 1990s they created what you see now. Which is apartment complexes and whatnot. I'm going to sit right here. Seems like a safe place. No pigeons.

00:13:46 John Daub: 7-Eleven opened up the first shop in the 1970s. This is new from Itō En, which makes really good tea. It's really good. And by the way, if you're an insider, I'm going to be doing another live stream. A secret live stream which you're not supposed to know about. After this one. I'm going to take you to where one of the freight trains crossed into Toyosu. This was the terminus of the freight train and the bridge between the main city of Tokyo and this area is still there. They didn't tear it down and in fact, I think they should make a park out of it. Let's see if the wind is knocked down a little bit here. Check this out. I was thinking about doing this on a midnight snack run and I still might do it later on tonight. This is a pastrami sandwich done by Japan. Check it out here. A pork pastrami sandwich on white bread. Kind of boring looking bread. But deli meats is not a big deal here in Japan. In fact, it's very rare to find pastrami anywhere in Japan. So it's pretty interesting that Japan has decided to make this sandwich.

00:15:16 John Daub: It says shin hatsubai (newly released) meaning it's a brand new sandwich that came out. So let's give this a try here. I think I can put you up here on the pole so you're not down on the ground. It's kind of lonely down there. Hands are clean. Pastrami! Oh man. This ain't no Katz's Deli. But you can see there's some mustard in there. Mustard seeds. Brand new from 7-Eleven. Smells like pastrami. It must be pastrami. MIR, welcome to the traveler level. It's nice to see some new members here. Ice and Wong and Insider. Awesome. Itadakimasu. Mmm. Mmm. It's really peppery. It's got a lot of pepper in there.

00:16:42 John Daub: Alright. Typical in Japanese sandwich. Of course, at the end of the sandwich, they kind of skimp on the materials, right? But you can see there's some sort of mayonnaise in there. Again, this is a Japanese taste. Interesting, isn't it? Kind of a mustard mayonnaise with some pepper. A lot of pepper in there. That's insane. Oh man. All I'm tasting is pepper. Not so much to me. Look, there's more pepper. Do you see that pepper? What? Do they really need more pepper? I'm basically eating a mouthful of pepper. It's not bad. It's just it's a lot of pepper. And you can see here the meat on the opening pack, on the open part of the package. It looks so appetizing. Whenever you get the sandwiches, it narrows out to just bread. I'm not complaining. Trust me. I'm not complaining.

00:17:41 John Daub: If you miss... I guess it's like cut up peppercorns. If you miss a pastrami sandwich, it's really good. It's not spicy. It's more like peppery. I love peppers, so this is not too bad. But I can see they kind of went maybe a little bit too far with the pepper. Like, what? There's got to be a balance with the pastrami. Mmm. It's really good. Marty Dittmer is here. Hey Marty, what does 7-Eleven do with all the crusts? That's a good question. I wonder. What do they do with all the crusts? Can you bake bread without crust? Can you? I don't know.

00:18:48 John Daub: I do like this matcha tea. It's got a... I'm a big fan of Itō En. It's not in the Coca-Cola vending machines. Itō En is a green tea company, mostly. So they have some of the best. This has more of a matcha taste to it. There's kind of a unique bitterness that touches in a different part of the mouth compared to regular green tea. And green tea connoisseurs might like this. This is unsweetened, of course. Green tea is... They don't put honey here. Why would they? Let's see here. Eisenclad writes in here no more... I know you're just kidding. I know you're just kidding. KT Loveit, Lawson's Hot Latte is the best. Actually, just pass a Lawson's. Maybe we can go check that out. I'm thinking about doing a midnight snack run really soon. Irvan writes in here gamble on the umeboshi onigiri (pickled plum rice balls). They're really good. Umeboshi is an acquired taste. Sabino Cruz tamago sando. Ellis is here. Welcome to the insider level, Ellis. It's nice to see you. You didn't have to join the... You didn't have to join it, but I love the fact that you did. Love you guys.

00:20:18 John Daub: Alright, um... My t-shirt says YouTube. I got it as a gift from YouTube, so... Actually, the material on it is so good. Whoa! Cops just stopped a trucker. The cops just stopped this trucker. Whoa! That's awesome! Check it out! I could just get on there and ride away, but don't do that. Someone's in trouble. It's not me. Hey! Where are you going? We've got gimbal problems now. Hold on a second. The gimbal's gone a little bit haywire. Anything can happen in these live streams. It just happens. And speaking of Bad Boy, we've got a member in our Discord server named Bad Boy. He's continuously lost in the Discord chats. How do I get you guys to come back? Drone has gone wacko. Really? Drone? What are you calling Drone? I mean gimbal. I know DJI makes it. Drones too. Look, your power's cut, but you're still moving. How are you still moving? The power's off. It's creepy. It's creepy. Alright, there we go.

00:22:20 John Daub: Alright, there we go. Initiating power. Three, two, one. So, basically, in a situation like this, we just keep doing what we're doing. Um, I don't know. This pastrami sandwich cost me 324 yen with tax. I don't know if that's too expensive, but if you compare it to Katz's Deli, this is pretty much a real bargain. I know. I was here first. So, we're gonna go down to the riverside now. That sucks for the trucker. Just act normal. We're right now underneath the Yurikamome line. I want to show you a little bit of Toyosu, um, aka the New Lands.

00:24:15 John Daub: Now, the sports gym that was the first sports gym in Tokyo is near LaLaport now. LaLaport is a big shopping mall here. So, if you do come to Toyosu, you don't just have to get a pastrami sandwich at the 7-Eleven. You gotta go to LaLaport. And LaLaport has some history there. And that's what I'm going to show you. The final part of this livestream is along Tokyo Bay. Also, this is where the Space Boat docks every now and then. But the Space Boat has been absent over the last couple of months. That was a close call. I didn't know that you know, an officer of the law would be right behind me while I'm eating a pastrami sandwich. I'm still picking those peppercorns out of my teeth. That's kind of slightly over peppered. Pepper pastrami.

00:25:30 John Daub: The news is here. Are you allowed to sit anywhere and eat? I believe so. I thought that was an unspoken rule. The unspoken rule is walking and eating. Basically, you can sit and eat, but walking and eating is seen as being rude in Japan. They're pretty cool fire trucks. Oh, we got a green light! Here we go. There's Tokyo Bay over there. You're gonna get a look at Rainbow Bridge as well as an old freight bridge that's still in operation and a freight crane that they keep around as part of the history of Toyosu. That's the Yurikamome Line that'll take you over to Big Sight and Event Hall and Odaiba eventually over the Rainbow Bridge to Shimbashi. That's where this terminal starts on the other side. Also, the Toyosu Fish Market is about a kilometer the other way. That way. So you can go there from here. I came by bicycle, which is just a 10-15 minute ride for me.

00:26:49 John Daub: Welcome to all of our new members. The Bebop is a traveler. Welcome, and Yun Wong, thank you. An insider. Alright, so since May, uh, June 1st, the playgrounds are open again. We had a state of emergency and then that ended about two weeks ago. And then gradually the city has been coming back. But there's still signs telling kids to be careful. Although they are wearing masks. It's a good thing. People are wearing masks, doing their best to social distance, and so far Tokyo is doing okay.

00:27:45 John Daub: So here's the end of Toyosu. And you can see I'm gonna show you where that the gas processing plant that was being considered for Toyosu Station. And Toyosu Fish Market. And you can see all of that from this point. And it's quite bright. The sun glittering off of Tokyo Bay here. Beautiful day. I run here quite a bit in the evenings. It's a long loop, but you can see there's so much space. It's really wide. Down here you can walk all around Toyosu Island here. The man-made island. And the man-made island goes all the way to the Rainbow Bridge. Do you see it in the distance? There's Rainbow Bridge. That bridge is now lit up at night in a red color as a warning. Because Tokyo is on an alert. Just to exercise caution. The governor, the governator, turned on the alert system. Which means, hey, Tokyo, wake up. Just be careful. The number spiked.

00:29:00 John Daub: Yeah. I'm gonna take you over to the end of this area. And show you one more thing. It is a nice place to live, Toyosu. It's connected by the Yūrakuchō Line, which means you can get into Ginza Ichichōme in about 10 minutes from here. That's really close. If you get on the subway, I think it's four stops. Heski 10600. Can you still really crank those gachapon (capsule toy machines)? Yeah. Just don't touch them and make sure you have alcohol wipes now. If I see some gachapon, maybe we'll check that out. But I think I might not be going into the shopping mall. It's getting really hot now in Tokyo. The humidity is so high. We're getting very close to the rainy season, which will be starting typically every year around June 10th. Beautiful day, isn't it? Kind of hazy. Whoa. That does, it's in here. Don't try to ride your bike down the grassy knoll here. It says here, stop. It's dangerous and you're going to end up like that kid. Oh, geez. Oh, no. That looks hard. Glad he's wearing a helmet.

00:30:33 John Daub: They say the, how high you are above sea level in case there's a tsunami that'll come in this way. Because the Pacific Ocean, if you just go straight, you'll eventually, straight and then a little bit this way, you get into the Pacific Ocean. Go straight, you're in America. True story. Adrian Healer has breakfast right now. Bon appétit. In front of you, you see what they have is, you see that right there? This is a crane that's been preserved by the area. One of the few things that we have to remember what this area used to be, as well as right here, you can see there's some industrial objects. They've turned this industrial, I don't know why it's like banded off here, but they turn this, I guess these look like a train track into a bench here. And then you have some of the things, chain and anchor from tanker boats showing the old history of this area. Right there, this is what it used to look like. It's interesting, the history. When you know the history of the places that you're at, it really makes your surroundings more interesting, doesn't it?

00:31:58 John Daub: Look, they haven't moved that anchor. This is where it hasn't moved at all. That's awesome. This is the way it was left um, twenty, over twenty years ago. It's been in the same position. That's pretty cool. And they've shown in here what it looks like. This is where we are right now. We are right here. So this is what it used to look like, and this is what it looks like today. Pretty stark contrast. Very Tony Stark contrast. Alright, so now you can start to see that crane. Let's walk over towards it. Take a closer look at it. And in another live stream for Go Insiders, I'm gonna take you over to that bridge over there. And then we're gonna go over yonder and we're gonna have a closer look at that.

00:33:18 John Daub: This is LaLaport Shopping Mall in Toyosu. It's a nice place. There's some more industrial objects. I guess these could be like benches. It's hard to know what the purpose of them are, but I know that they're set up for something. In the evening they bring this drawbridge down, but during the day, Space Boat makes a stop here. Pick up passengers right there. Yes, that is a Bubba Gump Shrimp Company restaurant right there. And we're heading out to Toyosu's obvious connection with Forrest Gump. I don't know what... Did Forrest Gump come here? I'm not sure. That'd be pretty cool if he did. We really don't know what happened after the movie ended in 1995 or 6, right? What happened to Forrest? I guess he came to Japan. Started Bubba Gump Shrimp here in Toyosu. There you go.

00:34:27 John Daub: This is a crane that has been preserved. I guess we can walk around there. Let's take a closer look. That has been preserved as just a reminder of the history of Toyosu Island. It's still kind of new history, but as we get closer and closer to like 2030, 2040, 100 years away, then these kinds of memories are quite important for the next generation. I wonder if anybody can go up there. Oh, these little speed boats, they kind of have like space boat designs to them. We can take a look at it from the front. On the weekends, let me get my mask on. Someone's coming. On the weekends, they have some sometimes they have events now, but they haven't been doing that for a couple of months. It's been pretty quiet. Everyone's supposed to stay home, but we're now in the lockdown is over. And since this is my neighborhood, sort of, I'm allowed to walk around. So these are kind of space boat-esque sort of. It's pretty cool.

00:35:57 John Daub: Hey John, welcome to the insider level. Awesome. Every time, every year, I'm seeing more and more skyscrapers built on there. And over here, this is all new. This was not here a year ago. These buildings were not here last year. It's crazy how fast the construction is in this area. Right? Yeah, this is a face mask a friend of mine made, and I try to... It's comfortable. Comfortable. So a couple times a day, this space boat arrives right here on the dock, and let's see if it's operating. As well as, check out this crane here. A little inlet, and this is the crane is right here. Yeah. It's a nice place. Sometimes Kanai and I will come here, chillax in one of these chairs. Do you see? And you can look sitting here straight into the harbor as the sun sets.

00:37:22 John Daub: Oh, there's only one boat a day? What? Duh, space boat. Himiko comes here. It's 1200 yen to Asakusa from here. By boat. It's pretty cool. Alright. So let's look at this old tower. Part of the history of industrial Tokyo from the 1930s. Used to load, unload and load freight boats, ships going one place or another. Boy, they really made them back then. Looks like heavy steel. Pretty cool. Like a mini Tokyo Tower. At night, they have blue LED lights illuminating this up, so it really is a striking sight when the sun goes down. But I'd love to see them do bungee jumping here, right? Don't you think? I think they could do bungee jumping. It wouldn't be very high, but maybe if they take this higher, they can do bungee jumping here. And you'd be jumping down into the water. What do you guys think?

00:39:06 John Daub: Toyosu area is a pretty nice area to live now. It wasn't always like that. This is the industrial heart of Tokyo. Just over there is the gas, the Tokyo Gas building. This is where they, I believe they had a processing plant. That's gone now. They've moved that. But they do still have a museum and offices over there. I think it's that round building there as well. And you can see there's a model home place. There's a place called Wild Magic, which is a barbecue area. So you can have some barbecues along the river over there. There's actually, alright, this is top secret guys. Don't tell anybody here. But over there, you see that grey building in the center? If you do come by bicycle. Just on the other side of there, they have a place where you can buy gourmet chicken and beer and snacks and sit out on the river. It's so beautiful on the harbor here. And not a lot of people know about it. It's so top secret. Don't tell anybody. In fact, on a day like this, I'd love to go there. I don't know if it's open. But I'm on my bicycle, so I might take a quick look-see. Do you see it underneath the bridge? Here? Yeah. Don't tell anybody, Chris Ellis. It's up to you now. It's in the hands of Chris Ellis.

00:40:23 John Daub: Alright. That over there, and I'm gonna be taking insiders over there in about 10-15 minutes. Cause I gotta walk over there. That's an old freight bridge. And there's people walking across a new bridge. But the old one is still in oper- the old one is no longer in operation. And it kind of looks like New York's High Line or something like that. I wish that they'd make it a pedestrian walkway. But it's kind of neat. So we're gonna get a closer look at another livestream. Dan from Canada, thanks for touring around and reminding us to be safe. Chillin' here the Airstream. Cheers. The Super Chat's blocked by this lens. It's like the one word there. Thank you so much for that, Dan. I appreciate it.

00:41:12 John Daub: Alright, cool guys. I'm thinking about doing a midnight snack run sometime this week. Outside and not in my refrigerator. But because the city of Tokyo has now opened it up and it looks like the infections are at a reasonable rate. Meaning like 10, somewhere between 5 and 20 people a day in a city of 15 million. Things are starting to open up and hopefully we can keep those numbers down here. That's good for all of us. That's why I try my best to wear a mask. I don't say- I shouldn't say try my best. I wear a mask when I'm in public with people. Just because everybody's wearing one that really keeps us safer and avoids the you know, outbreaks and stuff. We want to be safe. Keep your family safe. But also stay mentally okay because although a lot of people are self-isolating, you do need to get some sunlight and try to live a life, okay? People, take care of everybody.

00:42:16 John Daub: Yeah, I'll do- I'll see if I can do a night stream. It might not be a midnight snack run but I will do something at night outside. If you have any questions, you can leave them in the comments below. Thanks so much for hitting the like button and for joining and becoming a member. I'm gonna give more information. I didn't expect so many people to join the memberships so quickly but I'm gonna give an update to everybody about how this all works out. I still really appreciate everybody who's supporting on Patreon and I said that that's the best place to go and support but I really think that not having a platform here on YouTube is crazy. So I thought it was time. Bye guys. Oh, I wish Spaceboat was coming. Such a peaceful day. It'd be a good place for ice cream. Eating the ice cream right there in the corner. Someone's already there. Thanks, Jayden.