00:03 John Daub: Welcome to one of the most beautiful spots in Tokyo that I like to come to when I want to relax and reflect on life. Kanae and I were here a few months ago eating a bento in the spring and reflecting. And this is Tokyo Bay, beautiful city of Tokyo. There's the Rainbow Bridge in the distance. And if you turn to the right a little bit, you can see—it's over that building—but there's Tokyo Tower. This area gives you an amazing view of the city and all the boats that go by. If anything comes by, I'll turn the camera around. But because of the situation that we're in, there's not a lot of boats going by right now, and not a lot of people here either.

00:52 John Daub: I wanted to take a moment to talk with you about the last six months in Japan—how has it been and what the pandemic has done? Not just to me, but to the channel and to all of you. From this point, the six-month point on, we're going to see what the next six months bring. I'm an optimistic person, so I believe the next six months is going to be a lot better. It is wickedly hot—close to 38, 40 degrees here, which is over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. You can see there's not a lot of people here. There's just one fisherman down there. The Obon holiday is over here in Japan and people have gone back to work. I'm back to work too—I'm editing, but I'm lucky I get to work at home and I can take a break and ride my bicycle out to here, which isn't too far, maybe 20 minutes away from my house, to just relax, get some sun and then go back in. I thought I would take this time to talk with you.

01:52 John Daub: When this started in January, I could kind of see the direction that this was going to be a big, big problem. I started live streaming on Only in Japan Go to give you updates. I started doing some flights on travel to Japan. And it wasn't long after I started doing those that they started to cancel flights and procedures came into place where a lot of you weren't allowed to travel into Japan. In fact, many of you have had to cancel your trips. March, April, May was very, very difficult and complicated for so many of you, including me. I had to cancel a lot of location shoots, including Aloha, including a really interesting video at Fukushima in the town that was affected. I had access to go in and film an amazing episode to bring you the history and look into it. Next year will be the 10th year anniversary, so I'll do something special for that. But I had to cancel that in March, and that was really heartbreaking, as well as some other things that the channel launched. The new channel launch was also delayed because of the pandemic. And a lot of people lost their jobs and are still hurting out there. I see the news that's happening in the US. We've had riots. We've had a lot of misunderstandings and shifts in life. People don't like that. And I think the first six months of this pandemic worldwide have been really, really hard. It's important to reflect back and see how this has impacted your family and also look forward and see how the next six months is going to be.

03:43 John Daub: So for me and Kanae, there were some really good things that happened out of this pandemic or lockdown—we didn't have a lockdown in Japan. The great thing about this live stream is that I'll be able to talk about that and interact with you all about this. Welcome, everybody. Eugene Holberts here. Hey, Eugene. Shout out, Irvan. Gillette Fusion—what do you mean, Irvan? This is fun. Jeff Ang. Hi. Here's something for snack fun. Jeff, I'm going to put that to work, buddy. I already put that to work—I took an IOU on that and I bought something. Shane is here. How you doing, Shane? No Gillette fun. I'm actually using the Schick, which I kind of prefer the Gillette, to be honest with you.

04:35 John Daub: But the last six months, I've seen a massive change in Japan and I've seen a massive change in the way YouTube also works now. In the beginning of this pandemic, a lot of you might remember that I couldn't even use the word coronavirus or COVID-19 or pandemic because it was considered a sensitive event, like something at a school that hurts people. I understand YouTube's policies with this and I respect that very much. But this led to people not talking about this enough at a very critical stage. When this was starting to get out of control, I could feel the direction back in February. If you go back through the Only in Japan Go channel and you see the first live streams, you'll be able to see how we saw this coming—all the problems that happened. I'm very fortunate to be here in Japan during this pandemic because I think Japanese are a little bit better with masks and protection and listening to the government instructions and things like this. We've had a pretty good go in Japan. The numbers are much lower—maybe because of the testing, I don't know. All I know is that we look around and we see that people are doing their very best as a community to try to keep everybody safe. Not everybody is perfect here as well as in any country, but we're doing our best job to do that and keep our families safe.

06:23 John Daub: Over the last six months, I've seen a massive change in the way that we interact with each other, in the way that we go shopping, in the way that we live our lives. Sometimes more mail order, more reliance on other people to get the things that we need and more reliance on ourselves to cook for ourselves and take care of each other. That's been a good thing. Kanae and I have spent so much time together—that's a good thing and a bad thing too. But these are the times, the toughest times, that also build stronger relationships. And I think over the last six months we have built a stronger relationship on Only in Japan Go. I brought you into my house more. You've gotten to see me when I'm unshaven in the morning, camping in my tent in the middle of the night, talking, seeing pictures, hearing stories, and that's a good thing. That's a really good thing. I got a couple of things here—I did go shopping before this. A lot of people can't spend time with their families, but I don't need a haircut. I got to be shaved down by my wife, which is really nice. You guys are like family and that's really important to me. So when I go live—and this is always the case with this channel—whenever I was maybe lonely or I wasn't feeling good or I had something that I really wanted to share and I was alone, I never really was alone. We never really are alone anymore. We can just connect with one another through the internet. And we all have each other's backs because it is a tough time. And this community has always had mine. Cheers to building relationships.

08:18 John Daub: Speaking of building relationships, I'm going to build a relationship with this lager—just starting off with the six-month celebration or memorial. It's a non-alcoholic lager. I've never seen anything like this before, but I thought the design was pretty unique. It's made in Japan. I figure this is for tourists, maybe. Like putting a ninja on a beer is kind of weird, but I'm not drinking any booze. It's good—alcohol content not zero percent, but zero point zero zero zero. They went to the third decimal point to prove that there's no alcohol. Ninja back in the Edo period—ninja is not allowed to drink alcohol, I believe, because of their code. At any moment they could be called in—they don't want to be plowed. It's also written in Arabic and in Hebrew. I think they all come together in this beer—this is peace in the Middle East. Ninja lager. It's halal certified. Oh, that is so bad. Oh God, what is that? That's not lager. I know the secret of this beer—they make it taste so bad that you forget about all of your disagreements with other people and you come together and talk about how bad the beer is. It's like soda water with chemical-tasting malts and has an aftertaste of dog food. Let's just say that ninja have a different standard of beer. Maybe because they don't drink it. Yeah, I'll be going back to Sapporo Red Label Red Star.

10:48 John Daub: Now, this is the snack that I bought for all of us—chashu, get the real one. This is a really good one. This is an ahi poke don. I believe this is like a Hawaiian thing, right? Ahi is maguro—Hawaiian for maguro or something. So what we have here is a maguro avocado don. They put the fish and marinated it and put it on there with avocado and rice. A little lettuce—I thought it was healthier. Don't worry, I do have a backup drink. I did not rely on the Ninja Lager—I brought mugi cha (barley tea), which has a lot of minerals in it for summer and a lot of people drink this because it's good for you in summertime. Let's give this delicious bento a try. By the way, this is the last voyage for Chelsea, which is the DJI Osmo Mobile 3, which has been very, very bad lately. Bad girl—she's named Chelsea for her unreliability. Oh, that's good. This erases the memory of that Ninja Lager. This is really good. The Hawaiians know how to eat, man. Raw fish, marinated raw fish on rice—it's so simple and it's so good.

13:50 John Daub: Anyone want to guess what I'm pointing at right now? We have a sighting of a boat—during the pandemic, Spaceboat was very quiet and really didn't have a lot of people to ride her. And yeah, there she is, and there's like six people on top. It's nice to see Spaceboat on a very sunny day—not a love boat. I bet people have fallen in love on the Spaceboat. This is the best place—you get a view of everything. Check that boat out there. This is one of these boats—I've seen these in Singapore. They were like boats that had wheels on them and you could drive and also swim—amphibious boats. I'm in Toyosu Maguro Park, which is right over there. Just over there beyond my bicycle is Toyosu Fish Market—I was here just yesterday, just on the other side. So I wanted to come here on a beautiful day to relax and take it all in. There's a Skytree as well in the distance. Duck Tours is one in Singapore—Kanae and I were there a couple of years ago, and we saw that duck tour and we were like, we've never seen a boat like that before.

16:13 John Daub: Back to the last six months—so besides a lot of my shoots being canceled and HK shoots, a lot of shows are still offline. Tokyo Eye came back on and instead of doing tourism stuff, Tokyo Eye on HK moved over to covering the coronavirus and how that's impacted Japan and promoting small businesses. And this is one of my focuses, and I'm so glad that HK is following my lead. Now, they've always done that—it's good that they're focusing on small businesses and putting in the big picture and taking a look on how businesses have been affected by this. They have a new episode today—a director that I know that worked with for many years made a pretty good, nice episode. And there's no doubt I'll be back on the show—Tokyo Eye again in the next couple of months. There's a lot to cover, and I love factories.

17:42 John Daub: What are some of the other things that we learned here just yesterday? We've learned that Japan has a long way to go. Japan is not a perfect country. And I don't really say anything critical about Japan—and there's good reason because this is my home. The country has been really good to me. This is a safe place with a really good quality of life and delicious food and friendly people that you get to know. If you learn the language and you can fit in your way here, just like anywhere else in the world, you can make a home. My wife is Japanese, so I really love Japan very much. But it's not a perfect place. There are aspects of Japan that really need improvement. And I try to find positive ways to find those kinds of solutions. One of them was this whole testing and the way that they've been testing for the coronavirus here has been so slow and it's not surprising to me. It's not surprising to a lot of people just because Japan is a country that laws and decisions are made on a consensus of a lot of people. This is also a reason why decisions take too much time—they must come with a consensus that eliminates all risk. And you might get an answer six months later and you can't get anything done quickly in Japan as a result of this style, although it's changing. It's not really a lack of leadership—it's just part of the culture. If things take a while to get done, even in the digital era. And the PCR testing is one where I think we could switch to better testing—saliva testing, tests that take less time. Japan should be on the forefront of testing PCR testing or any kind of antibody testing. But they're not—and it's just because they see the risks in it. And the consensus is that this is the best at the time. And we'll meet next week or next month. By that time, it's too late. You have to have a mentality where you need to move quickly.

21:15 John Daub: Yeah, Japan is not a perfect place. We still use fax machines here. Just the other day, a client asked me to fax an estimate to them. So I had to go to the supermarket, had a fax machine and paid 200 yen to fax them a copy because I don't want to buy a fax machine. I asked, can I scan it and send you a PDF or take a picture of it and send you a PDF? And they said, no, we want a fax. So it's despite all of the high-tech stuff that we hear about Japan, it's also a place where things move quite slowly. Newspapers are still read here in Japan. People still use fax machines. The amount of flip phones in Japan—it's incredible how many people still use flip phones. And there's nothing wrong with the flip phone—it looks like Star Trek from the 1960s. But we've seen this in the pandemic where Japan is a lot slower as a result of this to address issues that are critical. And if they don't have a plan in place, to make one takes quite a long time. I think they have a lot of contingency plans. But once they get it right, then they start to perfect it and it keeps getting perfect and perfect. And I think by the time that the 2021 Olympics come, Japan is going to be really on the ball and we'll have like five-second PCR testing. They'll have some sort of neat technology and it just keeps getting better and better once there's momentum. Anything new takes a long time to adjust. But once there's momentum into it, they do move quite quickly here in Japan. And as somebody who's lived here for 23 years, I've seen amazing change—the last five years have changed more than maybe in the last 15 years. And it just keeps getting faster and faster.

23:42 John Daub: So what does that leave us the next six months? I've got a very optimistic outlook. Tada—welcome to an insider. We almost have 100 insiders—it's amazing. I have a new secret stream coming at a secret time in a secret place soon. And I also have a new Japan insider update notes—the last one on Koya-san (Mount Koya) was very popular. So I'll have another one in a week, maybe by the weekend.

24:41 John Daub: Does Japan have their own anti-mask people? I have a friend named Karen—she wears a mask. But most people are wearing masks like 95 percent. There's some people that don't wear masks, but it's not really too much of an issue—you just stay away from them. I think in the summer there are people that don't want to wear masks, but I haven't seen any fighting—just people stay away from those people. Just today I had to buy this mask pack because when I was riding my bicycle, my mask flew off into an area that I could not go in and get it back. So I had to go to the pharmacy and buy these masks without a mask on. But a lot of stores now have taken precautions with vinyl coverings. And staff have face shields and everyone has alcohol at the door, which basically doesn't have any purpose other than it might limit it a little bit. But I've seen that compared to five months ago, we were so much more prepared, but we're not there yet. Just yesterday, Governor Koike, the governor of Tokyo—who is also the mayor, Tokyo's actually a state—she just released these stickers that have a beautiful rainbow that go around it. And restaurants and stores that are adhering to protocol for the pandemic put this sticker out in the front so you can feel safe that the chef and the owner and the staff have studied and adhere to the protocols. And I think there's a little bit of an examination or something that staff has to take to make sure they're following policies and closing on time and things like this to keep everybody safe. And that's a good thing—it brings a lot more attention to the fact that this is not over. We still got a long way to go. Small things like this do help—you're going to see the stickers everywhere in the next week.

27:27 John Daub: Going back to the next six months, I'm quite optimistic about this because I'm seeing that we are returning back to normal life, but differently. We're more prepared. We're taking more precautions. People are not going out unless it's work related. And I think that we have to keep in mind that work-related activities that are essential for you to take care of your family—you have to go out and travel. There's really no way around it. The economy still has to continue. And filming the episodes is going to be quite risky for me. I'm 46—I'm not sure if I'm high risk or not, but I know that I don't want to catch it and I don't want to give it to anybody. I have to take as many precautions as possible in the next six months. I just have to continue working and be really careful with social distancing, wearing face shields on the shinkansen, masking it up, staying away from people, thinking about my family before myself and doing things. If I don't need to go out and staying home—things like this. These are—my mindset has changed quite a bit. And going forward, I'm optimistic because I can work again. More things are open. People are inviting me. Kanazawa invited me over a month ago to come and film there and make that episode—400 years eating food. So I'm quite thankful for that and the trust that they put in me to also take precautions. And I'll be doing more and more of that traveling to bring you these episodes as long as I can.

29:07 John Daub: I also started the fireworks event—a lot of you know about it. We've already been funded 100 percent. We're trying to get a stretch goal to get the 200 percent funded, which means that we're going to do a second. OK, this is a big announcement— we're doing the stretch goal is a second fireworks festival that I'll live stream to. Remember Honda-san, the guy who made the shakudama (star shells), the biggest firework in the world—420 kilograms, made an episode on that. Great story, such a nice guy. He said that he would make us some shakudama. And this is kind of a rare thing. We can't fire them off in Akita, so we have to pick another date in October. And I'm going to add this all into the documentary, which is going to make the documentary so much more diverse and colorful and focus on size and beauty. So it's also going to be the massive size of the fireworks in Katakai, but also the beauty of it in Akita when we fire those off. And I think we're going to see two different sides of the fireworks industry. This documentary is getting better and better. So I can't thank you enough for fighting it out and trying to get to that second stretch goal. It's five million yen, which is like 50,000 dollars. But you will get a nice video in return—I promise you that. And the access is incredible. I'll be able to put cameras near the cannons, fly drones. I'll be able to have cameras from all these different angles, interviews with the masters, the pyrotechnicians, people who've been making fireworks for generations, get you into the factories and show you how they make the fireworks shells, how they package them up together, how they light it off. What do they put in the bottom of the cannons to set that up? And also the most important and critical element of this video is this video, I hope will change the way that you see fireworks and your perception of it, because Japan has a different way to see them than I think in other countries. Many people—it's sort of somewhat similar to the cherry blossoms. It's just a beautiful thing that you see for just a small time and then it's gone and it leaves an impression on your life. Fireworks is an important culture in Japan going back all the way to 1733 after the famine where 900,000 people died. And I'm connecting this with that because I think historically it's pretty cool to see how people were in the past, which was in the Edo period, and see if we can take that kind of hope and passion that they had then after their famine and apply that to our pandemic in the second half of 2020.

32:43 John Daub: We have the best community on the internet by far. Any questions? This is a time where you guys can let me know what you're thinking.

36:12 John Daub: I'm pretty optimistic. And a lot of people are thinking that the Olympics will be canceled—no way. The show must go on. The Olympics will go on—maybe without you, but they will go on. And I think it's just about testing and protocol. The testing can get better and you can get results in five minutes. You can test before you do a wrestling decision. And if neither of you have antibodies, then you can go ahead and wrestle. I think testing is going to be that fast. And to dismiss something a year away is ridiculous. Technology and precautions and remedies and medicines move much quicker in a world like this. And we're at the six-month stage where we can see a little bit better on where this is going to be going. And to cancel it this far in advance means it's a business decision and not a scientific decision. And if we lose the 2020 Olympics for good, that's really going to hurt Japan and kind of take a little bit of hope away for the future of the city. But the good thing, if you do keep positive from this, is because of the Olympics, the infrastructure of the city is so much better. It's been renovated in so many key parts that were so old and aged. And now the city has gotten a facelift in many ways, just like in '64. It created a new highway system, created new buildings and changes and rapid development for the next 20 years. And I think Tokyo might become one of those hubs because the Chinese cities are so high-tech and so new—Tokyo really needed to renovate its system a little bit. And this was perfect timing for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics held or not held. But I still am optimistic.

38:37 John Daub: So there you have it. Nosh moderators, were there any questions I missed? Maybe we can get to 32,000 dollars by the time this live stream ends. So if you want to click the like button for sure. And let's see if we can get the message out there and try to make this fireworks project even bigger on Friday. Oh, I released—I think I can show it to you. Here's the design for the fireworks poster. And at night you can see Kaniyia on the bridge there—it's on the Kickstarter page. If you want to go over there, it's beautifully done. I'm going to be sending the postcards with that design as well as posters, which are Japanese fans and blue sheets so you can feel a part of Japanese fireworks summer culture at your home. And as I like to camp in my living room, you too can celebrate fireworks and watch the documentary in your living room on a blue sheet with a fan and a towel just like we do in Japan.

40:09 John Daub: And I'm going to add in posters to the other tiers—probably Friday, Saturday morning, you'll see some new tier rewards on the Kickstarter page. So if you go and you back that project, go back and look at it this weekend and maybe want to upgrade it if you wanted to get a poster or if you wanted to sponsor a shakudama, which is actually a thousand dollars for this massive watermelon-sized shell that might do a smiley face or a red color or a blue color. You can write a message, and we can tape that message to the fireworks shell. In fact, if you back this, you can send that message to me and I can tape that letter to your fireworks shell as we launch that mama into the sky and watch it explode—just cool. And we're happy to give shout outs if you have a YouTube channel or an Instagram. Every single firework that we make, every show we make—it helps the industry cope with the loss of jobs and give somebody a job as well as gives us hope to see something beautiful. Are matsuri still happening? No, they've been canceled, but we can make our own and we can add to other festivals that might be taking place. I want to find a way that we can make the biggest impact with the money that we're going to be giving to the fireworks association.

43:55 John Daub: Have you been to the new Miyashita rooftop park? I'm going to be going there tomorrow—I was going to go there today, but my gimbal has not been doing too well. I didn't want to go all the way out there and then not be able to live stream because the gimbal was having problems. The gimbal is actually going to be delivered this afternoon. So I'll be able to go tomorrow morning to the Shibuya area for episodes that you might know what I'm going to be filming. It's going to be early, but I'll be there tomorrow morning.

44:52 John Daub: Do you think the long decision-making traditions are more of an older generation thing or things that have changed? That's a good question. I think it's twofold. I think that is an old traditional thing, but it's made to reduce risk. Meaning if everybody checks off on this and everybody understands it and everybody is in the same direction, then on the other side of it, there's no blame because everybody supported it. But more than that, there's also a consensus, meaning that we all agree that this is the way to go, so this is the way we're all going to go. Then people all comply. So there's some good things with the way that Japanese make the decisions. But there's also some bad things in the sense that it takes a really long time. And sometimes it's the wrong decision, and you go against the voices of the few who might know a little bit more. It goes up to your leadership to be able to make those calls. In the business world, it's a tough thing—you have to be really patient. When I make videos for YouTube, but I also have my own business and I work for other clients, sometimes it takes an extended amount of time to get things done. But you never give up—you just understand that it just takes time to be patient. When you invoice a client in Japan, you'll do it before the end of the month. And then you might not get paid for two months. When you start a new job, your first paycheck might not come for two months. It's just the way that the Japan system works—you just have to be patient. But everything works out in the end. But when you need the need for speed, it's kind of hard.

47:09 John Daub: If this global pandemic is over, would you try to go to Taiwan? Yes—and fermented beegern. I will totally love to go to Taiwan. I haven't been there in 20 years and I have so many friends there. And we have a pretty good following in Taiwan—that would be great. The great thing about having this Only in Japan channel is that it's not exclusive to just Only in Japan—now I can travel outside and take a look at different stories. I probably won't do that very often, but the added flexibility is a good thing.

47:35 John Daub: The last six months, I've just been relying on Go because I didn't have another channel to Patreon and Go because I didn't have a main channel to get revenue from. So it's been a really big year for transition. 2020 in general, not talking about the pandemic, has been really tough for Kanae and I. But I think we're starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Please don't take the precautions lightly. Keep wearing your mask. Keep protecting your family and don't go out unless you really need to. But we can see that testing is getting better. They're working harder on the vaccine—we're getting in the third rounds of testing. The rates are leveling off a little bit. Turn off the TV and start reading a book—I think you all know what you need to do. You don't need to watch the TV and keep watching the updates and seeing the back and forth between talking heads. Read a book. Turn on YouTube. Go to my friend Kevin Riley's cooking channel and make a dish. Kevin Riley has some of the best YouTube videos on cooking, I think. And he only has 8,800 subscribers after like two years of constantly uploading food videos. Go and watch Kevin Riley's channel and you will feel so happy watching Kumar the Bear make food and enjoy cooking. Nothing makes me happier than seeing our friends succeed. And Peter as well—he's working really hard on his moto vlogs.

50:22 John Daub: I've learned that the post office, which is a big topic now, the post office in Japan has been struggling just like all the worldwide post offices. The last six months packages from Japan to the United States are not possible unless you're paying a lot of money. And if you are, you have to send everything by sea mail. And I've been sending packages by sea mail and it takes an estimated six to nine weeks to arrive, but they get there. So a big thank you to our patrons supporters for the patience to do that. And the melted chocolates, you know, they have unique shapes—put them in the freezer, they'll be good. Support our local post office. Our postal workers just—they're working pretty hard. I heard that they're doing deliveries on Sunday in some places to catch up. Our postal workers don't get enough attention. The post office is a community place where we can all meet one another out of the digital world. So buy some stamps—support your post office, buy some stamps and send some postcards. Send some postcards to the people that you know—maybe that's a good thing that you can do, write letters to the people that you miss if you have free time.

52:01 John Daub: Big thank you to my friend Dan and Lincoln—they sent me this amazing bag. This is such a cool bag—it's a good size and I'm learning from them how to sell merchandise. They've added secret pockets into this bag. This is the first edition What's Inside bag. And I like the colors on it—they did a really good job with designing it. Here's their water bottle made out of stainless steel, and it got a straw in there. But it's really well made—beautiful logo on the front of it. They came in three days from America—that's crazy. These postcards are of Lake Biwa—this is a Shirahige Shrine. This going out to Diana in Singapore and Jesse in California. I love this bag, Dan—I can put the postcards in this pocket. My gimbal goes here, my tripod and camera go inside here and there's a space for my laptop—it's perfect.

54:14 John Daub: Thanks so much for watching. Take care of your equipment and your equipment will take care of you—unless it's the R5, it'll just overheat and then get on fire. But I got a feeling that Canon is going to be pretty big in 2021—they're going to fix this. They have the best lenses. Thanks, everybody, for watching. If you have any questions, you can leave a comment below. Much love from Tokyo, Japan. I got so many travel stories that I should tell you. Next time we have to stay at home or something, I'll get the photo album and I'll take you to Tibet with me and to Cambodia. I've been to 72 countries backpacking and had a pretty incredible life that a lot of you might not even know about yet. Maybe I'll start to share a little bit more of that with you over the next couple of months as I try to get the new channel to grow. Getting closer to 100,000 subscribers has been pretty cool. Have a good day, everybody. Good night. Enjoy the last 20 seconds on Tokyo. Subscribe button—got the new channel with two new episodes over 20 minutes long. Amazing stories—Kanazawa and Hokkaido. Bye, everybody. Stay safe. Next six months—hit that like button.