00:00:00 John Daub: Hey everybody, that there in front of you is Akihabara Station. Welcome to Tokyo. We're going to be taking a tour around the area that not a lot of people go to visit. Akihabara is famous for Chuo Dori, all the game centers and gachapon (capsule toy) machines, electronic shops. This side of Akihabara is different. It's unique. There's not a lot of—well, you're going to see in this live stream. I'm going to take you around from the exit of Akihabara Station. This is where the Hibiya line is, as well as the JR line. Yodobashi Camera is just right there too. That's one of the biggest electronics stores in the world.

00:01:03 John Daub: I'm going to take you to the other side as the Sobu line passes over us, underneath the railroad tracks to a couple of parks, then loop around to the Kanda River and show you some of the older buildings and some of the history of Tokyo back inside of here. So buckle in for a 30, 45 minute live stream around the area. Welcome to Tokyo. Just got to wait for the traffic light. This is Chuo Dori. This avenue cuts through from Ueno. If you go straight this way, you get to Ueno, Okachimachi, then Ueno. If you go the other way to Chuo Dori, you'll get to Higashi Ginza and eventually down to Shinagawa, I believe.

00:01:37 John Daub: Chuo being the Showa era from about 40 years ago. Actually, Showa era extended all the way through World War II until the 1980s and ended, I think, in 1989. Really, really long era, Showa era. I think it was 64 years. All right. Eventually, we're going to wrap around this way, but let's go underneath the railroad tracks and find some interesting things. Now, this road here will take you straight to Asakusabashi. This is technically maybe Akihabara, an area of Kanda, but the Kanda region. But if you go straight this way, it will take you in about 10 minutes to Asakusabashi Station, which is a really neat area in its own right.

00:02:13 John Daub: But this is still the side of Akihabara Station on the Hibiya line. And we're going to go on the other side of the tracks here. There are loads in Akihabara of these one-coin lunches—one coin meaning 500 yen. And you can smell the tsuyu, the dashi as well. All of these delicious meats and soba simmering in a salty sauce. Get it from a vending machine. Akihabara is probably the king of cheap lunches, right? And maybe even the king of vending machines. But there is a ton of character in the streets here. Check it out. There's a ramen stand that's open for business here. This is abura soba.

00:03:19 John Daub: This one, I remember my friend Randy Santel ate, I think, six mega bowls of these in a live stream on Only in Japan Go. That guy can eat. There are a lot of budget hotels down these alleys as well. You're going to find if you stay in Tokyo, you want to stay in Akihabara. This might be the cheaper option, staying between here and Asakusabashi. There are a ton, again, like here's another really cheap restaurant that serves pretty good food. Tentengui—like skewered guts. Awesome. Whoa! It's got like a Fight Club in there. That's awesome. Dude, that is pretty cool. It says here, fight. Yeah! Better get out of here before these guys start coming out and wanting to fight me.

00:04:23 John Daub: This is the Apa Hotel. Again, one of the budget hotels in Tokyo that a lot of tourists find themselves in. The Akihabara Ekimae Apa Hotel. I think they usually run about 5,000 yen a night, 5,800 yen with tax or something. But during the high season, I see these going up to about $100 a night just because of the location. There's a little bar outside of it. Over here across this parking lot. I guess we could cut across underneath here. Oh, this is where Patrick, my buddy Kapatha Galbraith, and I had a drink here about two, three months ago. There are loads of little teeny shacks that serve all sorts of like yatai food. And you're going to see these. And they're still in business, just hanging on.

00:05:14 John Daub: If you do come to Tokyo and you do stay in this area, try to support some of these local businesses here. I'm going to wrap around and see what's going on. I'm going to show you a retro game center next. And I'm kind of curious to see if it's still in business. If you're following along on Google Maps, go to Akihabara Station and start tracing your finger from there to Asakusabashi Station. We're going to make a left here if we can. Above us for those joining us is the Sobu Line that runs between Akihabara and Chiba.

00:06:03 John Daub: Tofuro—that's a chain. Binchotan, charcoal grilled food. That looks really good. I like how they have everything in different languages for tourists. "Here provides you the best value to enjoy that Japanese food culture. The Tofuro hopes it can promote Japanese culture to more people by offering its customers the world of tea that is characterized by remoteness, quiet, and tranquility. The restaurant reproduces the streets of Edo period." Yes! So inside of this restaurant, a lot of people looking for themed restaurants. They make—this is a place where I remember in Shinjuku and also I believe they have one near Ginza. On Ginza corridor. They show you the old Edo period inside of there. It's just really well done. Usually there's a bridge, a red bridge inside of there. You can take pictures and stuff.

00:07:01 John Daub: So when my family—I think I took my mom there once. I took my neighbors who visited Japan too in there. They were quite impressed with the server. Because he was, I don't know, he just—he looked very feminine. And they were a little bit older and kind of shocked by that. So they got a picture with him there. So it was all in good nature. But he was a soshoku danshi (herbivore man). But it's super friendly. There's a hostel down there. And you will find some graffiti in Akihabara. It's part of the character, right? It's just part of the character of this city.

00:07:54 John Daub: For me, this is—if I come to Akihabara, I don't eat. I don't hang out on Chuo Dori. That's the main street that I take you through all the time. I come here to this area of Tokyo. And it's a lot more—do you see like narrow streets and alleys? And things are always changing here. You never know what you're going to find around the corner. It's true. Soshoku danshi—I think that's the name of the word. I don't think they like being called that. But it was a category of men who wore makeup and nail polish and didn't want to do anything and played video games and lived at home with their mothers. Which actually is not a bad thing. It's good to keep families together. It's kind of interesting.

00:08:48 John Daub: Little food truck. Oh, I noticed that more and more during the pandemic, more and more of these restaurants had food trucks. And when the restaurants had to close, they probably just bought this recently. The owners would take out their food trucks and start to sell their goods remotely into neighborhoods. And it took maybe two or three trucks. But before the neighbors started to talk. And there were always lines out of the really popular ones. For me, Kanae and I found a brick oven pizzeria on wheels. And had a really good pizza. But they stopped—I think it's right over there. But they stopped coming because the state of emergency ended. And we stopped eating brick oven pizzas because our waistlines were expanding.

00:09:43 John Daub: That in front of you is the massive Yodobashi Camera. It's a ninja walk. Ninja walk the streets. I'm actually on the lookout for a retro game center. And then I'm going to take you to a park. It might have gone out of business. I see FJ Gen Sokyo notices Yodobashi Camera. That's interesting. So I might just go the other way. This looks like a ninja cafe or something. Look at this. So they do cater to tourists. And try to find a way to—yeah, it looks like it's closed down because of—it's a bar that's closed down right now. They have oden. You can see a lot of different languages. There's some Korean and Chinese. But for the most part, these places—this area near Akihabara really relied a lot more on tourism. Which is not, you know, happening.

00:11:03 John Daub: Alright, let's go back this way. No jaywalking. Look how tame they are. You want to come to my hand? Hey, buddy. I got the same color jacket as your head. That's really nice. You're one of the good ones. Oh, no. I'm glad it didn't come on my hand. Somebody had a tough night and those pigeons are making a meal of it. Let's keep walking. I did not see that. One of the good guys. Yeah. Gross. Anything can happen in a live stream. This is pretty gross. Natsuge, I think was the name of the place. It was a retro game center that I had actually asked permission to film in during my retro game episode a long time ago and they said no. I was somewhat disappointed. But I had somewhat of a backup plan. So that was good.

00:12:22 John Daub: There are about three or four retro game centers, I believe, in the city of Tokyo. Two of them in the central city. One of them is in Takadanobaba. I don't know if it's still in business. And the other one was on that alley. Yeah, this way. Oh, they operate. They just started the hot soft drinks. You can see the bottom row is hot and the top two are cold. But I'm not a big fan of the Keaton beverages. Straight ahead is a park. And I wanted to show you this because we didn't—we only walked about three, four minutes from the station. And we're at a park. It's pretty interesting how quiet it suddenly becomes away from Akihabara walking in this direction.

00:14:00 John Daub: Looks like a business has left from right here. When it was hopping. I think that that game arcade is out of business. When this place was hopping with tourists, all these were full. All of these places were full. And it doesn't look like it's like that anymore, which is kind of a shame. I saw this alley here. What do we got down here? Oh, that's so interesting. All right. Let's just take a walk down here. Let's hope the signal holds on. Can these narrow streets date back a long time? You'll find the back entrances to restaurants and things like this, which would be great for movie location shoots for action scenes where a dude is running through a restaurant and going to the back alley. This looks like something that could be in a movie.

00:15:08 John Daub: If we pass any gachapon, got to get something for Johnny. I will be ending at the vending machine of horror. This livestream ends at the vending machine of horror. Wow! Wow, there's a Christmas tree from like a family Christmas tree. You don't see that in Japan. Christmas is not a holiday in Japan. I'm kind of sad. I'm getting the feeling that that retro game center went out of business, right? I'm getting that feeling. But to have an apartment in this area of the city would be pretty cool, don't you think? Between Asakusa and Akihabara. Look at that new, a lot of new buildings here. I haven't walked this direction in this part of the city for a couple of years on this road here. I see that there's more apartment complexes.

00:16:31 John Daub: Let's go this way. Just kind of see. Okay, yeah. So there's a little teeny shrine here. And I believe there's a park next to it. We overshot it a little bit. But in every corner of Tokyo, if you walk outside of the tourist centers off of the main streets, you're going to be super surprised with what you find. Over there is Showa Dori. So we've come already kind of a long way. Right here is Izumi Park, I believe. And look at this little shrine here. Bow. I'm always kind of afraid to film and go in there, but you can see the wolf, the kitsune (fox spirit), which is good for business. He's got a can in his mouth. Staying caffeinated.

00:17:59 John Daub: It's kind of super interesting to find a park here so close to Akihabara. That's Yodobashi Camera right there. So if you ever want to get a bento and find a place to sit and eat, here's your park. Izumi Park right here. A really nice open space. You can get a blue sheet or something—probably at Yodobashi Camera—and have a picnic right here in the park. Get a couple of bentos. Really nice. Do some pull-ups over there. A couple of rules. Do not feed the animals, meaning do not feed John or Jennifer. We are animals of eating. No flames, meaning I can't use my gas burner here to cook curry. No ball playing, no litter. You have to carry your own garbage home. Don't park your bike. Even bicycles are banned from parking here. You can tell it's the middle of the city. And be quiet at night. This is something that's very important.

00:19:31 John Daub: Alright, we're gonna go back now towards another park and to the Sobu Line. Pretty interesting. This is connected with Izumi Middle School or Elementary School. I don't see a sign right now. And I believe that's a hospital over there. Feel bad about asking you to eat seal curry. But here's some funds to buy something better to eat. I am not eating seal curry. I've already discussed this with the viewers. And even Irvin. We've discussed this. And I won't let me eat that. Don't worry, I'm not eating seal curry. There were other curries in there. Trust me. If I don't know how the food is sourced, I'm not gonna eat it from a vending machine. Or if it's not normal food. That's good looking ramen. But the shop is closed because of the pandemic. I hope they're not closed for good.

00:20:49 John Daub: I just know a lot of businesses have closed down. This is a Sunday. So you'd think they would be doing pretty good business with everybody off. But maybe they're just closed on a Sunday. Alright, we're gonna make a left right here. Akiba Part 2. You got it. This is the side that not a lot of people come to. And it's actually really nice. I mean, if you're trying to get away from noise, you're gonna get a chance to get some food. I'm gonna try to do that here. That looks like Toppan. Toppan is a big publishing company. I'm pretty sure that's the Toppan building. Because I had a meeting in there once with them.

00:22:23 John Daub: I'm kinda surprised. It seems like a lot of people watched that video till the end, didn't they? No, I'm not gonna be trying this seal curry. First of all, number one. I'm not really curious about what it tastes like. Alright. Somebody who was in like, I think the Romanian army said that seal was not really that tasty. Anyways. Number two, I don't know how it's sourced. Images of the 1980s of the seal clubbings is still kind of in my mind. I'm not gonna eat dolphin either, for example. Why would I eat seal? I just wasn't—at the time, I was like, seal didn't really register in my mind. But in Hokkaido, apparently up in Abashiri, they do have a lot of seals.

00:23:07 John Daub: Let's see if I can get a drink. I'm actually kinda thirsty. What do they got here? This is a price down drink vending machine. But these all look really chemically. Yeah, you know what? I'm gonna pass. Although that corn soup does look pretty appetizing. Mmm. Price down corn soup. It's gotta be fresh. Just gonna pass on that. Hey, look at this, Tommy Lee! I didn't notice him before. He's looking good! He's been doing Boss commercials for like 30, 40 years. And he is the boss, man. Indeed. Looking good, Tommy Lee Jones. Thanks for coming to Japan and making those commercials. Makes me feel good to see another American in town. Even if it's a picture.

00:24:08 John Daub: I'm going to another park before we make it to Kanda, the Kanda River. So the Kanda River is really interesting. It's before the Yamanote Line. Before the trains were here in Tokyo during the Edo period. The Kanda River was the kind of lifeline of the city of Tokyo, or Edo at the time. It goes around the city pretty much the same way as the Yamanote Line does. It kind of goes around the city pretty much the same way. It connects everything. For commerce, if you wanted to transport your goods, probably the Kanda River was the way you would go. Actually, I could go with just a normal, plain old water. Oh, there's the Max Coffee. These things are so sweet. Double the sugar, triple the cream. There's people out there that like that. There's people out there that love that.

00:25:21 John Daub: Alright, let's get into the Kanda River. I'm gonna get a drink. I'm gonna go with a hot one here. I'm gonna go with a Suica. Which one do you think is up my alley? This one is a Georgia Roastery Black. Roastery sounds interesting. And it has koku, which means some of the grit. It's clear and has a clear aftertaste, it says. Alright, let's try this. Oh, it's nice and warm. Like a deep roast! Yes! Rich roasted flavor and clean aftertaste. Well, I'll be the judge of that. Clean aftertaste. I need a boshi pan. It would be weird to say kanpai with coffee, wouldn't it? Whoa! Very, very deep taste, smell of coffee. Like deep, very, very bitter smelling. That's a clear aftertaste. Because there's a slight bitterness, but it's so even. There's no character to it. There's no aftertaste. Who doesn't want coffee without—you want a deep roasted coffee with no aftertaste? What? Japan is weird, man. Why wouldn't you want taste?

00:27:20 John Daub: Alright, we're gonna go towards this youth hostel and then to the park. Just weird. Hey, let's make a coffee with no taste. Maybe their taste buds are sensitive. Could be. Could be. So if you'd like to, I'm gonna be making a video for the end of the year featuring you. I'm taking everybody who sends me a video saying "only in Japan." And the directions are in the description of this video. I'm gonna put a mock up of everybody on the screen saying it just to celebrate our wonderful audience and everybody who's subscribing to the new channel. It's not gonna be on this channel, it's gonna be on the youtube.com slash John Daub channel. And that's the new Only in Japan channel. And we're so close to a thousand patrons too. We're gonna end the year really, really strong and come into 2020 bursting.

00:28:39 John Daub: This is a youth hostel and I believe I had some friends stay here once. The AND Youth Hostel Akihabara. And I'm gonna be doing a video for both the hostels Akihabara and hostel Akihabara. And they're still open. They have a bar on the first floor. And I know a lot of locals do come to the hostels just to practice speaking their English. So you do get some unusual people in there. But it's all in good fun. Good natured people. We do have a Discord server as well. And if you wanna ask questions about the video, how to do the video, or advice, you can go to our Discord server 24-7. Discord.gg slash onlyinjapango. It's free. You get an invitation to a community of 10,000 Only in Japan viewers. It's pretty cool.

00:29:37 John Daub: I'm lost. I'm never lost. Sometimes I'm late, but I'm not lost. There's the Sobu Line. Where's this park? I'll bite. The streets here are a little bit confusing. I'm kind of navigating by memory. Which is apparently not good. It's an interesting glass building. Looks like something that would be fitting in Omotesando. Lost. How far did I go? Look at this statue. Does anybody know what it is? I don't know. Is it just art? Or is there some deeper meaning to it? It's hard to tell. Oh! Okay, now I know where we are. We actually hit the Kanda River. We hit the Kanda River. I can smell it. You can smell the Kanda River.

00:31:10 John Daub: There she is. This is the river that I was telling you about. This was the artery to Tokyo. You don't see any boats on it right now, which is really unusual. The Kanda River smells a lot better than it did in the 1970s. In the 1980s. I know that there are some viewers that were in Tokyo in the 1970s and 1980s. They have stories of Kawasaki and the smelly rivers. You can see the Tohoku Shinkansen going to Tokyo Station. We're walking in that direction. Tokyo has cleaned up its act. The Sumida River was seriously polluted back in the day.

00:32:02 John Daub: Drop your phone in to give us a better look. Patio 87 moderators do not ban that person, elevate them—it's a good idea. No, no, alright. Okay good, I said no. Somebody just got timed out too, that wasn't that person. I could put the iPhone on a rope and lower you down but there's no guarantee I would get you back. They actually do have a wide angle lens on this that gives you a wider perspective. It's kind of harder to balance. If you really want to be lowered into the Kanda River that smells funny, really you're going to come back at like that 1980s movie of the guy who fell in toxic waste— what's his name, Toxic Avenger. It's weird. Some people weird. If you listen you can hear the shinkansen. There is an echo through the buildings here that anything that happens it just echoes off of this the left and the right and if you look behind me the buildings it just goes on and on and on like this until that building right behind and then it takes a slight turn and goes on and on and on.

00:33:39 John Daub: The echo is really strong so that's why at night when you do come to hotels and you're staying in this area you want to be quiet because people can hear everything in the streets and the streets here. Yeah so if you yell pizza and wine people can hear that. Alright this side of—you always going to find something interesting. What is this? This is a guitar store, Ikebe. Interesting and there's a lot more guitar stuff inside this guitar complex. A club—there's a club down there. Interesting what is also interesting is that there's a gasoline stand, a gas station right here that is interesting too. Look at the gas up there. Um it's closed right now but one of the most amazing things that I saw in Japan that they kind of made me stop were these car washes. The car just stays in place and the machine oscillates—the machine will move back and forth and clean your car.

00:35:01 John Daub: Isn't that—that is the most amazing thing. I remember seeing it for the first time in action and I just stopped in awe and was like do it again do it again but nobody came just one car. It's pretty amazing and it's reasonably priced too and they do it pretty quickly. It's all about how do you work with so little space and make so much out of it. Whoa this company's awesome not only did they have a guitar store next to it they have a drum store that is pretty cool. I had no idea and we're on the fringe of Akihabara. There are a lot of second-hand shops in this area as we get closer to Kanda River and I think the wind might pick up here. Here's a little side park apparently. This smoker's paradise over there. Showa Dori and again we're back at Akihabara Station so again this is a side of Akihabara that nobody really comes to.

00:36:03 John Daub: Let's look at the Kanda River and talk a little bit about this then we're going to be going towards that vending machine corner. This is the Izumi-bashi, one of the many that crosses the Kanda River and today we have a beautiful sunny day in Tokyo. But I want you to close look at this scene then close your eyes and imagine 1830. And imagine 1830 or something this is all boats alright all probably wooden shacks along here maybe some warehouses and all boats transporting goods um from one side of the city of Tokyo to another. Very interesting isn't it and I wonder if the traffic had was uh left side like like we drive on the left side in Tokyo and in Japan and the right side in the United States so I wonder if the boats were going in the left side and that's why Japan despite the influence from the United States the cars are on the left side and the US is on the right side and Japanese car makers best client is America so it must be really hard.

00:37:17 John Daub: Okay let's go on the overpass. I always wondered about that how Japan came to drive on the left side and not the right side. But I heard that Malaysia drives on the left side too. Toro Toro Porco that reminds me of my joke that I learned I don't know if it's a joke or fact but goes like this I've told it before. So I always wondered why in Tokyo people stand on the left side of the escalator and walk up the right and in Osaka they stand on the right side and walk up the left it's different. Okay there's some interesting history here so the story goes I asked an Osaka guy and I said why is that why do the people stand on the opposite side of the escalator in Osaka compared to Tokyo. And he told me well there's a historical background to this is it interesting really what is it and he said in Tokyo um there was a lot of samurai in Tokyo and in Osaka they had more merchants like uh you know salesmen so this this sword the samurai sword was on this side so they would stand on on the other side so people wouldn't get cut and protect the sword or something like that and then the merchants were on the other side because their wallets were in this pocket so they wanted if they put it on the other side then it would protect their wallet so they stand on this side.

00:38:51 John Daub: I said that makes a lot of sense and then he started to—I started to shake my head and then and then it started to dawn on me that they didn't have escalators back in the samurai period so don't ever ask somebody in Osaka for historical references because they just make a joke out of it so samurai took escalators right. Oh sorry the history lesson here here you can see the Kanda River the Kanda riverside and it was pretty much a market down this street um outdoor stalls along the Yanagibara embankment from the Shokuhinbashi bridge to Asakusabashi bridge used to sell second-hand clothing in place of clothes in the late Edo period and in the area was known as one of the markets in Edo selling second-hand clothing in place of clothes.

00:39:44 John Daub: Oh did I just read that Iwamoto second-hand clothing in place of clothes market was opened in 1881 after the Meiji Restoration to become the center of clothing industry in Tokyo when the growing popularity of western style clothing took place of clothes for everyday wear the core demand for the general population shifted to ready-made clothing in place of clothes prompting an increase in the number of stores selling ready-made clothing in place of clothes so the district was transformed into a western style clothing place of clothes town. It's a weird weirdly written place but apparently before 1881 when western clothes came into style this was the place because they would they would sell ready-made clothes so that's what was happening in 1881 now it's a modern city so people were pretty open about clothing in place of clothes but before that Japanese made the clothes to fit very very interesting history here.

00:40:29 John Daub: This is just right on the street you can see some dudes selling goodies I don't see any vending machines though do you so let's take a quick look looks look down this avenue which is totally not the same but right around this area is Bakuroyokoyama or Bakurocho industry area of Tokyo and that is this direction if you keep walking this way and that might be another live stream in the future Bakurocho Bakuro Yokoyama and Bakurocho this area was where in the Edo period the horses had to be you had to tie up your horses here as a horse stable area and that eventually turned into the textile area and if you're ever getting a kimono or a um you can get budget kimonos there but if you're getting a yukata for summer you can get them made there tailored with really good material you can pick your own material there in Bakuroyokoyama it's probably the cheapest place in Tokyo to do that so it's pretty good pretty interesting.

00:41:44 John Daub: So this area that we're in the side of Akihabara was the ready-made clothes area so when Japanese changed from kimono to western clothes this is where they started selling that stuff alright we're gonna cross across the street here we're going up we get a decent view of the Kanda River there's uh the ends of of the Kanda River and then we get to the uh Akihabara Station the Hibiya line you can see this we were walking under that for a really long time and now the Sobu line is making its way to Asakusabashi and Chiba but these overpasses are cool because you can really feel the city from up here. When I was in Tokyo in February 2019 I saw people scrubbing the concrete riverbanks of the Kanda River. They really keep it clean and they're proud uh proud of the cleanliness of Tokyo.

00:43:18 John Daub: This is Akihabara Station and I'm going to give you some inside local knowledge here alright again if you go straight you get to Ueno there's Akihabara Station the Hibiya line and if you walk right there next to that that store there is the entrance to Iwamotocho which is the Toei Shinjuku line. They do not connect but you can literally walk from one entrance to the other in two minutes okay so they don't connect on the map but knowing that these two connect is very useful because the Toei Shinjuku line connects one side of the city to the other and cuts straight through so if you ever want to get to Akihabara and you're along the Toei Shinjuku line you can get to Akihabara without changing the Hibiya line or JR you could just stay get to Iwamotocho and walk in two three minutes pretty pretty cool. There it is right there you see the subway sign Iwamotocho I W A M O T O C H O Iwamotocho and that's my bicycle.

00:44:47 John Daub: Alright if you were to go straight you get to Akihabara Station in about 100 meters or two minutes that's where we started this live stream so we've made a complete circle so now we're going to go back to a an area or vending machine that scares the living crud out of me. I might I think we just found that area that where there's a dead spot right there there's no signal alright let me see if I can find I gotta get some coins here I know if I go to the vending machine they're not gonna be able to take a ten thousand yen note so or Suica because these vending machines are pretty pretty old so let me go I'm gonna jump into this Yamazaki daily store and get a pack of gum or something.

00:45:41 John Daub: This reminds me of of some of the TV shows can you if you ever did New York you went and you bought a pack of gum for a hundred and you gave them a hundred dollar bill they would just completely obliterate you. Tasty Chronicle says that it's not good alright guys give me a minute i'm gonna read readjust the signal okay i gotta go inside this uh convenience store. Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you totally got in front of me cut the line. All right I just bought a pack of gum with a ten thousand yen note so now we're set for the vending machine corner sorry about that i'm gonna run through the the dead zone here apparently people said there was like 140p or something we can't have that Yanagihara Dori okay that whole building has a signal now good we're good.

00:48:52 John Daub: Ooh, baby. All right, tasty writes in. Excellent signal. It's a vote of confidence. Oh, nice. I can taste that clear coffee again. If it was so clear, how come I can taste it again, huh? Coffee maker people. That's got a real 1980s shape to it, that car. If it had pop-up headlights, I'd be sold. That one, too. It's a pretty cool, sweet ride. This one is a really cool shrine before we get to the—where is the vending machine? Oh, no, I got to keep going a little bit further. I see it down the street. This is kind of a cool little shrine that you'll get walking Yanagihara Dori. Down here, along the base of the Kanda River, this has been here for centuries, this shrine. Very cool. Oh, there's a little bit of history. Let's walk down here. Oh, there's a kitty cat.

00:50:24 John Daub: This is a Fujiko Stone Monument. Maybe you can read that there. The five stone monuments bear, to this day, traces of the Fujiko faithful who lived in the Yanagimori Shrine area. Fujiko was a popular faith tradition based on devotion to Mount Fuji. What? Fujiko was a faith devoted to Mount Fuji and attracted a large following among townspeople and farmers during the Edo period. In 1680, the deity enshrined in Fuji Sengen Shrine was moved from Suruga Fuji-no-miya. I used to live there. I was a monk. And enshrined together with Yanagimori Shrine. So, wow, I had no idea. So, in 1930, volcanic rocks from Mount Fuji were piled up into a mound resembling Mount Fuji called Fujizuka on the shrine grounds but no longer exists, having been taken down in 1960. What? Inscribed on the stone monuments are the words Showa, Imperial Reign from 1926 to 1989 and Taisho, Imperial Reign from 1912 to 1926.

00:51:36 John Daub: Crows! Birds! What are close to when the Fujiko was made indicating that those are the movements to receive the shrine. Those birds are going crazy. So this is sort of a rebuilding of it. But they brought rocks from Mount Fuji here. That's awesome. I had no idea. What are those birds? You guys are not even crows. Evil! This one's straight up crow. Can't do what they're doing. I need more time with that. Oh no, he put himself in plain sight. That's—what kind of bird is that? He's listening. I can't imitate. It's too high-pitched. All right, be respectful here. Okay, let's give 5 yen to the shrine. They're just really destroying my—I'm gonna give 50 yen to the shrine here. I don't know what bird that is, but it's destroying my harmony. And the cat is gone. All right, let's get out of here. I don't know. What? Where are those birds? I don't feel like ringing the bell. I just—the birds ruined my harmony.

00:54:03 John Daub: Wow, that's a sweet ride. I thought that the car hadn't been moved since the 1950s or 60s, and it's getting moved for the first time. We're making our way. It's a pretty cool shrine, and I didn't know about Fujiko, which is a devotion to Mount Fuji, this religion or devotion. This bridge is quite interesting. This is a shortcut. This is a shortcut that will take you across the Kanda River to the vending machine of horror. So I just want to show you a little bit of this before I go back towards there. The birds are reacting to 5G. It very well could be the point. Could be true. Could be. Here's the shrine over here. I found the cat. He's on top of the roof. You see him? There. He's hiding underneath the roof. He doesn't—here's one of his kind.

00:55:34 John Daub: I do like this area. There's a den. He's right there. Do you see the yellow banner? You can sit outside on the denki, and you can get a really good view of the Kanda River. Sometimes when the tourists are here, there are boats going back and forth. So there's stuff to look at. But for the most part, it's pretty peaceful and calm. Over there in the distance is the bridge between Akihabara and Iwamotocho Station that I was telling you about. So you can get from one to the other in about two minutes. The cat is still hiding underneath the roof there. Do you see him? Right there. I see you. That is the Washington Hotel. Oh, yeah. And crazy, crazy story about the Washington Hotel. I don't know if they still have it, but there's a room in there that has a model train that goes around the entire room. It's usually booked two to three months in advance. Call ahead and try to book that room if you get a chance. I think it's like $15, $20 more. But you can get model trains at the front desk, and you can change the trains, including the Shinkansen, which is cool. So for train otakus like me, that room is awesome. Awesome. I believe they still have it. But there's one special Washington Hotel room. Alright. That's local inside information. Not a lot of people know about that. Just put that in the book. I'm basically giving you the book that I would write. So better take notes and stuff.

00:57:22 John Daub: Took us an hour to get here, but now we're here, and we're going to go take a look at see this vending machine of horror. Okay. Because that's what we're going to do. I love these alleys. I guess this is the Shinkansen goes up above us from this point. Well, riding tandem. Be careful. 3000 yen fines. The police catch you. I wouldn't know, though. Not a lot of people come to this area of Akihabara either. But if you do, you will discover this street and this Ikinari Steakhouse, which is a chain that is making a roaring business here, serving steak by the gram. And you can see the menu there. It's pretty insane. I see the vending machine corner of horror right now. Or the cut, though, meaning you order it and they'll cut it depending on what you want. One gram is ten yen of hide steak. That's pretty cheap. And there's a point card. You can take away. You can get a point card here.

00:59:00 John Daub: And I met the driver of an NHK shoot that I was on. He had a point card that was filled up. Because on location shoots, he's always eating at Ikinari Steak. So he had about 40,000 points or something. And I translated how much money is that. It's like 40,000 yen or like $400 of points he's collecting on this point card or something. It's pretty crazy. All right. Here is the vending machine of horror. It's in a building that could at any moment be torn down or fall down. It's kind of creepy and scary. And should pretty much be a building. But it's here. And people seem to like it. I just noticed this one here. On the corner, they do have a very old vending machine that sells what? Yeah. You don't see these too often outside on the street corner. Usually family friendly. It's kind of expensive. Wow. Hello Kitty Water. Here's Yakitori in a can. Oden in a can. And I promised that I would get one of these for some people.

01:00:24 John Daub: Oh, it's a shame. The seal curry is sold out. It literally it is. It used to be there. Seriously, it's gone. $16.90. So I'm off the hook. I wonder who did buy it. I guess somebody saw that I was coming and they bought it. Nothing here. Wow. So I guess we're going to have to go. Deer curry. Seriously, I did not plan this. It's gone. All your stalkers bought it. Karl Rotson. I had one stalker. They're gone. Cops took her. She used to wait outside by my station. Kind of creepy. All right, let's go see if there's a deer there. Vending machine of horror, horror, horror. That's pretty creepy when you say it three times. Fernando is a new traveler. Welcome, Fernando. And is that Brendan Walker? Hey, get a Pocari Sweat for the person living above the vending machine. That's actually a really kind idea. Okay, Brendan. That's actually a really kind idea. Let's pay it forward.

01:01:45 John Daub: All right, let's see if we can get the. Oh, they do have the deer curry. That's kind of wow. That's $20. How did the deer curry more expensive? All right, let's see if we can get the Pocari Sweat. I found that sometimes the same item, if you look around, the same item is half price. If you look on the other side. So sometimes pays to look around. Okay, let's leave a Pocari Sweat for the dude upstairs. Do they have it? No, but got a love. A love. Love mobile here. I love Shaq. These Shinkansen toys are $15. Was that a retainer? Ew, that's somebody's retainer. Oh, no, it's a wind chime. It looks like somebody's retainer from high school. I'm not sure I would want that. Nobody's going to buy that. Gross.

01:02:55 John Daub: All right. You know what? Let's see. What can I buy here? I want to leave something for the dude upstairs. So let's start. Let's start off there. I don't see any Pocari Sweat, but we'll leave some. Some cow. Calpis. Okay. Some Calpis. Dear man stranded upstairs. I'm leaving this for you. That's from Brendan. Sir. Moshi moshi. Nobody. Nobody's there. What's that? Oh, Christmas ornaments. You get all these bells for $7. Okay, let's see. Let's go back to the. Let's see if we can find some more curry. I don't know what kind of curry that is. I can't see. That's a different kind. I'm not getting that. And that's more expensive than the other one. Stick with venison.

01:04:47 John Daub: Oden. All right. Let's try the Oden. Yeah, it's cold, though. That's the—it's kind of nasty. Cold Oden is real nasty and it stinks in there. I didn't see this one. This is a secret, secret alley, secret area. Let's get in here. There's a can of lychee and there's just various rocks. It's weird. This is a small size. And if you can upgrade to 100 yen more, you get a big size. It's weird. Can of mikan (mandarin orange). Interesting. It's a soccer ball. What? There's another popcorn machine, but I'm not waiting in there. This is this is where that dude lives upstairs. Some homeless guy. I'm getting out of here. What are we going to do with the ball? I'm going to put it in your dino package. Dude, that's they want four bucks for that.

01:06:16 John Daub: Let's see if I can find it. I got four. Seriously. All right, Irvin, you know what? I can't. I'm not giving you no seal. I'm giving you this ball. All right. You want a ball? You're going to get a ball. $4 ball. My gosh. Weird. Irvin. Weird. Why do you want this ball? No, he said he wants it. And I'm going to put in. I send him a box every month. Just going to put it in there. You really think this is worth $5? That's like a 10 cent ball. You want this ball? Confirm. Irvin, confirm. Five, four, three, two, one. Oh, he said no. What is it? Eject. Eject. Well, you told me to get the ball. All right, let's get out of here. All right, I'm not going to do it. Let's get this can and then eat something and get out of here. This place is giving me the creeps. It smells here.

01:07:30 John Daub: All right, we're just going to do it. All right, this is the venison curry. It's not. It's not deer curry. All right, it's venison. Venison is a meat. Okay, there's a difference between seal and venison. All right, I'm just saying I'm just putting it out here for people. One of them is there's a lot of venison deer and venison and Hokkaido. All right. And seal. We just don't know. I'm not getting a seal curry and I did find it over there. So stalker person who took the one here. It's also over there and you missed it. Okay. All right. You happy now. You really happy, huh? Irvin. Yeah. Oh, get seal curry. Oh, this is so cool. It kind of is. All right, there you go. That's coming home. I don't think Kanae is going to eat it. No.

01:08:54 John Daub: What do you mean cheap out? This is more expensive than seal curry. Oh, guess what? It was the last one. It was the last one. Special made. How am I going to open it? It's spicy. Azo Chika venison curry. Okay. All right. So guess what? I'm going to do a special stream later. I got to take it home. I can't even open this. Who comes walking around with it's not Bambi. It's venison. It's a meat. Okay. It's different. It's venison curry. It expires next year, which is good. That means it's all natural. No chemicals. So that could explain the price. I'm going to do a special live stream for just like I did last night for the boshi pan. Crack it with your teeth. Jake. All right. Look, I'm 46. I'm not 16. Some people think some. What do you think? Oh, yeah. I'm going to crack it with my teeth, man. Just because I'm 46. Just because there's 1700 people watching doesn't mean my brain cells go away. Peer pressure. Peer pressure never worked with me. I mean, my friends are smoking. I never picked up a cigarette.

01:10:44 John Daub: And it's a testament to if there's any kids watching, do the opposite of what everybody else is doing. Wait. If so, that means if they're not smoking, then you would smoke. No, just don't do anything bad. All right. Live up to the expectations of your parents. My parents are proud of me. I'm eating in a homeless shelter cans from a vending machine. See, there's the seat. It was 600. It was 300 yen cheaper for the same thing on the other side. I think, Irvin, you want one of these balls? Look, how come this ball is 100 yen cheaper than the other ball? It's weird. And these balls are better. Here's some oden. Should I try this one? That's $10. Oden. What? All right. Oden in a can. This is 430. It actually pays to shop around. You gotta shop around. The prices are arbitrary.

01:12:02 John Daub: In Osaka, you would shop around. This is Tokyo. It's 590 here for oden. Are these the easy open ones? Okay. I think I can eat that there. All right. So it's up to the people now. Let's go. You vote. You vote now. All right. Should I get Yakitori or Oden? None of them are heated and it's going to be completely gross. It's up to you. Yakitori or Oden because they're pretty much the same price anyways. You vote. Yakitori. Pixel writes in Yakitori. Irvin writes in Yakitori or Yaki-Oden. Then you can't get both. One or the other. Peach nectar writes in tasty. That's not even a choice. Bob writes in Oden. Yakitori. Yakitori. Yakitori. Yakitori. Yakitori. Get real food.

01:13:06 John Daub: I don't know. You know, by the way, if you really wanted real food, across the street is the Tonkatsu pork sandwich vending machine. Should I just go there? Should I just go there? Those are more expensive. Me and Mike Chen were there last, actually earlier this year before the pandemic broke. Should I get Yakitori or Tonkatsu sandwich across the street and get some real food? New choices. Oden. Oden. Oden. Cold Oden. Dinosaur meat. Yakitori. Yakitori. Yakiodin. Get Denny's. Peach nectar. I can do peach nectar. All right. Looks like I'm getting Yakitori. Nasty. I didn't make a promise with that. The promise ended when my wife said no. All right. My promise is to my wife. Who wrote that? She says, oh, you made a promise. Yeah. You know what? I got this venison curry. My promise is to my wife. Okay. She comes before you and you were overruled, dude.

01:14:16 John Daub: All right. Here we go. Happy life. Happy life. All right. This is Yakitori in a can. This is nasty stuff. Peter and I already ate this. We left the can. We didn't even finish it. I'm eating this. I can go get a sandwich across the street. I won't take it. It's not taking my cash. All right. Let's see if I got coins. I don't got enough coins. I got 300 yen. Why is it not taking my thousand yen notes? Let's try another one. Yakitori. Okay. Here's one. They don't. It's oddly they don't have beer here. I guess because it looks like a place where hobos would come to buy beer. Oh, that looks really good. They have dashimaki. Which is a good place to buy beer. Which is egg in a can. I could eat that. That's healthy. Oden in a can is nasty too. Oh, it took my thousand yen. All right. Let's do it. I'm having a bad day looking at this. So we're just going to go 13. This is for you. I can't believe I'm getting. Oh, this is so nasty.

01:15:57 John Daub: I still got 410 yen. Tasty. Tasty. I still got 410 yen. I got 410 yen. What number is that? 11. I got it. I got to retrieve my can. 11. This is for today's day. Deliver. Deliver. Deliver. Deliver. Since 1964. I hope it's not the same thing from 1964. I think I just spent like 20 off of the can of venison curry and the 30 bucks I spent there at Good Riddance. It's hard to cross the street to get to the sandwich vending machine. Oh, I forgot my change. Thank goodness it's a live stream because I forgot my change. Okay. Oh, it's just a good chunk of change. Did I get my change out of this one? Yeah, I did. I didn't buy anything there. Did I get my change into the other one? I can't remember. Well, it's gone anyways. All right. Let's get out of here. Let's go get some real food. Let's go look at the sandwich vending machine over there.

01:18:29 John Daub: How do I get over there? It's over there. There's no crosswalk that is convenient. What? Oh, there's another one over there. Wow. That looks really good. That looks like real food. All right. Let's go on over. We're going to get a sandwich. Okay. Because Tasty Chronicles said go get a sandwich. So I'm going to go do that. And actually, I think I'm going to need something strong to wash down this yakitori. I did get at the vending machine, which is completely weighing down my pocket. I got the venison curry, which I'll eat in another live stream. I'll do another live stream for insiders and travelers and Patreon supporters. Because I don't think it should be a spectacle of curry devouring. Venison is actually really good, okay? I got no problem eating venison.

01:20:26 John Daub: These are pretty good sandwiches, actually. But I'll tell you. It is a little weird. It's a little windy here. We were between the buildings for most of the live stream. So we got pretty lucky. But this is an open area near the river. So let's get a sandwich. I think the sandwich does not qualify as real food, apparently. Well, considering it's a pandemic, I'm trying really hard to not go indoors where there's crowded people. So this might have to do. All right. We're going to be out of the wind in about 10 seconds. So give it a moment. This might be the cheapest. This is the cheapest car rental place. $25 a day for a compact. Nico Nico. All right. Let's see what we got here. So they put in some lounge music, which is really copyright, I think, here. They also have Oden. What? The Oden is cheaper here. This Oden is so much cheaper. It's half the price of the other place. And there aren't that many sandwiches available. So there's a Katsu Sando and a Hamburg Sando. So we're going to have to go with this Katsu Sando, I think. Does that—what do you guys think? All right. We'll go with the Katsu Sando.

01:22:08 John Daub: Come to John. Memories of when Mike Chen and I were here. Not that long ago. How's the signal, everybody? You can see nice and clearly. Yeah. You see nice and clearly. All right. We're going to turn this way. Wonderful. We're going to turn this way. Lunchtime. Sanitize. Alcohol. I touched some buttons in what would be many consider a pretty nasty area. All right. I just cleaned off the table here. So we have a nice, beautiful place. Take a look at our wonderful lunch here. This is the Akihabara, the side that a lot of the tourists don't come. We just pretty much went through the entire east side over the last hour and a half.

01:24:22 John Daub: This is Yakitori in a can. This is really nasty. And we got it from the vending machine of horror. So I'm going to open this up for you because this is what I would do here. I do have some. Oh, that is so disgusting. It's congealed. Oh, that is gross. I don't think I can get to it. It's hard. It's like animal fat. I think this is supposed to be heated up. I'll be eating that back at home. Okay. Next up is moving on. Nectar. Because I like nectar. I can't believe that I just bought a $6 can of Yakitori and it's like congealed in there. Sunny. This is the best thing that I've had all day. This is really, really good. Thumbs up. Speaking of which, thumbs up, people.

01:26:09 John Daub: Next up on our hit list. This is the sandwich that Mike Chen actually, Mikey liked the other sandwich more. I think this one was good though, too. The other one was a juicier. There's a hidekatsu Sando. But this one is good. It expires the 21st. Just tomorrow. All right. So we're unboxing this puppy here. All right. So. Oh. Now this is real food. Things are getting really nice right now. Finally, something that's not congealed fat. This is good stuff here. This is a Tonkatsu Sando from a vending machine. Yummy, yummy. It's good. Building is the headquarters of the company that makes these sandwiches. So it does make sense that they would want to, you know, do something like this. Now I'm happy.

01:28:13 John Daub: I think I got my change, didn't I? I sometimes forget the change. Keep the change in the spirit of Christmas. All right. Let's see. We got any questions here. Jay Paul Cordery. Hey, Jay Paul. Beer money for after. Thanks, buddy. Hey, Rizal Repin. Katsu Sando and a drink. You got it. We got it, man. Thanks, Rizal. John Kimura. I still I want to make John happy. I'm going to use that also to get something for Kanae on the way back. She's not going to want venison curry. Okay. She's going to want something else. Beefrit0815. Rather take the egg. I know I kind of get a mystery box. Katrina, the mystery boxes are bizarre. Not. Maybe I'll get one on the way back. I'll think. I'll think about it. And Pocky Pimp is a new traveler. Hey, Brandani is here. Tonkatsu. Done. Rock OJ, Mr. New Traveler. It's nice to see your family. Now, Fumi-sama is here. New traveler. Great. Hey, Bela. Bela is an insider. Hey, Bela. You watching with your mom? Sorry about the Northwestern game, man. But I think you're on the Buckeye side, right? That's pretty good game. The second half anyways.

01:29:53 John Daub: I went to college with Bela. That's awesome. Clubra Bebop. I just saw that. Let me put in here. Get the live chat going on here. It's pretty cool in Japan. You can get a pretty good sandwich out of a vending machine. That's fresh since the headquarters is right across the street. Is the fried chicken at KFC that dry, John? Actually, it's just oily. I stopped eating KFC after I got so sick. I just couldn't get rid of processed the oil. I think the KFC in Japan is just a little bit better, though. Because it's Japan. I don't know. Yeah. So they actually cut the crusts off of the sandwich. This is breaded deep fried pork cutlet. And you see on here, there's this tangy sauce that they put on it. Not a lot. It soaks into the crust. Really, really good. Man. Somebody wrote, looks tasty. It's a tasty recommendation, Sunny.

01:32:13 John Daub: This Hokkaido venison curry. It cost me almost $20. And it looks like it's all natural from Hokkaido. At this price, it better be good. So I'm going to do this livestream a little bit later on. Maybe tonight. Yeah. We'll do this together with the community. It's a reason to be an insider or a traveler or a Patreon supporter. Support the channel in the holiday season. Thanks so much for joining me with this livestream. It's gone on for an hour and a half. And I got to get back to editing. But I'm going to do it. Because obviously that's really only for a thousand people. I've been taking sort of a day—some time off a little bit to relax and recharge as we get into the holiday season. Here in Japan, the temperatures are getting a lot chillier. It's down to about 2 to 3 degrees Celsius at night. It gets down to zero Celsius. It could snow.

01:33:07 John Daub: We did have a snowstorm that hit Niigata pretty hard. On the Sea of Japan side, where people snowed in their cars. There's an old guy who—I think they said he got hypothermia or something and they got him out but he's gonna be okay. I don't think anybody lost their lives but it was a pretty bad situation on the Sea of Japan side with the snow. I know that the East Coast in the US also got hit pretty hard with snow so it looks like it's gonna be a white Christmas or a slushy Christmas even here in Japan you never know. Tokyo it could snow but this is the site of Akihabara not a lot of people know about if you want to see the side that everybody else knows just go right there and you can see there's the building that I just did a live stream there two days ago that's the building the Sega number two building the decals and the animated animated characters are all gone from there.

01:34:04 John Daub: Akihabara has changed a lot over the last couple of months and since you guys international travelers can't make it here is a completely different it just has a different vibe to it right now. So, I'm going to go back to the hotel and see if I can find a place to stay. Sega number two building so I after an hour and a half I'm gonna have to say goodbye I'm gonna I'll walk past that vending machine of horror and maybe get something but I think we're pretty much done venison curry maybe later this afternoon or tonight special live stream for supporters there and I'll be back tomorrow with another live stream it's gonna be Monday morning and take you to another neighborhood of Tokyo or some sort of really interesting live stream to share with you you know because a lot of us are all locked in in Tokyo's it's okay right now I mean things could be better but wear your mask have a good day everybody see you from Akihabara that isn't dirty just it is actually a little bit dirty just the lens flares are bad on these really super wide ones.

01:35:11 John Daub: Cory thanks so much for setting up on Patreon oh wait wait wait wait before you go so I have it's okay if I go this way it's okay bye see you later. I'll keep that in place. Something popped out of my eyes. That's right. Thank you so much. Before you go, I have the postcards that from people who signed up yesterday this is going to Jack in Baldwin Victoria Nicholas in Staten Island Leon Ellison from Manila Edward Edward in St. Petersburg John in Spring, Texas. Catherine in Plano, Texas. These are all going out to you. And Savannah in Foster City, California. And Nick in Calgary, Canada. So we got a bunch of postcard club sign-ups today. And I made sure that you all have the Reiwa stamp, the New Year stamp for Japan. It's the Year of the Ox, and it says Reiwa III, which is the next year. So thanks so much for signing up on Patreon to the postcard club. It's pretty cool. Year of the Ox. Okay, it looks like Wagyu to me. Not the Kuroge Wagyu, but it looks like it could be a steak. Makes me hungry, actually, when I see Year of the Ox. All right, this is all going in the mailbox from Akihabara. Thanks so much for supporting. It's Kanae and I. And that's all I wanted to say.

01:37:25 John Daub: Whoa, the Nightbot just took out. Whoa, Sean's comment got taken out by Nightbot. It's awesome. He made a political statement, and he got taken out by the electronic moderator. See you, everybody. See you tomorrow. Or later on today, if you're an insider. We're actually 19 likes away from 1,000. You think we can get there in, like, five seconds? See if we can get to 19? Let's see if we can get to 1,000 likes in five seconds before I shut off. Five, four, three, two. Hey, Ellis. Three. We just got people coming. I guess we did it. And Dawn S., get something for Kanae. You got it, Dawn. I'll stop off on the way. Get something for Kanae. We did it. We got to, like, 11. Oh, my gosh. We got, like, an extra 100. That's the community for you. Have a good day, everybody. See you later on tonight and tomorrow in another livestream. Bye. Bye. Bye.