00:03 John Daub: Hey everybody, welcome to Tohoku. This is Morioka. Check that out. Nice. We are here at the front of the Tohoku Shinkansen, which you can see is connected. It's connected to this red Shinkansen, which is the Akita Shinkansen. Everybody is taking pictures because these two Shinkansen are like kissing. Do you see that? It's kind of a famous scene where the Akita Shinkansen is kissing the Tohoku Shinkansen.

00:39 John Daub: This one will start to take off towards the Sea of Japan from here. So we say goodbye, but a lot of people like to take pictures, you can see. How you doing everybody? Welcome to Morioka. I'm pretty excited about this trip. I'll show you the sign really quickly. We have about a minute or two before it takes off, but the purpose of this live stream is I want to show you the grand class, which is the best class.

01:15 John Daub: And Peter is the best. He's waiting there right now. We have a chance to show it to you in a very intimate way. There's some of the mascots on the side of the train making this pretty special. If he's looking at his watch, that means I better get back onto the train. Don't worry, I'm not going to be late. I'm so happy that you could join us on this special train. Again, completely reserved. You know who it's reserved for? It's reserved for that man right there, Peter von Gomm.

01:56 John Daub: Very cool. It's actually listed here as a party train, which is very much not the case. I'm really happy. I'm so happy to be doing this project. Let's go inside of the grand class. Welcome to the highest level of class. The grand class. Thank you, Peter.

02:29 Peter von Gomm: Welcome, Sir Dog.

02:39 John Daub: A really nice leather. We put our bags back here so you can't see them. They were out of the shot. Do you want to show the reclining seat?

02:44 Peter von Gomm: Oh, please.

02:47 John Daub: Do you see that? Show us. Watch this. Hold on a second. Watch Peter do it. We're at Morioka Station for a couple of minutes.

02:54 Peter von Gomm: There we go.

02:55 John Daub: That's going to be pretty cool. Do it, Peter. What are you doing? Oh, no, it's automatic. Look at that. Isn't that lovely? And it just goes. And the footrest comes up.

03:05 John Daub: As Nagoya John says, Peter, it's reserved for elitist snobs.

03:09 Peter von Gomm: Yes. Absolutely.

03:11 John Daub: Yes, Mr. von Gomm. We have reserved this car just for two of us. How do you feel being in the lap of luxury?

03:19 Peter von Gomm: I feel at home, John.

03:21 John Daub: Really?

03:22 Peter von Gomm: Yeah, you know, I'm used to this kind of stuff.

03:24 John Daub: If you had a little white cat on your lap, I would think that you were Ernst Blofeld. Ernst Blofeld being from James Bond, the bad guy that strokes the cat and all this.

03:35 Peter von Gomm: Well, yeah, on the surface he was a bad guy, but actually he was really a good guy.

03:38 John Daub: I don't think so. He was no good, Ernst Blofeld. The great thing with having this as a private Shinkansen is that you don't have to wear your mask in here. We had tests before to make sure that we were free from COVID.

03:57 Peter von Gomm: But I'm trying to hide this.

03:58 John Daub: Oh, you're trying to hide it? No, stop it, Peter. Stop it, Peter. It is really nice. And I think you're going to be able to see outside the window some of the station staff. The station staff has been saying hi to everybody. And that makes us feel even more at home.

04:16 John Daub: This is part of the Tohoku destination campaign that'll be going on from now until the end of September. September 30th. But the pass that we have is forever. At least that's what they've told me.

04:33 Peter von Gomm: That's a very long time, John.

04:34 John Daub: Forever is a long time. I can't believe how many people are taking pictures of this.

04:39 Peter von Gomm: Yeah, it's a special deal.

04:40 John Daub: It's a very special deal. Very special.

04:42 Peter von Gomm: It's a very special deal, John.

04:43 John Daub: Oh, stop it, Peter. 777 Cascade. Love your content. Keep it up. I appreciate that very much. Bob Joke. Gotta love the party train.

04:52 Peter von Gomm: Yeah, this is a party train. It is. It feels like it.

04:55 John Daub: We ate three bentos between us.

05:00 Peter von Gomm: Was it only three? It feels like a lot more than that. The fuko bento. No, four.

05:04 John Daub: Yeah. We had eight bentos. We ate four each. Oh, look. The local TV's here. Excuse me. 10:19, station. Is that NHK?

05:17 Peter von Gomm: I think that's NHK. Tohoku DC. Ekotohoku. Aomori Hō. Shin-Aomori yuki. That's the one.

05:24 John Daub: We are at the Shinkansen station. This is so cool. Tohoku DC. Tohoku, Aomori Hō. Shin-Aomori yuki. The Grand Class is really expensive. I think it was like five times the normal price. Something like that.

05:34 Peter von Gomm: It's very exclusive. It's basically like first class.

05:38 John Daub: We had three bentos.

05:39 Peter von Gomm: Yes.

05:40 John Daub: It's a president in the general assembly. There was a station like this. It's the same style. Yeah, it's very nice. It's very comfortable. You know what? I find the green car class on the Shinkansen is also very comfortable. It's not crowded, and it's comfortable.

05:57 Peter von Gomm: Right. The green car is, what, maybe double the price?

06:01 John Daub: Yeah. Or like 30-40% more? It is a premium. During the holiday season, this is a great place to sit because you feel more relaxed. I don't think they allow you to stand in the green car. But in the normal class, if it overflows, there'll be people standing in the aisle of the Shinkansen, which makes it a little bit stressful.

06:25 John Daub: Suzette writes in here, Hi, John. Hi, Peter. For dinner and drinks in Aomori. Nice. Thank you. We'll be treating PVG. PVG got a treat yesterday at the hotel.

06:35 Peter von Gomm: Yes, I did. That was a wonderful night.

06:37 John Daub: Peter, what does it smell like in here?

06:39 Peter von Gomm: I can't say that on TV, John.

06:41 John Daub: No, stop it. He's saying that just to make fun. It smells like leather. It smells a lot better than our hotel room did last night. A little bit like leather. It smells good. I think he was being serious. Bianca June writes in, I've made it to a live stream. I've been waiting to ride this. This won very much, so I'm excited for this campaign. And Elvis Camera, Hi, John and Peter. Someday we will visit Japan and ride the Shinkansen from Mel and Elvis in San Francisco. And our friend's second breakfast down there in Mexico only in Granada. It's a real train class.

07:14 Peter von Gomm: Yes, indeed.

07:16 John Daub: Tortoropoco is here, John. You are now the cream of the top of the Crème de la Crème. Wow, I can't even. I got lost in that crème. Very well put. Look at that! It's a close up now. Let's wave at them. Go to the door. Go to the door. Let's wave at them.

07:30 Peter von Gomm: You've been infiltrated.

07:40 John Daub: Hey, Peter, take my picture. I'm going to get out there.

07:42 Peter von Gomm: Sure, sure. I've taken over the stream.

07:50 John Daub: There he goes. John Daub, the man about town. Welcome to town. Tohoku! What a ham.

08:02 Peter von Gomm: Yeah. Morioka or bust.

08:09 John Daub: I didn't say bust a move. What a douchebag. Did I make him laugh? Arigato gozaimasu. That's my train dance. Bye bye. That's my train. I'll listen to the music. Alright, grand class. Open sesame. Grand class, but sir, you have no class.

08:51 Peter von Gomm: I have no class.

08:53 John Daub: Hey, if I made them laugh, then I was successful.

08:57 Peter von Gomm: You were very successful.

08:58 John Daub: Okay, good. That was fun. Alright, the grand class is very premium. For the next couple of minutes, I'm going to show you. Again, we're going to take off in a second. There's no TV monitors or anything like that, so you have to bring your smartphones. Let's say goodbye to everybody.

09:14 Peter von Gomm: Yeah, let's wave goodbye.

09:18 John Daub: Try not to shed a tear. Is Jason here, by the way? Jason? Yeah, he may be. James Boardman is here. A little Travolta action. Grant H is here. Jason, you're missing out on some really nice sights along this route. Boy, there's a lot of action there. We're going to show you some of the comments. Comforts of this. That's my GoPro that I was able to attach because it's a private car. Although we do have guests. Oh, they're taking off. This guy is NHK. This is NHK. Oh, he's NHK? All right, let's wave.

10:07 John Daub: Let's wave to NHK and the world. I love NHK because we do a lot of work with them. I actually met Peter at NHK in the studio there. And I've got to tell these folks about the NHK program that's being aired today. Oh yeah, right. Which takes place right here where we are right now in Tohoku. Raymond Centeno says say hi to Hana who's recording the train shuttle. Hi Hana.

10:35 Peter von Gomm: Say hi to Raymond. Hello.

10:48 John Daub: Godzilla 13. Who was the guy in that white suit at Tokyo Station? He's like the station master. He's looking over at us. He's going to do a panic sweep. Bye bye. Oh, I totally got on NHK with that shot. I totally, I knew he was doing this little 30. He had his third eye towards me and he panned. And the last shot he did was he panned over. I'm going to make the news. I know that was a money shot. All right, enough about that. Let me, I'm just so excited. Let's show everybody the luxuries of the grand class. So I'm doing an ekiben episode and showing you all the different kinds of classes. But one of the questions that we had was what is the difference between the grand class and the green car?

11:40 John Daub: The difference is green car used to be the first class. It was until about 2011. March 5th actually was about 6 days before the Great Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami. They started the grand class. And it was a place where like, it's more geared towards business people or people who just want that added luxury. If you have a lot of money, you might as well live it up in grand class. I think it's pretty comfortable. It gives you just an extra bit of elitism, I guess. One thing that you're not gonna see in this livestream is the services that are attached to the grand class because of COVID and the protocols in place for us we don't have champagne and all the other goodies but you know what I'm fine just riding it I'm fine just enjoying it actually does keep the it is quite separated let me show you here this is car number 10 again this is the special special like toilet for grand class and you can see here the wood paneling it's really beautiful I just freaked out all of the JR East rail staff you can see the wood paneling is so beautiful here's the restrooms here I like the fact that they have multipurpose rooms so if you have a child or you need extra space you can take advantage of that everything is just a little bit more premium you can take advantage of that everything is just a little bit more feeling on in the grand class this is the multi-purpose bathroom here that allows us to go in let me see here yeah it's I love the fact that Japan JR East has a multi-purpose restroom so if you do have any disabilities you can get in and use the restroom and not have to worry about not being able to having to need special services you could do it yourself and I think that that's wonderful.

14:03 Peter von Gomm: Oh oh you didn't Peters narrated a documentary for NHK that's playing right now yeah yeah you want to pitch it sure sure Fukushima Monologue and it's about the gentlemen that remained in the no-go zone after the tsunami took out the that's the guy with the llama right yeah he basically was like a Doctor Doolittle to leave so that he could tend to all of the animals that people left behind and he remained there for the last 10 years defied the orders to evacuate and so we did this documentary I narrated it and it's fascinating is one of the most challenging I've done to date just powerful beautiful at the same time but he had over 200 animals that he cared for ostrich wow there was the others pigs cats dogs everything living together and it's an amazing story so check it out on NHK World playing right now is it on demand it's not positive it'll be on demand it's playing multiple times over the next 24 hours cool it's called Fukushima Monologues right you can see it on the app as well playing live thank you Peter.

15:24 John Daub: You the voice of that and probably adds a lot of value to the high call one of the things that is disturbing and thank you Nosh also shared the link to everybody hopefully you can see it the now the iPhone does a good job of it but if you're trying to film on the grand class there's this irritating flicker and I found that if you have the a1 the Sony a1 camera you can get rid of the flicker if you shoot at 1/115.5 shutter speed I think I have to adjust it to one doesn't have an automatic no no setting you have to do by yourself have to do it by hand to find out to find the frequency and I can find it at 1/115.5 shutter speed brilliant and I need that and then it gets it there's a slight flicker but it's a lot a little bit better some of the things in the green in the grand class include right here the tray is pops out like this which i think is pretty unique and I like this inner calm that's not it we're not clean up on John's aisle please stat we're in a tunnel I thought it was a we were in a tunnel I don't think anybody can hear you Suzette hi John hi Peter Thank You Suzette Hendricks welcome a new insider welcome to Hendricks we're going through some tunnels right now let's see who else is here Edison hi John Peter you guys really make me feel like I am in Japan right now by the way Peter looks awesome today.

16:59 Peter von Gomm: Thank you so much I feel awesome and wish Leo a happy and healthy Leo is doing good I just had a son about two weeks ago now a little bit over two weeks ago and my wife is holding down the fort yeah I can make it back here glad you finally chose a name yeah really well we're still not sure if it's gonna be Rio RIO or L or in English Leo but Rio Leo kind of sounds the same that's great that's all good brought down here in the house Aloha from Hawaii the view is also a reason to ride the car not back of the tunnel right now because we're in a tunnel yeah do you have any unusual talents with your nostrils or ears something you could yeah I'm teaching my son right now doing what you're hardly moving it okay watch this what is that something passed on through generations it's genetic I don't know can you curl your tongue yeah how about your bottom lip how about your upper lip I.

18:21 John Daub: Alright, this livestream has degraded into absolute ridiculousness. Anything else with the grand class that we want to introduce, Peter?

18:26 Peter von Gomm: Well I just... We're having fun. I'm in jail.

18:38 John Daub: Yeah. This has incredible attention. Something worth trying at least once.

19:00 Peter von Gomm: So you think this is splurging?

19:03 John Daub: Well, you said it's like four or five times more than the standard ticket. It is. So I would say for most people that is splurging.

19:12 Peter von Gomm: It is worth it and I think it's part of the experience.

19:15 John Daub: If you are riding on the trains here in Japan, I think you can't get a grand class pass. But there is a Japan Rail Pass for the green car which I think is really good. It's actually worth it. It's not so much more than the regular pass. But we're riding right now on this and the grand class is not open to us on this pass. I just want you to know that. We get a special access to come in here. This is the JR East Pass, Tohoku area that just started on April 1st. You can get this. You only need a foreign passport. You don't have to be an actual tourist to get this. For the first time, you can be a resident of Japan and use this. Just got to show your foreign passport. 20,000 yen or about $200 for five days consecutive. Norihodai. All you can ride. Ride all you can according to the schedule of the Shinkansen and enjoy it. And that includes the local trains too. It's not just the bullets. You can go to Aomori and then catch a local train to get to your Shinkansen. Or to your ryokan or whatever. And use it for all one price. 20,000 yen. That's so cheap. I can't think of a better use of 20,000 yen.

20:27 Peter von Gomm: I knew he wasn't going to agree with me.

20:30 John Daub: Yeah, I can think of it. Actually, it is a pretty good deal. Yeah, and the views outside on the way are fantastic. Right now it's the cherry blossom season. So we've been seeing lots of beautiful sakura along the side of the tracks, which has been splendid. But I'm looking forward to getting to our final destination. Aomori.

20:51 Peter von Gomm: Yeah, which is the ryokan tonight with a fantastic onsen.

20:56 John Daub: All right. That's going to be really nice. That should be a lot of fun. We are going through the tunnels, so the quality might not be that good. I just want to say thank you to all of you for joining us on this adventure. I know a lot of you have been looking forward to this. It's not often that you can livestream on the Shinkansen with permission.

21:13 Peter von Gomm: Right. Usually.

21:14 John Daub: Yeah, people will do. Anybody who's actually taken video on the Shinkansen, 99% of them did not have permission. We were able to get that, which we're very thankful for.

21:25 Peter von Gomm: Which is huge.

21:25 John Daub: So a big thank you to JR East as well. And for Jeki and for Jarman International. Really appreciate them helping out with this trip. We're going to be livestreaming once again at 12, about 12 o'clock. I'll set up the livestream about 30 minutes before at A-Factory in Aomori.

21:44 Peter von Gomm: What is A Factory?

21:46 John Daub: A Factory could stand for Apple, it could stand for Aomori, but they sell a lot of the goods and a lot of the cuisine from the region of Aomori. It's quite a unique place. Wow, looking forward to that. Do you still have room in your stomach for some more food?

22:00 Peter von Gomm: I do, especially dessert. I'm looking for some ice cream.

22:04 John Daub: Apple ice cream or something would be really good. John Kimura is in the house with the Double Two. Hey, Kimura-san. Yeah, thank you for that. And who else we got here? Bradshaw Studio. I got to say thank you to everybody. Oh, and Ocean Discovery. My son is into trains and loves your channel. He's learning a lot about Japanese culture. His name is Colin. Oh, Colin. Hi, Colin. How you doing, Colin? Thanks for watching. Trains are cool. Trains are very cool. I've always had a love affair. I'm a train otaku with, especially when I came to Japan, my train otaku-dom. It reached Mount Everest when I arrived here. So one last look back at PVG really resting in his...

22:52 Peter von Gomm: That is a light. It is not an intercom. I'm guilty. He's saying thanks for bringing me along.

23:03 John Daub: We'll see you in Aomori. You still look like Blofeld. If you just had a little white cat on your lap, yeah, don't play.

23:12 Peter von Gomm: Peter, don't play with the train.

23:18 John Daub: Thanks, everybody, for watching. I hope you enjoyed the Grand Class tour. Lots of space for your luggage up here. I don't know what else to tell you. Except that there are slippers that you can get inside of here. Just every bit of comfort that you can afford. Lots of leg room. It's worth it. Until we see you in Aomori, have a good day, everybody.

23:41 Peter von Gomm: Are you asleep?

23:42 John Daub: Don't forget to hit that like button.