00:00:01 John Daub: Welcome to the city of Tokyo. This is the mass vaccination site in Otemachi. There's a lot of really interesting stories to tell you for the next 15-20 minutes or so. It says wakuchin (vaccine) right there. The arrows point the direction. If you're over the age of 65, you'll come here. I'll tell you some of the criteria and some of the background stories on this. Now I can't actually go inside, but I will describe to you what it looks like inside as well as give you an overview of what this is all about and why they're doing this. Again, you need to have an inoculation ticket. I'll tell you the three criteria that are necessary for you to get jabbed.

00:00:49 John Daub: And I just showed a little bit before the Hato Bus. These are the yellow buses. How you doing everybody? Welcome to Tokyo, Otemachi. The yellow Hato buses. This is a bus that is for tour groups. So if you come to Tokyo you want to take a Hato Bus tour and you get a chance to see the area—it's pretty convenient and it's right outside of Tokyo Station. When I was riding over to this vaccination center I saw that people were being led right outside of the exit of Tokyo Station directly to the Hato buses. There were people holding signs and so you could see these yellow Hato buses just filled with people over the age of 65. It's kind of interesting to see the signs—free bus to the vaccine center which is right there behind me. Those tents there tell the story and it's a really good thing because Hato Bus is one of the companies that has been hard hit with the lack of tourists. I'm really happy to see the city of Tokyo utilizing companies that are hurting right now, struggling to do stuff like this. So kudos to the government of Tokyo, to Governor Koike for this effort.

00:02:01 John Daub: Now Tokyo is fighting hard right now to get to one million jabs a day. In order to do that, if they do that by mid-third week of August they'll peak out at 70% and it'll start to go down according to the statistics. We want that because that would mean that Tokyo would be on the swing down before the Olympics—that's the target right now. We're struggling to get to 500,000 a day but it's starting to ramp up. Hopefully we can get there—at 600,000 jabs a day we'll peak out in mid-October which is after the Paralympics. That's not what the government success maybe depends on the current government because a lot of locals right now are very skeptical about holding the Tokyo Olympics.

00:02:55 John Daub: So the three criteria necessary in order to get a jab here are: you must be over the age of 65 right now; you must not have gotten the Pfizer vaccine—I think that in the U.S. they're giving the Moderna one here; and the other criteria is you must live in Kanagawa, Chiba, Tokyo or Saitama. If you live in one of those four prefectures you can get it and you must have received an inoculation ticket in the mail from the local government. If you have that you can come here and get your jab and it's very organized. Let's walk around right now. I'll give you some more data—the local media is here and has been stopping people for interviews. I talked to a couple of older people and they said that it didn't hurt. They look pretty strong—stronger than me. But I'm fascinated with how this process is working. You can see the sign here: 65 years and older. They're very strictly adhering to these rules so John can't walk in here and just walk in and get a vaccine jab—that's not how it works. They're also checking—you can see they have a heat scanner, an app that checks people's temperature as they walk in. It's pretty fascinating.

00:04:36 John Daub: Now this area is run by the Japan Self-Defense Force—all right, it's like the army, navy, air force, marines of Japan. One of the reasons why Japan has been slow with the vaccination rollout—not just because they wanted a domestic testing of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine before use, which added two months onto the time that was approved here—they just don't have the manpower to give those jabs. They don't have trained medical professionals so they've enlisted the help of dentists to help jab people, give inoculations, shots. They also have asked the Self-Defense Force, the military, to help do it. I'm hoping that they start asking convenience store clerks because that would really change the dynamics of this. So for those joining us right now, you're looking live at the large-scale vaccination tents entrance for people over 65 to get their shots.

00:05:52 John Daub: Now here's the thing—with this, this is one of the largest vaccination centers in Tokyo, which is one of the largest cities in the world. This center can only vaccinate 10,000 people a day right here. So that means what—300,000 a month? So that's less than a million in three months at this one spot and this is the largest. So they're going to have to resort to more local places like universities, work sites, local areas, local parks and try to get vaccinations done there. But these large-scale places are especially useful right now to getting people into one spot and getting all the Self-Defense Force people in the one spot and organized. They're also opening more mass-scale vaccination centers. One of them is at Yoyogi Park which is going to be a viewing platform for the Olympics but since there are no tourists coming they've decided to turn that into a place where volunteers and police and firefighters can get vaccinated at that spot. Tsukiji—what used to be the Tsukiji fish market—is now becoming a mass vaccination center. It's a big parking lot right now but by the beginning of July I believe they're going to turn that back into a parking lot for the Olympics.

00:07:08 John Daub: This is a live view of the people walking into the vaccination center—it's pretty orderly but you would expect nothing less in Japan. The people going in all over the age of 65 from Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa and Tokyo. This is a new thing—they're taking pages from the U.S., the stadium vaccinations and a lot of the other countries that have had great success in vaccinating large amounts of people very quickly. If they don't do this right now the public is so against the Tokyo Olympics without having a good number of people vaccinated and feeling safe—I don't know how they're gonna safely be able to do it even though they promise that everything's gonna be really safe but people just don't feel safe and that's a lot of it I think right now.

00:08:52 John Daub: According to Kyodo News this one is giving the Moderna vaccine. If Japan can get 1 million vaccinations a day then by the third week of August they will peak and it'll start to go down and the country will feel more safe going into the Olympics—we'll basically sigh relief as the games start. If they do 600,000 a day, which is about where we are right now, it does not peak until mid-October which is after the Paralympics, which will cause a little bit of uneasiness or a lot of uneasiness for the general public here. I think if they can get to that one million number then maybe they start to open up the venues a little bit more to people instead of having empty venues—they can start to allow people into it and that would make the Olympics feel like the Olympics. But as it is right now I don't see if they can't raise the number of jabs, of vaccinations per day, that they can have people in the stadiums or the venues. That's a big issue. I'm not sure how they're going to hold it and there's a lot of debate on that right now within the government, even the JOC. I've heard some rumors—again the rumors that they might not even, there's a chance that they still cancel the Olympics.

00:10:17 John Daub: Why can't they delay this till October? That makes a lot of sense for the sponsors to have more people watching, more people. I can't understand why the 1964 Olympics were held in October, which is much better weather. There seems to be a rush to get it on time here at the end of July. And by October, no matter what, we will have herd immunity and it'll be a lot better situation. That's what we're all hoping for, right? Well, that has not been the case here. It is very orderly. If you have questions, there are so many staff members here to help you get to where you're going. I'm pretty impressed by this coming here. I knew that Japan would do a really good job with it, but they do have the volunteers here, they do have people, medical staff—everybody is here. Just the numbers don't seem to be enough, though, for this one site—10,000 a day puts it at less than a million for this one spot after three months. So there's a lot of work to do.

00:11:33 John Daub: We'll walk around here—this is also the entrance. People have been walking this way. I guess if you're in a tour group, you'll walk this way and enter through this. People are coming out after being vaccinated, too, from this direction—maybe a sigh of relief on some of these people's faces. This is the building right here—I've been in here, I think it was for taxes or something. This is a government building—this isn't a hospital or anything special. This is just a typical run-of-the-mill government building that they've cleared out a couple of floors for vaccination.

00:13:02 John Daub: It makes a lot of sense for me, in my mind, to vaccinate families together. But I never understood why they make family members come on several trips—like grandma will have to go first, and then the daughter will have to come three months later. It just doesn't make a lot of sense. But vaccinate everybody in groups—that's the kind of the way I feel. But I'm not a doctor. So inside here, what's in there? The floor is green. It's a lot of partitions, white partitions—they don't go up to the ceiling, they're just temporary partitions. Inside, there are some from the Japan Self-Defense Force—they're not doctors, but they look like doctors because they're in white robes and stuff. They have the needles and the jabs, and they're doing the Moderna one. And I think it was June 24th, people start coming back for their second shots. So right now, they're really working hard to get everybody in there for their first shots if they're over 65. And then coming back on the 24th for their second inoculation—that's the plan anyways. Apparently, anybody can apply and reserve online for this. If you have pre-existing conditions or something that would make your system weak, you can get a doctor's note and apply with that. And depending on your age, it doesn't really matter—but the priority would be given to, within your age group, to those that have pre-existing conditions that would put them at risk.

00:14:49 John Daub: I've heard Tsukiji—there's a couple of other ones. Tsukiji is a parking lot that's going to be turned into a vaccination center, but turned back to a parking lot before the Olympics. Yoyogi Park, which I took you to a few days ago, was being set up as a mass-scale vaccination center, but I believe this is the first one here.

00:15:28 John Daub: This one crow is really bearing down on this center. Toby (crow). It's from the Ministry of Defense—sounds like a religious thing, right? The Ministry. So a lot of the people that are coming out look pretty happy—I see a glistening in their eyes. Could be the vaccine. It is a pretty hot day—over 30 degrees, the humidity is normal. It's not quite hot enough to be Japanese summer yet, but for the rainy season, this would be pretty hot—about 31 degrees in Tokyo today. And the people walking in right now have inoculation cards finding which entrance they need to go to. In a very Japanese manner, they have all of these maps and arrows to tell you which direction to go. That's for the station—Kanda Station and Otemachi Station. The station is in Otemachi Station. If you're used to the way that Japanese systems work like this, then should be pretty easy to get around.

00:17:20 John Daub: I'm guessing Kanae and I will be vaccinated in a place like this—I'm not really sure. But we'll get a vaccination card from the ward that we live in. Tokyo has 23 wards—we live in Chuo Ward. I used to live in Edogawa Ward. And all 23 wards, I believe, will send out inoculation cards for people to make their reservations and go to a certain site near home. And Kanae's father, I believe, is getting vaccinated next month—he's in his 60s. So that means at me, at 47, probably in August, I hope—fingers crossed. Toby (crow)'s vaccinated because Toby's a crow—he's up there in that tree. I think he's gone.

00:19:01 John Daub: I would believe that this is a stronger shot because it is a COVID. So I'm guessing that you might want to ask your doctor. I think a lot of people in the U.S. have gotten vaccinated who can at the moment—we don't have that luxury. I heard that Taiwan is getting 750,000 vaccinations from the United States as being a part of it. So in Japan, it's like Japan's ally with the U.S.—Japan, I have not heard any information about that, any vaccines coming here. But we do have a partnership with Pfizer. Half the country will be receiving the Pfizer. And then the Moderna, they struck a deal with that. And I believe Prime Minister Suga, when he was in the United States last month, signed another deal with Pfizer, the CEO of Pfizer to get more doses here to the country and into Japan. And there has been some news that Japan sent some vaccines to Thailand—that could be possible as well.

00:20:54 John Daub: This is the mass vaccination site, large-scale vaccination site in Otemachi in Tokyo. And I came here just to check it out to see what the operation was like—it looks like it's going pretty smoothly. Again, 10,000 people can get vaccinated here per day. It goes on from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., apparently. They put up here the times—now she's starting to change the times for the vaccinations from now 2 to 4 p.m. So the inoculation cards you receive from your local area probably has that data on the card, so you want to hit the time that you're at. But just to reiterate, if Japan can get to 1 million vaccinations a day, they'll peak in the third week of August, which would mean the Olympics would be with herd immunity. And having the venues filled with people might be okay. But if it's 600,000 inoculations per day, Japan will have a hard time with this through the Olympics. And we just saw a military truck pull through—part of the Self-Defense Force team here giving the injections.

00:22:16 John Daub: 600,000 shots a day, which is about where we are right now—we're a little bit underneath that. I believe it was 485,000 last week. That would mean that this would be raging until the middle of October when we peak out and the numbers start to come down. So fingers crossed that we get up to that number. But it's going to take a huge effort by the government because Japan just does not have that manpower. Population has been decreasing for a long time and medical staff, doctors, nurses—there's just not enough of them here. US military base is offering vaccinations to US citizens—not at this time, I've already asked. I have friends at the air base, at Yokosuka, at the naval base—I know some people down in Iwakuni. I have been asking, but that is not an option currently, unfortunately. Yokult is here, giving drinks to the thirsty, which is nice.

00:23:25 John Daub: And they are using the Japan Self-Defense Force—this is entirely staffed by the Japan Self-Defense Force. I wouldn't say entirely—I think that there's probably some bureaucrats and other people in there making this work. But those giving the jabs, it's mostly the Japan Self-Defense Force, JSDF. They also do the Sapporo Snow Festival up there in Hokkaido, which is pretty cool—you can see the Japan Self-Defense Force. Sometimes they'll line up in military gear outside. That Sapporo Snow Festival was started by the Japan Self-Defense Force in the 1950s, I believe—it's pretty cool. This is the building number three, government building in Tokyo, that brown one. And I've been in here already for taxes or something way back in the day—I had to come here for some kind of government documentation when I started my business, I believe. But now today, government building has been turned into a large-scale vaccination center. The Japanese media is here—they were interviewing people over there.

00:25:34 John Daub: So as I was saying, do you think this is enough? Now you've seen a little bit of the outside—inside it's basically volunteers distributing people to certain places to register, a very quick Q&A to help explain about the shot. They get in, get the jab—there's an observation area where they're looked after for a little bit. And then the elderly are guided to the buses, which are run by Hato Bus, which is a great story. Hato Bus is one of them—they weren't doing good business because all the tourists were gone. This is a bus that tourists like to get on for tours around the city. Those buses have been just idling in a parking lot. And now they're being put to use by the government for this. And it's great that they get a job and a contract from the government to shuttle people to this vaccination site—pretty cool. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this—is this similar to something that you've seen in your country? Do you think this is enough? 10,000 people at this one site—is that a lot or a little?

00:27:04 John Daub: There'll be more sites. It's good to know that 10,000 a day is actually quite significant—I just wasn't sure. That's good to hear. A fair starting number, I guess. More sites to rush things—absolutely. They are now going door to door in Los Angeles—that's a great idea. Here goes that Hato bus I was telling you about right now—filled with people over 65, shuttling them from Tokyo Station to the site. More sites are needed. I would not take Sputnik—but if that was the only one I could get, I'd probably take it. I would probably take it for peace of mind. They need to put it in pharmacies, hospital sites—convenience stores would be pretty good places to do it. Just set up a tent right outside of the convenience stores. We have mobile units going out to the countryside.

00:28:37 John Daub: I have not had access to the vaccine yet—but we're getting there. I have a lot of friends that went back to the United States. I've had friends that were not even American that went to the United States to get the vaccine—that's crazy, right? So there are tourists going to America to get vaccinated—they'll do the quarantine, they just want to get the vaccine. America is a place with easy access to it. And those friends have come back to Japan and are fine and feeling very confident. I have a wife and a child and a job and it would be hard for me to leave to do something like that. But if the situations were different, I would definitely be going to Guam and getting an AirVNV—like Airbnb, AirVNV, which is air vaccine and vacation to Guam. Guam has a campaign asking American residents living in Asia to go to Guam and get your vaccine there. And the US government has given some promotional money as well as a lot of vaccine to do just this, to help kickstart Guam's tourism program, attracting Americans back in there first. And it is close enough to do, but it's very hard. I think they're giving the Johnson & Johnson one—just one shot—but there's still a quarantine time of 14 days to wait when coming back into Japan. Go to Hawaii is also an option—I might just go back to America, or back to where my parents live. Hawaii would be nice too, but I'm going to quarantine—I'll quarantine in my childhood bed like I did when I was a kid with the flu.

00:30:28 John Daub: If you'd like to, you can write in where you're watching from—it's always nice to see the location. If you're shy about leaving a comment, that's a pretty easy one—softball. Definitely click the like button. I might try to take you to some more vaccination sites. I think as the Olympics get closer and closer and Japan starts doing a better and better job at doing this, I'm somebody who always likes to focus on the positive. It's been really tough to do that, but this is something that's positive—I want people to take something positive away from this. If I could show the world that Japan is doing an increasingly better job at doing this after all of the criticism that it's been receiving for a long time, then wow, I will do that. And it's funny because about 8-9 months ago, Japan was a star—it was a place where everything was going right. And now it's a place where things are very much... There's the Yakult lady bringing in drinks—they still do that by person, right? The delivery by little carts like this of Yakult—they haven't changed in decades. Yakult's like these little teeny yogurt drinks, which are so nice.

00:31:52 John Daub: Yeah, I really want to focus on the positive. I'm going to be doing a Japan travel update tomorrow or Thursday. I've gotten some requests, and I've heard from Thomas, who's in the United Kingdom—he just recently got a student visa to come to Japan. It took him quite a long time to get that—I think there's just a massive backlog. And I'm going to send him a couple of messages—Thomas, if you're watching, you can share that information if you want to. You can join me on Discord tomorrow or something—I'll explain a little bit about it. But he's going to be staying in Okayama. And I've been in touch with him about student visas—he was able to get his from the UK. So he'll be here in Japan finally, after waiting for quite a while—they just had a very massive backlog of student visas to process. But they are moving because I know people who have them now. So it's good news for those that have been waiting for visas and trying to get into Japan—you can. You still have to quarantine, but it's moving now and that's a very positive thing.

00:32:55 John Daub: Once again, the worst-case scenario, Japan will peak by the middle of October with this—a few months after the United States, which is a shame because that's after the summer season. If Japan can get to that million number and exceed that, then this peaks in the middle or third week of August, which is when the Olympics start—that is huge. So everybody, we should be encouraging Prime Minister Suga to be fighting hard to get to that number of one million a day because that's what the numbers say—we will be done or peaking at this by the third week of August, which would make the Olympics a lot more stress-free because I live here—I got stress. And hopefully we can stop talking about this. Look, the thing that's holding up tourism and stopping you from coming to Japan is this pandemic and Japan needs to get a handle on it so I could greet you here.

00:34:38 John Daub: I'm fascinated not just with the drink itself, but with the way that they distribute that and how they have not changed since the Showa era. It's just like this very cool tradition—traditional system of distributing it by like a Yakult lady who takes them into offices and stuff, delivers them door to door like the milkman back in the 1950s. Thanks everybody for joining—hit the like button if you're interested in seeing more of these vaccination centers and Japan travel updates. I'm going to do another one in about 48 hours time as I get some more information for everybody. But right here is the line for the vaccination for those 65 and older. It's pretty—every 15 minutes or so, departing from Tokyo Station, trucking old people here, which is awesome to see. They're getting their jabs and coming out a lot smoother, a lot happier—the masks covering those smiles. I would be smiling if I got it because that means I can get back to work and not have to worry about getting sick or getting other people sick.

00:36:26 John Daub: My biggest fear with this was not so much me getting sick, but me one day getting sick, not knowing it, and getting other people sick and causing a chain reaction, which I've watched enough movies—I don't want to be that guy. But again, with this rolling out, unless barring some unfortunate mutation or situation, I do think there's... Question for those that are watching is, do you tip your Uber Eats guy? Japan, we never tip for anything—it's all included. But I did Uber Eats recently for the first time and it asked for a tip. And I was confused by that because there's already a service charge. Tipping in Japan, right? It's confusing. I've asked a lot of my other foreign friends and they're confused, too, whether or not to tip. In the US, you would tip—but in Japan, you never tip at restaurants, that's you never tip at the taxi driver—you don't tip for services in Japan ever. So it's confusing. So maybe we throw them—I've been throwing them a 5% tip because there's also a service charge in it. But it's just very confusing. But I know that they're working really hard. So depending on the order and how far that they're traveling, I throw in a little bit extra money. But to me, I'm not sure if it's something that's usual in Japan—it's not.

00:38:09 John Daub: There's a lot of these people here with the signs—so you never can get lost. These volunteers are holding signs with arrows—that's what they do all day. And it says vaccine this way—it's very hard to get lost. Again, Japan does such an amazing job of getting people to come. And if you get to the right spot, if you get in the general area, you will be found—yeah, you will find a guide. Oh, thank you—did you get a vaccination? Wow, how is it inside? Very busy. Oh, she watches the show—she says it's very busy inside. That's so nice—I'm glad that she's working there and helping out so many people. It's just a very good spirit—people coming together to help other people out in this time. And big shout out to all of the people on the front lines and give their time for other people like this in risky situations. I know with the vaccination out there, it's not as risky as before, but still, it's still a tough time. And I'm sure family members feel anxious if you're working in such an environment. But this is a good thing—and I'm very happy to have somebody stop and say hi. Not a lot of people have stopped to say hi to me—I'm a person that thrives on human hellos and love, and I can't get enough of that. So please come back to Japan.

00:39:56 John Daub: For those joining us, we're outside of the large-scale Tokyo vaccination center in Otemachi. You can't hug people in a pandemic. But I was looking at the statistics for tourism to Japan—it's like after 2020, it's gone really, really down. And this year, I think they're averaging maybe 10,000 tourists coming into Japan somehow a month—I don't know how they're getting in, but maybe their family members or something. But I do know that the pie chart gives three countries over 50% of the tourists coming to Japan. China, Korea and Hong Kong—those three countries make up the majority of tourism to Japan. And Taiwan is in there, too—but those