00:00:21 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome. Today is a treat for me because I'm a very big fan of this YouTube creator who has been for the last three years, I believe, making a documentary on a topic that I'm deeply interested because my wife Kanae and I just had a son. And I believe this documentary answers a lot of questions that I've been thinking about for him. And he's with us, not here in Japan, but via Zoom. He is the creator of the channel called Life Where I'm From, 1.47 million subscribers, pretty amazing, Greg Lam. There he is. How you doing, Greg?

00:01:08 Greg Lam: Hello. You're so high energy, John, and it's so late at night for you.

00:01:11 John Daub: You're supposed to say hello world. I'm so disappointed.

00:01:15 Greg Lam: Hello world. How are you? What's going on?

00:01:19 John Daub: Yeah, that's how you always...

00:01:20 Greg Lam: But I have to practice it. You know, when I do my hello world in my intros, I'm always like, hello world. Wait, hello world.

00:01:27 John Daub: Is that the face you used to? You have the like half smile?

00:01:30 Greg Lam: I think so, right. Hello world. Today, we find ourselves in John's live stream.

00:01:37 John Daub: Yes, you do anyways.

00:01:39 Greg Lam: So Greg, again, the creator of Life Where I'm From.

00:01:42 John Daub: A wildly popular channel on the internet. And you have been working for a very long time on a documentary.

00:01:51 Greg Lam: I have the page right now on your screen. It's called Being Japanese.

00:01:56 John Daub: Nihonjin Toa. And it's now on Vimeo for rent and can also purchase a copy, which is pretty cool. What prompted you to make this documentary?

00:02:11 Greg Lam: You are not... It's true. I have a question. I didn't know you're going to ask this question.

00:02:14 John Daub: Really? Oh, okay.

00:02:16 Greg Lam: No, but it's a very common question. And there's so many answers to this.

00:02:21 John Daub: Oh, well, what's the brief one? Because people have short attention spans, I've heard.

00:02:29 Greg Lam: Okay, okay, okay. Well, okay, look at me. I'm actually half Chinese. A lot of people don't know that. But people, if they know my last name is Lam, L-A-M. That's a Chinese name. The kanji is actually forest. You know, Hayashi in Japanese. Lin.

00:02:48 John Daub: Anyways, in Canada growing up, I grew up in a really white area, Winnipeg. And so I was like considered Asian Chinese.

00:02:55 Greg Lam: I moved to Vancouver, which is a lot of Chinese people there are considered white. And so I kind of had like this mixed identity.

00:03:04 John Daub: But I was always Canadian, right? I could always call myself Canadian. No one would argue with me.

00:03:09 Greg Lam: So with my kids, they are kind of like mixed like me as well. But in Japan, for themselves to call them for them to call themselves Japanese and just have it like that, we're Japanese. It's not so straightforward. Right? So I'm wondering why? Why is that? Why can you say I'm Canadian in Japan so easily, but not say that in our sorry, see, I'm Canadian in Canada so easily.

00:03:32 John Daub: But in Japan, you can't say I'm Japanese so easily.

00:03:36 Greg Lam: Yeah, you know, I, for me, I'm somebody with a mixed background. I grew up. My mother's from India. My father is American, but he's got a background in German English in America.

00:03:47 John Daub: We identify ourselves with whatever we are in our past American, African American, Asian American.

00:03:54 Greg Lam: Now, when I was a kid in the 1980s, we didn't do that. All right. We didn't have these designations.

00:04:01 John Daub: So when I came to Japan, you were either Japanese or you were a foreigner, right?

00:04:06 Greg Lam: Yeah, I was a foreigner. Yeah.

00:04:08 John Daub: One of the great things about Japan.

00:04:09 Greg Lam: One of the great things that I learned from this video, and we're going to show a trailer of this in a second, is that it kind of puts a little bit more gray into this than I realize.

00:04:19 John Daub: I don't I don't know. I don't know.

00:04:21 Greg Lam: A lot of the people that you talk to and I've got a list of them, and I'm sure you're going to explain, have like different experiences, different stories about like, are they Japanese people that question it, even though they are, but they're not.

00:04:37 John Daub: And I. Why don't you explain? Tell me a little bit about The people that you interviewed. Why did you pick? Like I knew you went up to Hokkaido, Okinawa. You went down there to talk to people in Okinawa who historically they're Japanese, but they're not Japanese. They're Okinawan and got a very interesting point of view.

00:04:55 Greg Lam: We have the Zainichi Koreans, which is a very big group in Korea. Generations have been living here, have still Korean passports. We have the Nikkei Brazilians that you talk to, as well as the The Kikoku Shijo, which are returnees back from Japanese born here, lived in the United States and came back to Japan. All these different angles.

00:05:18 John Daub: And there's even more naturalized Japanese people that were British or American that became Japanese, changed their passport. Like when you look at it from all these angles, it's not such an easy thing to say that you are Japanese, is it?

00:05:37 Greg Lam: Um. In some ways. And I mean, I don't think anything is a spoiler because I think looking at the documentary as a whole, just so many questions and discussions.

00:05:48 John Daub: So we're going to show clips from the documentary. I don't think it's going to spoil anything. But one person said, you know, the simplest way you can do it is just nationality. So what's in your passport? So Japanese, you're Japanese. If you want to go really basic like that, you know.

00:06:03 Greg Lam: But of course, throughout the documentary, there are some people who were born and raised in Japan. Like Japanese is. Their primary language, sometimes their only language. And they are still not considered Japanese by some Japanese people.

00:06:19 John Daub: So but why did I go to all these different places like, you know, the Ainu in Hokkaido? Because they've been there for a very long time. They were separate from Japan up until, you know, just maybe about 150 years ago. Same as Okinawa as well. They were separate from Japan. So they became Japanese relatively. Recently in modern history. I know 150 years ago sounds like a long time, but they weren't always Japanese. But now, you know, the government wants them to be considered fully Japanese, you know.

00:06:52 Greg Lam: And even Zainichi Koreans, like you're saying, there are some people whose great grandparents or their grandparents who came from Korea to Japan. And they've been living as Japanese for, you know, a long, long time. So even their parents, they look Japanese. What they do culturally is Japanese. What they speak is only Japanese. So and a lot of them naturalized and actually have a Japanese citizenship. But still, if someone finds out that they're originally not Japanese generations ago, they might say, like, well, they're, you know, they're not really Japanese. So it's just interesting to why this is.

00:07:33 John Daub: Yeah. And I'm going to have to answer my son. That was interesting. You have a there's one of the people that you talked to. Was it? Joe? Who was bullied a lot when he was a kid. And right. Yeah. From Yokosuka. And he did not. He had a pretty normal childhood until about age seven. Right. And went to elementary school. Yeah. Yeah. And then it just got really bad. He became quite bullied.

00:08:01 Greg Lam: And like for me, as now that my son is half, he's half Japanese, half half American. Like, I'm thinking about these things.

00:08:10 John Daub: Well, why don't I just show you everybody out there? I put a link in the description if you want to check out and rent or even purchase. I'm somebody who purchased this video because I think I'm watching it over and over again with Leo when he gets older. But you can rent this on Vimeo, which is pretty cool. Let me just show you the trailer. Everybody here for the next minute or so. Check this out.

00:08:32 Documentary: What makes a Japanese person Japanese or not? Is it the blood that runs through their veins? A parent they were born to? The country they grew up in? Is it how they look? How they act? How they speak? To seek answers, I went to the far north, Hokkaido, to talk with the Ainu people who have lived on the land for thousands of years. I went to the far south, Okinawa, who had many influences from Chinese to American to Japanese. I went all over Japan and met with Zainichi Koreans whose families came to Japan from Korea generations ago. Nikkei Brazilians returned to Japan after generations. Hafu, who have one Japanese parent and a strong connection to one another. Kikoku Shijo, who grew up partly outside of Japan and often feel like outsiders upon returning. Refugees, who may have been born and raised in Japan but can struggle to attain citizenship. And I met with naturalized Japanese, who became Japanese later in life. I met with all kinds of Japanese, who are Japanese, but it's complicated. What is being Japanese?

00:09:36 Documentary: When I was asked if I was Japanese, I felt a little strange. I'm Japanese, but...

00:10:12 John Daub: I thought it was really interesting. She said she has a Japanese passport. Okinawans were not considered Japanese before World War II. There's some history with this. They were, but it was complicated. It was actually much before World War II. This is around Meiji Restoration time, like 1860s. They became Japanese. But after World War II, they actually ceased having their Japanese passport. They had a special Ryukyu passport. Special passport.

00:10:41 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:10:42 John Daub: I didn't know this occurred. But I met some people and they showed me their documentation. We had our own special passport and we needed permission to go into Japan. Between World War II and 1972, I don't remember the dates quite exactly, they were something different. And then after, they became part of Japan again.

00:11:06 Greg Lam: The girl from Okinawa said that she has a Japanese passport. But if... If they had an Okinawan passport, she would prefer that.

00:11:15 John Daub: Yeah. I thought that was interesting.

00:11:18 Greg Lam: I thought that was interesting too. But I... I mean, I think a lot of them seem like they'd be pretty happy with having both, honestly, is what it seemed like. But their identity is... At least the people I interviewed were strongly Okinawan, right? They're really proud of being Okinawan. And I mean, that's just their identity, you know? That's who they are. But they were fine being Japanese. So it wasn't... I don't think they were like anti-Japan or something.

00:11:48 John Daub: Right. And my camera has frozen here.

00:11:50 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:11:51 John Daub: Yeah. I'm like waiting for your reaction here and just see your dumb smiling face at me.

00:11:58 Greg Lam: Hey now.

00:12:01 John Daub: So if... So we... There's a bunch of different kinds of Japanese that you interviewed. Of course, there's Japanese by blood. The pure form of Japanese. I guess. I don't know. Well, it's pure in quotation marks. And that's not my quotation marks. There's a study that some professor did 20, 30 years ago that talks about the various traits that you can think about of being Japanese. Nationality, you know, the pure blood, or pure genes. You could have the language you speak, where you were born, where you grew up, your personal identity, your culture, all these different factors. Where you currently even live in. Right?

00:12:44 Greg Lam: So, but I mean, how do you realistically trace someone's blood? Right? Are you going to DNA test everyone in Japan and figure out, okay, what percentage Japanese do you need to be to be Japanese? And how accurate are these tests? So it starts... I mean, and then you're starting to get into like eugenics and stuff where people like wanted to have a pure race and then that's didn't work well in history as we know.

00:13:08 John Daub: So, yeah. So what... Oh, I got the creepy smile.

00:13:10 Greg Lam: Oh my gosh.

00:13:11 John Daub: So what was your... Don't worry, I can go with a different camera here as a backup.

00:13:19 Greg Lam: Yeah. Maybe you can change it and switch your camera. I know you're going to be lower quality than me and you won't like that.

00:13:26 John Daub: It's all good. Go with your backup cam. What were the different kinds of Japanese, you know, because my wife is Japanese, your wife is Japanese. Can you go through the list here of the people in the documentary that you interviewed?

00:13:40 Greg Lam: We had Ainu, Okinawan... Oh, okay. Yeah, sure. Ainu, Okinawan, then we have Zainichi Korean, Nikkei Brazilian. So those are Japanese that went to Brazil. I think they're starting in the 1910s, 1920s for better work life and whatnot. Then came out Japan. You have largely like from the 80s onwards. We have Hafus, which is a huge group because there's one Japanese. One Japanese parent, one non-Japanese parent. And so you can get so many different mixes with that.

00:14:16 John Daub: Kikokushijo, which are people who are typically Japanese, but they've studied or went abroad overseas during childhood and come back. So culturally, language wise, maybe they kind of seem different to people. They definitely don't seem like they fit in. A lot of people have that experience.

00:14:35 Greg Lam: You have the Nikkei community, which are people who... left Japan and maybe never ever really came back. So those are like second, third, fourth generation. Nisei, Sansei, Yonsei, like Nikkei American, or like Canadian, right? So Japanese American, Japanese Canadians. And these are people who went through sometimes the internment camp or the relatives did, right? And they have some interesting history. And some troubled history. And there's refugees, right? In Japan. That they might have been born and raised in Japan. And only speak Japanese. Yet they don't actually have Japanese citizenship. But they're otherwise, I mean, they're really Japanese, you know? And naturalized is the last major category that I have in the documentary. And those are people that, you know, decide to switch nationalities. And become Japanese nationality-wise.

00:15:42 John Daub: Now, when I was watching the documentary, it didn't seem like those people had a... It wasn't a tough decision for them to go from To give up their nationality, their passport from where they were born. And become a naturalized Japanese. It didn't seem too hard. Because there was one thing that seemed to drive them. They didn't ever not want to be able to come here. Or like...

00:16:07 Greg Lam: Yeah, I mean, because you don't know. That makes sense to me. Because, I mean, you know, being Canadian, I've seen a lot of immigrants become Naturalized and become Canadian. And, I mean, to me, growing up, it seemed like a no-brainer choice. Because, you know, we always hear Like, in Canada, we grew up like, oh, yeah, Canada's a great country. We have lots of immigrants. And people want to come live here. And we have a good, you know, life in Canada. So, it felt... And we know so many people that, you know, became Canadian. So many people's parents came to Canada for a better life. So, it seemed really natural that people would become Canadian.

00:16:48 John Daub: But I guess a big exception with becoming Canadian is that you don't have to give up your nationality. Your previous nationality to become Canadian. You can hold dual nationality or, you know, triple nationality. Whereas in Japan, for people who naturalize, they do have to give up their former nationality. So, the formerly British person, the formerly American person, the formerly Canadian person. They all have to give up that nationality to become Japanese. But their life was in Japan, you know?

00:17:19 Greg Lam: They wanted to be Japanese. And so, for them, that was the decision. They wanted to come back to the country. And their country was Japan, you know?

00:17:27 John Daub: You know, what was really heartbreaking for me was the Zainichi Korean community. And when that was presented in the documentary, they're like, like, yonsai. Like, fourth generation. Like, fourth generation. Living in Japan. Kids that only know Japan. Can't even speak Korean in some situations. And they still have Korean passports.

00:17:47 Greg Lam: Is that still the case today, right?

00:17:50 John Daub: Oh, mmm. They, I mean, so, there's a special class. Like a special permanent resident for Zainichi Koreans, right? And it's their choice on whether to naturalize and become Japanese or not. The rules for them are a lot different from everyone else. So, that's a very special case. And for most, they can quite easily become Japanese if they want to.

00:18:13 John Daub: Why don't they become Japanese? It could be for various reasons. One is identity. People don't want to give up their identity. Which I understand. Like, I mean, I wouldn't want to give up my Canadian, you know, passport citizenship to become Japanese, right? I'm happy being a permanent resident of Japan. And my wife, she did not want to give up her Japanese citizenship and become Canadian. She's happy being a permanent resident.

00:18:49 Greg Lam: So, for some people, it's just, you know, they feel their identity is tied to their passport. So, they don't want to give it up. But there's a lot of people that did, you know, get Japanese citizenship and became Japanese. There's a lot. But it's hard to find the numbers because in these census for, you know, the statistics the Japanese government keeps, once you naturalize and become Japanese, you're just Japanese. You're not previously anything else. You're just Japanese.

00:19:20 John Daub: There's a comment here that I want to address. Again, this is a live stream. I haven't been reading the comments. So, I should, yeah, check them out, too. This is in Katakana. A-Ban writes in here, you are also engrossed with being Japanese soever. You can't change your race or complain about it.

00:19:29 Greg Lam: This has nothing to do with that.

00:19:30 John Daub: Again, one of the reasons why. I purchased Greg's documentary on being Japanese is so that I could explain to my son the, like, the way that Japan treats people that are different than them is different than the way we treat people in the United States and Canada and elsewhere in the world, elsewhere. And for me, even after living here for 23, 24 years now, I still can't fully grasp how my son is treated. That's why I really wanted to purchase this documentary. Get the point of view of all these different other people that make up Japan. And yet, so many of them in this documentary, they didn't really feel, I don't know, Japanese. Like, some of them questioned where they fit. And I don't want my son to have those feelings. So, A-Ban, I think you're missing the point. I don't take the comment too seriously. But I think it's important to understand that. I think it's important to address it because some people watching this are probably thinking about it. This is not what this is about.

00:20:37 John Daub: Again, like, let's go back to some of the people that are kikoku shijou, which are returnees, Japanese that were born in Japan, lived abroad, grew up abroad, and then came back to Japan. And a lot of, I was an English teacher and taught children that returned. Returnees, we would call them in English. A lot of them worked at Toyota. They would live in Ohio or Tennessee at the factory. And then when they come back seven or eight years later, their English skills were great and their Japanese skills were not there. After a year of teaching them on returning, they didn't want to speak English because they felt their English level was higher than the other Japanese students at their schools. They were embarrassed. They felt like they didn't fit in. So, they started to regress. And they started to return. And they started to lose their English skills that they had learned for years living in the United States to try to become Japanese again. And that was really heartbreaking for me as someone who is trying to teach them English to maintain their level. They didn't want to after a while. Some of them had friends in the United States and wanted to keep that connection. But a lot of them wanted to give it up because of the age they were at, teenagers.

00:21:54 John Daub: What feelings did you get that? And talking about your own experience, Greg, like that of your children. Because they're also in both the school systems.

00:22:05 Greg Lam: Okay. Let me think about my children first. Interestingly, when they were going through school and they've been in the Japanese school system for eight years, they didn't initially tell me having any problems with, you know, bullies or feeling different or people making them feel different in their school. Later on, you know, I heard some stories like this. Oh, this person called me Gaijin. Or this person treated me like, you know, like, what are you doing? Like, you know, like, you can't be friends. You have to make an appointment or something like that. But they're like just, I mean, out of eight years, I think there was like maybe one or two or three incidents per kid. So it's very, very little. And I think that kids will pick up on anything that's different. So I wouldn't consider my kids especially having a problem.

00:23:00 John Daub: Maybe you're not. Maybe you're worried about Leo. Maybe you won't have a problem, especially living in Tokyo, where there's a lot of it's very multicultural now in Tokyo. And there's a lot of people from around the world there. So I think Japanese people are getting used to seeing different people speak different languages, have different looks to them, different cultures.

00:23:25 Greg Lam: The one thing that impressed me at the school that we went to was the principal. He had a special day where the grade six class. They gave a presentation to the school and they were presenting about Japan. They asked parents from different nationalities come and listen to this presentation. And he had us for tea in his office. And he's like, oh, what language do you speak at home? He's like, oh, great. You're speaking the you know, you're like native tongue as well. That's great. Keep it up. Like, you should really keep your culture, keep your language as well. We love that. And they would have me come in and do book readings. So I read books to the kids in English and stuff. So everybody knew, you know, I was Shintaro's father, Aiko's father in school. And it was generally fine. Like, I had a very positive experience there. And I think my kids had a pretty good experience as well in the school system.

00:24:27 Greg Lam: But what you see in the documentary, you know, you're seeing you're not going to hear a lot of people saying, oh, yeah, my childhood was completely normal because that's like, I guess if you have 15 people say that in a row, it's. It's not that interesting. But some people did have fairly normal upbringings. But, you know, we pointed out where there were issues. And sometimes these issues are like 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 40 years ago, 50 years ago. So what it is today, it can be different from what it is in the past. But sometimes it depends on the area you live in. Sometimes the time period you live in, how you look. There's so many different factors involved. So it's not a simple answer.

00:24:57 John Daub: Speaking about how you look.

00:24:57 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:25:02 John Daub: One of the things from the documentary that was fascinating again, and if you don't know, this is Greg Lamb. Just to introduce everybody here. He's the creator of the Life Where I'm From channel on YouTube. And for the last three years, he's been working on this documentary called Being Japanese, which when you watch it, you just see so much. You can see the hard work and love that he put into this. Everything is perfect. Greg, I was super impressed as someone who does this as well. Not as good. But going back to it. Looking Japanese is the key. There's been a lot of jokes, a lot of YouTube videos where people are speaking fluent Japanese, going to restaurants, ordering in fluent Japanese. And people not pretending like they can't understand what they're saying because they can't understand that the person who doesn't look Japanese is speaking Japanese. I've had that happen too. Where they respond in broken English. And I said, wait, I just talked to you in Japanese. Why can't you? Did I do something wrong with my Japanese? No. They just don't imagine you because of the way that you looked.

00:26:06 John Daub: And we have kind of a trailer, kind of a clip here from the video on looking Japanese. Do you want to introduce this before I show it?

00:26:12 Greg Lam: There's several clips that are looking Japanese. I don't know which exact one you're showing. I think this is the one with the girl. What's the number on this one?

00:26:20 John Daub: I'm not sure. I think it's from the bus. The girl with the bus.

00:26:24 Greg Lam: Oh, right. Okay. Well, okay. This situation, just to set it up, there's two different ladies in there. One is mother is Japanese. Father is Black American. And so her story is from the States in New York. So that's what she's telling from. Whereas the other lady, her, how is it? One parent is from Czech and one parent is Japanese. And she is talking about a perspective from Japan, just so that you know, like where these are occurring. So one is occurring in America. One is occurring in Japan.

00:27:02 John Daub: All right. Let's watch this. This is a clip on your appearance looking Japanese.

00:27:14 Documentary: I remember meeting this bus driver who saw me and said, you Asian? And I was like, yes. He was like, are you Black? And I was like, yes. And he was like, oh, that's cool. And then he was like, I'm not Asian. And then he proceeded to like tell me that he was going to find an oriental woman. He was going to quit his job in New York and find an oriental woman. And he was going to make children like me.

00:27:42 Documentary: Wow. That's new. Like, I didn't even know what to say. I was working at a sushi restaurant when I was in high school. But sushi is not allowed. You can't hold it. The reason is. It doesn't look good.

00:27:58 Documentary: I can see it from the audience. I think that's what happened. You're going to study abroad, right. You're doing a great job at a sushi restaurant. You like Japanese culture. You can make up a story by looking at it.

00:28:16 Documentary: When I saw people with these faces in Japanese culture, I felt like I liked Japan. I felt like I was in a great country in Japan. I feel like I'm learning new things to be able to touch other cultures.

00:28:37 John Daub: That's pretty deep. I've had that, like, people have images of, because of the way you look, they have images of what, like, if you see someone who's black or see someone who's from India, they must be this way. So the stereotypes and the generalizations are quite strong. So the way you do look in Japan is quite important. And it seems to be really important to the being Japanese thing is your gaiken, the way you look, right?

00:29:08 Greg Lam: Yeah, I think so. That's probably one of the biggest factors is how you look. And it's one of those factors you cannot change, right? You just look the way you do. Maybe your clothing style, you could change that, or your hair. And whatnot. But yeah, essentially, you look how you look.

00:29:24 Greg Lam: So I think part of the reason I made this documentary is like, yeah, there's, you can look different and still be Japanese. I think that's where a lot of people who were in this documentary wanted people to understand is that, you know, like, just look beyond the looks, essentially, right? Go a bit deeper.

00:29:47 John Daub: The other thing I would say is, is language and how you speak. And this one's kind of interesting because people say, well, you have to like sound like you're Japanese. But even what does sounding like Japanese really sound like? Because if you're from Tokyo, you're going to talk different than from Osaka or from Okinawa or from, you know, the Tohoku area, like in Aomori or something like that. Like they have some pretty strong accents, especially the older generations, you know, our dialects or whatever you want to call it.

00:30:17 Greg Lam: Right. So what is the typical Japanese accent? I think it's like, like a way of speaking Japanese sound or way of speaking Japanese.

00:30:22 John Daub: Yeah, but I can kind of understand the speaking part because in Canada, I feel like that's probably the biggest indicator you can think of as someone who has grown up in Canada or is Canadian is if you listen to them and you don't hear any, you know, obvious accent, you know, that doesn't sound like a Canadian accent. You'd be like, oh, OK, this person probably is from somewhere else, you know, originally like.

00:30:45 Greg Lam: Yeah. So the history before World War Two, before television in Japan, people had regional dialects that were quite strong. So you kind of could get an idea where someone is based on the way that they talk. But with television and radio, it kind of unified the Japanese language to where the older generation when I travel and I'm in Miyazaki, I can't understand what anybody over the age of 75 is saying. But everybody under, you know, everybody under around 70, they can speak standard Japanese, Japanese, which is pretty much constant no matter where you go. Now, unified by television and and radio.

00:31:38 John Daub: Of course, Osaka is going to be different, but like, we don't know. It's even harder to be I. It's because there are a lot of differences amongst the dialect. Now everybody has the same dialect. Everybody has the same fashion. They have the same, same dress, everybody and this is one of the things a lot of people who come to Japan remark, People dress the same. Black business suits, they try to conform here in Japan. And if we look different, we can't. It's impossible for me to conform on the way I look. Do you have anything to add to that?

00:32:15 Greg Lam: Just an interesting tidbit about the language you're talking about. Before World War II, before the TV, the accents were stronger, the dialects were more diverse. But I found out in the Tokugawa era, before the Meiji era hit, so this is before the 1800s, let's just go there. People, they can only communicate via writing. Even if they're in a neighboring prefecture, they have to write the kanji out to communicate. So I had a whole big section that I cut out of the documentary talking about all this progression of standardizing and becoming a more homogeneous culture. But it's kind of a myth that Japan has always been very homogeneous. They're actually in ways more diverse 100 years ago than they are today.

00:32:58 John Daub: Through my series, Only in Japan, this is one of the things that I try to do. I try to impress on people that Japan has 47 prefectures. And within these prefectures, despite the fact that in the modern era, things are pretty unified, there is a unique culture, unique cuisine, unique everything in each one of these prefectures. And even in some of the regions within the prefectures. People in Akita in the north, they have a different, they eat more rice than the people down in the south. The south, they'll eat more noodles. I found that fascinating. The Akita Komachi rice more up in the north. And down, they're eating soba. I'm like, what? It's like, do you have kiritanpo here, which is a famous dish from Akita? He goes, no, no. They eat that in the north. What? So even within the prefectures, there's unique cultures that we don't realize. I guess even Japanese themselves don't realize so much anymore.

00:33:57 John Daub: But like, you know, and this is what everybody's probably thinking, Greg. Do you want to become Japanese? And I think this is the thumbnail and maybe, you know, this is like, I personally.

00:34:06 Greg Lam: Thanks for that thumbnail, John.

00:34:07 John Daub: Yeah, thanks a lot. But personally, I have no desire. I'm American. I'm proud to be American. I don't want to change being an outsider. I don't think that that's not something I've never really been interested in. I'm happy to be an expat living here. But my heart, if you ask me, is probably straddled between both countries. I cheer for both in the Olympics. I cheer for both. I want to see the success for Japan. And knowing the Japanese heart and how people are here, I have a different way to look at it. I have more, I don't know, because Japan's been so good to me over the last 23 years.

00:34:48 John Daub: How about you? Where does your heart lie? And have you ever considered becoming Japanese?

00:34:57 Greg Lam: Right. Well, I think I actually said this earlier where, like, I'm not going to become Japanese. I'm happy being a permanent resident and keeping my cane. And citizenship and my wife is the opposite, are the same. She wants to be a permanent resident of Canada and a citizen of Japan. And we're both happy with that situation. But I love Japan. I love living in Japan. I love Japanese culture. So, yeah, and like you said, with the Olympics, I cheer for both teams. And I also love Canada. And I'm a Canadian citizen. I love Canadian culture as well. It's possible to love more than one thing. You know? And, you know, cheer for more than one thing and have more than one identity. Like, it doesn't have to be so black and white is what I feel. I think that's where people get stuck on. They're like, well, it has to be like you're for team A or for team B or, you know, team C. Like, why can't you just be for both? You know?

00:35:48 John Daub: Yeah. I think in Japan it is more yes or no. There's no middle ground. And in the west, we have such a more diverse population. Again, you said you can't. Walking around Canada. You can't tell who someone is by the way that they dress. But in Japan, you kind of can. You can tell who the tourists are versus the locals based on the way that they dress. But you couldn't do that in the United States or in Canada, could you?

00:36:16 Greg Lam: No. No, but it's interesting. I can. I feel like I'm fairly good at telling who is Japanese walking on the street in Japan. I don't know if they're like, you know, what their citizenship is or our role. Or what not. Or, you know, visa status or whatever that is. But just from a distance, I can see, you know, a couple of Japanese people standing there. I'm like, I think they're Japanese. And I'll walk by and I'll hear them speaking Japanese. I'm like, ah, yeah, I got it. And it's the way they dress, right? The fashion. And the way they do their makeup. So I think the way you look can really tell, like, you know, where you're from. But in Canada, people look so diverse. You can. I mean, it's really. You can never say with certainty, like, and point out someone to say, like, that person is Canadian or not. Right? But they can be Japanese and Canadian. You know?

00:37:20 John Daub: Right. And this is another thing. I have a lot of friends that are Japanese. Japanese American. But they can't speak any Japanese. I speak more Japanese than them.

00:37:22 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:37:23 John Daub: I've had friends that were Japanese. And I was the translator for them. But they had a Japanese name. They had a Japanese look to them. Right?

00:37:29 Greg Lam: And they couldn't speak any Japanese. And this freaked people out. When the foreigner is translating. They thought it was a joke. But it's not.

00:37:37 John Daub: It's hard to explain that. Look. After World War II and the internment camps. After this. And in your documentary, you lay this out really well. Japanese families really wanted to prove that they were Japanese. And started to. They didn't teach their kids Japanese.

00:37:45 Greg Lam: American you mean. That they were American. That they weren't Japanese.

00:37:49 John Daub: Right. But they weren't. They were American. But they were of Japanese descent. So, yeah. It's very important to get the details right with this. But, like, I. And then you have a couple generations from now. And then you have a couple generations from that. And the grandkids have no idea about the mother tongue of their grandparents.

00:38:05 Greg Lam: I'm the same. Right. I can't speak Hindi. I can't speak Marathi. I was never taught. Because it was seen as a useless language for living in America. But now I wish that I had been taught Marathi and Hindi. And be able to understand a billion people.

00:38:25 John Daub: Right. Well, it's easy to say that language. But I think there are a lot of people. I think there are a lot of people who are probably thinking the best for you. And in the specific case of the Nikkei, you know, the Japanese Americans, they actually went to, like, reeducation. I mean, you can call it reeducation camp, the internment camp. Where they were taught Americanism and how to be a good American. And so, they're trying to. I mean, they were locked up, you know. Essentially. And so, if you want to go back in society and prove that you're American, you have to act like an American. Which meant speaking English. So, you didn't want to be a Japanese. You didn't want your kids to go through the same trouble that you did. So, you made sure that they learned English. They acted like American. And that worked, you know, to integrate into America. But then, you know, a few generations down the road, they can't speak Japanese. They don't know the culture. They go back to Japan. They look fully Japanese. They can't speak it. And Japanese are like, why can't you speak Japanese? And they're like, I am Japanese, but I'm American. I'm Japanese American. I'm Nikkei. And a lot of Japanese actually don't know the history. You know? And they don't understand. So, it's tough for these people that have, I guess, you know, if you want to say like the Japanese blood or the Japanese genes, but they don't have, you know, the language or the culture. And they feel a loss for this. And it's hard for them. And we tell the story too in the documentary.

00:39:56 John Daub: I see that Gil is here watching this. He's a journalist and knows a lot about the history on the U.S. side. You know? The internment camps, I've been studying more about that history over the last couple of years. And I don't know enough about it to comment. But it does have a big impact. Again, the Nikkei Brazilians, Japanese are all over the world. And I guess when they come back into Japan, it's, you interviewed some Nikkei Brazilians that left Brazil and came in there. And they had a different experience. Can you talk a little bit about that from the documentary?

00:40:29 Greg Lam: Yeah. Well, both the Nikkei Brazilians that ended up in the documentary, I actually interviewed a lot more than what you see in the documentary. But both of them, they only, they didn't speak any Japanese to start off with. Right? So they had very little Japanese culture. Although in Brazil, they were considered Japanese. Right? People thought of them as Japanese. But they go to Japan and then they're like, wait a second. Like, I'm not Japanese. Like, what am I? You know, like, they're the Brazilian. But in Brazil, they weren't Brazilian. They were the Japanese. So, like, they didn't belong to either place.

00:41:13 John Daub: And it's interesting because one was a blue collar worker in the factory and stuff. And he had a very positive experience, actually. He said the Japanese were very nice to him. And some took him under their wing. And he was trying to learn Japanese. And he had a great time.

00:41:31 Greg Lam: And the This was the one in Shimane, right?

00:41:32 John Daub: Yeah, Shimane. Right.

00:41:33 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:41:33 John Daub: I watched it. And then there's, yeah. I saw your drone footage was key to that. Some of my drone footage in the documentary.

00:41:40 Greg Lam: Thank you so much.

00:41:41 John Daub: Yeah. Although the quality was a little bit low. I think it was like 1080p. Sorry. I can't compete. Not 4K.

00:41:51 Greg Lam: No, not Shikoku. Sorry. Shimane.

00:41:55 John Daub: No, no, no, no. The other place. Fuji. The factory.

00:41:59 Greg Lam: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:42:00 John Daub: Shizuoka. Sorry. I knew it started with an S.

00:42:05 Greg Lam: That factory footage was cool. But getting back on track, the lady I interviewed, she was working a white collar job. And she's trying to learn Japanese. And she wanted to learn Japanese as a kid. But her father was like, kind of like your parents, saying like, oh, Japanese is a useless language. So they never taught her. And so when she came to Japan, her friends were giving her advice to say, like, don't say you're Japanese. Don't say your parents are Japanese. Just act like you're a foreigner. And that way, people will accept you better. Because if they find out you're Japanese, they'll say, well, why don't you speak Japanese? Why don't you do these Japanese things? So it was tough for her as well in that case.

00:42:41 John Daub: This is a question that I want to ask you, Greg. And you can in the comments, if you're watching here, you can answer this as well, if you have some experience in this. Is it better? Are you better off as a visitor, being seen as a visitor? As someone living here or a citizen? For me, I think visitors have the best situation coming to Japan. They don't have to adhere to any of the rules or policies, speak the language. And we have the omotenashi culture, meaning if you're a guest, you're treated like royalty. But if you live here, it seems like you're treated a little bit differently. I don't know. It's stricter. You have to know the rules. If I mistakenly put the garbage out on the wrong day, they will crucify me. And I mean that figuratively.

00:43:25 Greg Lam: You won't actually do that. But they're very strict and they get upset.

00:43:31 John Daub: And if you're a citizen, probably it's even stricter. You have this huge weight on your shoulders. Right? Do you think that that is the case? I know it's different for my wife than it is for me. I'm so relaxed here. And she has societal pressures. Did that pick up?

00:43:45 Greg Lam: Yeah. I mean, I know about the pressure because my wife has all these unwritten rules, right? That's those societal pressures you're talking about that she knows about and she has to adhere to. Whereas, you know, like you and I can get a pass because we look different and we're not Japanese. And so they're like, oh, they don't know because they're not Japanese. And so you can get a pass.

00:44:10 Greg Lam: But interestingly, the three people that I interviewed for the documentary, The Naturalized Citizens, they thought it was completely fine being Japanese. I mean, obviously they wouldn't become Japanese if they didn't think they would have a good time being Japanese. And they said the initial reaction of Japanese people would usually be like, oh, I'm Japanese. And they're like, oh, wow, you became Japanese. And they actually would have gratitude like, oh, thanks for choosing our country. Thank you for becoming Japanese. Like they're really honored that they would do that. So it's maybe interesting in comparison to what people think would be the reaction of Japanese. But they had very positive reactions. And then after they get over that initial awkwardness of like, oh, OK, you're Japanese. And they're like, OK, sure, you're Japanese. And they treat them normally. And I think the big thing is effort and like integration. So if they're trying to integrate into Japan. And you do things with Japanese people, I think you tend to be fine. Whereas if you're going to isolate yourself and not try to integrate into society, then I think there can be issues.

00:45:11 Greg Lam: But the interesting thing about these naturalized people, they said they get the most flack is from non-Japanese, right? It's the people online, the people who are saying they can't be Japanese. But the Japanese people, for the most part, they don't care. They're like, oh, yeah, thanks.

00:45:24 John Daub: So. It's so funny. I've been policed by non-Japanese about being Japanese. Has that happened to you where there's other foreigners?

00:45:34 Greg Lam: It's funny when I get policed because I'm not Japanese. I'm not trying to be Japanese. But people like you can't be Japanese. I'm like, yeah, I'm not trying. I'm not trying to be. But if I was, then what is the problem?

00:45:47 John Daub: Right. But it's yeah, it's it's really funny. I've had Japanese people don't care. Like for the most they don't like, you know, we're generalizing. Right. You shouldn't. You know, how vast majority don't care. Why are you walking and eating? You shouldn't do that in Japan. I'm like and like there's a guy Japanese walking by. He's holding a yakitori on a stick, eating it. It's like these little rules. Yeah, we have the social rules. But when foreigners are telling me that and none of the Japanese care, it's not such a big deal. Chill out, dudes.

00:46:21 John Daub: I'm serious. It's it's we've been here for a very long time. So we've seen some stuff. It's talking about naturalization.

00:46:22 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:46:23 John Daub: It's a very interesting conversation, Greg. I want to show a clip that we have here. And I was interested about about this process again. Like I don't have any desires to do it, but I was curious about the process. And a lot of people are they ask about it. And the person you interviewed also has a website and talks about it. The process in Japan, it is not that hard to become a naturalized Japanese, is it?

00:46:50 Greg Lam: I'll say yes and no to that question.

00:46:55 John Daub: I like that.

00:46:55 Greg Lam: I think it's a lot easier than people think. I think it's a lot easier than people would imagine. If you are from a developed country and have or I know I shouldn't say that if you have a university education and are professional and you have the skills to get a visa, like a professional visa to go work in Japan, then you just need to spend your time in Japan work for five years and then you can apply to become Japanese. And as long as you make a stable income, you don't have to make a lot of money, like just really basic income. And you can speak like elementary school level Japanese, then you shouldn't have any problem become Japanese. It's actually I find it's much harder to become Canadian or American than it is to become Japanese if you're an educated person.

00:47:45 John Daub: Yeah. Yeah. I think so, too. It's very hard to become an American. If you're born there, it's very easy. You just be born.

00:47:50 Greg Lam: Yeah. I mean, you got birthright citizenship, just like in Canada, right? You just got to be born there. Then you are.

00:47:56 John Daub: But in Japan, if you're born there, you're not born there. You're born here. That doesn't make you a citizen.

00:47:56 Greg Lam: No, which is interesting. And I thought this was odd when I first found out about it. But then I did some more research. And North America is actually more of the exception. The Americas are more of this exception than the rule for birthright citizenship. A lot of countries around the world, even if you're born there, you don't become a citizen automatically.

00:48:22 John Daub: But it is weird to see people in their 20s or in their 30s who were born and raised in Japan who don't have Japanese citizenship.

00:48:26 Greg Lam: Yeah. They've been born in Japan all their lives, but they don't have Japanese citizenship. It is bizarre. And we've had some in the news recently, refugees that have been living most of their life here came here as kids. And now they have to return to a country that they don't even speak the language or know the culture. And it's just weird, especially with Japan with the shrinking population. You think we would be doing a better job of this as a country. And I say this we because we live here. I don't know. I'm just a little disappointed about that.

00:49:00 John Daub: But the naturalization process was interesting. It was interesting to me. And the experience is it. And this is where the documentary was very entertaining to me. Hearing the stories of naturalized citizens going back to their country with a Japanese passport and having the reverse. I don't know. I don't know if this clip did they talk about it in this clip? I mean, yes, essentially, it's the experience of a naturalized Japanese who's, you know, white looking. And he's white. He's going back with Japanese passport for immigration in America and the UK. And people are like, what's going on? They can't understand it.

00:49:35 John Daub: Yeah, it's it's pretty freaky. I don't know if that clip has to do with it. But this is a clip about naturalization. That's the clip has to do it. I think so. Yeah, a clip from the documentary. Go ahead.

00:49:39 John Daub: So this is a documentary from Greg's Vimeo documentary. He's been working on this for three years. Being Japanese, Nihon Jintoa, rental 500 yen and you can buy for 1500 yen to support something. He's been doing for for three years. Good friend of the show. Let's take a look at this.

00:50:00 Documentary: When I made the decision, I've been in Japan for 13 years. And by that time, Japan felt like my country.

00:50:08 Documentary: You get some YouTubers saying they would never naturalize in Japan because they want to be absolutely sure they can always go back to their own country. That's why I naturalized. I wanted to be sure that I could always come back here.

00:50:22 Documentary: So it's kind of like that. It's kind of funny that when David was returning to his former country, the UK, he encountered some issues.

00:50:29 Documentary: I had to line up in the non UK, non EU passports lane, which had a much longer queue. Got to the front, hand over my passport and the immigration official looks at it, looks at me.

00:50:45 Documentary: I didn't know they handed these out.

00:50:47 Documentary: First time I went to the US because that's where my father lives. The guy looks at my passport. And says, Japanese passport. Why do you have a British accent then?

00:51:00 Documentary: My accent. My only theory is that he's had sensitivity training and has been told you do not tell people they do not look like their passport, but hadn't been told not to tell them they don't sound like their passport.

00:51:14 Documentary: Another visit to the UK the guy told me, well, you don't exactly look like a typical Japanese businessman, do you?

00:51:22 Documentary: No.

00:51:23 Documentary: Have you been to the UK before? Yes, yes, a bit.

00:51:29 Documentary: Wow, never seen this before. Someone not of Japanese descent with a Japanese passport.

00:51:34 Documentary: And the guy who was actually studying me says, yes, but is this okay? Hang on a minute. You're actually thinking about not allowing me to enter the UK because I'm white on a Japanese passport. That's interesting.

00:51:56 John Daub: That's pretty, I love that clip. And we were talking about it. You couldn't hear us. We're kind of talking about how his facial expressions are so funny because in that situation, I can't even imagine. But it, you know, again, like it's abroad. When you see a Japanese passport, you're expecting a Japanese face because 99.9 something percent of people from Japan look, have a look to them and he does not. And there's no name.

00:52:23 John Daub: Again, we have names for everybody like, you know, Zainichi Koreans and Nikkei Brazilians. There's no name for somebody who's a naturalized Japanese that has white, that's white or black or just unusual. Doesn't look Japanese. For Japanese that don't look like they're Japanese.

00:52:38 Greg Lam: Yeah. So like, I bet you he has a ton of stories about even more than the documentary.

00:52:47 John Daub: Well, tell me, I mean, like, this is a reason why in the documentary, you should watch it on why he explains why he wanted to do this. So I could be a naturalized Japanese and the reasoning for it, I can completely understand. And that would be his reasoning is probably the reason why I might want to do it too one day. But it's not something that's even on my radar right now. But it's just funny. The stories that here, like the password can control on the other side, having kind of a reverse shock and then having on the Japanese side, being very polite.

00:53:25 Greg Lam: Oh, yeah.

00:53:26 John Daub: Well, you know. wasn't in the clip though so people didn't see that but no no it's not it doesn't matter i just you know how long do you keep these clips but um when he went into japan people didn't have any reaction at all they're like they just look at passport like okay let him in no reaction on the japanese side ever coming into japan it's always going you know into a different country a non japanese country that people react to him so and maybe that's like what we're saying is like japanese people seem to be fairly accepting of naturalized citizens but on the opposite it and it's like the non-japanese that are like what how can you be japanese you don't look japanese like they kind of like they can't understand yeah i i think through this whole journey of being japanese the documentary and i could totally see this on netflix and hulu one day this is it's so well produced and done it's it's just a little bit under two hours it could have been seven hours right how did you edit it was like six hours i bet you there's a director's cut in here right there's got to be like six hours long it's too i mean i have a cut i have a cut that is six hours but it's it's very i mean boring to watch i would think being japanese saga no no i mean i could have broke it up into like a lot longer parts but it just it would take so much longer to make you know and i just wanted to wrap it up into something that seemed like a watchable time frame although two hours is a long time to watch if you're not into the subject it did not seem that long because this the the editing the editing the the editing the the editing the the editing the the flow of it the even the narrow i was impressed with your narration too greg i thought it was really i tried to keep that to a minimum my first cut actually i didn't have any narration whatsoever but you kind of have to like figure out why are all these clips in the way they are and happening so but you could have made this you could have just made this one big manga couldn't you because the the image the manga illustrations in here are really well done i was really happy with that and i found this guy kind of i was looking and i put out a call on social media asking for artists to help illustrate and uh just nothing seemed to fit like what i was looking for and then one day i was walking around and i saw this poster and like oh wait this is kind of the artwork i would like and so i snapped a picture of the artwork and later on you know we saw that he had a signature on it so he looked up and like had a twitter handle instagram we looked the images like oh wow this person lives in tokyo so we contacted the person and they were interested in the picture and you know illustrating these parts for the documentary and uh that worked out really well i was really happy that he could you know bring to life some of the stories that people had um we're gonna wrap this out now and uh take a look at some of the questions here this is the part of the live stream where if you have a question for greg a serious question yeah yeah let's answer some questions yeah there's some serious questions here all right nothing weird uh let's ask greg i want i wanted to ask you um we're gonna do an instagram live stream for a little bit after this uh which is a different format um on only in japan tv i want to talk to you about ichiro and otani and them living in japan and i want to hear your thoughts on on what their experience is now that we've kind of seen on both sides i wonder what shohei otani is going through right now as someone who is yeah i don't know i have no opinion on this well i will i will pluck away at this and i will i will expose your core on these important issues of the day let's look here at some of the questions that we must have come in here question will be great it started with will so it was a question will be great to be on netflix or any platforms that's not a question but i like that we're thinking and it started with will i thought it was a question no no um thanks for coming on greg are you coming back to japan right in sherry yeah greg is in canada now are can i tell them that oh my gosh should it did i just expose no i'm currently in canada yeah okay yeah i'll be back in your time zone it's it's 2 a.m for me it's um like 10 p.m it's 10 10 a.m right now yeah yeah no yeah i'll be back in japan soon enough just pandemic is kind of uh you know mixing up plans you know do you miss japan a little bit yeah i definitely do the biggest thing i i miss is the uh the public baths the own sins you know i would go there weekly and i just miss it so much doing that but you know like my house is over there too of course so i miss the house uh miss the family over there miss the food like lots of stuff yeah definitely here's one um you've said visiting your kids schools has been generally good do you think they've experienced issues being hafu as children already this comes uh zali qq feel i feel honestly like uh action i don't think he cares that much about it so he's pretty fine and i hear that often talking to people that you know one sibling will be like just totally blasé about things they don't care they're fine another one will like feel something pretty deeply so i think um you know ico she you know internalizes things more thinks about it more and maybe see things sees things that aren't necessarily there more right like um she's always wondering what how people are feeling and i understand that because that's what i felt growing up too i always wondered like what people were thinking of me and whatnot uh but in turn of in terms of actual like big problems as far as we know there there haven't been any um and i was surprised like i said before that um how encouraging the school was and other like parents and people were of um you know our identities and we have a lot of uh you know friends and family that want to come visit us you know when we're like oh when you when you go into canada we want to come to and see and check it out and they're interested in visiting canada and stuff so overall like if you have to weigh out the pros and cons there's a lot more more pros than cons from my perspective as a parent but you know my kids might say something different and they might say something in five years that i'm like oh i didn't know about that you know so we'll find out they're they're evolving as as teenagers do and my question is i get lots i got more questions do do they do they like being in canada or japan better i would say japan better they're they've grown up most of their memories are from japan right so they like japan better at this current moment um but you know when we were in canada they liked canada better so because they they're born in canada so i think you just get used to the place you're living and i mean if you're happy there then you're going to like it and so they weren't unhappy in japan the whole time they were in japan but they did have a hard time you know like the initial everybody i think has you know that initial transition period it's tough me coming back to canada it was very very tough actually transitioning bullying is it worse in japan or in canada uh it's interesting because i've talked to here in Canada and they're saying like yeah I keep up bully pretty bad we switched schools or we had this problem I think we do things to be aware of bullying but it still happens so I don't know without being a kid in both school systems I don't know if I could honestly answer that but I don't my kids didn't experience any harsh bullying in Japan that I am aware of so and it could be just the the school were in right like everyone knows everyone in our school so they seem pretty welcoming and you know we were integrated within the community too right you know like we're involved with the PTA and you know we were seen a lot so we're wasn't like we're the strange people like people knew us so yeah there's a lot of questions that are not related to the topic so I want to stick to the topic at hand what did you think makes kids get more discrimination growing up so I think that answers it and look I am different. I'm brown. It's hard to hide your color in the United States growing up in the 80s, and I was different. A lot of kids bullied me. They thought I knew the crane kick, and they thought that I knew karate because of Daniel LaRusso, and I got beat up. I couldn't defend myself. I had no Mr. Miyagi to help me out.

01:02:15 Greg Lam: He beat up too, though, if you remember.

01:02:17 John Daub: Right.

01:02:17 Greg Lam: Had what? Before he learned.

01:02:19 John Daub: Oh, that's true. He got beat up badly as well.

01:02:21 Greg Lam: And you know what?

01:02:21 John Daub: Right. It did not make me any safer that he released a part two and a part three, and this movie kept just following me through my childhood.

01:02:32 John Daub: Thank you, Daniel LaRusso. And if he comes back to Japan, I will track you down, and I will show you what wax on and wax off really means to me, because on my own experience as a kid.

01:02:48 John Daub: Growing up. It's hard, Daniel. All right. Now that that's done, I think that's all the questions that we have that's related to this topic. I got even more, and we'll take this over to Instagram for a little bit, just to check that out. You also have Instagram, right, Greg?

01:03:03 Greg Lam: Yeah, I do. It's just Life Where I'm From.

01:03:05 John Daub: Life Where I'm From. I like it. Simple. Thanks so much. If you do have a question, you can also ask us on Discord, on the Discord server. We'll have a section in the general chat. I'll be talking, and you can always question me there. And on Instagram, you can write questions. And leave a comment below. And finally, I have Greg right here. The Vimeo is now on your page. Life Where I'm From Films, Inc. Check out the documentary, Being Japanese, produced and created by Greg Lamb of Life Where I'm From. Three years of hard work is just $5, right?

01:03:44 Greg Lam: 500 yen.

01:03:46 John Daub: And I purchased a copy so I can watch it forever. How long is the rental good for? Is it like 24 hours?

01:03:52 Greg Lam: No, no, no. I made it a week because we have behind the scenes. It's our documentary, so maybe you want to take your time watching it, go back to some piece of parts. So I wanted to give people enough time to fully enjoy it. So it's a one-week rental.

01:04:05 John Daub: Yeah. I'm going to ask you on the next live stream on Instagram if there were any stories that you encountered that surprised you while making this or anything that you... Anything that you...

01:04:16 Greg Lam: Definitely, definitely. Definitely, right?

01:04:17 John Daub: There's got to be a lot of stories. After three years of making this, I'm sure there are even more stories. And Max, who is another YouTuber, I was really surprised to see him in there being half. And hearing from him, he kind of looks like an adult version of Leo in a way. So I was nice to see him.

01:04:40 Greg Lam: I don't know. Leo's like five months. He's not that grown. But Max is a really nice guy. And I was happy to see him. And I'm glad he's in there.

01:04:47 John Daub: Thanks, everybody, for watching. And a big shout out once again to Greg Lamb, creator, producer of the Life Where I'm From channel and documentary artist. Are you ever going to do this again?

01:04:56 Greg Lam: Final question. Will you ever do this again? No, no, no. Three years. Feature-length documentaries.

01:05:00 John Daub: Oh, come on. You know you want to do it. Admit it.

01:05:03 Greg Lam: I had planned to do one called Being Canadian, honestly, to go the other side and see what it is to be Canadian. Explore that question.

01:05:12 John Daub: Really?

01:05:13 Greg Lam: But yeah, yeah. I was really planning on doing it. But not this moment. I'm all full-length documentary burned out maybe in a few years. Or maybe I'll do it in little parts. But I'm going to stick to maybe 20 or 30-minute time length for mini-docs. And I'll be doing series on the channel where I'll explore a topic over a number of videos. But it'll be all on YouTube, just on either the main channel or the X channel. So yeah, I'll be posting a lot on my channel from here on out for the next little bit. But yeah, I can't get enough of the YouTube channel as well. And I'm a fan. And I'm always watching, looking for the next uploads.

01:05:56 John Daub: But this is a two-hour version of... It's even better than the stuff you put on YouTube because there's a lot of love in there.

01:06:00 Greg Lam: It's definitely different. I did put a lot of effort into it. I did try hard to do it.

01:06:10 John Daub: But I think it's a heavy topic for some people. So yeah.

01:06:15 Greg Lam: Well, we'll talk about your background because it's more in video production than... Than me.

01:06:18 John Daub: So you have a lot... This is your background, what you do. And that's why you make it so beautiful and so perfect. Perfectionist.

01:06:22 Greg Lam: Greg Lam, thank you so much for being on the show. Once again, check it out on Vimeo. Have a great day, everybody.

01:06:28 John Daub: Thanks for having me, John.

01:06:30 Greg Lam: You're welcome.

01:06:30 John Daub: Thanks, everyone, for watching. Cheers. Bye-bye.