00:00:00 John Daub: Hi everybody, welcome to Ginza. This is Kabukiza Theater, one of the most cultural places you'll find in the city of Tokyo. And in front of you, you see that in the middle of your screen is one of the decorations you'll find during Japanese New Year called a kadomatsu (pine gate). Sorry, he says that I'm a karomatsu. That guy was looking at me. That's a kadomatsu. And you can see matsu right there is pine. It's a symbol of longevity in Japan. And you'll find that as part of the kadomatsu. And bamboo poles, three of them placed like this. Typically, the bamboo poles will be cut at an angle. These are not, but there's no problem with that.

00:00:39 John Daub: You'll find these in front of almost all the stores here in Ginza. And as we walk around, I want you to look for those kadomatsu. See how many you can find. So far in front of Kabukiza Theater, we have two. And there are a couple of other really traditional decorations that you'll find around the city. How you doing everybody? Welcome! In this livestream, I'm going to be taking you around Ginza looking at those New Year's decorations. I hope you're doing well in this holiday week. Join me for an adventure around the city of Tokyo.

00:01:12 John Daub: This is Higashi Ginza. The Kabuki Theater here has been renovated about, I don't know, I guess they finished it around five, six years ago. It's right there. Beautiful building. This is where you would find traditional Kabuki Theater here in the city of Tokyo. There are a few other places, I believe, but this would be the main one. And right in front of us is Ginza. My backyard. Filled with loads of different shops. Some of the most luxurious brands have shops there.

00:01:41 John Daub: And during the New Year's season, everybody has holiday today. You're going to find a bunch of kadomatsu. Shimenawa (sacred Shinto rope). Shimekazari (doorway decoration). And the third one is kagami mochi (mirror rice cake). A double-layered mochi cake that is in front of houses. Typically these New Year's decorations will come out on January 1st to 7th. But you start to see them really after Christmas. The 26th, Christmas decorations are put away very quickly. And New Year's comes out. New Year's being a bigger, called shogatsu (Japanese New Year) in Japanese. Much bigger than Christmas is here in Japan.

00:02:33 John Daub: How you doing, Jesse11286? Happy New Year from Misato and myself. Happy New Year, guys. Hello from Albuquerque, New Mexico. You can write in where you're watching from. We have a very global audience. And right now the US is pretty much still awake. Getting late on the East Coast. You also see at this time of year, Japanese flags everywhere. The flag of Japan is not something you see quite often here. Just at public buildings where governments are. In the United States, you see the American flag just about everywhere. But you don't see that in Japan. But at this time of year, they really do. Japan really is more unified, I guess. Maybe everyone is staying home watching NHK. It seems to be a tradition. But this is Japan's holiday. Shogatsu.

00:03:44 John Daub: I saw that dark street. Happy holidays, buddy. Now where do you get these things here? There's a flower shop right in front of us. Sometimes you'll find some of the flower shops will make these decorations for New Year's. Of course, they wouldn't be selling it now. Everybody has them already displayed or prepared. Let's see if we see anything in front of this store. Oh, up there! I believe that's a shimekazari. It's a special decoration put in front of doorways that's sacred. I guess it keeps away the evil spirits but also attracts the good gods to come in. And you'll find these shimekazari and shimenawa in front of buildings. Shimenawa, I believe, is just a rope. A very symbolic Shinto rope that is put in front of the buildings.

00:04:44 John Daub: It's pretty neat to see that. The decorations are taken down once again around January 7th. So the Japanese New Year goes on for a good week. But again, after Christmas, they get rid of the Christmas decorations and lights pretty quickly. Alright, here's two more kadomatsu. Again, once again, they don't have them cut on the top. Usually they're sliced at an angle. Let me see here. That's real bamboo. That's real bamboo. Interesting. It didn't look real to me. It's so colorful and green and fresh. It's too fresh. There isn't a shortage of bamboo in Japan. That stuff grows so fast.

00:05:32 John Daub: The best bamboo comes from the island of Sado-ga-shima (Sado Island). Sado Island in Niigata. Because of the high winds. Especially during the winter. It's so windy there. The bamboo are twice as strong as the bamboo on the mainland. That's what they say. Who says that? Probably people from Sado-ga-shima. But it's true. Back in the Edo period, the Sado bamboo was much prized. Alright, I'm trying to get around the people here. It's quite crowded. You see another kadomatsu in the doorway of Mitsukoshi Department Store here on Ginza. Yonchome, the 4th street. It's a real pretty one there. It's big! I think it's around 3 meters high, maybe 4. It's much higher than I am.

00:06:19 John Daub: Above the doorway, you'll see another shimekazari. Really pretty. I think we'll get a chance to get closer to another one of those shimekazari. As we move on. Aloha! Abraha Dhaniya is in the house. Across the street, we have Kimura-ya Bakery. Do they have anything? They probably have a shimekazari up on the top there. Do you see underneath the sign?

00:07:08 John Daub: Now, the mochi... I think you might have seen them in the supermarkets. They start selling them around the middle of December. Maybe a little bit earlier. That mochi is placed in the house. There's usually a place... tokonoma (alcove)? I can't remember the name of it. There's a place inside of a Japanese house where you would put this. And you eventually will eat it. Japanese, you will eventually eat it. On January... I think the date was January 11th or 12th. Again, I'm not Japanese. So I don't buy one. But I think we might have one inside the house. A lot of the Shinto rituals mean not being Shinto. But just my experience living here, I've seen a lot of it.

00:07:56 John Daub: A lot of the shops do have them. Almost all of them I've passed so far. It's just sometimes they're in places that you wouldn't really notice. Almost looking like Christmas wreaths. There's another shimekazari. Very nice. It's pretty. It's subtle, right? It's not something that stands out too much. When you go in neighborhoods, residential areas, people will have that on their doors. I don't think we have one on our door. Maybe I'll have to try to find one.

00:08:39 John Daub: Alright, let's cross the street. Don't have to look at that. Of course, Apple doesn't have anything in front of their shop. Can really feel the spirit in front of that. With them, huh? Yeah, as you all know, they took a lot of money from me and delivered nothing. Not really happy with Apple. If you look on Twitter, you'll find my thread explaining it. Oh, there's a great one right there. Do you see it on the right side? This is Mikimoto, which is the jewelry shop. Very famous for pearls here in Japan. I guess they're famous for more than just pearls. Look at the diamonds dancing in the window there. Almost looks like a scene from Frozen.

00:10:00 John Daub: But we do have a shimekazari right here. Really beautiful. Look how big it is in front of the Mikimoto sign. Wow. There's a mikan (Japanese tangerine) in there. Do you see that orange? That's a mikan, which is like a Japanese tangerine. Again, you'll see them on top of the kagami mochi that they have at the New Year time. And we eat a ton of mikan during the winter because of... get some vitamin C. And that's just when it's harvested. A lot of them are indoors or coming from Kyushu. Down in Nagasaki, Fukuoka area. Hey, Michael Sassanos here. Always love your walk through Ginza. A must for you. Find a snack somewhere happy. Almost New Year, my friend. Thank you, Michael. Nice to see you here today.

00:11:00 John Daub: And of course, our good friend, WRX Turbo is in the house. Yeah, there it is right there. Let's get a closer look at this one. Kimura-ya has bought one. Shimenawa. You can see the rope in there on the back. That's a good looking shimenawa back there. And again, it's a Shinto decoration used to bring in the gods. The good gods. And the people, the customers to buy bread. And we also have here a kadomatsu placed here right on the street. This one's about the same height as me. 200 centimeters tall. Again, I don't know why they don't cut it at an angle. Some of these are not cut at an angle. I guess they keep the bamboo really fresh.

00:12:07 John Daub: Again, this is real bamboo cut off here. Three different sizes too. They're always in bunches of threes. One short, medium and tall. Always in this style. Just sometimes you'll find them cut at an angle on the top. Maybe for safety? That could be a good reason. Here, let me get in the corner. Maybe for safety? I'm not really sure. But we're going to look around and see if we can find some that are cut at an angle. But I see here Wang S. Very good. There's actually an emoji that is on every single Apple phone. There's a kadomatsu emoji or something? There's a lot of Japanese emoji that are on your phones. You just don't know what they are. I didn't even know. I had to find them. Because I believe that Japan makes them. They add in a lot of their culture into them. No matter where you are in the world.

00:13:11 John Daub: So there's the Wako kadomatsu here. Wako, one of the most prestigious department stores in Ginza. Has a really nice one here. Shimenawa, not on it. Really pretty. Religion is not such a big thing in Japan. People don't wear their religion around. They don't talk about it so much. But at holiday seasons you see it a lot more. Let's see if we can cross the street here. There's another one in front of the Wako department store. Very nice here. Again, not cut. Maybe it is a safety thing. I'm not sure. Oh, you know what? Let's not cross the street yet. Let's keep walking down here.

00:14:10 John Daub: I want to see if there's a big Gap. It's like a clothing chain. American clothing chain. Let's see if the Gap has any Japanese shogatsu decorations in the front. So Wako here has put it in front of the window. Which is nice. The year of the tiger. The year of the tiger is coming up. How cool is that? Wow! Shohei Otani. Yo, dude. Look at this. He is the Seiko man. MVP. Boom. That's a nice shot. He's the Seiko man, everybody. Japan is pretty proud of Shohei Otani for winning that prestigious award.

00:15:12 John Daub: Oh, did they put it back? This angel wasn't here for a while. This is a brand new building. I believe they just finished building it. They just finished renovating it. You can see it. It's very beautiful here. Just a little bit past Yonchome, the fourth intersection here in Ginza. And for the longest time, this statue was missing. I didn't know if they took it away or what, but it looks like they put it back. It's a little cupid that sits here on the street. It's been here for ages. Looking around the corner, I'm not even sure the symbolism of it, but it's got to be important if they returned it after the construction of this building. He looks like little Leo, except maybe a year older. We'll have to bring, when Leo can start to walk, we're going to have to bring him here. Pretty cute.

00:16:09 John Daub: Hey, Ryan K's here. Aloha. Happy New Year. All right, there's the Gap right there. Here's a small one in the Ginza Chuo building. What does GAP stand for? Great Apparel. Great American Production. I don't know what GAP stands for. Mind the Gap. I don't. Does anybody know? Does it have a meaning? It's a big one. It is. We were going to buy something for Leo here. We were going to buy something for Leo here because they would embroider his name on it for free, but I don't think we got it. I don't know. I don't see any Japanese decorations in front of GAP. That's kind of weird. Maybe they're very traditional and they're waiting for the new year, but I don't see anything in front for shogatsu. That's kind of odd.

00:17:49 John Daub: There's no Japanese decorations in front of the GAP, but there are sales up to 60%. That dog was looking at me. All right. The Sony building is now under construction again. They had this as an open space and kind of event area, public open space, but now it's been boxed up and they're actually building the new Sony building there. So it's going to be a while before it comes up. Again, I don't understand why some of the American department stores don't have any of the decorations at all. Fujiya, they have a little kimono girl, but she's always been there. Oh, there's the Shinkansen going by. Did you catch that?

00:19:01 John Daub: Let's go take a look at the entrance to Jiro Sushi. See if he's got some kind of decoration. Jiro Dreams of Sushi, right? Maybe he'll have some sushi decorations. I don't know. So here is another building. I believe it's down in the basement here of this building. Sukiyabashi Jiro. Excuse me. This is the kadomatsu here. Really beautiful in front of this building. Two of them about 250 centimeters high. The one at Mitsukoshi was the tallest that I've seen so far. A little bit over 300 centimeters. Shimekazari, I believe. Is that mochi kagami? Gosh, I get confused. I can't see the kanji in my head. That's why.

00:20:01 John Daub: All right, it's down here. So if you were going to go to the sushi place, you would go down to the basement. Of course, there's no sign at all for it. And if you do go down there, the signal dies. And there's... It says no cameras at all. He's very strict. He just doesn't want to be filmed. I was sure after the documentary, it just completely ruined him. I mean, it was good because a lot of business came that way, but ruined the way I guess he sees his customers and it ruined the type of customers that came into the shop. And you can see it as the entrance of his sushi place. It's just not... It doesn't seem friendly and inviting. It's sort of meant to keep tourists away. I don't know.

00:20:41 John Daub: If you're booking online or by telephone, you don't see the entrance. I think maybe Jiro, maybe he lost it when... I heard that there were tourists from China that came and asked him to cook the sushi because it was raw. I heard a story from somebody that he lost it. He got really upset when tourists came in and asked him to cook it. But here's the deal. They're paying $300 for a meal or something, which I think is pretty cheap for high-end sushi for like the best high-end sushi. That's reasonable. But $200 to $300. But if the customer wants the sushi cooked, you have to kind of do what the customer wants, right? I don't know. I don't think you can get angry at the customer.

00:21:33 John Daub: We discovered what happens when that happens here in Japan, especially if they're in front of you. Customer service in Japan is some of the best in the world. But then you run into things like I have with Apple Japan, where they have these rules and they stick to the rules. Even though they make no sense. And you end up with customers that are not happy, but they read you the legal fine print and say it's your fault for using the Apple Store. That's what they said. It's your fault. We feel bad. I'm sorry, but it's your fault. Customer service, whenever they read the fine print and start talking about legal issues from something you purchased, you know it's over. You're not going to get what you want. Thank you, Apple Store Japan.

00:22:24 John Daub: Check it out. This one is cut. This is in front of the cinema. That's matsu, the pine, a symbol of longevity. And three bamboo cut at an angle. This is what you'll see typically. And I see that they have cut the ends off of it. You see, I guess for safety. But it does look more beautiful when it's cut at an angle like this. And it is quite a sharp angle, isn't it? I'd say it's like 60%, maybe. Because of the angle, it leaves a little hole right here. So. It's a very unique spot. Very, very pretty looking. Kadomatsu.

00:23:13 John Daub: I don't think that Apple Japan knows what they're doing. Probably theft in Japan is very low. 99.9% of the time, everything arrives as normal. But when it doesn't, customer service here can panic when something goes wrong. It's strange that a trillion dollar company like Apple would have a branch here in Japan. That panic comes. And I have to go to the default, which is the fine print in the store and say, no, we delivered it to you. That's the extent of our responsibility. Doesn't matter if you received it or not. You paid. We delivered. I said, show me the proof. I don't have a signature. There's no signature. But I'm no longer angry. I just talk about it. Maybe too much next year.

00:24:07 John Daub: I'm waiting to hear from Apple USA to see if we could come to some sort of arrangement. But if not, then I'm sure I'll make a video explaining my path with Japanese customer service. The positives and the negatives. There are some good things and some bad things. One of the great things with Uniqlo is that customer service, they won't approach you and ask you to help. They won't ask you, like, can I help you, sir? There's no pressure. But sometimes people like that. They want to be approached. That's a really pretty kadomatsu. There's a shimenawa in the front. Some rope and three points. But they didn't cut the tops off these.

00:25:02 John Daub: Hey, lovely Takilo's here. I see the fireworks. I'm about to release that new fireworks video. Just put the thumbnail of it on the Discord server. You can go check that out. I'm pretty excited to release this. It's about a 30 minute main channel episode. This direction takes you to Yurakucho and Yurakucho Station, which is on the Yamanote line. And you see the Shinkansen passing by every five minutes. It's pretty nice. Above there is the Shuto Expressway (elevated highway), which is the big major highway that's above ground. It's the most stressful road I've ever driven on in my entire life. The Shuto Expressway. It's so narrow and people do not go the speed limit. They go 20, 30 kilometers above the speed limit. And then that narrow road, unless you're used to driving it, it's like a video game at high speed. And when I go high speed in those kinds of video games, I crash. But you can't because it's your life. So that's the Shuto Expressway. It's scary as hell.

00:26:08 John Daub: Peter's used to driving on there. I wonder if they... I don't think they allow motorbikes up there. All right, here's a flower shop right outside of the Uniqlo here in Ginza. I wonder if they're selling any of the kadomatsu or any of the decorations. No, I don't see it. But people do buy flowers. Kanae bought some flowers to put in front of the door yesterday. I don't see the decorations though. I think that by now you either have it or you don't. But I'm seeing that American businesses here in Tokyo don't have any Japanese decorations for New Year's. That's kind of odd.

00:27:06 John Daub: The thing is, I think with foreign businesses, you want to be doubly sure that you make sure you understand the sensitivity of the local population that you're serving. You don't want to be double as good as your competitors, right? Hey, Gil's here. Yoi otoshi wo omukai kudasai (Happy New Year). Thank you. John and Kanae and Leo, I just finished the final chapter of my book about Japanese food and American. Tabemashou (let's eat)! I'm just chilling and saw you're doing a livestream. Welcome, Gil. Gil is a journalist, a writer for Nikkei Asia. I want to make sure I get that right, Gil. It's great to see your book. I'm going to try to pick it up. I guess it'll be on Amazon or... Send me a letter to tell me how I can purchase it, the best way to support you, and I'll buy a copy. I'll be happy to promote it here with the community.

00:28:15 John Daub: Tabemashou means let's eat. Sometimes in Japan, we actually say let's eat more often than you think we would because we're all so polite in Japan. Sometimes we're waiting for somebody to start and it requires some person to go, tabemashou, let's eat. Itadakimasu (I humbly receive), tabemashou. Sometimes people just are waiting and waiting and waiting and looking around. Itadakimasu is just such a formal way to say it. But we all say that before we eat. The parting of the chopsticks. Itadakimasu. All right, let's cross the street here. We'll go past Itoya, which is a stationary store here in Ginza that's right there in the center of your screen. We'll see if they have any kadomatsu. See what it looks like there. See if we can find a nice shimenawa.

00:29:17 John Daub: Louis Vuitton. Let's see. That's a French shop. Do they have any Japanese decorations in front of Louis Vuitton? Chanel doesn't. But if we look at Matsuya Ginza? Okay, Matsuya right here. We do have... Is that shimekazari, right? Beautiful fan, a mikan clipped up there above door. Really pretty. But Louis Vuitton does not have one. So I'm getting the feeling that foreign businesses, although they smell nice, wow, it smells very nice. They don't have one. I would probably get one. Bulgari.

00:30:23 John Daub: I was in New York City before I came to Japan in 1997. I just bought a PD 170 Sony camera and was making video content. This is way before YouTube. PD 170, PD 180 was an amazing professional camcorder by Sony. I was with a friend of mine. We were interviewing people for videos for, I was making educational videos in Japan. So we were interviewing people on the streets of New York City. So we stopped some guy who was very well dressed on the street and asked him for an interview. He said, sure. And we asked him to introduce himself and he ended up being the president of this company in Paris. It was like, what? It's like, wait, what? So he was the president of this company, a really, really handsome dude from Paris. He stopped and he gave us a mini interview and I filmed it. He was one of the first people I interviewed ever. And that was really nice of him to give us the time. And then he was really busy and he went off with a big smile. Very friendly, charming.

00:31:38 John Daub: Itoya really does have some of the best here. Kadomatsu, check it out. I love the design of these. There's the matsu, the pine, again representing longevity. And these are about 225 centimeters high. Maybe 250. I'm not sure. I'm 180. So I'm looking up at them. Itoya, one of the big famous stationary stores in Japan. There's a back store. There's a store behind this that has a lot of stuff, too. But this one is the main Itoya. And you can see they have here the floor plan. Down in the basement, all the calendars, which we don't buy much anymore. Desk and office stuff. The best stuff's up there. They have a lot of stuff up there with the paper. If you go and you look in the craft area, too, there's a wrapping stylist. So there's some paper is for Itoya is a big deal. And Japanese paper is, I would say, like the best in the world. Just the detail of it. The washi paper (traditional Japanese paper). The old traditional way of making it. I hope we never lose that.

00:32:58 John Daub: All right. Walking along. Let's see what else we can find here. A couple other shops before we swing around. There's Tiffany's. Which is the jewelry shop. We don't see any New Year's decorations in front of their shop. But once again, traditionally, the New Year's decorations wouldn't come out until January 1st, until the 7th. So it's not like they're doing something wrong. But I'm not being judgmental. I only do that. I reserve that for Apple Japan. But I do think that, you know, you might want to get those out there. Even the subway station and the building owners, they put one out. Check it out. Here's one in front of the Ginza Ichome. This is near Ginza Ichome Station. They're just placed around the buildings, again, to invite all the good gods and ward off the bad ones.

00:34:00 John Daub: They're selling the... They're selling old Christmas flowers. So they're trying to get rid of the Christmas flowers. And then you can buy some matsu there for the house. That's interesting. Yeah, the Christmas stuff is going for 50% off. Oh, check it out. Let's take a look at these here. These look beautiful. These look like New Year designs, too. They're about $30, $40 for each one. There's a pine comb in there. And there's a little mini one, a little mini kadomatsu. It's $22 for this one. That's real nice. All right, just a little more.

00:34:48 John Daub: Our friend Gil here, his blog is the Nikkei View. And I write for newspapers in the US. The book is subtitled, The Tasty History of Japanese Food in America. It'll be out next August. I'll get you a copy. Absolutely, Gil, absolutely. And I'll do my best to get the word out, too, and sell some copies of it. I'm so proud of you putting the book together. Looking forward to it. Quiet. It feels like it's crowded, but it's not crowded. Streets here are typically, at this time of year, a lot more crowded than this.

00:35:46 John Daub: Harry Winston. Is that a brand? I don't know a lot of these brands. I feel uncomfortable with the people standing in front of the door. I feel they're there to keep me out. Does anybody feel the same way? Does anybody feel the same way as me? I feel like those people that are standing in the door are there to keep me out. Therefore, I'm not part of that elite. I think that the people that are elite, they feel like they're there to welcome them. I feel like they're there to keep me out. Is it me or does anybody else feel the same way? I don't know. Pixel Adobe's. It's like a bodega, yeah, me too. Yeah, they're there to keep us out. The normal people. But that's not true. I'm sure that they're there to welcome us. It's just like, it just feels like if I try to walk in there, they're going to pat me down or something. Make sure I didn't take anything. I don't know why. Maybe it's just me. I'm a pauper. Pauper. What was the city in Game of Thrones? Flea Bottom? Probably from there. They're bouncers. Are they? Are they bouncers or are they there to welcome you? I don't know. Why would you need a bouncer? I think I'm very dressed up. I'm wearing my finest LL Bean.

00:37:15 John Daub: All right, we're going to walk back around and I'm going to take you to the most stylish Starbucks cafe and see if they have any new year's decorations because these are brands that we all know about and see how they have decked out their shop for the Japanese new year. This is Ginza Ichome. The Ginza first intersection. So you pretty much walk the entire way. Let's swing back around. Jotty rates in here. Bouncers in case that the customers don't have money. I would probably be one of those unless they take credit. I don't know. I'd have a lot more money if you know Apple would refund it.

00:38:26 John Daub: Here's two decorations in front of a shop that is closed. Ginza Room. Looks like a hotel that's closed for the holidays, but they have a really good kadomatsu right here at the door. It's about 150 centimeters high. Maybe a little bit over a meter, 120 centimeters, but it is cut in the traditional way. It is sharp. Wow. OK, now I can see why this could be dangerous. Look, see that it is sharp. Need some hand cream. So that's why they do that. I guess it's liability and stuff like this.

00:39:14 John Daub: I did tell people I was going to do it. But I did tell supporters that I'll probably be screaming. I need a signature as Ross did when he says on Friends we were on a break. That's going to become one of my phrases. You need a signature. I will not let up. I will fight till the end. Apple took money from this community because that iPhone was supposed to be for this streaming. Right now we should be using an iPhone 13 Pro. Never arrived. They charged us for it. Didn't send it. I will not let up until they either refund us or send us what we have purchased. It's not fair.

00:40:06 John Daub: All right, here we go. One of the most stylish Starbucks in the entire city. The Meguro one might be a little bit better. This one was I used to teach English on the second floor to students bootleg lessons, private lessons. My charge is about $40 an hour, which is reasonable. Usually we'd end up talking for like 90 minutes. They can get their money's worth. But you'll find a lot of English teachers probably still up there teaching their students. No decorations in front of the Starbucks Reserve here, but that doesn't seem to be uncommon. Traditionally they come on the first. Look how nice it is inside there. Hold on a second. I can kind of pop in. Look at that. This Starbucks has bread up here. That's crazy. It looks like a real bakery. You can see the baked items in there. The food so much better than another at the normal Starbucks, but you pay for that privilege. You pay for it. It's not free.

00:41:20 John Daub: Hello, Katsu. The entrance is in the other direction. This is the upper hotel Chuo building. Oppa's got just buildings. They're not hotels. They just own property. It's crazy. It's like five companies buying all the property in the area. Let me cross the street here. This is Motoji and for NHK I actually made an episode in here with the CEO of this company trying on kimono and explaining the high quality the prices of them. Motoji has been in business for a very long time. They're closed for the holidays. You can see the kimono fashion right here. You can wear it with a hat. It's pretty nice. It's all washed out because it's so bright, but I'd love to work with them and feature their kimono on here. I think that's his. Is that his son? He might have retired the materials and the prices can go up to almost $100,000 for a kimono based on the level of quality in the silk and the design and the custom craftsmanship. I still have his business card. The CEO's president's business card. I hope to get in touch with him this year.

00:42:50 John Daub: I do have now people helping me out with the production. I'm going to go to the next one. I have a production of Only in Japan starting in January. So it's going to be moving pretty quickly. And that might be one of the really interesting episodes, huh? Hey, I see King Grandos here. Have you been to Rump Cap in Ginza? Good Hamburg steak? I think I just walked by there didn't I? No, I haven't been there yet. I have not been there yet. Thanks for the suggestion. I love the hamburger, especially if they come on that sizzle plate, the gravy on there.

00:43:56 John Daub: Okay. If any of these are some foreign businesses as well I do notice that everybody did get rid of the Christmas decorations there's a shimenawa that's a red one I've never seen a red shimenawa before very stylish that's an aroma and organic herbs shop and then here is um I think Kanae goes and gets cream in here sometimes I end up waiting outside for like 10 minutes it's worth it it does smell good inside the shops here Sabon and Neal's Yard and Kiehl's since 1851 I don't see any new year's decorations in front there but it smells good my wife doesn't want a Gucci gift she doesn't like those brand stuff jewelry people were upset when I gave her a vacuum cleaner there must have been like uh 720p is really blurry rest group it's not just the pixels it might be just a bad signal in between all of the buildings here sorry about that i'll try to get out of this area it always let me know if the picture's blurry.

00:45:03 John Daub: I gave her a vacuum cleaner but it's not a vacuum cleaner it's a Dyson this is the kind of vacuum cleaner that it changes the way you vacuum it changes everything it's fun it's like tech it's like giving somebody a computer or a video game a vacuum cleaner is actually it's a pretty nice pressure-resistant vacuum cleaner it's a pretty nice if it's a Dyson like that a turbo Dyson with all these attachments and stuff will you just walk around and pretend like it's a vacuum gun it's kind of cool so no decorations in front of that Starbucks there see I saw this carbonated water and I thought this was pretty cool I think it's like a Canada Dry type of thing but they put sugar in it and salt and I can't understand why they put any so it says here no there's no sugar but they put salt in it and I don't understand why they put salt in the sparkling water so I stopped drinking this brand see I don't want salt in my water I don't need any more always read the labels you just never know what's in this stuff even in Japan again we all consider Japanese food to be really healthy but Japan is also the king of natural additives how do I say like flavoring fake flavors and stuff look at the credit cards very traditional for the new years right now artificial flavorings and stuff Japan is the king of that they had coffee that wasn't coffee Boss espresso they called it they had coffee extract in water and they called it a Boss espresso and I guess they put caffeine in all of it was artificial it wasn't that bad but it you could tell it wasn't real just the dough it was just a different kind of drink.

00:47:44 John Daub: All right there's the uh I don't even know what this bank is anymore Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ I think they got rid of the Mitsubishi I don't know they got rid of the Tokyo it's not just Mitsubishi UFJ used to be Tokyo Mitsubishi now it's just Mitsubishi UFJ bank so my bank was originally um called Tokai Bank in Nagoya when I first came to Japan Tokai Bank became uh UFJ bank then UFJ bank became Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ bank then Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ bank became Mitsubishi UFJ which is now MUFG I don't know so over the course of 23 years my bank changed names five times it's pretty great well feel I hear trumpets do you hear the trumpets I used to play the trumpet in elementary school strongest lips.

00:48:50 John Daub: All right everybody so I hope this gets you in the spirit Christmas might be over but this big holiday is just starting tomorrow night for dinner everybody eats soba to cleanse the body for the new year coming up all the special foods come out on new year's day Kanae is going to stay with her parents home and start to prepare over there and i'll be there on the first tonight i'm hoping to plan to release the 30-minute fireworks factory video on the main channel so look for that if you have any questions leave me a comment at any time don't forget to hit that like button to encourage me to do more and i'm thinking about doing a new year's eve live stream we will see there's not much i hate watching it on tv i want to be out there in the elements if the signal's bad i might just record it and upload it really quickly afterwards like i did in 2020 but yeah Ginza is pretty nice it's nice to see during the holiday season the new year's season all the decorations that they have and you're seeing all the flags going down Chuo-dori avenue towards Shimbashi Station this gives you a feeling of what the Japanese New Year's like coming here to visit at this time of year very quiet on January 1st I'll come out and you'll see the streets are completely empty as people stay home with their families and just rest they don't want to go anywhere but I think we're gonna go somewhere this is the best time to find the city is just different and unique on the 1st of January people go to the shrines but they don't go out anywhere else really maybe Shibuya I don't know maybe we'll have to go and find out all right see everybody take care have a good day have a good night thanks for watching.