00:04 John Daub: No matter how many times I come to the Tokyo Skytree, I'm always so impressed with its beauty. Tokyo Skytree is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, 2022. It opened in 2012. It seems like yesterday. We've got a cloudy day today, but that's not going to dampen my feelings for this place.

00:25 John Daub: Hey everybody, I'm in Oshiage. This is the Tokyo Skytree, and for the next 20 minutes or so, I'm going to take you around this area, walking and showing you what it's like in the springtime. I just filmed inside there. I'm making a video about the earthquake safety of the Tokyo Skytree. We went down to the very bottom, the basement of the Skytree, into the core of it to show you what makes this the safest building in the world. Actually, in an earthquake, you probably want to come here, and I'll explain a little bit more about that in this episode. You can always ask me a question in the comments below if you're not watching live. I'm also watching that live chat. How you doing, Joy? I see a lot of people from yesterday here. Thanks, guys, for coming back.

01:09 John Daub: Does anybody know the height of the Tokyo Skytree? I'll give you a hint. It's the tallest freestanding tower in the world. 634 meters up. Hey, we got Alyssa. Alyssa's here. How you doing? Today, I'm going to show you the Skytree with some of the blossoms. Check this out. They got like these standing kayakers. That's kind of cool. I didn't know you could do this. They're always coming up with some original attraction to make this an even more interesting place.

02:04 John Daub: But I'm really excited about this edited video that I'm doing, where I take you not just to the top. I take you outside. I still have one more part to film in the future. Today, I talked with the designer, the people who built this, and interviewed them. Konishi-san is his name. We went down to the basement and then into the core of the Skytree. I learned so much about this and what makes this the safest place in Tokyo.

02:35 John Daub: But the purpose of this is not a tourist attraction. A lot of people forget why they built the Tokyo Skytree. It was because they needed to have a broadcast tower that was tall enough to get over the tall buildings in the center of Tokyo, which made Tokyo Tower obsolete. They couldn't get the signals out. The Tokyo Tower is the television broadcast tower for Kanto, the entire area, like millions and millions of people. But because of the tall buildings around it, it could no longer do an effective job. So they built Skytree in an area where there are no tall buildings whatsoever, and could get that broadcast signal to everybody. So in the case of an emergency, this is the safest place to be.

03:15 John Daub: When they built the Tokyo Skytree, they built it so that it could withstand a Shindo 7 earthquake. There is some high-tech stuff inside of this tower. It's not a building. It's a tower. That makes it not just extremely beautiful, because they put a lot of thought into the design. You could see the passion of Konishi-san when I interviewed him. You could just see it in his eyes, like light up when he talks about the Tokyo Skytree. But it could survive probably when all of these buildings fall down because of an earthquake. Tokyo Skytree is still probably going to be there because of just all the earthquake proofing and just in the design. They said if you have a Shindo 3 earthquake and you're on the very top, you don't even know that there's an earthquake going on. It doesn't sway because of the countermeasures that they have in there.

04:10 John Daub: What's really interesting about the Skytree was the design comes from that old five-story pagoda design. You can see the design. This is in that rendition on the other side there. But the core of it is made with... There's a core to it. And that core is separate from the rest of the building. And that is what they use in the five-story pagodas, the wooden pagodas from centuries ago. They're using kind of the same technology. Now, they started using it in a practical sense in America in buildings 100 years ago. But Japan has its own ways always to make things even better.

04:49 John Daub: Now, these canals, I don't believe they were here before the Skytree. So I think these were made after. But what's great about it is they reflect the Skytree in certain areas of the canal. And if you go down this way, I don't know, about 400 meters, just keep walking. This is in the opposite direction of Asakusa. You're going to find some really nice reflecting pools that are similar to the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C., where you have the reflecting pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial. You get kind of that same view of the Tokyo Skytree, which is right above me. It's just impressive to look straight. I still can't believe they did this in Tokyo. How can they build a structure this big in the most earthquake-prone major city in the world? And I'm guessing that we got more quakes than Mexico City. It's just so crazy to me.

05:55 John Daub: Now, Tokyo Skytree is not free. You got to pay to get in there. And when the tourists are here, it's quite a long line. But it's not that long when you have a press pass. They just let you take a special service elevator on the side. So I took the service elevator to Asakusa. But there's one more piece of information I thought was pretty unique about the Skytree. I think it has one of the fastest and smoothest elevators in the entire world. I believe it's one of the fastest. The fastest one is now in China. I think it was the fastest one coming down. There's some statistic that makes it one of the world's most amazing elevator rides, too.

06:35 John Daub: So there's a lot of stuff going on inside of here. It's more than just a tower. I love the poles in here. And I asked him, I said, why did you come up with this design? Why does it look the way it does? And the answer was that they, of course, they wanted to make it safe. They had to come up with a design that made it to any kind of an earthquake, which would be able to withstand it. And typhoon and lightning and all sorts of natural disasters. You don't have landslides because there's no mountains around here. But they thought about all of this stuff when they built it, of course. And that's so sad to see the blossoms falling down.

07:20 John Daub: They thought about that when they built this. And the design was also extremely important to the company that made this. The reason why is they wanted it to be an iconic image. So it wasn't just about building a tower. It wasn't just about building a broadcast tower. It was about building an iconic image that people would not forget when they came to the city. And that's why they built this. I think they did a pretty good job. I think they were going to go in a different direction with this. And after much debate on the final design, they came up with this one. But I think if other designers had had their way, it would have been something that was more concave, like some of the structures that you saw in China. But I'm kind of glad that they came up with the design that they did. Because I think that's what they wanted. I think when you look at it, you could say that it has a sort of a Japanese... It feels like it's a Japan tower. It's modern. It just kind of fits in with the building. Maybe it's because I've seen it for the last 10 years now. Even before that, when they started building a column up there. But for the longest time, I guess people weren't sure if they liked it or not. And over time, the design of the Skytree has just grown on people.

08:50 John Daub: Speaking of growing, check out these flowers. It's just beautiful here. All these are brand new cherry blossoms because they had to do a lot of construction. But we're pretty much at the end of the cherry blossom season. Oh, is this the platform? You can't go further than here. So I guess the kayakers had to turn around. And there they are taking a break.

09:33 John Daub: This place is also pretty awesome because they have a shopping mall inside. And an aquarium! The aquarium inside the Tokyo Skytree has penguins. Last time we were here, it was weird, okay? So you can get a ticket. But if you pay twice as much, you can get an annual pass. That's pretty crazy, right? So we got an annual pass. So Kanae and I, we ended up coming here like three, four times instead of one time. Which was really smart because we ended up coming and shopping here, just because we wanted to go to the aquarium. I think that was a pretty smart thing. So for the price of one ticket, you can enter. For the price of two tickets, you can get a season pass and come as many times as you want. Which I think is a pretty cool deal. I don't know what it is today, but that was the price for like, I think we had it like five or six years, five years ago. We had an annual pass.

10:33 John Daub: All right, let me take you up the steps here. We can get a different view. Those kids are going the wrong way. Hey, Thomas, how you doing? I see Brandanias in the house. How you doing, Brandania? Wow. Now we're really up close and you can see the construction. The elevator is made by Toshiba. So we got in touch with Toshiba to get access to film some of the elevators. But that's going to have to come in the next shoot that we do. It's pretty cool.

12:08 John Daub: Now you would think up here, the signal would be really strong because this is a broadcast tower, right? So you better be getting some clear 720p. All right, from the deck, you can see the canals. Pretty nice. Entrance to where I'm going is free. Solamachi (Tokyo Skytree Town) is the name of the shopping mall. You don't have to pay to go in there. But it's worth coming to the Tokyo Skytree just to go shopping and have lunch. You don't have to actually go up to the top.

12:56 John Daub: But if you do, you get probably... All right, the observation deck is the same height as Tokyo Tower. It's higher than Tokyo Tower. I mean, the height. Tokyo Tower's observation deck isn't much. It's not nearly the same. It's so low compared to Skytree. Skytree's like twice the height. And you can see inside of here. I can just take you in for a second. It's just an average shopping mall inside there. They've got a food court. They've got clothing. I think there's a Uniqlo in here. You get just about everything inside of the shopping mall. It's accessible by the Hanzomon line, which is the purple one, and the Tobu line. There's a Pokémon Center here, apparently. We've got some Pokémon people here.

14:00 John Daub: And because everybody was so nice yesterday, I have to go and get something for Kanae before I come back. Her friend actually owns a café here. Hold on a second. This is really good information. I think it's on the seventh floor. But Sol's Coffee. I don't know if you all remember. About three years ago, I interviewed the CEO of a local coffee chain called Sol's Coffee. S-O-L-S Coffee. Owned by Kanae's friend. It's rare that you have a chain run by such a young lady. A branch of her café here at the Tokyo Skytree. So if you go in there, you can go to Sol's Coffee, and you can say, Kanae sent me. Only in Japan sends you. I'm sure you'll get a smile because I think she's working in there too. But she's got several branches of coffee shops around Tokyo and Japan now. Very ambitious. Just opening up locations all over the place in unique areas. I think this is maybe the most unique. What do you think? I would love to have a shop here. This is where the Only in Japan office should be. Skytree. Very cool.

15:19 John Daub: I'm going to take you down here. And I think I can walk with you to the other side. There's also a Ghibli store. I'm not sure if it's out of business or not. It could be. I'll take you through the shopping area without talking and give you an unfiltered feeling of being here in Japan at the Skytree as a shopper. But as someone who just likes to walk around. I think the Skytree has got a lot of cool places just to walk around it. Because it's so close to Asakusa. You can see the cultural heart of Tokyo. Then you can walk over here and see the modern heart. This iconic Skytree. Ten years. I can't believe it's been ten years. They've had it in operation. It seems like yesterday they just opened it up. Has anybody ever been to the Tokyo Skytree? If you have, you can tell me about it.

16:32 John Daub: Alright. I'm going to walk through towards the other side. So no talking. Just listen. Take in the sounds. Hopefully the signal stays strong. I'm getting hungry.

18:44 John Daub: Well, that's new. There's a Nitori and a Life supermarket across the street. Wow. There's the entrance to the subway. And guess what? The Ghibli store lives. Can you say it? Tonari no Totoro (My Neighbor Totoro). Ghibli's got the best store. Now we're on the other side. Yeah, Corona. That's dangerous to start singing any Ghibli song. You're asking for trouble. There are a few sakura trees. Different variety. There is a community bus here that gets you around for 100 yen, which is pretty cheap. This is part of the Sumida Ward. Kids are half price. Hey, it'll take you to the other Tobu stations and you can get the JR Kinshicho or to the Oedo line. Oh, I didn't know that. So you get the Oedo line by a bus for just 100 yen. That's cheaper than taking the connections to get the subway from the Hanzomon line. Did not know that. And the Asakusa line also comes here too. Right there.

20:31 John Daub: This place is always evolving, always changing. So even 10 years on, again, this is the 10th anniversary. It's been kind of marred by the lack of tourists. It doesn't have the same vibe it did three years ago, but it's still the friggin Skytree, man. Thank you, Reds. That's a very nice thing. Oh, I panned over and got no view. What? This building got in the way. I wanted to take you out and end this live stream at one of the canals. So let me just swing around here. You can park your bicycle here if you rent a bicycle and go around the city of Tokyo. I wouldn't park it here. I would park it out on the street because it might not be there when you get back just because the city picks it up over time. But there's usually bicycle parking lots like the one over there, and it's free for the first two hours. So you don't have to worry too much. It's just really cheap to park your bike. And there's a lot more bike parking lots than there were five years ago. They found a way to put them underground or it's just getting people to want to use them because it's so much more convenient to just park your bike right here.

22:04 John Daub: Yeah, Michael, in the city, you pay for parking a bicycle because there's not a lot of space, but you don't really pay nobody. Most places are free, but they don't want you leaving your bicycle there overnight. They want you to move on. So you might have to pay 100 yen for every two hours. It's pretty cheap when you think about it. If you park your bike on the street and they pick it up, then you have to pay, I don't know, between four and ten thousand yen to get it out. I think it's about 4000 yen. I haven't had that happen to me yet, but I've gotten sort of ticketed in this sort of ticketed. Oh, you know what's around here? That strawberry cheesecake in a can. Right. That's just straight ahead this way. You can get a cheesecake out of a vending machine or cake in a can. It's a great idea. What sort of ticket? I don't know. They put like a ticket on your bicycle and say, please pay this fine or something. Most people don't pay it. I don't think anybody pays it. So most of the time it'll be a warning with a map to tell you where the parking spaces are, because most people in Japan park on the street because they don't know where the parking spaces are.

23:44 John Daub: Here's the canal. We put a little bit of distance between us and the Tokyo Skytree. But from here you get a nice view. Michael Rosales, that is tall. It's so tall it makes it the tallest freestanding tower in the world. Take that CN Tower in Toronto. You get nothing on Skytree.

24:36 John Daub: And I was in here filming for the main channel episode about how they earthquake-proof this tower. And I finished it. That's why I got this backpack of camera gear on my back. Peter von Gomm was here. I'll put an image on Instagram with Peter and me underneath the Skytree. It's kind of a... I think I have a photo in there. I actually filmed this episode three years ago for NHK Tokyo Eye. Since Tokyo Eye stopped, I got to keep the tradition going and film some of the places that are really interesting. This is one of them. But PBG was down there. That's right, REO. With me. He was helping with camera work. And I promised him a really interesting story. He'd tell his kids he was in the basement of Tokyo Skytree. And it was good also to share that experience with a friend. And I took him on the Seven Stars too for the Discovery Channel shoot two years ago with Tappy Eats. He was there too. That was pretty cool. For Discovery Channel, we rode Japan's most expensive train. It was a $10,000 a ticket, but we got to go on from the Discovery Channel.

25:48 John Daub: My neck hurts looking up at it. You can see on the side there all the broadcast equipment on the tower. That's its main purpose. Thank you, Peso. Yeah, this is an attraction, but it's also a broadcast tower. Primarily broadcast tower. So when they made it and they put it here, this is not the best place for a tourist attraction. One of the places that they were considering was Ikebukuro. I remember this from like 15 years ago when they were talking about the construction of the Tokyo Skytree. Ikebukuro was one of the places they were considering. What was the other one? There were a couple of other really prominent areas, but they ended up here because of several reasons. One, there weren't any other high buildings in the area, and we don't think that anyone's going to build high buildings in Asakusa, which means that for 50 to 100 years, there's not going to be anything blocking the signal from the Tokyo Skytree. That was part of the reason why it's in Oshiage. You have to remember this is a broadcast tower first before a tourist attraction, second.

27:19 John Daub: However, because it's such a beautiful design and you see it from all over the city, it does make you want to forget about that it's a broadcast tower and think of it as a place that you want to kiss your wife for the first time maybe. And if you're waiting until you get married to give her a kiss, that's not going to happen. You have some other issues. But I might have taken Kanae here on a date when we were dating before we got married. Some good memories up there. Right, the observation deck at Tokyo Skytree is 350 meters, so it's higher than the entire Tokyo Tower, which is crazy. Yeah, that's the cake vending machine down there.

28:14 John Daub: The city of Oshiage, I remember there wasn't anything here really. There wasn't a reason to come to Oshiage at all until the Tokyo Skytree was built. And I'm going to take a right here and you're going to be able to see they really did a good job of making this neighborhood interesting too. So if you step away from the Tokyo Skytree, somebody who likes to support small businesses, maybe take a look around the neighborhood. The cake vending machine, I did an episode about three weeks ago that's straight ahead about 300 meters. That's worth coming here. I think Daikokuyu, which is an onsen (hot spring bath), they actually have onsen in the city of Tokyo. You don't have to go out to the countryside. Yeah. They drill deep for that one. You can go to Daikokuyu if it's still in business. But Oshiage is bustling. It wasn't always like this. And I say by bustling, meaning there's people here. It wasn't always, usually wasn't a lot of people here because there's no reason to come here. Tig, thank you. Nice to see you. Sejap is here from Singapore. How you doing? And Michael Sassano, always a pleasure to see you here.

29:25 John Daub: Thank you for taking us on this fun live stream around Tokyo Skytree since it's 2 p.m. in Tokyo. Grab a snack. You got it. I'm going to take something back for Kanae. Leo's waking up in 30 minutes, so I want to be there. It's always funny to see him with his cranky face going at 2:30 when he wakes up. And there's the canal that goes straight. They used to have this amazing tendon (tempura rice bowl), which is tempura on a bowl of rice with shrimp. And the shrimp were so long and made like a tower shape. So they put three shrimp and made a tower out of it. But I don't know if that's in business anymore.

30:20 John Daub: I'm still sticking to the fact that I think that Tokyo is going to... Japan is going to open up in the summer. But I've been wrong before. I just love, you know, Tokyo Tower is a beautiful tower. But here you see it with the other small buildings in the foreground. But you just realize as you pan up how freaking tall Tokyo Skytree is. Even from Asakusa, you're standing there. You look to the right and then there's Tokyo Skytree. It's so freaking tall. Now when I filmed this for NHK, I'm going to wrap back around to where I started and then end the live stream. Is that Chan? Chan's here. Enjoy these moments with Leo because you'll blink and he'll be grown up. My seven-year-old is telling me I'm too silly now. Kanae was very emotional when Leo went to daycare for the first time yesterday. So we know that he's getting bigger and bigger. He's starting to talk more. It's gibberish still, but he's talking a lot. I think he's going to be close to being able to say stuff. But I can already see he's getting frustrated by not being able to communicate effectively. That's why I think kids throw tantrums because they can't effectively communicate. They like want to say it, but they can't. So when he throws a tantrum, I kind of look at it from that point of view. Like, oh, what's he saying? He wants me to pick him up. I think he's more like me. But he looks more like Kanae. I think he looks more like Kanae than he looks like me. But he certainly has my personality right now because we're both kids. And when he grows up, I'll probably be more like his mom. Until the age of 13, he'll probably be like me.

32:25 John Daub: Oh, I forget. What was the name of the... Nariyasi-kun? Yeah, there it is! Oshinari-kun. That's his house. So that is the mascot of Oshiage, this neighborhood. Let's cross the street. I was there for NHK in 2009. I remember doing a report there and meeting that massively headed mascot. Let's go take a look. That's his house. So he has his own special home where you can go in and say hi, but it looks like it's closed. I think it was Oshinari-kun. It's like 13 years ago I was here. They were still building Skytree at the time. Almost everybody who owned the businesses here were grandmas and granddads. Everybody was like over 65 and had extended family. So it's an old neighborhood. And you can see this is an old building, right? But I'm telling you, if you come to Oshiage, stop in here. It's so cute. Oh, and shut up. It's shut for right now. This is Oshinari-kun. Oshinari-kun because Oshiage, Oshinari.

33:52 John Daub: Interesting story about Oshinari-kun. So when Oshinari-kun was created, it was before the Skytree was actually born. And we didn't know what the Skytree was going to look like back in 2006 and 2007 and 2008. We just know that they were going to build something. But they still had to make a mascot. So they thought that the tower would look like Tokyo Tower. They didn't know what the Skytree would look like. So the original Oshinari-kun head ornament looked like Tokyo Tower. I don't know if they changed it. But they used what they thought that the tower would look like. And now I guess they evolved it to make it look more like the Skytree. But that's really funny. Oh, he's closed because of Corona. So if you do come when they open up Japan, come and say hi to Oshinari-kun and support him. Buy some goods, merch. I know Oshinari-kun will appreciate it. And when I did get to meet Oshinari-kun underneath the costume, and he was like a 75-year-old guy. I was just impressed with how much energy he has. Because that costume is not easy to walk around. I thought it was obviously going to be like somebody in their 20s or 30s. But it was a 75-year-old guy who was inside there. I'm telling you, people here in Japan, they got energy all the way up until almost the end, I guess. I don't know. Kanae's grandfather was almost 100.

35:20 John Daub: All right, everybody. We'll just stop here at Oshinari-kun's house. I got to get back. So what do you think? Do you think Tokyo Skytree is worth visiting? I think there's a lot of stories that you don't know about this tower yet. So I'm going to tell that to you in an edited video coming probably in May. I have to start editing that one, too. There's so much stuff going on. I just had the daimyo packages. So for those of the United States who are getting a Superbox, which is like two or three times bigger than the normal box that's on the way. I've been pretty busy. All right, everybody. Have a good day. Have a good night. Thanks so much for hanging out with me for 30 minutes. I'll see you in the next live stream. Maybe tomorrow. I'm going to maybe you'll see Peter von Gomm on Thursday and he'll join us for a live stream. He's with his son, Joji. But he just released a new video on his channel. So he's doing some cool stuff. There you go. All right, everybody. See you later. And I'll post that picture of us underneath the Skytree on Instagram in a couple of hours.