00:00:00 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome to another livestream where we're going to be introducing to you the Japan travel update for June with me as a guest who won't be speaking to us because he's really hungry—Greg Lam from Life Where I'm From. How you doing Greg?

00:00:35 Greg Lam: I'm alright.

00:00:40 John Daub: Yeah, we're just going to pull into a service area right now. We're about 30 seconds away from that. This is Moriya. Check it out here. I want to talk with Nexco and all of the weird robots and trucks that they have for highway work here. We're here in Japan and actually Japan doesn't have an entry ban if you're already here. But right now we have gotten a little bit more news from the Prime Minister and the travel authorities who are going to be giving us more information in about, I don't know, I think in about a week we'll hear more about this.

00:01:30 John Daub: But an interesting thing that the Prime Minister said, he said that foreign tourists will have to wear masks. I don't even know what that means. I think he didn't emphasize enough. Do you think we can sneak in there? In the front row? Front row? I don't know. You never can here. Maybe park farther down. Maybe. Well the Prime Minister said that we got to wear masks and I already, I mean Japan is telling you that you don't need to wear masks. Oh I think right here on the corner. Can we sneak in there? Yes! Oh that's awesome. Oh we can pull right through. Oh my gosh that is like gold when you can pull right through like this. Oh gosh that really happens. A little bit too happy John. I am very very happy.

00:02:30 John Daub: I got to buy him lunch. We're doing an episode in Scuba not too far away and I can't tell you what it's about because it's top secret. I didn't know that. Sorry I tweeted that. You did, did you? No. Don't trick me like that. Yeah the travel update. So the Prime Minister said that on June 10th foreign tourism will return but the blue list, there's a blue list of 86 approved countries that can come in for tours. But you can't just come in as a free tourist. You actually have to be a part of a government sponsored tour which is not for everybody so this might not be the perfect time to book your trip so don't book your trip yet. However, I'll give you in about a minute a reason why you might want to do that. June 10th we're going to start to see some people come in here and hear some stories about it. How do you feel about tourists coming back Greg? Are you angry that we're going to lose this really nice ability to walk around sites that are completely empty?

00:03:30 Greg Lam: I don't care. No thank you. No I think it's good though to be able to walk around. I think it's good to have people come back honestly. I mean people have been waiting for so long and I know when I had troubles like you know even as permanent residents we couldn't go back at a certain time. You're prevented from doing that so I think just easing up the ability to go back and forth between countries is just a nice thing. Considering the Japanese could do that the whole time right?

00:04:15 John Daub: Yeah basically. Basically. The good thing about the June opening is that for those 87 people that are coming in, they're going to be able to walk around the city. So for those 86 countries there's no more quarantine. There's no more PCR tests.

00:04:45 Greg Lam: Really? No PCR even? No more PCR tests on arrival if you've been vaccinated.

00:05:00 John Daub: Oh triple right? Yeah if you haven't been vaccinated then there's a PCR test and I think there might even be quarantine. The thing is though and the thing that worries me and I do this show called TBS Hiroobi every now and then about inbound tourism. And they asked me this question about what I felt and what are those potential problems that I have. And I said well of course if tourism does return in June that Japan is not prepared for. And I gave them about an interview for about 30 minutes about different things. But one of them that was that they used in the news program was about masks. And there's this big debate in the United States people just don't like to wear masks on anything when they go into stores or indoors. And Japanese do that all the time here.

00:06:00 Greg Lam: Yeah I mean I guess depends where you are but we've been traveling around the country separately.

00:06:15 John Daub: Yeah. Different places and the mask wearing is very very high like over 90% even outdoors right?

00:06:30 Greg Lam: Right.

00:06:35 John Daub: And whether or not they work completely is debatable. I do think it works on public transportation. I think it works when you're in crowded spaces. Yeah. When you're outside in a park by yourself. Yeah it's the outdoors one that's kind of tricky you know. It's like is it really doing anything. Like I mean I think when you're outside of like a busy station there's tons of people. It just I don't know. I think you know what when we had the state of emergency everyone who went outside was wearing a mask. Remember those days? I mean but yeah everyone still is wearing a mask. Everyone is but everyone's still wearing a mask. I think during those days if you went outside during a state of the emergency and you didn't have a mask people would look at you and think bad thoughts. And you can and I've been in Japan long enough and I think maybe you have too where if you're doing something wrong or you think it's socially not right you feel it right? You can feel people judging you.

00:07:30 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:07:35 John Daub: And Chan I saw that go by here. Sorry I was driving. Chan is stuck in a trunk Greg. Here's a little something towards your rest stop.

00:07:50 Chan: Thank you Chan. Thank you.

00:07:55 John Daub: I'll use that for what are you going to eat here?

00:08:05 Greg Lam: I have no clue. We haven't gone in so I don't know what's there. Something light.

00:08:15 John Daub: Something light. I'm watching what I eat. Why should people book trips right now Greg?

00:08:30 Greg Lam: I don't know because it's really expensive too. I was just reading about it. It's like really crazy pricing. Do you think the trips are going to get more expensive? Because of inflation in the fall? Or do you think the prices are going to be?

00:08:50 John Daub: I think they're going to get cheaper because more flights is going to drop them down I think. Because right now it's still limited the number of flights going in and out. It's expensive man. If you want to lock your, if you think you got a good deal and you want to lock your trip price in now you would probably want to book in advance. Yeah but then you have to be part of a tour so it's not just so easy as. For right now but if you're in August or September I think that they're taking bookings without you needing to go on a tourist trip. It's so tricky man. This whole pandemic time you think one thing's going to happen and it changes like who knows dude.

00:09:30 John Daub: I want to ask you guys a question here. This isn't going to be a very long live stream but I wanted to ask you all a question. You can read the live chat because in this playback the live chat has so much value. Are you thinking of coming to Japan and when are you thinking to come to Japan and are you getting your tickets? And are you getting them so they're fully refundable? Are you getting insurance when you book your tickets? Also in the comments if you're watching this in playback please leave me a, leave everybody a note because I think a lot of people are going through the same problem of when do I book my ticket and if I do will it be safe? And how is everybody else planning their trip to Japan despite it not being so clear right now? Because there are people who are doing that. I see that every day yeah. I kind of want to be more helpful to you but there's not as much news as I thought. But it's interesting though I think the guidelines for the tourism to return is not yet decided which is why they're doing this test. That's with trial. Trial, trial, trial tour thing.

00:10:30 John Daub: My gut says at the end of this they're going to have a document that says that they want you to wear a mask on trains and indoors that might be contradictory to what you do in your own country. Because in Japan they have their own sets of customs. People don't need to be told in Japan to wear a mask. They do it anyways right? Generally. 99% of the people. So the society works pretty well like that and if you don't you feel guilty so that part of society works extremely well.

00:11:15 Greg Lam: Yeah actually you know what I'd be worried in crowded places if there's so much people not wearing masks that would make me anxious to tell you the truth.

00:11:30 John Daub: Right me too. I don't get angry anymore but if someone had their nose out and they're near me I kind of felt slightly like dude really put your mask on right or get away from me. And if I'm walking around the city outdoors you can definitely tell there's a foreign looking person not wearing a mask. They stand out a lot. They're judged harsher right? Yeah so I don't. Warners. Yeah. I pretty much the only time I take off my mask outdoors is when I'm not around people or when I'm like jogging. It's just you know it's a fairly wide open place. And I don't wear it when I'm running either.

00:12:15 Greg Lam: Yeah.

00:12:20 John Daub: John writes in here, Greg hello from wet Winnipeg. Oh Winnipeg. I was there in the winter for the snowy snowy snowy Winnipeg. I'm going to release that video next or this upcoming winter. Oh okay. Guess you can't because the summer is coming. Well I don't know like by time you know I came back we would be able to edit it's like winter is over so. Right. I thought releasing at the start of the winter would be cool. But it was like record breaking snowfall in Winnipeg so. Wow. I got lucky with the timing. That's what I love about life where I'm from it doesn't have to be about Japan right? That's why you're not Greg in Tokyo right? That is a very conscious decision not to say anything about Japan. Was that one of your options when you started the channel? How did you come up with life where I'm from?

00:13:00 Greg Lam: No I mean it's really in the name of the channel. Like it's about life where I'm from. So it wasn't supposed to be just about our family. It's supposed to be a lot of different families. Obviously that didn't pan out but. Right. It's supposed to be about life in different countries. So it's not Greg in Japan. Because it's more about. It wasn't actually both our channels wasn't about us anyway so we didn't put our names in it. Sort of about the topic here.

00:13:30 John Daub: But isn't your channel now Jon Daub only in Japan or something? Well yeah okay just things going on behind the scenes that people don't they shouldn't care about. To the awesome dynamic duo. You guys are the best. Wow so who's Batman? And Robin? Dynamic duo. Would you be Robin? I don't even watch that stuff dude. Really? Okay so he's Robin. Alright moving on. Because we got Daniel Rast. I want to be Batman that's why I'm driving this time. Although you want to drive on the way back? You can drive. I could potentially. Yeah I don't mind driving. Alright to put this to put this a pin on this with the travel update. Not a lot of stuff has changed since the last time. I'm gonna we're going to see how everything pans out so I'll do another travel update on June 10th and then again two weeks later because I think we're gonna have some news back on how they want to evolve the tourism. But my best guess is that by the end of summer they'll start to allow some blue lighted. It feels like yeah by the time fall kicks around they'll have something or maybe after the election. Yeah. You know. Oh right the Japanese elections in September right? I thought it was a bit earlier. I thought it was in the summertime but. Yeah. It could be in the summer after the election when everybody votes that's when they'll do something that might be more more useful.

00:14:00 John Daub: The thing is though that I think this tourism is connected with the mail and I don't know Japan post is a disaster right now. For eight months we couldn't I can't send anything to Australia or no no packages to Canada doesn't make a lot of sense to me. So hopefully Japan opening up means packages and mail will return because that's a good indication of the country has returned. Again this is a lot this live stream is a lot for you guys so leave a comment below and let me know what your situation is and I'll use that information for the next one. Anything what are you working on Greg? You want to tell the people.

00:14:30 Greg Lam: What am I working on? Oh I'm working on shotengai (covered shopping arcades) so Japanese shopping streets. That should be interesting I hope. Yeah the old place is like in Koiwa right? You using Koiwa? I went there before but I have footage from all over the place so. Right. Talked to some shop owners talked to some associations so. Should be interesting for people who don't know about shotengai. Did you go down to Osaka and do the long one down there? No I didn't do the Osaka one but yeah. So I'm just talking about shotengai in general so. Some of them have really modernized haven't they? They're finding ways to make it more newer. I've heard those stories I don't really see them you know out in the wild from just walking around. Yeah. Like there's people who are using the places that have shuttered and they're using them for like share spaces like for working. Or maybe share houses or like rental places so there's a lot of different businesses going on but if you go into your average one that I've seen. I've been to a lot lately you know it's just what you know to expect but maybe the viewers don't know so I'm gonna introduce them. I love shotengai but it's changing a lot. Did you know there's a Don Quixote in Ameyoko? Oh. You didn't know that? This is Ameyoko is kind of a shotengai. Yeah it's kind of a different though. Because I mean I think a lot of the people who go to Japan they'll probably end up more on the touristy shotengai right? That's right. So they're getting a different feeling than the local shotengai so I'm concentrating on the local ones. Yeah. Because it's a really different mix of shops and different feel so. It can get pretty eclectic too.

00:14:45 John Daub: Suede Hightower two years your badge just changed buddy. That's pretty cool and sneaker floral. No flavors. Flavors oh. Come on. Do Nike stores in Japan carry a lot of sneakers that sell out in untied states? If so which ones if they have no idea you should make a video about it. I would do a shoe video actually. Are you a shoe guy? I'm not but I think I've been I did you read Shoe Dog? That was by the guy who founded Nike. He came to Japan a lot and his inspiration for the shoes was Japan and that's an episode that's online. You need to get a sneaker head then. I need to get there's a lot like it won't be hard to find a master in that here. Greg we live in Japan. A lot of sneaker heads people. That's the one thing that people have like a dress code. Sneakers is the one thing that they sort of break the rules on right here. It's interesting what you can see people wearing with suits. Yeah, right. They wear suits and then sneakers or weird socks that because you can kind of break the conventions and that little part bust out like a branch that breaths out of that winter little green branch coming out at the end. That's would be the shoes. I got a child. Who's one year old. Okay, I do that all the time. Final questions here. J Fox rates in here flights already booked for late September hoping we can freely travel by then happy to wear a mask only do it when you need to September should be fine. But they're telling you telling Japanese not to do it because of the heat exhaustion more people will die of heat exhaustion than they will from covid if everyone is wearing a mask like that in the summer. That's my bold statement for the day. Do you have a bold statement you want to say before you tune off?

00:14:55 Greg Lam: No, you love doing live stream. Don't you hate it? He hates it.

00:15:00 John Daub: Yeah. All right, guys. I got to go buy him lunch. Thanks so much. That's our update. We're on the road to Ibaraki to scuba. We'll see you later. Maybe I'll send a picture. Some us and what we're doing. Sorry. Shy. Did you just do that? I'm sorry.