00:00:00 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome to Akihabara. In the rain! It is definitely a different experience when it's coming down like it is right now. You have the people crossing the street on Chuo Dori (central street), which is where I am, right in front of the Don Quixote. In this episode, I'm just going to take you around, go get some gachapon (capsule toys) and have a nice time.

00:00:28 John Daub: Because I'm having an awful day, an awful weekend. My Sony Alpha 1, which is my main camera, it's an 8K camera, it's a little pricey. I was doing a shoot in the bathroom and it fell off of the suction cups—I should have known better—and landed in the bath, only like a split second. Probably going to be okay. But then I tried to get the water out, it slipped out of my hand and then I broke the screen on the back. So I took it to the Sony Repair Center, which is here in Akihabara. Which is why I'm here, not actually for gachapon. Thankfully, the Sony staff, I got my A7S3 cleaned, because that might become my main camera now.

00:01:08 John Daub: I'm seriously, you know like that sickness you get when you're nervous about something and it hits you in the pit of your stomach? Well, I rushed my baby to the hospital, which is the Sony Repair Center. You guys want to take a look at that? Here we go. I took some video in there. Watch this. So this is in front of the Sony Repair Center. They're open, I think it's like 10am to 6pm all the time. They don't speak a lot of English, but they will try their very best. This is the sensor cleaning. I had a smudge on the sensor of the A7S3. This is before, you can see the smudge there, and here's the after. They did such an amazing job of getting rid of that smudge. So I'm super impressed and I'm super excited about it. Because you don't want a smudge on your sensor, like ever. So it happens though.

00:02:07 John Daub: The A1, the Alpha 1, has a guard so things can't touch the sensor. But the A7S3 does not. This is now my main camera in this bag here until I get the prognosis from the doctor on the A1. Please fingers, everybody please cross your fingers. I can't lose my 8K camera. Oh my gosh. So let's get moving here. I have to literally do this. You can't hold an umbrella and walk around streaming here. There's a gachapon. This is in front of the Don Quixote. There's a gachapon place just, I don't know, like a couple of hundred meters up here. Maybe a hundred meters or less.

00:02:51 John Daub: The Don Quixote, I've noticed here the street foods are really bad. You can check this out really quickly here. There's a meat place. It says Kobe beef, but this looks like A3, like really bad. I can't say for sure. But I think they know that foreigners know the name Kobe beef and they kind of do that. You can see there was no marbling on that stick there. And it's quite pricey. So just be careful. I think we're going to get Kobe beef. Go to Kobe. Don't eat it in Tokyo at Don Quixote. An A5 Wagyu experience with that stick of meat. Although it is cool to eat it in Tokyo. Stick with me.

00:03:47 John Daub: I'm also struck by how busy it is here in Akihabara compared to the last time I was in this area. It is so much busier, even in the rain. What? See, Gracie's catching a live for the first time or in a while. Welcome. How you doing everybody? It's a little bit late in the day to do a live stream. Tomorrow I have a treat for you. My friend Matt Ault will be joining us from Ikebukuro, we think. I haven't seen him in like 10 years. But he's one of the guys on Japanology on NHK World. I met him on the set of Tokyo Eye so many years ago. And it's really cool to reconnect and hang out. And I'm going to be asking him about his newest book. One of the great prolific writers in Japan about Japanese subculture. So if you guys want to have some questions for Matt, that would be awesome. You can send it to me on Instagram. Or on Patreon. Or something. And I will absolutely ask him.

00:04:58 John Daub: Alright, here's the bank of gachapon right here. Just met two guys from Portugal that came and said hi. They watched the show before. And they've got a couple more days in Tokyo before they go back. That was nice. Gosh, there's so many. There's always... What is this? Spray cans? This is cockroach killer. What? No, Kanai's not going to be... And they have different bugs? What is this? This is too weird. Let's go around here. I don't know a lot of these characters. This looks like a spongy cat. Leo might like that. Looks like a spongy cat. If you're not quite sure, sometimes you can look into the side if you can. And get an idea. That might be kind of cool. Of course it's not for me, it's for Leo. My son Leo who was doing a Super Bowl shuffle. When I say Super Bowl, he had a bowl of food in front of him. I think he was more interested in that.

00:06:08 John Daub: I don't see any doorbells. Oh, look at the penguin! And stationary. What? Not sure if he's into the skeleton thing yet, but one of them glows in the dark apparently. Alright, this has got to be something better. Spongy cats right now winning it out. There's Pikachu and a Pokeball. These are kind of lame on this side. Really? Oh no, this has got to be something better. Maybe it's all down lower? What do you guys... Did you see anything interesting? I'll walk a little slower so you can absorb this. It is in 1080p, so you're going to get a little bit clearer image. Planet of the Apes? What? Like who's into that? Oh, this is so cool! Check this out! It's a hoikuen (nursery school) cat family. How much are these? 300 yen. Okay. Let's get one of these.

00:07:34 John Daub: So you'll see these kids in baskets all around Japan. They're preschoolers. And their mission in life is to have fun. Alright, let's get one here. Gacha gacha pon! Ta-da! Hey Brondania, thank you! So this gachapon is sponsored by Brondania. Aloha! That's a cool cat right there. Alright, coming to the umbrella fort I've made here for us. Alright, what do we got here? It requires construction. That'll be fun to do. Oh look, it's a cool cat! It's going to require some... Oh look at these small pieces. I'm going to have to really do some parental guidance on this. We can't end up eating this. We'll have to play with it and put it away. That's so cool. I wanted the crying one. Look at that! There it is. The crying cat's the best one there.

00:09:17 John Daub: Alright, let's head to Akihabara station. Thank you Brondania. I see Michael Sassano is in the house as well. I'm with you too. I'm so fascinated with Akihabara. Let's just pan around here. This is the famous intersection. It is just so vibrant and cool. And in the rain it's even kind of cooler because you know in the sunshine it's a little too bright unless you have really blue sky with wispy white clouds. But here, the colors just come through with the clouds. There's something about the rain, that glow of the lights off of it. And I bet in about an hour when it gets just a little darker, it's going to be really nice. Again, the streets are so pretty in the rain in Akihabara.

00:10:21 John Daub: Hey, Kiri Subulok. Hope you and your family are doing well. First stream I caught in a while. Welcome back. I'll be moving to Sapporo, wow, in April. That's awesome and congratulations. Share your secret. What kind of setup are you using today? This is the iPhone 14 Pro, which is the iPhone 14 Pro. It's been a disappointing phone so far. On a DJI Osmo Mobile 6 using the Prism app. It's no secret. And the HEVC encoding looks great. It's our YouTube app. I've moved on from the go live, moved into the Prism world. As long as you have a signal of at least 6 Mbps up, you get a pretty good 1080p live stream. Better than the Qualcomm I'd get out of a YouTube 720p live stream. There are advantages to using this app in particular. But I think YouTube will eventually catch up. But until then, and there goes the Sobu line up there. Until then, we're going to be using this one.

00:11:27 John Daub: The images of Akihabara are just so cool. Here's one site I'm never going to get used to. Let's walk over to the street here. Right in front of us, Sega World is gone and Mega Giggle Era has begun. I saw this sign a couple of days ago and I'm just not going to be used to this. Right? What do you guys think? Let me know what your feelings are. The Giggle World. There's the infamous remaining Sega World on the corner there. Underneath the Sobu line. It's not the same.

00:12:21 John Daub: I'm looking forward to my friend Scotty from Strange Parts coming back here. Every time I walk through here, I'm always looking. I'm more into the electronic side of Akihabara than I am of the manga, anime, maid cafe subculture part. I'm very much into the... So got some Giggle thumbs down. I mean, I think the games are the same, isn't it? It's just the name that changed. And they actually kind of kept the colors. Imagine if they turned it from the normal Sega colors, this red building, to something like green or something. What an enjoyment that would be. Right? So I think they're doing their best. I think the verdict is still out. If Giggle gives a thumbs down or a thumbs up, I guess we're gonna have to get some feedback because I haven't been in a game center honestly for a very long time.

00:13:22 John Daub: Alright, let's go underneath the Sobu line here. The great thing about this is the rain is stopped when you're underneath the rail tracks. That's quite a view. Alright, let's go to the Denki Town entrance. And these shops are still here for just a little bit longer. I reckon they're gonna be on their way out. These alleys here, already you're starting to see a lot of shops that are shut down. So I think there's some movement. Maybe they're gonna be doing something with the old electronics stalls that are right in front of the Denki Town exit to JR Akihabara Station. This shop is still abandoned. And every time I come here, I'm just shocked at the changes. I guess we can say that this is the new generation of Akihabara really.

00:15:06 John Daub: Scruffy looking RGB writes in here. Share your secret. Oh, I think I answered that here. Not much of a secret, bro. Wait, I'm trying to balance the umbrella on my head. If only I had three hands. Now, there is the creme brulee donut on the other side. That is worth a potential. But as you can see, I'm in awful shape right now. And I'm on a diet. So we can just get one donut. It's chilly out. I think it's mostly because it's raining. Yesterday was a really warm day. A little bit windy. It feels more like spring than it does in winter. But Tokyo is an exception compared to the rest of the country. You go out to the mountains, you go out to the Sea of Japan side, and you have a totally different weather experience.

00:16:08 John Daub: Let's walk to the other side of Akihabara and get a quick look. Oh, man. You know, Radio Kaikan is not the same as it used to be. But it's still nice to have those orange... Even though they're LED, they used to be neon lights. The vibe of Radio Kaikan. I'm glad that they still kind of do it. I like the way they used to jut out onto the street. The old sign. But I can't complain too much because we've seen just so many outrageous changes. It's still here. The new skyscraper building is much cleaner and safer than what the old building used to be. And then we have here the hamster tubes are still Tsukumo, I think it was. The electronic chain now is part of Sofmap here. So I'm glad that another company came in here and took over the hamster tube building. It didn't change it too much because riding the hamster tubes is part of the fun of Akihabara. This 1980s vision of the future. I guess they thought that we'd all be living in tubes. I don't know. Either way. I wouldn't mind too much. That'd be kind of fun to have a hamster tube house. I say that now. I guess after 24 hours living in one. Maybe not.

00:17:35 John Daub: Alright, let's cut through the station here and then I'm gonna head back home. There's the JR station. Just got a notification that Singapore has dropped all its mask restrictions so we're seeing more and more people in Japan doing the same. Yangalang is here and Brondania is encouraging me to give up my diet and go straight for the donut. Brondania, how dare you? I love it. Alright, I'm gonna have to do it in this direction though, Brondania, because you know I shouldn't be doing that. I'm supposed to go get a haircut too. I don't think that's gonna happen. I'll have to do that tomorrow. On Thursday I'm going back to Yamanashi to finish a video that I've started to work on. There's snow up there now so it's gonna be a fun drive. Leo and Kanae are going with. So this should be fun.

00:18:49 John Daub: So the Gundam Cafe and the AKB48 experience is gone and it's now Tamashii Nations store and I have no idea. But it looks really nice. I have no idea what is a Tamashii Nation. It's a heart with horns and lightning. It's pretty cool actually. It's always nice when the family can come with me. The episode's gonna be released this month for sure and it's gonna be a really good one. It's less about, you know the story is not so much about the fact that it's the oldest hotel and the second oldest building business in the world. 709 A.D. There's another story that I found that's even more fascinating to me and I think it's a different angle that'll be fascinating to you as well.

00:19:45 John Daub: Alright we're going underground. Hopefully the signal holds out and we'll see what's on the other side which is you know, Yodobashi Camera. Oh there goes the Shinkansen! Is that the Hokuriku Shinkansen? It is! Going to Kanazawa. Tokyo is such a it does feel futuristic in many ways. Having the Shinkansen glide through Tokyo is just so awesome! Yeah raise your hand if you're coming to Japan in the next couple of months for the cherry blossom. The ume (plum) blossoms are starting to bloom and I'll take you in a live stream in the next couple of days to go take a look at some of the trees around the city that are there because spring fever is in the air once the middle of February hits. Everybody's kind of like past winter already.

00:20:53 John Daub: See Juni808 is gonna be here. K is coming on Saturday. What?! That's awesome! Charles F. on the 23rd. And here we go. Here's the largest I think it's one of the, maybe China has something bigger but this is the largest to me the electronics store in the world. It's like 8 or 9 floors of amazingness. I no longer buy stuff from here. It's just not cheaper to get it from Amazon or sometimes directly from the manufacturer. But the great thing with getting stuff from Amazon is Amazon's got this really good return policy. E&M is encouraging me to get the donut. Yeah, you know what? Kanae would never let me let him eat that donut yet. He would not eat that. No way Kanae would let me give him a donut.

00:21:54 John Daub: Kanae's a really good cook. So she, Kanae, Leo hasn't been eating his vegetables lately. So she minced up all the spinach into like a paste and she put the spinach into a kind of pancake which Leo loves. So he gets his spinach and he gets his pancake. I like it too because it's green. So sometimes I'll eat Leo's. But I guess it's only fair that Leo gets a donut too, right? That's not gonna happen. Oh, let's take a look at these gachapon. You never know what you're gonna find. Including an egg ring. That's what you always wanted. Tell her you love her with pudding or two chicks on each other. What? Uh, okay.

00:23:15 John Daub: These gachapon banks sometimes have more interesting stuff. So the Sweets Paradise is out of business. You see that right there? It's now a wasabi mochi shop. So just keep that in mind. Sweets Paradise used to have this sushi cake which I loved. Not for the flavor, just because of the novelty of it, the idea of it, which is really cool. There's the drink options from Coca-Cola at this present time. Nothing really striking. Oh! Whoa! This is one of these bell sounds. What? How much is that? 400 yen. Oh my gosh, do I have enough? I gotta carry these coins. Whenever I see something with a ding-dong, I'm in like Flynn. Anyone named Flynn here?

00:24:22 John Daub: Alright, I got 300. So what I need to do is to get a donut. And by getting the donut, I will get money. Let me get my mask on here. What is that contraption? Wow! Those look like muffins. Guys, this is not good for my diet. They got other stuff here too. This is a, this is the creme brulee. What is this one? Crepe de brulee. Oh, I gotta try that one. Crepe de brulee, guys. Is that a donut or crepe? I'll try it later. Oh, you have 2 yen. Excuse me. Okay. Thank you very much. Looks like a crepe brulee donut.

00:25:49 John Daub: Alright, before I eat this donut with you, Brondania and everybody else who sponsored the donut, thanks a lot, first of all. Have you no shame making me eat a donut? Alright, let me get this real quick here. Okay, one. Yeah, give me the money for the gachapon. Not for the donut. Pretty please, not for the donut. Make me buy gachapon and keep my ways and I'll make this line a respectable whatever it is. Which is not respectable. Disrespectable. Alright, here we go here. So let's see, let's hope we get something interesting. Oh, that looks interesting here. Alright, so if you want to hear what this sounds like, I'll put it on Instagram a little bit later as an Insta story. So, check it out. It's gonna be, I don't even know what this is. I guess it's just something, sound. That'll be interesting.

00:26:58 John Daub: Because I'm trying to survive here with the umbrella and a gimbal and a wallet that's open and a bag of donuts and my A7S3 camera that's been cleaned in a waterproof bag. Beautiful. Look at all this stuff I got. We're gonna manage. I'm gonna turn it around because it's a little bit more interesting in this direction. You can see the people going by. Alright, let's try this here. So this is Peter's favorite, the Jack and the Donut. Actually from this direction you can see the Shinkansens going by.

00:28:10 John Daub: Alright, I forgot my cardinal rule. Never get anything that's weird or over the top. Always stick with the basics. I should've, last time I went over for something that was a novelty donut, it was nasty. Alright. Yeah, Lee, I certainly hope it's copyright music. Alright, here we go. Let's take it out here. This is what's going in my gut. Alright. It's creme brulee crepe donut. I don't know why they did that but we're gonna figure this out here. Itadakimasu? Stick to the normal. It's too dry. It's so dry. There's some kind of gel, like a maple gel. It's too dry. Put that away. Maybe it could be sitting too long. Stick with what they're famous for. Don't try to get fancy. Stick with what they're famous for.

00:30:09 John Daub: Alright, I gotta go to the Hibiya line, so let's go through here. Get through here. John's gotta get home. I got a lot of stuff to do. I'm just really praying and guys pray with me that the Alpha 1 is gonna be okay. That I was able to save it from the water. It is water weatherproof, which I don't even know what that means. It's probably just a marketing term that makes you feel comfortable about something, but I'm gonna go check it out.

00:30:51 John Daub: Do you guys know what that is? I can give you a hint. Pray for A1. Thank you, Peso has started a new hashtag that will burn the internet down. Like that really nice lady who was in the halftime show for the Super Bowl. Rihanna. Congratulations to her. I heard that she's pregnant. Hashtag pregnant. It was pretty crazy. That's good news. As a parent, I know. It's nice to have a kid in the family. You can see Leo doing the Super Bowl shuffle on the Instagram stories. And there you go.

00:31:45 John Daub: So yeah, just a little background. I took the A1 camera like within an hour to the Sony which is probably a big mistake. I should have dried it out. I have these super absorbent silica gel that they put in the shoes, you know, but it's really instant. And I have the lens that was on the camera in that right now and the lens is going to be okay. But the A1 was going there I got in a hair dryer and sort of dried it out. I don't think a lot got in there but we'll see. But I should have probably in hindsight waited the weekend and gotten all the water out before I gave it to Sony. Because I think they have a policy of not working on anything that has any water on it. Or they could see that I paid an arm and a leg for that camera and they could, you know, help me out here. Help a brother out. We will see. I'll let you know.

00:32:42 John Daub: I got a Patreon Q&A coming up in the next couple of days. I'm going to record it. Jason who might be watching over in Canada he asked me about the health of the A1 so I will let you know in that update. And as soon as they know you'll see me crying or very relieved and happy. I don't know yet. Nobody wants to lose a many thousands dollar camera ever. Especially if it's your main rig. But stuff happens. Alright everybody. Thanks so much. Don't try the rice trick to dry out electronics. I got the lens in there but the silica gel works even better. So if you got a bunch of that that's pretty good.

00:33:29 John Daub: Alright everybody. Have a good day. Have a good night. I will see you tomorrow with Matt Ault who will be joining me talking about his new book. I'm pretty excited about it because he's got a lot of knowledge on subcultures in Japan just like my friend Patrick Galbraith who I'll try to have on the show again really soon too. But if you have any questions for Matt, join us. We're going to probably do a livestream around 12 noon tomorrow. Sometime around maybe 1pm because I want to have lunch with him. Buy him some lunch. So we'll be back between 12 and 1 for a livestream to talk about Japanese subculture. From Ikebukuro. And we did have one postcard club sign up yesterday so that sign up will be getting two postcards. Thank you very much. And if you sign up today I'll give you a second postcard too if you're a new sign up. Two for one. But you have to join the postcard club. Patreon. Bye everybody. That creme brulee donut. I think it needs a coffee or something. If I drink it now I'm never going to get to sleep.