00:02 John Daub: How you doing everybody? Welcome to Tokyo. This is Tsukuda. It's a little island that's in Tokyo's Chuo Ward, which is my backyard, my neighborhood. And they're holding a festival today at the Sumiyoshi Shrine. This is the summer festival where Tokyo just comes alive. Let's go check it out.

00:24 John Daub: Over the next three weeks to the Obon holiday. Wow. It's so hot. They're taking a break now. Street food. So if you're in the area, you're going to want to check out Tsukuda, the Sumiyoshi Shrine. Get some lunch too. This is where I am exactly. It's super hot. It's boiling. It's going to be about 37 degrees Celsius. The humidity is up. You're starting to feel that summer heat that we didn't feel over the last couple of weeks. But now it's here with a vengeance. They were throwing water just a couple of minutes ago to cool down the participants. Check it out.

02:04 John Daub: And here we are live as we're on the top of a bridge here. They also play some taiko (drums), some little percussion instruments right here. This group will be playing some background music. Looks like they're getting ready to do so really soon. It feels like 40 degrees Celsius. Yeah, it's super hot right now. But there's loads of summer festivals coming up. I was just at one a couple of weeks ago, the Soma Nomaoi, which is in Fukushima. This is one of my favorite summer festivals. And it also starts the summer festival season in Tohoku, a 700-year-old samurai festival with traditions that actually go back a thousand years with armored horse battles like this. It's pretty amazing. Japan is a country with so much history. You feel it in its festivals. And it's just fun. There's lots of food. Your stomach's happy. Your eyes and ears, all your senses are happy, except maybe the heat.

03:14 John Daub: But one of my other favorite summer festivals is the Earth Celebration that's going to be taking place on Sado Island in just a couple of weeks. And I heard from them that they actually have tickets still available, which is crazy. So I asked them about it. And here's a QR code that you guys can click if you want, if you're interested in going. You can still get seats to the Earth Celebration, which is almost always sold out. This is their first time back since the pandemic, so yeah, I got a feeling that it will sell out. It's just when I heard that they had seats, I almost wanted to go over there and jump into the festival. But yeah, this is one I've covered here in the live stream as well in the past. And if you're in Japan, this is worth going. You can actually camp on the beach. And we'll have somebody from Kodo talk to us about the preparations for their summer festival that's going on. They even sent me a schedule. It's quite full, isn't it? So I'll talk about that a little bit later. There's so many summer festivals. Let me see what else is going on today.

04:31 John Daub: Edogawa Fireworks is happening tonight on the other side of the Sumida River. And that's where I used to live before I moved here to Tsukuda. Look at that hat. He's in the party spirit. Let's walk around a little bit. Hey, Saya, thank you. Kanae, Leo and Grandpa are coming in a few hours. So we'll be back at this festival with family. How you doing? Steve, how are you?

05:08 Steve: Good talking, yeah. How you doing? Are you streaming? Yeah. Just walking around. I didn't want to put you on the spot here. Yeah, we saw you walking up the road. This is my wife, Miyuki. She grew up here.

05:14 Miyuki: Oh, hi. We're here to see our nephews in the carrying the mikoshi (portable shrine).

05:19 John Daub: Okay. Yeah. It's going to be a really hot one, huh?

05:27 Steve: Yeah.

05:28 Miyuki: It's not noon yet.

05:29 John Daub: I can see the dragon head. Have you seen it?

05:35 Steve: No. She thought it started at 10. We got here a little bit after 10.

05:39 John Daub: Yeah. They just came down the street, Tsukuda Nichome, and they're taking a break for a little while. I got a feeling they'll be playing some music soon. But it'll be going on till tomorrow. I think they started at 5 a.m. in the water or something. That first year you brought me. Did they do something like a ceremony in the water? Or they took it out in the water?

06:05 Steve: Yeah.

06:08 Steve: I signed up for that last night, so the trip.

06:12 John Daub: Oh, yeah. Oh, thank you. Good.

06:14 Steve: Yeah. Good. Well, so we'll see you there. All right. We're almost at our goal.

06:18 John Daub: I think it's close to 10 now. We need 30, but to do the trip, I think we need about 10 or 11 people. Yeah. So that's huge.

06:27 Steve: Yeah.

06:29 John Daub: I'll see if I can round up some people.

06:32 John Daub: Hey, hey. I love that. I just don't know because it's a Sunday, Monday.

06:36 Steve: Right.

06:36 John Daub: So I don't know if people have to. That's the issue. I wish it was on the weekend. It would have been a little bit easier. But I think we're aiming for tourists that were here on vacation. But there's maybe half the people are people that are living here in Japan that just always wanted to go to that festival.

06:50 Steve: Right. Yeah.

06:51 John Daub: All right. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be fun. It'd be better if it's just a smaller group, too. It's going to be fun. All right. See, I'm going to take these few hundred people around. I'll catch up with you later.

07:06 John Daub: All right. That was Steve. So Steve is going to be joining me on the fireworks festival to Niigata on the bus trip, which is pretty awesome. Let's walk around to the end of the street because this is where, if you look at the end of the street, this is where the omikoshi (portable shrine). So if you do come to Tsukuda any time of the year, at the end of the street, you can see the omikoshi. And it's home. And they said it was made of pure gold. I don't think they might have been fibbing. I'm not sure. But they sure look heavy. Now, this island has a history going back to the Edo period and maybe before that. But I know during the Edo period, this is where the fishermen came. The fishermen who caught the fish for the Edo shogunate. They were from Osaka. And they put them on the island because they didn't want to be there.

08:06 John Daub: Boy, that guy's trying to get it. All right. We should be back again. So the festival, I kind of took, we're about 50 meters away. Let's go to the front of the street. Sorry about that. I didn't expect that we would actually get any signal blockages because of the people. But when everybody's using the uploading, I guess after the festival took a break, everybody started to upload their photos. And you could see them on their smartphones. And that created, that made the system really slow. But this festival is going to be going on today and tomorrow. So if you're in the area, if you're in Tokyo, I would highly recommend. Number one, tonight, go to the Edogawa Fireworks festival. I would get there early, meaning probably you want to bring a blue sheet from the supermarket. Take some food with you because the lines there are crazy. Take a cooler. Go to Daiso, the 100 yen shop. Get a cooler with some ice and take a six pack of beer or something. And you can go hang out at the Edogawa Fireworks festival. That starts at 7:15 or 7:30 and goes on to just a little bit after 8:30, I believe. And they have 16,000 fireworks shells that they're going to explode, which is pretty crazy. And then after that, you can come back here tomorrow to Tsukuda. And you can see the festival going on. I think Kanae and Leo might be here tomorrow as well. I'll be in Hiroshima. But it's a pretty amazing festival. It's in the center of Tokyo. And this is just about a 15 minute walk from Tsukiji Market. It's about a 20 minute walk from Ginza. That's crazy, right? So it's a really convenient place.

10:04 John Daub: The festival's just over there. Now that the signal's back, I can sort of test it and see if we can go back in there and see one of the omikoshi. Tomorrow, I'll be there after the ceremony for the bomb, which was at, I believe it was 8:15 a.m. So I'll be going there in the early afternoon. At least I plan to. Plans could change to film a train. And I'll be leaving pretty quickly after that to go to Nara for a shoot that I have there tomorrow. So I'll be in Nara the day after tomorrow and I'll be in Hiroshima tomorrow. Schedule is really crazy, guys. And I'm doing my best to also find time to edit. This is how you stay cool. Buckets of water on the street. That's pretty cool. Literally. And here's one of the omikoshi. You got kids on the street here with water guns. Again, we're, it's like about 100 degrees Fahrenheit. And you can see this is where we started to lose the signal. Steve was here.

11:25 John Daub: And the last thing I want to show you guys here is the fireworks festival. If you're looking for a summer festival to go to, come with me to Katakai. Here's the link right there at the bottom of your screen. I'll be taking 30 lucky people. Well, I don't know how lucky you are. But taking 30 people with me. And we'll be taking a look at mega fireworks shells. There's a yonshakudama (4-shaku ball), which is the largest annual fireworks exploded every year. And this is in September too, the 9th and 10th [?]. And then we'll go take a look at the birthplace of koi (carp). Which is going to be pretty awesome to do it with other people. I've never done a bus tour before, so this is the first one. Link is down at the bottom if you want more information on it. And I'd love to have you join us. Steve, somebody who lives in the area, tapped me on the shoulder. And he's here. He's going to be on the bus tour. That's really cool. He just signed up. This is the yonshakudama being lowered into the cannon. This is what the tour that I'm taking you to. Now, only media can go to this. I'm trying to see if maybe it'd be okay to go. But I'm guessing it's going to be difficult to show the lowering of the yonshakudama. This was for the longest time the largest fireworks shell in the world. Now, people have just gotten crazy because they wanted to get media attention, I guess. But he actually produces this every year, two times. This isn't just a media thing for him. It's a way of life.

13:09 John Daub: So there you have it. I wanted just to share with you a little bit of the summer festivals here in Japan. This is a big one. This is a really big one. And if you are in Japan, if you're in Tokyo, I recommend that you come out here. Edogawa Fireworks tonight. There's another fireworks festival in two weeks. I believe it's Suwa-ko (Lake Suwa), which has 40,000 fireworks shells. It's one of the largest in terms of fireworks exploding. That's in Nagano. You can take the Chuo Line from Shinjuku and get there in about two hours, I believe. Hotels are really hard to get. But you can camp in the area. In fact, you can camp in front of the fire. You can camp at the station as long as you clear out of there at 6 in the morning. You should be fine. There's portable toilets everywhere. I've done that before. But that's one fireworks festival that you really should see. Suwa-ko Hanabi Taikai is one of the biggest of them all. It is really massive. You know what makes Suwa-ko Hanabi Taikai really special? They have these fireworks that they explode on the water. And when it explodes, it makes this sound. Bow-wow. As the sounds echo and reverberates off of the water. And then it echoes off of the mountains that surround the lake. It's one of the most unique fireworks festivals I've ever seen. And it's got this niagara sparkler waterfall that's over a kilometer long over the lake. And I've never seen anything. It dances on the eyes. Once in your life, it's one of those experiences that you really have to see.

14:34 John Daub: The Bon Odori Festival will be starting in about two weeks' time as well. The Bon Festival. I'll be going to Nara to see how one of the temples there starts to prepare for the Bon Festival. It's a big cultural event in Japan. And a lot of the summer holidays surround the Bon Festival with the Bon Odori dance. It's a lot of fun. And it's not too hard to learn those dance moves.

15:09 John Daub: It looks like the signal has gone unstable again. Which is a shame. I don't know if you guys can see this, but he's blessing the omikoshi from the Sumiyoshi Shrine. And the priests from the shrine are now off to the next omikoshi to bless. They went through all of the procession here to bless those omikoshi. These are smaller ones held by kids. But they're not insignificant. And every neighborhood in Tsukuda is represented here on this island. And it's a local festival. And all around Japan, there are local festivals just like this one. But this one should be one of the big three. Again, held only once every two years because it is the last [inaudible]. Do you see that tree? I showed this to Jared who was visiting from Hawaii. Inside there, that tree is in between a lot of buildings. And you can go in this alleyway and you see this secret shrine. And you can go in there and take a couple of pictures. But it is one of the most unique sites in Tokyo that not a lot of people know. It's not in any guidebooks that I know of.

16:42 John Daub: That is impossible to drive a car around here on this day. It's held once every two years. So it's held on odd-numbered years. 2023 and then it will be held again in 2025. And this festival will go on today and tomorrow. And tomorrow will be the last day. Until 2025. This is pretty crazy. But there are festivals that are held every two years. There are festivals that are held every six years. Like the one in Nagano. The Onbashira (log-riding festival) in Nagano where they ride logs down. It looks like the most dangerous festival in the world. It's also the coolest. Not because it's so dangerous. But because you get these little people on these massive logs that they cut down. They've been doing this for over a thousand years, I believe. At least 700. And they ride the logs down. Oh, they're singing. Ah!

17:48 John Daub: I'll stay here where the signal's okay. Remember that hat I was showing you before? It's a procession coming down here with the dragon. There's the dragon going through the streets. That's awesome. Oh, there's more. Oh, what a treat this is. I didn't... Hey, Kamen Riders here. Thank you. There are some Westerners or expats that are also participating in this festival. This area has a lot of expats living in it, which makes it really vibrant. Again, this island is where outsiders were. The fishermen came from Osaka were not allowed in Edo in the city itself because it was separated. So it's got that kind of a history. So I feel pretty comfortable here, too. Wow. All right, let's go. Let's see if we can... Maybe the signal will kick out, but maybe we can get a shot down the street here. Ah, this is awesome. I'm able to share this festival with you guys. All right, there you have it. There go the dragons down the street. That was pretty awesome.

20:19 John Daub: All right, guys, if you have any questions, you can leave in the comments below. Summer festival has started here in Japan. It is extremely hot. They have the hoses out. You see them watering down the street to keep it cool, watering down people as they go by carrying the omikoshi portable shrines and the dragons right now going down the street. Stay cool, everybody. If you're in Tokyo in particular, and I'll see you in another live stream tomorrow from Hiroshima or possibly this afternoon. Let's see what Kanae and Leo, if they're cool with a live stream and the signal is strong enough. Maybe I'll go live and show you a little bit more of this festival. But tomorrow, Hiroshima, and the day after, Nara. Don't forget to hit the like button and see you real soon. Mata ne. Bye, Kerry.