00:01 John Daub: So here we are in Shinbashi. We're gonna be doing a walking tour from here in this spot, kind of deep in Shinbashi to Ginza Ichome, which is a very interesting area. And of course this is the luxury part of Tokyo, from the very rustic side of Tokyo. I'm starting here at Hekireki, which is one of the famous pudding and coffee restaurants. You guys might have seen this place on social media. No more photos in there, no more videos apparently. They're very strict. Overtourism has had its benefits and disadvantages for foreign visitors, but let's be honest, the place is mostly foreign tourists and he only makes 50 puddings a day. It's sort of overrun with foreign tourists. Locals can't even get in anymore and yeah, it's certainly changed a lot. But I thought I would show you where exactly this place is because it is quite a popular place.

00:54 John Daub: So we're just gonna walk around. Walk by here and again, they call him one of the three top chefs. Very interesting. He just put the sign out. So the pudding is sold out for today. You can see. That's a shame. But you can also see the no video sign. So we have to respect that if you go inside there. Yeah, let the guy make his pudding. He's been on social media already so much. But our walk is gonna be, I'd say about 30-35 minutes.

01:40 John Daub: Oh, look at this. This lunch looks really good. Oh, look at that. It's a massive portion. One of the things about Shinbashi is you really do get what you pay for out here. Things are a lot cheaper, a lot more affordable than in other places. That's pretty impressive. They've got a vending machine where you can get it. This looks like a chain, but it's hard to tell what's a chain and what isn't these days. We're more near Toranomon than we are Shinbashi, I think.

02:23 John Daub: We're gonna go down some of the alleys here. One of the parts of Shinbashi which I think is the most interesting is the alleyways of Shinbashi. There's so much character in it. You're gonna see this part of Tokyo change rapidly over this walk. All of the neighborhoods are very different, one from another. You can tell when you go from one side of the tracks to the other, for example. It's very interesting like that. We're gonna get off of this main. We'll go this way and then take an alley. It's about 10 minutes to get to Shinbashi Station from here. We'll go past the new Shinbashi building and then eventually cross under the Yamanote line into Ginza. Where Ginza Ichome will be our final stop. And we're gonna see some stuff.

03:17 John Daub: Now when I was walking through Shinbashi Station, check this out for a second. I'm gonna walk down this alley, but check this out. Do you see, this is gonna pop up on the screen in a second. This is a tourist information robot. It's a little bit creepy. He's in the basement of Shinbashi Station. Look at those eyes! Digitally winking at me. It was a little bit creepy. I didn't stop. I wanted to get to this live stream start really quickly, but I think it might be worth stopping in here for another live stream in the near future. Apparently he can speak Japanese, English as well and gives tourist information which is useful for tourism. It's pretty funny.

04:27 John Daub: Michael Sasada is in the house. Aloha, welcome. Let's see if we can find something to grab. I know in Ginza we do have the daifuku shop which I love to stop in. Akebono. Look at that car, what is that? That's a Ferrari, what is that? Did you see that, what was that? You can't go down some of the alleys here, that was pretty sweet. Oh is this where they're at? Do you see this, this is Yakult. Do you know Yakult? Yakult, I saw the ladies as well. These are, there was a Lotus. Some of you might know Yakult. I believe they have a, they own a baseball team, right? But you can see the ladies push these carts and they're like oh my god what is that. They've been doing this since like the 1930s or 40s, it's old school. They push the carts around Tokyo, you see them going into businesses. Yakult is like this sweet yogurt drink, that's kind of cool to see.

05:51 John Daub: All right, here's the B Hotel, this is new, I haven't seen this one before. This is a pretty good location actually in the heart of old Shinbashi with all the alleys behind it. But in order to build that hotel they probably had to let go some of the other businesses so that's kind of a sad point but I don't know what was here before so I guess it's not missed so much. Was it a tonyu restaurant, soy milk? A lot of construction going on here that's too loud. I'm gonna go, you can see there's some alleys across the street there. Ya knock a coffee chain, postal van, the streets of Tokyo are always very colorful. Oh it's a green light, let's go, we can make this. I put a link in the description with the map of our walk today so you can go.

07:10 John Daub: Oh Rolls-Royce, is that a Bentley or Rolls-Royce? Such a good, that's gonna pass us in a second. All right you guys tell me what car this is, what is that? Wow. Rollerblader rates in here. The earthquake warning was a non-event, I know if you're wondering what it was, I got it this morning too, it was like at 6:00 a.m. or something. We got this early earthquake warning, nothing happened, phone went off earthquake, it's an earthquake and no earthquake. But I guess it's better to have some kind of a heads up although what are you gonna do with three seconds, brace for impact? But we get that on our smartphones so it lets us know it's good things. But earthquakes the warning sometimes it happens after the earthquake starts, I don't know. But when they're false alarms people do get angry in particular in the middle of the night.

08:47 John Daub: All right now we're in Shinbashi, you can tell there's a lot more flare from the old train station. You see Shinbashi was the terminus or the start of the first train line in Japan. Tokyo Station wasn't built yet, Shinbashi was the station. And I've done a live stream, they have a replica building of where the station used to be located which is near Shiodome now. There are some really interesting cars, I did not expect that for Shinbashi because this is like grandpa town, they call it like oyaji town (salaryman town), there's a lot of kind of old guys stuck in time. At least that was 20 years ago, I don't know if they've passed on but it's time that I can tell that Shinbashi is changing little by little. I hear some people talking about Shinbashi as if they're going to be a super restaurant. W-R-X-Turbo is in the house, welcome. All right I can see the station up ahead, we're gonna go to the left, let's take a look at some of those alleys now.

10:03 John Daub: There's a 7-Eleven ATM vestibule and they take foreign cards, it's quite famous here. Check this out, you see what I'm talking about. This alley says walk down this way. This is the old part of Shinbashi. I hope that they don't change it ever. But you see, there are some new buildings. It's just earthquake-proofing. But the alleys have so much character to it. I actually missed, I should have walked down from there. But there's some amazing little restaurants in here. Some snack bars where there's a mama-san, a lady who's running everything. She's also the entertainer. I believe, was it this one? I think it was this one. For an NHK show about 15 years ago, I went in there and I sang karaoke with the mama-san. Was it enka or something?

11:10 John Daub: I'll wait for this lady to pass. This is the public restroom here. It's funny, it's outside. Very Showa (Showa-era). See, the alleys have so much character. I just saw a fat cat. There's a fat cat. Let's go say hi to the fat cat. He's like, who's that strange guy making noise? Is that the fat cat? Walk away, walk away. Obviously, you can tell from just the architecture where I am. That's the new Shinbashi building. And there's nothing new about it. It was new when it was built. Again, it's a building I hope never changes. That type of architecture, you don't really see in too many spots anymore. Very unique. But it has been slightly renovated inside, I noticed over the years. Very slight. But inside of here, you'll find some old retro, very interesting game centers. And here we've got a gyoza stand. Check it out. Wow, all those deep fried food. That's the good stuff. And you can get a lunch for 780 yen. All that food for $5. It's a pretty good deal. You're going to find a lot of great deals in Shinbashi. And that's the reason why I think this is a great place to stay.

13:15 John Daub: Here we are. This is Shinbashi Station, the back side of it. I say that because the front side might be the other side facing Ginza, facing the sea. We're on the train plaza side. A wide open space with that steam engine or SL train on the left side here. Again, Shinbashi is famous for being the train station from, when was it? Like 1872. And you can see the old train station right here. Meiji 5, the fifth year of the Meiji era, which is 1872. That's what the station looks like. A replica of this is on the other side. It looks really beautiful. There's the first train, 1879 right there. That's fascinating. And you can see, that's how old it is. You've got ukiyo-e of the train passing through to Shinbashi Station. And then nowadays we have the electric trains of the Yamanote and the Keihin-Tohoku line going through here. Next stop, Yurakucho in that direction. But I like what they've done. They have renovated this just a little bit. They do have events on the plaza here, which is interesting. There's the Shinbashi building. Sorry, the new Shinbashi building.

15:05 John Daub: Alright, let's cut through the station. It was in the basement here that I saw the robot tourist information booth, which was fascinating. This is the Hibiya entrance. This entrance has been renovated about three years ago. Two years ago they completed it. It's really nice. It looks certainly newer than it did, which was a necessity. Shinbashi Station has always been pretty retro. Oh, this is the mini truffles. This bakery is very famous. Usually there's a line at the shop. Here you can see the fresh-baked bread. Is that a cinnamon roll? Oh my, that looks good. That looks too good.

16:31 John Daub: Alright, we're outside the Shinbashi Station. If you look up into the sky, a lot of character to this area. That's Shiodome. It's down in the basement here that I saw that robot tourist information thing. Never seen anything like it. Shiodome was built in the year 2000. So it's 25-year anniversary next year. Brand new area. It wasn't anything much in this area. And now it's skyscrapers and offices of Dentsu and certain other buildings over there. Let's cross the street now. We're getting over to Ginza. Bye bye Shinbashi. Again, this is one of my favorite places to stay if you are going to pick a hotel. Because of all the restaurants, it is a hub. There's a bus that will take you to Roppongi from here. That'll take you to Shibuya direct on the bus. But you can just jump on the Yamanote line and get there anyways. Shinbashi is very convenient. Up above us, the Shinkansen tracks right here. The Shinkansen tracks right above us. And these older ones are the Yamanote and the Keihin-Tohoku lines. The new one is the Shinkansen.

17:57 John Daub: Alright, this is where things get a little bit interesting. I believe the Hooters is over there. I'm always curious because they went out of business in Japan. Or at least the Akasaka one did which was their original. I'm not a fan of Hooters. I don't go to Hooters. But I'm kind of happy that they're here. It makes it feel like a touch of home. The wings are good. But I believe it's on the next one. Underneath here, underneath the highway is the Hooters. I believe it's still there. A couple of other restaurants here. I'm going to take you under the tracks just for a second. I want to show you something interesting. So, I hope the signal is okay. You can actually walk under the tracks. There's a walkway that will go right underneath the tracks. And there are restaurants that line the left and the right. So, be aware that there's some secrets inside of the alleys underneath the Yamanote line. Between Shinbashi and Yurakucho station. This is a very interesting alley. I've already tried to livestream it. There's no signal in there. Maybe I'll go back and see if I can livestream it again. But it's pretty deep between the tracks and cement everywhere. So, this side of the rail, the tracks, I just wanted to give you a quick look.

19:44 John Daub: This is where you see those cranes over there? They're going to start the construction on the Imperial Hotel. This is, you know, where Queen Elizabeth stayed. And a lot of other places. They're going to be renovating it. So, you can see it over in that direction. So, if you want to go take a look in the lobby. I would do that ASAP before they start their renovations. And nobody can go in there. And there's restaurants underneath the Yamanote line right here. Which are very good. You always find like secret places if you just kind of look around. Like this little bamboo forest that's growing here. No graffiti! There's an izakaya over there. They're saying one draft beer for, look at that price. That draft beer is 199 yen or a dollar, $1.50? That's cheap.

21:04 John Daub: The elections are coming here in Japan pretty soon. These are for the election posters for the candidates. There's the Shinkansen. Here's the entrance to the highway. As you can see, the highway. No pedestrians. No bicycles. Once you go up there. You've got to pay, cars only. You need an ETC card I believe. Which is like E-ZPass. Alright. This is a very important junction in Ginza. If you go this way. You're going to what's called Ginza Corridor. Lots of really nice restaurants in this place. A good place to find a place to eat. If you're not quite sure. Walk down Ginza Corridor. You'll find a place to eat. There's some bars there as well. If you walk in this direction. You get to Tsukiji-bashi. Which we've been to so many times in this show. And if you walk in this direction. Go straight. You get to the Don Quixote in Ginza. Make a left. You go down the main street. Which I'm not going to do. Because we've done that so many times already. What I'm going to do is to walk this way. And talk a little bit about Ginza Corridor.

22:39 John Daub: And this building right here. Now this. I don't know if this is a Kurosawa building. The guy who designed the capsule hotels. But it's a Shizuoka Shimbun, the Shizuoka newspaper building. And it's such a weird design to it. Sometimes they have a street food truck here. One of them is one of the best Mexican food trucks in Japan. He's based in Yamanashi. But he drives out here. I guess a business is better. He'll come here maybe once a week. I think Thursdays. But he's usually late. He's here about like 6:30 p.m. CNN broadcasted his truck. And he's been quite famous. I've written him a couple times on Instagram. Really nice guy. It's a bizarre building. So we go down Ginza Corridor. I see the chef doing some prep for food. It's quiet. Lunch time is just finishing up right now. Some of these restaurants have changed since the last time I was here. Another reason why it's good to go back through places. Tokyo seems to reinvent itself every five years. A lot of the restaurants that were here aren't anymore. And new ones take the place. There's a few oldies and goodies. But it's always sad to see them leave.

24:25 John Daub: We had a couple of themed restaurants that went out of business. Oh this is a wine bar. I've been here before. They open up these glass windows up to the street. And it's really nice to sip wine on the corner there. Hey Bianca that makes me happy that you were watching the... Here's an old marker. What's the significance of this thing? It's a stand for pigeons. You find a lot of these markers in Tokyo. Sometimes they're not marked exactly what they are. You have to ask local leaders or the tourist office. And sometimes the tourist office doesn't know what it is either. I'll show them a screenshot of this later. Has anyone tried Japanese wine before? It's available. It's always available because it's not very popular. But it's gaining some traction. Very little. It's always been sort of a harsh drink. Japanese wine. There's some good ones out there though.

25:50 John Daub: As you can see I think at dinnertime around 5:30 it really starts to get crowded in this area. This is one restaurant when people ask me can you, I'm in Ginza, where should I eat? I like this place as a recommendation and they're still in business. Right here. You see this on the left side? It looks like an old Meiji era restaurant. It's got that old, I guess like end of Edo, early Meiji feeling to it. I believe this is Tofuro? Or has it changed it again? Yeah, this is Tofuro. I've taken friends here many times that were visiting Japan. They have a very large menu. Like they're on the window. She's making soba here. Look at that, right in the window. That's pretty cool. Ah, sugoi, soba desu. She's working really hard. That's cool. Tofuro is a place where I brought a lot of friends here visiting Japan to Tofuro. Inside it, there's some really neat decorations. There's a tempura bowl here. You've got soba. Unagi. They have a lot of different things. They have some wagyu on the menu as well. So you get a little bit of everything. Wow, look at that good tofu there. The inside of the interior is really nice. They have a red bridge that looks like you're in a Japanese park inside. So for ambiance, food, the variety, it's definitely a recommendation. I don't think you need reservations, but you might want to do that in particular on the weekends. But with all the tourists here, you probably should call ahead. If you call ahead, they'll usually make sure you get a better table. If you come, you get whatever's left over. That's another reason to do it.

28:22 John Daub: We're looking forward to you, Ramsay Silent, making a visit here. Go hang out at Tofuro. I've been in this hub before as well. I haven't been to the hub in maybe 10 years though. British pub. This is where all the English teachers hang out. At least they used to. They close at midnight, I see. I had a point card. I was working on it from 2006. Until 2016. That was the last time I went in there for 10 years. I had points. I collected it. And then I looked at the back and they said, oh, sorry, it expired last week. I said, one week ago? I've been working on this for 10 years. And they said, sorry, nobody ever wants to honor that point card. So the hub point card was really worthless. It was painful whenever you asked. So like, can you do this? Could you honor it at another place? I guess they make the owners pay. That's why. It's a nice looking, it's an oyster bar that doesn't smell like oysters. It's really fresh in there. Check this one out. Raw, deep fried and garlic butter sauce there. Wow. I'm telling you, the Ginza Corridor. And this is sort of like a TGI Friday's vibe inside, but more local, I guess.

30:10 John Daub: Istanbul. The thing with the food here is that it's different than like a chef's. This is a very modern-looking restaurant. It's a really well-established place. This Turkish restaurant is quite good. It's not like fast food, like a kebab place. It's a proper restaurant type of place. Gosh. I wish they had a Romanian restaurant. There used to be one that went out of business. If you've never had Romanian food, it's really good. Sarmale, oh, with some țuică. Can't wait to go and visit my friends in Cluj-Napoca again. They have this dip that is made out of burnt meat, eggplants oh my gosh it's so good. This place is doing pretty good business they grill the fish out there right there so you get the smell of grilling food and makes you want to come into the shop. Wow 300 yen this place on the Ginza Corridor has a happy hour from 5:10 to 7 p.m. it's 300 yen for an Asahi Super Dry that is so cheap for a restaurant oh my goodness. Like I see cheap izakayas in an alley maybe to get people in but they don't need to do that this is Ginza Corridor you're getting a 300 yen beer in Ginza Corridor that's crazy.

31:41 John Daub: Sukiyaki hotel this is a chain for sure. They got a lunch sukiyaki 1690 yen for the wagyu beef sukiyaki large set that's pretty good. Oh those are the guys that check the parking meters and the bicycles. I came by train you can see here this is Tokyo Kobe beef is so far away. Kobe beef in Tokyo there are so many beef brands that are closer they do it in English just because everybody knows Kobe beef. Kobe beef is so far away there's Hitachi beef which is much closer I think is a comparable quality. People pay more for the Kobe beef so whenever I see it and if you see it in Osaka it's probably pretty good it's like dude it's the further away from Kobe the more there are other brands of wagyu beef that are just as good.

33:14 John Daub: All right you can walk underneath here there's a ramen alley underneath on the left side here with about 10 ramen shops and then there's an app there you can continue to walk underneath the Yamanote line through here let me take you and then we're gonna go to the right here so you can see this entrance will take you there that will take you all the way I think 300 meters. It will take you all the way to Yurakucho Station. It's pretty cool. And there's several restaurants underneath here. And you can hear the trains going by up above. Super interesting. I like it. You can sit outside in the alley as well. It's very unique. All right, let's take a right. There's the Imperial Hotel in Hibiya Park where that green is. That's Hibiya Park over there. And let's keep a move on. Keep it moving. We're going to get away from the highway, the shutoko (expressway), which is right above us. And we're going to walk past.

34:47 John Daub: You know, there's some properties that are like the property of death. Do you know what I mean? Like, no business ever survives at that location. That's this place right here where there's this Vinos and Yamazaki. It's changed so many times over the last 20 years. This used to be a place called Chronic Tacos from, like, California or something. They opened up a chain and now it's a... That went out of business fast. And then now it's called Vinos and Yamazaki, like a wine shop. Across the street is the Au Bon Pain [?]. I don't know how you would say it, but it's a French cafe where you can sit outside and see the world go by, I guess. It's a chain. There's a lot of locations. There's one in Shinbashi near the Montbell and the Prince Hotel. Now this is the most prestigious kindergarten you can see here in Japan. This kindergarten, the kids had to wear... Like, I've told this story maybe a few times before. The kids have to wear Armani suits. Like, it's a special uniform created by Armani. It was over $1,000. It raised a lot of eyebrows here, made the news. I don't know if they still gotta do that, but the parents have to spring for this kind of uniform. It's not cheap. And they're like kindergartners. They're young kids, so they're gonna grow out of it. It sounds like something they can wear for more than a year. The tailored. It's pretty wild stuff.

36:39 John Daub: So on this walk, we get to go past there. Now we're in the heart of Ginza. We're basically at Tsukiji-bashi. But I don't really wanna go on the main roads here. I wanna take ya to a different area. So what we're gonna do is cross the street here, go past the Kumamoto store, where you can get a Kumamon. I think it's over there. Oh no, it's right there. That brown shop, I believe, is the Kumamoto building, where you can get a Kumamon doll. They're not very expensive, comparatively, because Kumamon doesn't have a copyright on there. It's pretty much free to use for just about anyone. I remember when I was making a Jet Bunny's mascot episode, one of the successes, the reason why Kumamon really took off, is because the prefecture says, please use Kumamon. So he's on promotions for so many things, almost a representative of Japan.

38:20 John Daub: The streets of Ginza are a big contrast to where we just were 30 minutes ago. That's a new hotel. I believe that's a new Marriott. Looks quite nice and, of course, quite pricey. But if you have some Bonvoy points, it might be worth splurging at that location. It's really nice. Typically in Japan, you get what you pay for. If you just need a room, a box, you're gonna get that. This is quite famous as well. Some of the old whiskey bars. There's the Ginza 6 building. I've been up there. From that angle, you can get a really nice view from the garden, looking down onto the street, in particular on the weekends when they shut the roads down.

40:00 John Daub: Alright, we're walking around. What is this here? Like, I'm always finding interesting shops. This is Pierre Marcolini of Brussels. Maybe the most poorly run city in Europe right now. But it sure looks good. It's like macarons. Somebody said, don't go to Brussels. I was like, why? And then I researched it. I'm like, oh wow, there's a lot of crime there. Oh, wow! Bánh cuốn [?]. I love bánh cuốn. It's a cake that's rolled like that. It's got that sugar crisp on the outside of it, usually. Sometimes I don't do that. It's so good. The shop owner, the attendant waved at me. I'm like, yeah, I wanna go in there too. I need a cup of coffee with that. Something's gonna be built here. Oh my god, bánh cuốn is... I never knew, I'd never seen bánh cuốn until I came to Japan. Same with shu cream, these cream puffs. I'd never seen that until I came to Japan. Sorry, the wind has picked up here a little bit.

41:39 John Daub: Hello. Yeah, you tracked me down here. I did it over 35 years ago. Oh, wow! I know how to build the shoes. Okay. From Denmark. Yeah, again. Did I have those last time? No, it was in 2019. Actually, it was close to exactly five years ago. Oh, wow! Before the pandemic. No, I said the word. Oh, no. Oh, you wanna say hi to everybody? Yeah. Hey. Hey, how's it going? So I got these. Is this from the Carlsberg Brewery? Yes. Oh, wow. Oh, very cool. I had some... Somebody gave me... Was that you? Yeah. From your grandmother? Yeah, it was me. I still have those. Now I remember. I got these really nice Danish beer coasters. And they had a very sentimental, like a... From your... It was nice. Welcome back. What are you doing this time in Japan?

42:44 Caller: It's my 30th birthday...

42:46 John Daub: Happy birthday! Yeah, not today. What is it?

42:50 Caller: Close to two weeks ago. I was in Fukushima at Ebisu Circuit, drifting for the first time.

42:57 John Daub: Oh, cool.

43:02 Caller: And then just traveling, seeing stuff. Also been to Hakone. Drive the Hakone Skyline, the roads around there.

43:09 John Daub: Oh, Hakone, yeah. That's a nice road, yeah. Very good. You've had nice weather.

43:14 Caller: Yeah, great weather. Not too much rain. The rainy season is like about a week away, it feels like.

43:19 John Daub: Yeah, I'm leaving next week. Oh, really? Okay. Very good. What are you up to today?

43:27 Caller: Actually not much. I was just looking around, seeing I was going to Tokyo.

43:31 John Daub: Okay. My plan was actually to go to Tokyo Station, to a Tokyo car shop where you can assemble your own car.

43:41 Caller: Oh yeah, yeah. That's a good place.

43:43 John Daub: But if you use the pass, then they will assemble it for you. You're going to go over there?

43:48 Caller: That's the plan.

43:49 John Daub: Okay. You can go there completely underground, actually. Yeah, if you go underground, it connects up with Tokyo Station through the International Forum. But it's... Maybe on such a night like this. On such a nice day like today. That doesn't make a lot of sense. But if it was raining. Yeah. Very cool. I'm glad that you made it back here to Tokyo.

44:10 Caller: Oh, yeah. I remember one thing more.

44:12 John Daub: Oh. A little piece of Danish candy with the best name maybe for anything.

44:22 Caller: It's Vingummi.

44:24 John Daub: Oh, very cool. Is this like the licorice?

44:28 Caller: No, just like Vingummi, like a Haribo.

44:32 John Daub: Did you give me licorice? You gave me licorice last time?

44:34 Caller: Yeah, in this car. I remember the licorice.

44:37 John Daub: If you haven't been... I think everybody's been to... Have you been to Denmark yet? For me, Denmark is red hot dogs, Carlsberg, gammel dansk, and black licorice.

44:47 Caller: Yeah.

44:49 John Daub: And go' morgen gum [?].

44:51 Caller: Yeah.

44:53 John Daub: Marshmallow stuff they put on an ice cream. I didn't know what it was last time, but I got scolded when I came back.

44:58 Caller: Oh, you figured it out?

44:59 John Daub: Yeah, what it was. We got it at this colorful buildings in the... In the center of town, there was an ice cream place. My friend said, you got to get that with go' morgen gum. I'm like, what? And it was really good. Sweet, thick. Yeah. That Danish. Well, thank you for this. I'm going to walk around. You can join me if you want. I'm just going to go here for about 30 minutes.

45:22 Caller: Yeah, I actually started going there because I saw a walk.

45:27 John Daub: Okay. And took the kids and I walked to the station you arrived. You arrived doing that. And then I got a little bit of a shock. You know what? I was like, you have to look at the screens to find you. Oh, yeah. It's kind of fun. It's like 30 minutes. Thank you for this. I'm going to put this away. Thank you for that.

45:45 John Daub: Wow, look at this. This is a new Onitsuka Tiger, which was the competitor to Nike. If you've ever read Phil Knight's book called Shoe Dog, Onitsuka Tiger was the inspiration for Nike and it came to Japan many times. It's funny to see the brand really proliferating. Really growing. But it's at nowhere near Nike's level. We've got the Dutch waffles here is that Dutch company I don't know yeah I say that because oh maybe Belgium because I see the Pepee boy okay Belgian waffles yeah. Over there is my favorite prefectural store which is the Nagano store always stop in there you can get some good stuff and then there's a really good tempura place um get a bowl of tendon but we want to put Michael Sasada's money uh I gotta get this did you want to yeah why not okay get you this blueberry daifuku pair. I'm not going to be able to share the texture but I guess it's all mochi here this is seasonal so right now it's a blueberry season. I gotta get one for Kanae too so we'll use this one gotta get that for Leo and Kanae.

48:48 John Daub: That's the way you're going to go to the store in Nagano. I'm going to go to the store in Nagano. It's a Japanese product. I don't know what it is. It's a domestic product. Thank you. The price is 280 yen. Please check it. Thank you. Alright, you got it. Let's try this. You're not a mochi guy?

49:48 Caller: No, I'm not.

49:53 John Daub: Oh, wow. It's very soft. Here, we can just try it here. I wanted to try this because it's very sweet. The thing with Akebono here, all of this is seasonal. The daifuku is all seasonal. So, right now, until the end of June, they have blueberry daifuku. You can see the construction behind us too. This is crazy. Right in the center of Ginza. I've never had a blueberry daifuku before. Itadakimasu. Wow. That's a fresh blueberry. Very sweet, white anko bean paste. There's a mochi mochi, of course, mochi around it. Quite nice. It's a little on the pricey end. It's like ¥324 for one, but for a little bit of a snack. Yeah, no, the price is ¥324 right now. So, I think it's worth it for me. Well, thank you for that.

51:15 John Daub: I'm actually going to get to the chicken. I'm going to take a lot of fries. I'm going to get a little bit of a bite of the chicken. So, I'm going to take a little bit of the chicken. Maybe catch you tomorrow. It's alright. So, the bell that you just heard is up there on Wako, on the intersection here at Yonchome. It's been, I don't know, a hundred years or more that Wako Bell's been going. We're talking before World War II, I believe. After that, a lot of this was bombed out, had to be reconstructed. The firebombing of March 10, 1945 really devastated this part of Tokyo as well. But there used to be, it's hard to imagine, but there used to be a streetcar that went right down the middle of Chuo Dori, up and down. I think they took that out in the middle of the Showa period. But they finished the renovations of the subway stations here, so the entrances are quite nice. The Sony building is not done so. Sony's inside of the Nissan building, which is funny.

52:38 John Daub: What am I supposed to do? They're walking right at me. Have you had this one yet? This is right there. This is the original shrimp sando, the ebi katsu sando. Maybe one of the best. Just outside of the Showa Street. That's really good. The wagyu beef sandwich. Kimura-ya since 1869, which is the Meiji era. The emperor liked the anpan that they made and the baked goods did not come to Japan, really. Of course, the Portuguese brought stuff, but it didn't become mainstream until this shop. Bread is more... There's anpan, which is very popular, just butter and red bean paste. There's some good bread with a lot of history behind it. But the cafes up here have some restaurants. You can get an ebi katsu sando. I highly recommend it. Something maybe to take away for a snack later. Interesting. But this street is always changing. Always changing. I bet you that building's gonna go soon too. Looks like the leftover from the bubble era, the 80s. That design is very cool.

54:27 John Daub: And this is pretty much where we're gonna leave you. This is now going to Ginza Ichome, which is the Ginza One neighborhood. So you can see a lot. In 45 minutes walking around, now 50 minutes walking around Tokyo from one side to the other. You have a starting point and then you have a goal. And you see a bunch of stuff. Got in about I don't know, 5,000 steps or so. Forgot my step counter. This used to be the Apple building. They moved it to the other side of Ginza. Now something else is coming in. We're not quite sure. But yeah. You've seen this a thousand times. Alright. That's all we got for this live stream. If you have any questions, you can leave it in the comments below. If you want to see a map of about where I went, there's a link in the description as well. The postcard this month I believe is gonna be the Kawaguchiko black egg with Mt. Fuji in the background. It has to be done. It's sort of in the news right now. So on Patreon you can join the postcard club helps to support the channel. Yeah there's always a course that we did today. It's supposed to take 26 minutes. You better double that. Alright everybody. Have a good day. See you in the next episode. Mata ne.