00:00:01 John Daub: Hello, everybody. I think we are live today. I wanted to talk a little bit about the dangers of Japanese beaches. Swimming in Japan, you would think would be safe. Japan is a relatively safe country in society. But when it comes to natural disasters, Japan is maybe one of the most dangerous, if not the most dangerous. We've got typhoons, tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides. We've got the Pacific Ocean, which in itself has very strong currents. I think if you're coming from maybe like the Gulf of Mexico or Europe or New York, for example, the rip currents and rip tides are not as strong as they are in the Pacific.

00:00:47 John Daub: I learned that out by just standing in it when I first got here to Japan. I don't think I'd ever been in the Pacific Ocean until I came here. And I remember it's just a lot stronger. And for tourists in China, I think it is also something that they're not quite used to. If you take a look at this map here, two tourists, one of them in particular, two tourists who were swimming just north of Shimoda in Izu, Shizuoka Prefecture, one of them in a yellow inner tube, like a tire inner tube type of thing, was pulled out to sea 80 kilometers. And that's the focus of this episode.

00:01:29 John Daub: Also, there have been some jellyfish found on the beaches in Wakayama. And the jellyfish are another reason why Japanese beaches are not so ideal in the summertime. Portuguese man o' war—you ever heard of those? Those are not the type of jellyfish you want to be messing with—found on beaches in Wakayama. I'll get into that in a little bit. But I want to just talk about the craziness of this story. Now, this is a very long way to go. If you are swimming, you're on the beach, you're just swimming right outside of her hotel. I'm sure her friend was freaking out and she was too, getting dragged. Again, you see she's going past Oshima, going into the Pacific. The way that the currents go, it pulls up north and out towards the Pacific, just cutting across. I guess it's the Kuroshio current (黒潮，black tide). We'll take a look at that in a second here. But you can see that it's going to be a little bit of a drag.

00:02:36 John Daub: She had traveled 36 hours. And just, I'm glad it was in July. This was about three weeks ago. I'm glad it was in July because the water temperatures are relatively warm. Had it been maybe a month earlier, probably, I don't know if she would have made it because the water temperatures do raise quite a bit in July. Let's take a look at some of the video here. It was startling to me when I saw that she was coming off of the boat. You can't really see her face the way the Japanese news is reporting it, but you can feel kind of that being trapped in an inner tube on the ocean for so long. You get a feel that the Pacific Ocean is massive. I don't know if you realize how big it is until you look on the map and see like most of the world is filled with that blue stuff, the oceans, the Pacific being the biggest.

00:03:38 John Daub: A tanker had apparently spotted her and they had called the coast guard. The coast guard came with the helicopter, swooped down, picked her up. Thank goodness that that tanker found her. This reminds me of the story from John Mungichi [?], one of the greatest stories in Japanese history, a fisherman who was carried away by a storm in the exact same direction that she was going. He was lucky enough to catch an island. Here's the helicopter picking her up. He caught an island and was trapped there for like six months with no food and water and three other friends. And he was rescued by a whaler ship in the 19th century. She was rescued by a helicopter. Thank goodness for that. What a task and good job for those that were out there to rescue her.

00:04:34 John Daub: The story made the news here in Japan, and a lot of people started to wonder like, how could this happen? How could tourists not know how strong the currents are? What, was the beach not marked? And this is where Japan starts to self-reflect on what went wrong in this kind of situation. The beaches have lifeguards in the summertime. The beaches have signs in Japanese, which is something that they're going to have to reconsider because foreign tourists can't read the Japanese signs all the time. But there are certain things that municipalities locally are going to have to start to think about as more foreign tourists start to consider swimming in the ocean here. If you've got a beach—which is a pretty good chance in Japan being an island—you have to really consider some of the dangers involved with that.

00:05:25 John Daub: When I first came to Japan, I was shocked. Here's the images of Chiba. Luckily she didn't go too far past there because then you start getting away from where the ships come in and she would not have been found. Here's the helicopter picking her up. You could see the yellow inner tube. It does not look very big, which is kind of shocking that they were able to find her. Like the tanker saw her, saw that she was in distress, called the coast guard, brought him in and then she was rescued. Her friend, I don't know, the story didn't really pick up too much after that. But when I saw this on the news, I'm like, well, this is a good reminder when you do go swimming in Japan or you want to go to the beach, because it's so darn hot here in Tokyo, you're going to want to get some relief. Going to the beach is one way you would think.

00:06:06 John Daub: I have friends down in Zushi, which is the most famous beach in the Tokyo area, Zushi, Kanagawa Prefecture. Right now, the reports are that there are a lot of jellyfish in the water. So these are the kinds that sting you. So when you get onto the beach, you have to watch where you step and you also have to watch when you're swimming. You might want to have body suits. You see a lot of people doing that. The reason why is because of getting stung by the jellyfish. And I didn't even consider this because in the Atlantic, we never, I can't recall ever having to worry about jellyfish that much. But in Japan, in the summertime, the waters get really warm and the jellyfish, because of this current...

00:07:00 John Daub: It's called the Kuroshio current. And the way that it moves, it's also nicknamed the black current. Probably because it's been taking people out to sea for millennia. But the way that it works is you can see the Pacific Ocean in the north there just goes around in a circle. And the way that Japan is positioned, that massive current will be pulling you along the coast. It's just plucking people off of the beach. You see that big line here is that current that she was getting swept into. And the water, depending on the tide, is ripping you out into that current. And you're going to go out to sea predictably to Alaska, most likely. But that's the Kuroshio current, which is pretty crazy. Be careful when you go on the Pacific Ocean.

00:07:54 John Daub: I'm looking at the live chat. If you, chat, if you have some questions, please do ask. I think this is a good time to kind of reflect on some of the dangers in the summertime. Another story that I wanted to talk to you about is the one of jellyfish. These jellyfish were discovered on the beach in Wakayama Prefecture just a few days ago. And they have signs all over the place. But none of the signs say that they found Portuguese man o' war jellyfish on the beach in English. So this could be a problem. Luckily, Wakayama is not a place where a lot of foreign tourists go to. But if you didn't know the kanji for jellyfish, you would not understand why the beaches were closed. So I think that a lot of the municipalities have to do a better job of it.

00:09:53 John Daub: Basically, when you go to Japanese beaches, wherever you go around the country, please do... When you get off at the train station, please go into the local information offices. They're usually in the train station or around the train station if they have one. It's very important to have local knowledge. It's very important to ask locals about the beach that you're about to swim in before you do it. I know a lot of people, you see a beach and you want to go in there, but you don't know if it's protected or not. It's good to get that local knowledge because again, you don't know what's going on with the situation out there on the beaches. If there's jellyfish there, if the riptide isn't particularly strong today, why isn't there a lifeguard there? There's a lot of concern right now that tourists aren't getting this kind of information.

00:10:50 John Daub: It is summer, so it's just one of those things you kind of have to think about because Japan is, in particular, a very dangerous place. Those in Hawaii, I see we've got a lot of people that are in Hawaii watching because of the time that we just happen to be live streaming. Yeah, there's a lot of people who know about this, but the majority don't because they've never swum in the Pacific Ocean who are coming here to Japan. And as Japan gets more of a popular destination, more people who have never swum in the Pacific Ocean are coming here than ever. So there's a higher risk that something could happen. But yeah, Japanese beaches are a little bit dangerous. And I think you really do have to be mindful of that. And I think you really do have to be mindful of the local information and the lifeguards and go to beaches that have lifeguards because in this case, it could save your life.

00:11:51 John Daub: Carrie writes in here, I'm expecting to see a monster jellyfish climb out of the water, Godzilla-style. In the Pacific Ocean, you don't know—it's so darn big and deep. You just kind of figure there's got to be some massive stuff in there. Godzilla could be another thing that you should be worried about. Marianas Trench is like 10 Mount Everests put into one. If you've ever seen the movie Abyss, you know, anything could happen. That's one of those great James Cameron movies from the beginning. I love that movie. The mysteries of the Pacific are here. And yeah, Godzilla could be one of them indeed.

00:12:36 John Daub: The lady, yeah, thank you, John. Yes, she is absolutely a survivor. And I think some of the news media was talking about her age certainly helped. The warmer water certainly helped. The time of year and 36 hours later, the time that she was lost and the time of day just happened to be like she slipped through the cracks. Because there's a lot of boat traffic going along there towards the city of Tokyo. So the fact that she was missed, first of all, it's possible because it's not very big. She wasn't in a big raft. But it was lucky that she picked a bright color. Reasons why life jackets should be like yellow or very bright green. You just never know. Don't pick like a blue life jacket, for example. Pick something that's really going to stand out. And you have a better chance of being discovered.

00:13:28 John Daub: People wonder why I'd rather go to space than the beach. Space, I think if you're going out to space and you get lost, you just have to figure that you're not going to be discovered at all, at least until the end of time. Unless there's life out there, which probably there is. You have a better chance of being discovered in the ocean. But then again, I think that the ocean is just scarier. It's colder. There's winds. There's rain. There's things underneath you. There's sharks. Yeah, maybe space isn't so bad after all. The Abyss, that movie, was just remastered into 4K. I thought James Cameron was never going to do that. But it's apparently been remastered into 4K. And I think it's on Netflix or Amazon Prime.

00:14:30 John Daub: Did you notice a beach swarmed by dragonflies? I know that there was a ton of dragonflies in the summertime all around Japan. I also know that in particular the Sea of Japan side, there's a lot of fireflies, which is really beautiful. Down in Mount Daisen near Yonago. In June in particular, when the weather starts to warm up, there's fireflies. I've never seen a density of fireflies. Just happy because Yonago has some of the cleanest, Mount Daisen has some of the cleanest water in the world, I think. There were some happy fireflies because they were everywhere. It was so bright outside there. So it's kind of neat to see the fireflies now with the world getting more populated and more pollution. The fireflies, very unique creatures. If the water's dirty, they can't survive very well. So seeing them is a sign of really clean water.

00:15:29 John Daub: And tourists are actually going to Yonago to see the fireflies. So the dragonflies in the summer are also something that you'll find all over the place. But I haven't seen them at the beach that I can recall. Maybe because it is quite windy usually with the beach on the shore. There's usually winds that keep things like dragonflies away. Just the seagulls can manage there. But I would like to see a swarm of dragonflies. That would be pretty cool.

00:16:01 John Daub: If you haven't already, I have a video that just released here. Nara right now is an amazing destination to go and visit because of not just the deer and the hiking and the nature. It's a little bit cooler out there in the woods perhaps. But Todaiji (東大寺), which is one of the biggest wooden buildings in the world, has the big cleaning of the massive statue. There's a big Buddhist statue which is 50 feet high, 15 meters high. And they're doing that cleaning in about three days from now, which is crazy. So I released this video in a timely fashion. I filmed it last year. And if you go to YouTube right now on the platform, on my main channel, I just released this video. And I do hope that some of you go and check it out.

00:17:05 John Daub: It's called How Japan Cleans. And it's a fascinating look at how 200 people about will get on top of this statue. First, they do a blessing to take the life out of the statue because in Buddhism, they believe that the statue is like a living thing. And there's a haken (開眼，eye-opening ceremony [?]), a prayer that they do to remove the life from the statue so they can climb upon it. So there's a lot of little details in this video that I didn't learn until I actually went and interviewed the chief abbot of Todai-ji Temple, who I met like six, seven years ago. Extremely nice person. We did a business card exchange. And I contacted him after the pandemic and said, look, I would love to come and film this story because I'd never seen it on YouTube done in a way that I think that I could bring it. I want to tell the background around it. And I was able to get press access. Nobody's ever done this before on YouTube.

00:18:18 John Daub: I was able to show you and bring you inside the temple and show you how they work. Look at them. They're just little people. It reminds me of Fraggle Rock. You guys remember that TV show? Fraggle Rock. Like all these little Doozers [?] here doing their best to try to clean that massive wooden statue inside that massive wooden building. It's a pretty good episode. I think you're really going to like it. It's only about 11 minutes long. Go check it out. Leave me a comment. Let me know what you thought about it. These kinds of attractions that don't seem like attractions to Japanese are super attractions to people like me and you.

00:19:07 John Daub: They don't use any power. No electricity doing it. It's kind of an analog thing. So I think that once you learn the background of this cleaning, I hope it's something that people go to see. Now, keep in mind, you have to get there. If you're day tripping from Kyoto, you better get there like at 7 a.m. Because this thing starts really early. It's over by 9. Let me just put it to you like that. And if you're getting there at 9, you might be just catching the butt end of it. So unless you're inside of Todaiji and it's about like a 15 to 20 minute walk from the station. You better get there like really early, like 7 o'clock. First train out or spend the night in Nara if you really want to see the cleaning.

00:19:51 John Daub: As soon as they opened up, you can as a tourist go and see this when they opened it up. There weren't a lot of tourists there because not a lot of tourists wake up at 7 or 8 a.m. to go and see the Todaiji Temple, which is a shame because in the summertime, that's the ideal time to go and see Todaiji Temple. So just a little bit of a hint. You can go there on the 7th. But you also want to note that you probably should go there early in the morning on the 7th and you get the whole city to yourself as well. It's really quiet and peaceful and really cooler too. Because the heat right now is unbearable. You get in the sun with the humidity. It is just that.

00:20:39 John Daub: So I hope that this story not just the Buddha, but this about the beaches and the dangers of being in Japan. I hope it's just clear to you that if you do go to the beach in Japan and you do have a swimsuit. Maybe you're not even going to be going in the water because of the jellyfish. So just keep that in mind. Swimming in Japan. Maybe bring more water so you can douse yourself and feel like you went to the beach. Maybe not going very deep. But just be mindful if you don't see signs for the jellyfish. There's a good chance that there are.

00:21:12 John Daub: Like when I came to Japan 26 years ago, which is crazy to think about it. My Japan anniversary passed 26 years now. This is me entering my 27th. The one thing I thought was really weird was they close the beaches like on August 30th. And when September 1st, even if it is a hot, sunny day, the beaches are closed in Japan. In the US, we go on to like Labor Day, right? In Japan, September 1st, there's no more lifeguards. The beaches closed down. All the kids go back to school. It seems like and it's summer's over. Nobody's going to the beach. It's like August 30th. And then September 1st is like night and day.

00:22:09 John Daub: And the reason why I was told was just even right now, there's just too many jellyfish. And when September comes in, it's just like understood. You don't go into the ocean anymore. Because the jellyfish have come closer to the coast and it's just uncomfortable to go and swim. Now, if you're in a boat, you go swimming in the ocean. It's okay. Also, just be mindful of the currents, too. But if you are coming from the beach, the jellyfish do come in closer because the water is a lot warmer there. And it can be kind of crazy. After I went to the beach in September, I realized it. But when I came here 26 years ago, I really didn't know why Japan was like night and day. It's like 40, 35 degrees Celsius, which is like, you know, 90s. People still want to go to the beach, right? Why wouldn't you just keep it going? Japanese don't go to the beach because of the jellyfish. That's mostly the reason why.

00:23:30 John Daub: The best time to go to the beach is probably right after the rainy season. Like there's a couple of a few good weeks. Not all beaches are the same either. Some beaches might be fine. They might have a net that keeps out the jellyfish. So you just want to check. But for most of the local areas in Japan, they don't have like nets and stuff. It's a Pacific freaking ocean. There's going to be some jellyfish coming into the shore. And apparently at Zushi, which is the most famous and most well-known party beaches, fun beaches, sort of, you know, like you got that fun vibe beach. That's Zushi. There's a lot of jellyfish right now. So it's not the most ideal situation to be going into the Pacific Ocean.

00:24:13 John Daub: And after you saw that poor girl getting dragged out 80 kilometers for 36 hours, maybe you might just want to stick to like Tokyo Skytree and just kind of hanging out at Odaiba Beach, which is what me and my son did yesterday since mom was working. All right, everybody. That's all I have for you. I'm going to answer some of the questions that you submitted in the last live stream. Well, the live stream a few days ago and every day for the rest of the month. I'm going to try my very best to have some content rolling out to you. This is the content for August 4th and we'll see what more content we can get out for August 5th and 6th and 7th and for the rest of the month.

00:24:54 John Daub: So if you have a question about anything in Japan, you can always leave it in the comments below. And I'm going to be trying to take the ones that really impact this community the most. And I'm going to be cutting those out and then putting them on the screen and then answering them as I walk around on location doing other things. One of the things I can do is answer some of your questions, record them, upload them later, and then share a little bit of information about the area of Japan that I'm in. Pretty cool stuff. And I hope that this channel becomes a really good resource for you when you come to visit Japan. Anyways, go check out the main channel. Leave me a comment there. We got 14,000 wonderful people who've already gone and watched that video. So thank you so much for the support, everybody. And I'll see you in another live stream really soon. If you're going out swimming, be careful. Matane.