00:00:01 John Daub: Happy New Year! We are back! It's been a while since I last saw you guys on this channel. We were trapped at JFK, me and Leo having flown from Tokyo to JFK in something of an East Coast snowstorm where we had to stay overnight at a great hotel. That episode was very interesting. Go back and take a look at it from a couple of weeks ago. But time flies. It's crazy to think that we're already 11 days into 2026 and I haven't live streamed or given much news to anybody except for those that are on Patreon.

00:01:30 John Daub: We ended the year with a really tough month. I don't want to get too much into it. I like to focus on the positive stuff, but just a little bit of a breakdown. In December, we lost a family member, Kanae. I think it's something that perhaps she should talk about because it has to do a lot with both of us. But we lost a family member and she had to have surgery. I think you can read between the lines there. It's not something that parents like to talk about. And it was really hard for us because of complications. She had to stay behind. And Leo and I went to the United States, just the two of us. It was a really heartbreaking end to the year.

00:02:45 John Daub: But we were able to resurrect something of a Christmas spirit, having Leo and I in the U.S. with family and then calling Kanae, who was with her father and her relatives in Japan and connect via FaceTime or Line or some of the video chats that we were doing back and forth, like twice a day to make sure that she was OK. We waited until after the surgery to go and to see if she could come with us to the United States. Of course, she had complications and she couldn't come, just precautions. The one thing you'll learn about Japan with medicine is that they always take extra precautions, which is a good thing. Thank you so much, Matt, and everybody who's writing in here. I know it's a tough thing for me to talk about. I'm trying to look forward with this, but it's still pretty fresh events.

00:04:00 John Daub: Not too long after that, and it was almost a blessing that my wife had to stay behind. I don't want to get too much into this because I want to look forward to the year. But I think you guys deserve some explanation why I haven't been on for a while. And I don't want to because this is something of a shock to all of us. We have a relative who's very ill with cancer, I guess we can just name it. And it's going to be a battle for the entire family. The doctors missed it in November in a checkup, and there was some coughing. We took this family member to the hospital and they found it, stayed in the hospital overnight. We were all really super concerned after we'd gotten through this one ordeal. Another one jumped up.

00:05:15 John Daub: And whenever you have someone—and Jeffrey in Philadelphia knows this all too well because I've been talking with him—someone who's lost somebody from cancer, it's a battle for the family. And now we have to fight really hard as a family to keep our spirits really high to get through this next challenge. It's part of life, this never-ending fight that we have with events and challenges that we get, not just with ourselves, but with our family members. And you have to be there for them. And we're going to do as much as I possibly can while keeping the channel coming. The content coming because I know you guys are here for that. But that's a little bit of the stuff that's going on behind the scenes. It's just a rough, challenging time. And in the storm, you have to have some sort of balance inside of your life.

00:06:30 John Daub: And I think I have to be the balance for my wife and she for me when I'm having a tough time. And we try to manage that with Leo, who's our four-year-old son, and that's also a challenge. But there are times where she's gone and I have to watch Leo and take care of him. And to do that in a loving way and responsible way is very important. That's just the way that I was brought up and that's just the way it sometimes goes. And that allows that if I focus on my family and get through some of these challenges that I need to do and do it in the right way. I think opens up the ability for me to make more content successfully going forward. And that's really the ultimate plan, I think, to make sure that we focus on the family, we get through the challenging stuff.

00:07:45 John Daub: And this family member is getting treatment, which is great. We've been diagnosed. Had a biopsy. We're waiting on that. And once we get some more information, we can start to take steps into this. But the shock is over with this for most of us. And now we're leaning into finding solutions and a plan for this and this family member. A lot of you who do know me a little bit and been talking to me have been very helpful with that. And I really appreciate it.

00:08:30 John Daub: OK, so the channel, that's my own personal stuff. I don't want to get too much into it because we all have personal lives. It's not something I like to drag the community into, but sometimes you need an explanation to understand what's going on behind the scenes. I do apologize that I didn't get as much content out in 2025 as I planned to. But I guarantee 2026 is going to—I guarantee every year is going to be a positive year because I'm a hopeful, helpless optimist. I guess you could say I'm going to be optimistic no matter what, because I think and that's just my outlook on life in general.

00:09:30 John Daub: So I'm hopeful that you have to be positive and just when you get knocked down, you have to look at the positives and what you have and focus on that and work on this stuff that a lot of it can be overcome pretty easily. I'm talking in general terms. But the way I do things is I try to stay as positive as possible. And it's been really hard watching all the content on how Japan is bad. I see what's going on. How Japan, Shinjuku is how Japan is a dangerous place. Shinjuku is a place where you go and people are fighting. Don't forget the smell today. Mahalo, Brandi, is in the house. Thank you so much. I love you. Thanks. I can't wait to see you later on this year too, Brandi. So either here or in Hawaii, who knows.

00:10:45 John Daub: I think for the family we're going to need some time to decompress too so maybe a family trip is on the horizon like on Wednesday. So I want to talk about a couple of things that are going on with the channel some of the stuff that's going on behind the scenes with the channel now that I've been able to tell you a little bit about what's happening in our personal life. As you can see Leo is getting really big and talkative and who knows he might be the face of the channel sooner than later I guess you could say it's pretty extraordinary to see.

00:11:45 John Daub: Right now I'm working. I'm actually editing a main channel video right now. I'm doing the live stream right now. I'm doing my very best to shift into gear as it's now Sunday going into Monday. Japanese are off back to work in full strength. This is the first week back to work starting tomorrow so the country shuts down pretty much until about Monday and they started work last week but it's not until this Monday that really the shift starts. It's kind of a slow start to the year. There are retail workers that of course are working 24/7 and we appreciate it but office workers and stuff I think it's this Monday is the real reality check to be honest.

00:13:00 John Daub: So yeah I'm back to work now. I could show you on the other side here. See here's the um I'm chatting here I'm working on this video. This is um Japanese strawberry video. I just want to show you the opening to it to give you a little bit of an idea on what's coming in the channel. I also have something on Japan's stinkiest food and gosh the climb of Mount Fuji. I'm right here in the reflection. Let me just play this for you give you a little idea. Oh that's like a very variety. Let me just play this for you give you a little idea. Why is this here? Japan is over 300 strawberry varieties all racing to be the sweetest juiciest and most beautiful berry. In Tochigi is Japan's top seller sweet tart loved everywhere upgraded in 2020 to be even better. In Saitama candy sweet Amari three-time national champion and deep red Benitama deliver a one two punch igniting dessert cravings. Strawberry battle variety in the late 1800s to today's flavor packed fruit war.

00:14:30 John Daub: All right I get I added a couple of things here found a way to engineer and make the perfect one so it's about the uh that's the opening. It's always fun to edit and put in the music. It's kind of a spoiler video. I just wanted to show you a little bit of that especially the Patreon in the scenes. Oh hey thank you so much. I see David is here. Welcome back Mr. Dob. I'm very happy to be back. You know I feel pretty rusty doing live streams. It's a skill that you can get rusty with if you don't do it quite often talking in front of a camera talking with people but it comes back to you like riding a bicycle I suppose.

00:15:45 John Daub: But I was kind of nervous setting this up. It had been a while. I think I don't done only like four or five live streams. The uh rotating berry looks yeah it was fun. I have a this rotating um disc thing that you can put stuff and it gives you a 3D three-dimensional angle if you do it really slowly. If you film it in 120p you can do it even slower which is cool so you can control the speed a little bit more but filming in 8k you get some pretty good details with this kind of stuff so I've been using that a little bit more. It's fun to travel with that thing too so it's a little bit of a dimension to the content.

00:17:00 John Daub: So this episode will be coming this month as well as maybe two or three more. I'm gonna do my very best to edit this out and try to get it this Saturday sorry this Wednesday. Leo Kanae and I will be traveling to Kyoto the city that we kind of love to hate to love. It's the overcrowded city of Japan let's just put it let's keep it what it is. It's the cultural heart of Japan that is overcrowded with tourists from all over the world which is a good thing for Japan I guess and it's a bad thing because you don't see Kyoto the way perhaps you should see it which is a relaxing time but there are times where Kyoto does shine early in the morning and I'll be taking you there in live streams.

00:18:15 John Daub: But the purpose of it is to focus on a main channel episode. We have a um a job to do which is to highlight um well it's a job and we're going to be highlighting I don't want to spoil it too much but I'm going to be working on that and try to get this episode out to you as soon as possible. Another family vacation where we get a chance to take you to another spot especially a popular one like Kyoto and highlight something that is not actually we're using Kyoto as the backdrop to highlight something else which is kind of fun so I'm excited about that.

00:19:15 John Daub: So I'll try to do some live streams Wednesday Thursday Friday on this channel bringing you to Kyoto and taking some questions about Kyoto over tourism and maybe get impressions on what our three days were like in Kyoto. We'll be leaving there on Wednesday coming back on Friday so tonight's three days in a hotel. I'm kind of looking forward to it. It's a break but it's work so I got a lot of planning. I've been planning this for the last three or four weeks behind the scenes. I'm calling locations we have a restaurant booked we have uh I have a rental car to take you on a day trip from Kyoto so you get to see an area outside of Kyoto from Kyoto so it's going to be a pretty good episode looking forward to that.

00:20:30 John Daub: Getting out of Tokyo with Kanae who's doing a lot better thank you guys. Live streaming wise there's I love this live streaming going and taking you out on the gimbal here but so many people are doing it nowadays it's getting like what is really valuable to you. I don't want to make content just to make content that's not fun that doesn't show the passion that I have for this so I have to find topics that resonate with you most. Most of that is outside of Tokyo and I can only make great content outside of Tokyo when I'm not in Tokyo but I'm in Tokyo because I live here editing all the time that's why you get a lot of Tokyo content on this channel so I'm hoping thank you Walter good to see you live again take all the time you need to get back into the YouTube saddle family is important indeed praying for you and your family I really appreciate that.

00:22:00 John Daub: We went by the shrine on Friday when we got back because we didn't do the hatsumode (first shrine visit of the year) day which is the New Year's probably a little bit late but I think kami-sama (the gods) might be able to do it for you guys so I hope you guys enjoy it and I hope a little forgiving but we stopped by and said a prayer for our family members and our family and also I always say a prayer for our community because I know a lot of you are watching some of you in hospitals I can't travel to Japan because you write to me and I really appreciate that so much guys prayer helps it really does.

00:23:00 John Daub: Going to Kyoto in September okay so I hope I can get some ideas you absolutely will get some ideas I'll make sure I pack in some hints so the episode is showing you one thing surrounded by Kyoto and because I'm in Kyoto of course I'm gonna be packing in with lots of information on the locations around there I won't be going to Arashiyama and the bamboo forest it looks like just a joke so there's so many tourists there it's just a joke so we'll I'll be doing my best to bring you as much interesting content in the end of this week on this channel so it's gonna be pretty cool.

00:24:00 John Daub: Let's see here what else we got to talk about ah so in Tokyo I'll be of course taking you around the city and I'll be doing a lot of stuff in Tokyo so hope you guys enjoy it and I'll see you guys in the next video. But I'm gonna be very selective with the content my assistant Emmy goes and she calls typically tries to get access to places it's getting harder I have to say because people don't want YouTubers in there and in Tokyo there are just too many tourists already so there's not a lot of desire to promote things that are already promoted by tourists they're like we don't need to give you access we don't need to work with you because we already have a bunch of tourists we don't want more.

00:25:15 John Daub: Just create a lot of content and I'll see you guys in the next video. Crazy to hear and I'm gonna be talking about that too. I have here all this stuff that I need to do quote-unquote podcasting I'm showing you an SM7B mic I haven't really done a lot of that on the channel and I talked about last year I might revert back to that and I didn't but I might do that just because look there's a lot of people that are walking around live-streaming it's kind of an annoyance if I don't do it without a permit I feel a sense of responsibility to make sure that I'm not impacting the people around me.

00:26:30 John Daub: I want to show you the Japanese countryside but in Tokyo it's just so crowded so I might start to go back to podcasting with a really nice microphone and a camera using this studio setup that I'm using and talk about a lot of issues that impact you. I think many of you put your trust in me as somebody who has lived here for almost 30 years now it's just crazy I'm gonna go into my 28th year now and using that knowledge and that experience to bring a lot of these topics that you might be reading in the news, give it a perspective that you have learned to trust over the last, I don't know, since 2012, 2013, since I started YouTube here.

00:27:45 John Daub: And I think if you know me and know the way I bring the content and know all the places that I visited, it can be certainly a resource for you to have that voice in there. So I might start that podcasting a little bit from here, talking from here when I can't go outside, especially during the rainy season and bring you that kind of information on topics that are resonating in the media. And hopefully I can do it in a more positive way. I'm just really exhausted from all the negativity. And I think many of you can relate to this. There's just so much negativity on YouTube, like it's rage bait. It's getting because if you don't have any, it's making an emotional connection to get you to click. And a lot of the topics are just negative topics. And it really brings me down. And I don't like that. And I don't want to bring content that brings you down. And I want to stay positive because that's just what our community is all about.

00:29:45 John Daub: So I want to focus more on that as I probably was a little bit down in 2025 because all there's so much Japan's overcrowded, Japanese don't like foreigners. It's getting harder to come to be all that stuff is nonsense. Within that Japan has not changed. Everyone's right. Japan has changed. Japan has not changed. Japan is Japan. Japan has always changed. The things that always change are always changing, but the heart and the core of Japan has not changed. It's still there. I travel the country. I go around. It's still the same country. The people have not changed who they are as an identity. The attractions have not really changed that much either. The countryside has not changed. Of course it hasn't changed. It still has declining populations. It still has its own issues. These haven't changed.

00:31:30 John Daub: So whenever I see Japan has changed in the title, I know this is just like clickbait. Whenever I see something negative, I know it's just rage bait and I don't engage in that anymore. And I hope in 2026 going forward with all the stuff that's going on, especially if you're in the United States, being torn apart by these issues, I hope that this isn't a place and sometimes it may have even seemed like that, that you feel a place where you can escape to. Escape to Japan and have a really positive experience. That's what I'm hoping for this channel in 2026. That's the direction of this channel. More and more. I want to take you out to the countryside. I want to keep that mission of taking you to places that you haven't seen before.

00:33:00 John Daub: I want to keep that mission of sharing the 30 some years, almost 30 years of now. I'm just rounding it up now. 30 years of knowledge in here to help you not just plan your trip, but also learn more about Japanese culture that enhances your trip, that enhances the experience for Japanese people that you're going to encounter and enhances the experience for you who was visiting it in a much better way. Jennifer, happy new year to the Daub family sending lots of love. Happy new year to you, Jennifer. French. It's nice to see you. Much love. That's wonderful.

00:34:00 John Daub: I wish I could do more meetups, but it's also getting to the point where sometimes these like casual meetups can, a lot of weird people out there. So it's getting harder to meet people, but let's see what we can do with that. I might find a way to do that, but I would love to meet like Jennifer, if you came, all you had to do is direct message me and I'd be there to come and see you. Cause I know you for so long. Common writer, fan rogue, happy new year, John, and everyone stay positive, John. Japan adapted, but keep the identity as Japan. Exactly. Japan is Japan. It's not any Kabuki-cho is not any more dangerous than it was 20 years ago. In fact, it's probably a lot safer. Just it's evolved a little bit, but the core of what it is, it hasn't changed at all.

00:35:30 John Daub: All right. Shinjuku's core hasn't changed at all. And that's really important for you guys to realize. As you look at the content on YouTube, a lot of it is made to rage bait you into watching. And that's not the complete story. Did a YouTuber get punched in the head? Yes. Did that happen by a tout? Yes. Have those touts been here for the last five, 10, 15, 20 years? Yes. As long as I've been in Japan, there have been touts on the streets. They were in Roppongi a lot more. Minato Ward has cleared them out and I believe they're going to be cleared out of Shinjuku soon enough.

00:36:45 John Daub: Here, Google Irvin. It is so nice to see you. Welcome. Welcome back as well with a new name, but the same emoji, I guess you could say. I believe that's Kamakura, right? It's nice to see. I'm here on the moon island. Okay. I will see you there too, brother. I'll see you around town. Me and Irvin had a lunch in Ginza, not too far, not too long. I guess it was like two years ago now. Jeez, it moves fast, but that place is out of business, which is crazy. So I got to find a new place, a new secret place to go and eat my lunches when I'm in Ginza now. And maybe we can find that at Irvin. So hit me up and maybe we'll, I got a chance to meet with Richard too, who is a supporter from Idaho.

00:38:15 John Daub: I guess I could say that he's been with the channel for such a long time. And I had a drink. I don't drink alcohol anymore, by the way. I had a drink, which was club soda with a twist of lime and rosemary or something ridiculous. I asked the internet, I said, what's a drink that would sound impressive? But not be a drink. And I came up with that. So I ordered it and he had a really great whiskey, which I really wish that I was drinking still like this 20 year or something. But anyways, it was great to see Richard and talk about stuff other than YouTube. And that's the great thing about visiting, meeting with you who are visiting here. Whenever I get the chance, I get a chance to reset, be myself, talk about anything except for YouTube content. Sometimes talk about your trip and that's nice to hear as well.

00:39:45 John Daub: So yeah, I mean, I get to know a lot of you through Patreon. So I appreciate everyone who's supporting there and the direct messaging and also from the chat here. And over time, I get to know you and then it like we all feel like family really, right? Satrio. It feels like family, doesn't it? Here. I can see y'all here in the chat. Joy as well. I've seen Joy a couple of times. By the way, Brandy, we did find your gotcha poem. It's here. So Leo hit it inadvertently. I'm gonna send you a package. All right. So it's on the desk. We thought that perhaps the customs officials took it. No, it was just Leo.

00:41:15 John Daub: Patreon's doing well. The postcards are going out a little bit later this year, this month. So the postcards will go out on the 15th, 16th on Thursday or Friday. So I'm hoping they get there by the end of January. But I'm ordering it tomorrow. It's a slow start to the year. The printers were closed for maintenance for a while. Very busy printing nengajo (New Year's cards), but we'll ship back into it as soon as possible. And the daimyo packages are here this month. Oh my gosh, hold on this month. I have it right here. I found this at on um I only have 30 of them.

00:42:30 John Daub: The Sakura flavored KitKats were already out in December at the end of December, right before I left for the US. I'm like, what the heck Sakura-aji (sakura flavor) right now. So I ended up getting 30 of these. So for daimyo supporters, the first 30, most of them I think are already claimed. I'll be sending one of those, a full bag of the Sakura KitKats. They're sold out already all over the country. It's crazy. They had these for people that were studying for exams. So it's actually on the package. They were not meant for tourists. It's all in Japanese, but they were meant to, you can see like it writes in here, let's fight, ganbare (good luck, persevere), like for you. So you can write a message and give it to somebody, because KitKat, kitto katsu (surely win) is like fight for success or something like that.

00:44:00 John Daub: It expires October 2026, but I'll put a full bag in for you. The Sakura flavor, there's like little bits of the sakura in there. I think that's kind of cool. So I'll put this in the daimyo packages for this month and those will get sent out around the 20th of January. I appreciate the support as well as some confections from Tokyo. I think they had the kinako (roasted soybean powder), the roasted soybean chocolate cakes that I was interested to buy. But right now, strawberry is the big deal. Strawberry is all over the place. As you can see with the next main channel episode here, it's all about the strawberry, the aroma shelf, like acidity, size, sweetness, color, texture, disease resistance.

00:45:30 John Daub: I interviewed Japan agriculture in Tochigi to talk about the history of the Japanese strawberry and how it's an all encompassing episode. That's going to be really great. I'll see you guys on the main channel soon. If you have any questions, anytime you can leave me in the comments below on this episode or on Patreon, or you can try me on Instagram, although that I think it's much better to hit me up on Patreon or in the comments. And I really think this is going to be a great year.

00:46:45 John Daub: Right now there aren't as many tourists coming from China. It's obvious. And it's also leading to price reduction of hotels, which is a really good thing. Japan is even cheaper as a result of the demand going down a little bit, but make no mistake, crowded areas like Kyoto are still crowded, but Kyoto has experienced this kind of shift where they've more hotel rooms. So prices are going down, which is good. And I'm going to talk a little bit about that in a live stream, probably from Kyoto. And we'll see if we can do a little hotel comparison between then and now and these tourists not coming to Japan, because they make up the most tourists coming to this country, how that's really impacted Kyoto.

00:48:15 John Daub: I'm really curious to walk around Kyoto this week and see what it's like without mass tourism from China. And you can tell that there are still tourists that speak Chinese because they're from Taiwan or Singapore or Hong Kong but mainland China, the tourism is way down. And if not almost like just a fraction. So there's a lot of businesses that are hurting here in Japan. So it's about making sure that for me in my heart, somebody who loves Japan, that we get a chance to highlight places that need tourists that are welcoming to tourists. So you can get away from places like Kyoto, which is a great experience, but you can get an even better experience in the Japanese countryside.

00:49:45 John Daub: If you know exactly where to go and hopefully through this channel, I can give you that inside information, like how to dress, what to wear in certain months, how to pack more effectively, how to prepare for the next month, Japanese using technology. Maybe we'll talk about some of the translation apps. We'll talk about how to talk with locals, cultural sensitivity, which is not really an issue if you're a guest, because you don't have to be a hundred percent culturally sensitive, making a little bit of an effort saying arigato (thank you) is probably enough or a lot, but it's good to know a little bit of inside baseball when you come to Japan. And that's what I'm hoping that this channel can do.

00:51:15 John Daub: Any questions here? I'll take a minute to answer a question or two. Should my wife and son and I go back to Japan before he turns two instead of going to Europe? I just feel $400 ticket is better than tickets to Japan when he's, that's a good question. Japan doesn't have um I would say so. And what do you who do you think I am? I'm going to say come to Japan, you know, but I know that the tickets to Japan might be a little bit much because of the demand is still you know it's not a big deal. But coming from the United States, we paid an arm and a leg to fly to the United States and back a lot more than I did in the years past.

00:52:45 John Daub: But right now hotels a little bit cheaper. Right now the yen is at 158 to the dollar. So I would say, depending on where you're flying to, Japan makes a lot of sense. Right now there's none of this political stuff going on. Some people YouTube are talking about it. It's life as usual here in Japan all right so you don't have to worry about some of the issues that the West is involved with right now in Japan you can kind of escape that here which is great and you can do your own thing that's also a good thing and if you've been to Japan before right now it's blue skies it is warm it's 15 degrees Celsius or like mid 50s so it's really nice here and you can find the snow snowstorms are coming on that on the other side of the mountains you can find everything in Japan in January this is the low season we'll talk more about January as well.

00:54:30 John Daub: All right that's all I wanted to talk about 30 minutes of welcome back say hi to all of you who have been waiting for an episode many of you were so nice to take all the time you need I took more time than I needed but it was very important for me to get behind evaluate find out what we need to do as a family and then move forward and then once I have that settled or at least understood I settled is not the right word once I have a kind of a better understanding and we're out of the tough part of figuring out what was wrong with the family member now we can work on resolving it or trying to find the best solutions and moving ahead and I can get back to getting the work as well and this is what I love to do I love stories I love stories I love finding out how to take care of my own family or having an idea, many of them coming from you guys, and taking that seed of an idea and creating a story around it, which are the episodes that you see here on the channel.

00:56:45 John Daub: If you haven't already, I do have a request. Can I make requests? So if you haven't already, hold on a second. If you haven't already, I have on my main channel, this episode, it's Bigger Than Tokyo Inside Japan's Fireworks Capital. If you haven't already seen this episode, please go check it out. YouTube is just not suggesting it. I don't know why. YouTube is not suggesting this episode. So if you haven't already seen this episode, it's an incredible episode where my family and I go to Akita, which is the heart of the fireworks industry in Japan. And I put a camera where we enjoy it from the street food to the hotels in the area. Samurai Village, Kakunodate, walking an Akita Inu. If you haven't seen this one, please go check it out. For some reason, it's not getting suggested at all. So I appreciate that. And see you again tomorrow. I intend to keep it up for the rest of the year as much as possible.

00:58:45 John Daub: Be like local winter food. Man, I imagine what Ainu people eat. Up in northern Hokkaido, it's so cold up there. I can't imagine either. It would be interesting to find that out. How they survive up in... It's hard to find an Ainu community. Even the National Ainu Museum is quite controversial because it's not run by Ainu. So there's a lot of debate on that. But I think that's a really good episode idea. So thanks for that. And I'm going to look into it. I think winter food or summer foods, the seasonal foods in Japan is what it's all about. Coming here when you stay in a ryokan (traditional Japanese inn), you're going to find foods that are just incredible.

01:00:15 John Daub: Roly Poly Rabbit, nice to see you back, John. Happy New Year to you and your family. May 2026 bring you recovery, healing, happiness, and prosperity. Thank you so much for that. And I appreciate the thoughts. And I wish all of you a really successful and really great 2026. You know, the year might be incredible. The year might have a little bit of turbulence or a lot of turbulence. I don't know. But I want this channel to be a place, a refuge, so to speak, where you can get away from that and just let's immerse ourselves into Japan together. Right? Let's immerse ourselves into Japan together on this channel.

01:01:45 John Daub: We'll talk about some issues that might be controversial, of course. But to do it in a way that comes out with a positive resolution, where we feel love for Japan. This is what we watch this channel for. A shared love and respect for Japan, Japanese culture. Whether you're from Japan or not. Whether you're visiting as a tourist. You just want tourist information. You want to learn more about this country. Learn more about Japan so it can improve your... There are things that I've learned from Japan over my knowledge here that have made me a better person. And perhaps things that you can learn that help you as well. There's just so much love and interest in this country that goes beyond just tourism. And that's what this channel is about.

01:03:30 John Daub: Gary Johnson, you're amazing. Keep the chin up. Much love to you and your family. Thank you, Gary. Nice to see you. And I appreciate that very much. And we're going to have an amazing year. I say that every year. But I know this year is going to be amazing. This is on YouTube. Let me see here. 2012, 13, 14, 15. This is my 15th year on YouTube. 15th year being a YouTuber. That's crazy. So it's going to be a great year. And I know that we're going to have some challenges. But we're going to do it in a way that's positive. And if you ever see that I go to the dark side, all you got to do is check me. Give a little nudge. And I come back really quickly to the good side.

01:05:00 John Daub: But in this world, it's very easy to go to the dark side. No rage bait. I'm going to try my best. No rage bait. No clickbait. Nothing like that. Let's just keep it very positive on Japan. I don't really care too much the way that the algorithm is, I don't really care too much on trying to get content just for views. I'm making the content for the story and the way that we love as a community. And that's my goal for this year. If I do a good job at the content, the views will take care of itself. That's what you subscribe for. And my goal is to make sure that the people who subscribe to the channel, the people who love this channel, get the kind of content that they really want to see. And I have a pretty good idea of what that is. And that's my main goal, to stick to that mission and to give you the stories that you look for, that other creators in Japan aren't covering. And I'll be that light for you.

01:06:45 John Daub: Yoda disapproves you going to the dark side. I know. I know. I can hear that voice. I can hear that voice. But sometimes it's hard not to sometimes, but this isn't... It's not good to bring that dark side to the internet. There's already too much of it. They don't need my voice for that. Let's bring some light. Light is the best disinfectant. Let's bring some light to all of it and make it an amazing year for all of you. And yeah. I'll see you tomorrow. Another live stream. See you guys. Thanks for the questions.