00:02 John Daub: There's a terrace boat. How you doing? Welcome to Tokyo. They're actually going around looking at the cherry blossoms. Make sure we get the audio in here. How you doing, everybody? There goes a tourist boat looking at the tourists looking at the cherry blossoms. Tourists looking at tourists. There's Tokyo Skytree right there on the other side of the bridge. But I'm actually on this side of the river looking at these trees. This is such a beautiful spot to be looking at the cherry blossoms, but we don't actually have any blossoms on it. This is the big tease.

01:12 John Daub: Now we get the announcements that spring has started. About 48 hours ago, I was here in front of Yasukuni Shrine reporting that Japan had officially started the cherry blossoms. And yet at the same time, there are dudes down there counting. They counted 61 cherry blossoms. Here, let me play the video. They made a huge media event out of it. We actually see more cherry blossoms on this tree because it's more sheltered. It's actually a little bit warmer over there, so they come out earlier. But you see, the Japan Meteorological Agency had dudes out there counting the blossoms for the official records. They actually got 61 blossoms counted.

02:25 John Daub: So I got all excited, this is like 72 hours ago. I said, oh, spring is out here. Look, the dudes, they announced it. And yet I got out. The reality is I'm walking around Tokyo the last couple of days, and you know what? There aren't a lot of cherry blossoms out. It's a little disappointing for a weekend. You think? You know, I want to kind of enjoy the cherry blossoms, but I kind of want to have a little hanami (cherry blossom viewing) holiday with this today. And they're not here. So this is a live report from the riverside. I'm bringing it to you. They're not here.

03:28 John Daub: So this episode, I'm not just going to show you a tree which has buds on it, which in itself is pretty significant. But we do have one star today. That star is a blossom up there. It's not even summer, really. I guess it's Sunday. In Japan, on Sunday, people work hard. They play hard. Okay? They earned it. This bud's for you. Speaking of buds that turned into flowers, look at that. Do you see it? There's actually one on there. You see it? Look. Look at these guys, they came out like, all right, someone said, there's a party.

04:28 John Daub: What have you ever done that before? You come out and you're the only one at the party. And then there's one person, they're playing music. It seems like there's a party, but there's nobody there yet because you're the first one. Well, that's these guys right here. They're also the first ones to drop off, too. And they leave the party. I hope they don't fall off before the party even starts. But they've come to the party, but the party's not here. The thing is, I'm here for the party, too. And I am the only one here, too, you see.

05:20 John Daub: So a couple of people walking the bridge. But usually on a Sunday, it would be a lot more crowded than this. This whole area would be really crowded. If I go up on the bridge, you can look down along the river and you would see loads and loads of people just enjoying a bento, enjoying the spring. So let's walk there. And while I'm doing that, I want to show you what Leo and I did, because I got more up my sleeve than just a bunch of empty trees. Although it does look really nice. You can see that the color of green, spring really is here.

06:12 John Daub: The difference between Japan and the United States is that when the cherry blossoms come out, we all go out and picnic under them. And you can open alcohol bottles and get a little wasted underneath the trees. But you can see that the green is out for these trees. I don't know what exactly they are, but it feels really good. And the birds are chirping, the weather's warmer, the sun feels warmer, the days are longer. And that means spring is here. There's a couple of people out. Hardcore, real hardcore.

07:00 John Daub: You know what's also out? The pollen. The big news, of course, you know, oil prices, all the stuff that's this, you know, the world's on fire. Everything is rough these days. And then it's the blossoms. Spring is coming out. And that third story that doesn't get talked about is the pollen, that yellow pollen that comes from the trees. It wafts in the air, comes in these clouds, and then lands on your balcony and leaves a really thin layer of yellow all over the place. Also mixed in with the Gobi Desert sand, which is quite famous in March because the winds are super strong.

07:55 John Daub: This time of year, the spring winds can be brutal. It's not too bad right now. But out in the Gobi Desert, in Asia, on the mainland, it blows up the Mongolian sands and they do actually get up and then come into Tokyo. And we've had years where it was really bad. 2004 or 2005 was one of the worst. All the cars were just covered in dust from the Gobi Desert. Kind of cool in a way, but not when you, like, breathe that stuff in. It's really fine dust, really fine sand.

08:45 John Daub: The pollen, at least, I guess it's sort of degradable. But not the sand. The sand, like, just sits in your body as a weight. Probably making mud. I don't know what the heck that's doing inside me right now from 20 years ago. Don't want to think about it. This is what I did the other day, and I wanted to do a live stream and talk about it, but the museum was crowded. Leo and I, we went out on the Yurikamome line, which is the monorail. It's a driverless monorail.

09:35 John Daub: So he thinks he's driving the train. I don't know how and why. I guess it's just because the seat you're in. But he literally thinks he's driving the train. Look, he's very, very serious. And he's not even joking. I'm serious. He's not joking. I tried to, like, make a joke out of it. He didn't take it. And then we went to this. This is called Miraikan (National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation). And I wanted to show you this museum, which is kind of cool on a rainy day.

10:25 John Daub: This is where they got the wacky robots and stuff. You can see the emotions. This one is supposed to be able to share the emotions and also react to your reactions. It is. It's really creepy. And so only in Japan, because in Japan, we celebrate robots. And that's the solution to, like, our labor problems, right? With not having enough people. We're okay. We got dogs, we got robots. That'll help. We don't need people who won't assimilate and stuff like that.

11:15 John Daub: These robots are for elderly or for lonely people. Wellness robots. They're really cute. They give a little bit of movement, which is nice. And then this furry guy. I don't know. This would be kind of creepy walking around my house. I could see a horror movie with this guy, right? He doesn't have any fingers to hold weapons. But I can see if they get a little creative in version two. He could be the star of a horror movie. It's cute and cuddly, but really.

12:00 John Daub: Oh, and inside the Miraikan, they have this globe with a lot of these video screens in here. And it's super interesting. They do a lot of stuff with it, a lot of educational stuff, but they also turn into, like, a weather globe. So you can see that the typhoons and stuff on it. It's really cool. Sometimes they do it upside down. We were looking at Australia and Japan on the other side. And the walkway goes around it, which is cool. It's only about $4 to get into this place. And kids are free, which was even cooler.

12:45 John Daub: A couple of the exhibits, you need to get tickets in advance. I think those are free too. It's just making sure that doesn't get too crowded inside of there. Miraikan means future. So Leo got a chance to look at some of the future. This thing was from Toyota. It's like Honda's ASIMO taken to another level. Imagine if Japan weaponized their creativity. Can you imagine? Like, all right, we, you know, there's the Droid wars and stuff. The clones in Star Wars.

13:35 John Daub: Imagine Japan weaponized these things. I could see some. That tail doing some wicked stuff. But this comes from Toyota. I could see, like, 10,000 of these going in here. Listen, I'm gonna say something. Don't attack Japan, because Japan has a lot of stuff that nobody's ever heard of. Okay? That can come and get you. So, like this. And it looks cute at first until it turns deadly. And this is where that globe turns into the world. It's so cool walking around here.

14:25 John Daub: This is a really cool, like, two or three hours you could spend on a rainy day, which is exactly what it was on Friday, which was a holiday here. This is inside the International Space Station. Check it out. So this is an actual, like, living quarter. And that dude right there from the Miraikan, he was talking to us. His English is pretty good, but I started speaking in Japanese, and he changed to Japanese, which is interesting. My Japanese overpowered his English, which is always kind of funny.

15:10 John Daub: But that's it. International Space Station toilet. He opened this up so we could take a look inside there, not use it. But he opened it up so we get a closer look. Leo appreciated that. He really wants to be a cosmonaut or one of these astronaut dudes so he could play ping pong with water. That Japanese astronaut was doing something with water. There's a lot of buttons which are also fun for Leo. He likes to push buttons. Yeah. See that? He's practicing his button pushing, but he's eating.

15:55 John Daub: I guess he's playing ping pong with water or something. Really interesting. There's a lot of stuff inside this Miraikan. I don't think a lot of people know about it. This movie that they have with how they make beef and how they get stuff from out in the country to the supermarket. This is good for kids to know that like meat doesn't come from the supermarket. It comes from somewhere else. But that was the shower room, right? The sitting shower, which is kind of cool. It's like a body shower. You just kind of lay down and go.

16:45 John Daub: That was at the. They brought a lot of the really cool stuff from the Osaka Expo 2025 to the Miraikan. So you can kind of go to the Osaka Expo. Since you couldn't go because you're coming now, you can go there and kind of experience some of the stuff that they had at the Expo, which is kind of cool because right now you can't really enjoy the cherry blossoms here. Not yet. At least not here. But there are other things you can do. These yatai bune (stall boats) or these tours.

17:35 John Daub: This one actually has teppanyaki on there. So they're actually cooking like okonomiyaki on the top of the tables inside there. So they're eating and drinking and they're taking a tour along the river. So there are other options besides the amazing space boat. There's this one which is I think really cool. Wouldn't you agree? I think so. Just a programming note as I'm going through this here. A lot of stuff going on here. This video is coming tonight. This is the next main channel.

18:25 John Daub: Yeah, I do have a main channel. This is the main channel episode on smarter travel trying to battle overtourism. So I traveled to Kyoto on a family trip for three days with just a day pack. But how do you do that? So like Tokyo Station is a mess with these luggage, these hard shelled luggages. And Kyoto's got a problem with it. So I thought I would tackle it instead of complaining about it. Let's make a video and show a better way. And that's what we did.

19:10 John Daub: We got a chance to work with Anywhere again and go to Uji and eat a lot of matcha and have a pretty good time out of it. So that video dropping tonight, it just got the thumbs up from the people we were working with. So that's exciting. I always like that there's always a second layer of checks and stuff when we work with somebody else. And that always makes the video a little bit better. Factually accurate, for example, which is important. That's what you guys trust with Only in Japan.

19:55 John Daub: And the postcards did actually go out. Now that I'm talking about that. This one here, I'm sending one to. Do I have it with me? No, I don't have it with me. It's right in my living room. So to spend in Germany, your postcards going out today. But everybody else went out on Thursday, right before the holiday. So that they should be getting there sometime next week. I think not this week coming, but the next week. In the US things are going a little bit slower. International mail services a little bit slower than usual.

20:45 John Daub: But you can see the arrow. That's where I am, right there. My net time was 3:31 and I finished it at 3:30. The clock says 3:32, but my net time was 3:31:32. So that's what I go with. That's the time I actually crossed the starting line. And it was a good race, you know. And on the back of it there's a little bit of information about the Tokyo Marathon. And you can see Tokyo Station. What I love about this picture is it's the goal, right? This is the goal finish line.

21:30 John Daub: And the beautiful scene of Tokyo Station in the background just kind of makes it really cool. So tonight, if you haven't already, make sure you go to the main channel right there. That's where the edited videos are. And I'm gonna take you to Kyoto. And then next week I also have the video on childcare for tourists. There are a lot of boats at this time, childcare for tourists, which is such a cool idea. Like when I was working with you guys know Mimaru Hotel. They're really cool.

22:20 John Daub: They have these apartment type hotels which is perfect for families. When I was working with them, they introduced to me a childcare service. This placation where parents can go on and do date stuff and leave their kid behind. Because you don't know babysitter in Tokyo, right? You kind of don't want it like, maybe you kind of want to do stuff that, you know, like go have really expensive sushi or go to a department store that has stuff that might be breakable and you have a five year old. I'm not taking Leo to like the top floor of Mitsukoshi with glass. I'm not taking Leo to an omakase sushi experience. That's like $300 a person, right?

23:10 John Daub: He's not gonna get $300 out of that experience. I don't even know if I got $300 out of that experience. So I went to my friend Shinji's sushi shop. He's a sushi chef. He used to live in the US and now he works here in Tokyo. He invited us out. So Kanae and I went, we ate there and we put that into the video. I like promoting local businesses and friends and he's a good guy. And I also put in Mitsukoshi. And I was shopping for glass item stuff that's breakable.

23:55 John Daub: And then we checked Leo into a placation, but it's really like childcare. And they take care of Leo and let him play for three hours while we were able to go out on a date and also go shopping. And I thought that, you know what, I'm gonna make a video on this because this is like really cool because all the tourists, a lot of tourists with families, I think kids don't want to go shopping. Kids don't want to go to a boring sushi shop and sit there. They want to play, right?

24:45 John Daub: So you go and you get them a quick lunch and you put them into this play area, which is inside. It's like two floors. It's almost like a theme park. And then you can go out and do your thing and then you come back. At first, Leo cried. He didn't want to leave us. And when we got back, he didn't want to leave the play area. And the funny thing is, when I talked with other parents, they said that the highlight of their trip to Tokyo for the kids was this play area, which is really funny.

25:30 John Daub: So I thought that I'm gonna make a video on this. So I have like a 12 minute video that's gonna come out after this Kyoto video tonight. So it's gonna be really good time to energize the main channel and get a bunch of other releases. So I've been not doing as many live streams now because I'm more focused on editing as well as Kanae and Leo have been sick, not just from the pollen. And that's the thing that the slow killer is the pollen that comes in around. I'd say it starts for me around February 20th and goes on until like April 5th.

26:20 John Daub: And then it kind of goes away, but it's from the sugi (cedar) trees. What are sugi trees in Japan? In English? Cedar trees. Japan planted a bunch of them after World War II, and now they've come to roost about 30 years ago, and they roost big time. They all this pollen swarms Tokyo. Other areas in Japan don't have this problem. But after World War II, they're like, we gotta plant some trees to rebuild. And then they found out, well, we're rebuilding with cement instead of cedar trees.

27:05 John Daub: And cedar trees now in the 21st century are too expensive to cut down and bring into the city. So you know what? They just don't touch the cedar trees. If they need wood, they just import it from Thailand because it's cheaper. So in the end, we end up with pollen, which slowly destroys us. It's really bad. I didn't have such bad allergies before. I'm not suffering that bad, but my eyes hurt and some nights tough to sleep. Despite the fact that we have an air purifier.

27:50 John Daub: So get that air purifier in your hotel room working because it will save you a little bit of trouble and help your body recover a little bit faster from the wear and tear breathing in that yellow stuff that I can kind of see it in the air when you zoom in. So I'm zooming in there. I don't know, you can kind of see that there's something between you and the buildings over there besides the pixelation that happens. There's a little bit of yellowness in the air, and that's from the pollen, maybe a little bit of the Gobi Desert stuff.

28:40 John Daub: Daniel writes in here. Thank you for helping us plan our vacation. I'm so happy to hear that. You're welcome. It's time to do some Patreon Q and A live streams that answer people's questions. We have about 2,000 people on the Patreon now, which is crazy. Gotta go do some Q and A to help you plan for the summer trip. That's coming up fast. And I've been here for almost 30 years now, so I know a little bit about how to get around and some of the attractions.

29:25 John Daub: A lot of it has changed when tourism started to expand in 2017, 2018, 2019. So it's a little bit different than when I first visited it in like 1998, 1999. But these places sometimes are centuries old. So it's not really like Japan changes, but it doesn't really change. Right. So I'm happy to hear that. That's really one of the purposes of this channel, actually utilize the live streaming format to be able to talk about this stuff. Let's go. I don't know how it's going to be. I want to walk under this.

30:15 John Daub: So if the signal dies, I apologize. This is a time where you guys can write in where you're watching from. We'll see if we can catch space boat go by and kind of understand the big story of the time, which is the cherry blossoms and, you know, stuff going on in the Middle East and all that other stuff. Prime Minister was in the White House and trying to figure. I love this picture, right? Do you see it? It's like under the bridge, you start to see the Skytree. It's really cool. It's a cool shot.

31:00 John Daub: I come here at least once a week. And you can eat a bento at the end of this island, which is really cool. Usually on a Sunday, this would be filled with people, but you can see the cherry blossoms just aren't out yet, which is a shame. Here comes that tourist boat again. Where in Tokyo are you? I'm watching from Melbourne. Hey, good day. Yeah. I don't have a map, but this is called Shiodome Island. And this is Chuo Ohashi (Central Grand Bridge). Chuo means central, center.

31:45 John Daub: And this is Yushima Dori. And if you just go straight, you go straight to Tokyo Station, like right to where the Shinkansen is, which is cool. I got a lot of friends that live on the island. And these people are watching the island. Here comes that tourist boat again. I think this launches from Monzen-Nakacho. You might want to look this up online. It's really cool to be with a bunch of people. And, you know, we travel on the subway and stuff. It's just kind of fun to be on a boat because the air is different here.

32:35 John Daub: It's a different way to see the city for sure. That's a hanami boat. Hey, that bridge is big. Hold on a second. What happens if they don't even come out through the other side? What if they don't come out from the other. Okay, good. I was gonna say that would be really weird. Bermuda Triangle type of stuff. That's a hanami boat. Looking at the cherry blossoms. But as you all saw, there's not a lot to see yet. Isn't that a lot of cherry blossoms to see yet?

33:20 John Daub: Let's go up here. Maybe we can see one or two blossoms. How you doing? A couple of. There's a young Japanese couple watching me do YouTube stuff. Going up the mountain. So these are some Yoshino cherry blossom trees. And you can see they're right there. These blossoms are right there. They're just about to explode out. Look, you see the pink right there? It's hard to focus. iPhone won't get it. Cross over. They wave to me over there. How you doing?

34:05 John Daub: Am I too close? Doesn't seem like I'm too close, but you can see they're just about out. And I think next week's going to be the big week. And then I think we might get three weekends. So if this counts as a weekend, because there's like one blossom out, all these trees have, like one blossom, right? So they kind of count, I guess. But I think next weekend's going to be a pretty good weekend. And I think if it doesn't rain or there's no strong wind, we're gonna get two more weekends out of this.

34:50 John Daub: So this could take us into April, I think, where they're still hanging out around April 5th. So I think those that are visiting, we're right on schedule. Even though it looks like they're coming out early, they held. Yesterday was kind of cool, so they held out. So the blossoms are still in bud. So they haven't really come out yet. We're in a pretty good situation. For those that are going to be visiting next week, you're gonna time this pretty good. Those that are here now a little bit early, it's no problem. Just a little bit early.

35:40 John Daub: Look, it doesn't really matter in the end. Cherry blossoms, you're in Japan. You're freaking in Japan right now, and you're about to have an amazing adventure. So I would not worry about the cherry blossoms too much. You know what I mean? Except for Meryl TCG. Who's going? I'm gonna miss it. No, the second week of April. You're not gonna miss it. This is the beauty of the cherry blossoms. You're gonna miss it in Tokyo, but there's like, all you got to do is head north or head a little bit away from the city, and you'll be perfectly timing it so it doesn't matter exactly in Tokyo.

36:30 John Daub: If you miss them here, they're blooming somewhere else all the way up until June, the beginning of June, in the very north of Hokkaido. So the great thing about Mother Nature is that spring doesn't hit all at the same time. This is my third time going to Japan. Well, you should know this. All you got to do is go up to Sendai, and you've timed it perfect. True story. You could probably see them. And I bet you Nagoya has maybe 10 or 15% bloomed. They actually started the cherry blossom season a day before Tokyo, so Nagoya is maybe a day ahead.

37:20 John Daub: So I bet you they have a little bit more. But you know what? There's nothing here. So really, this weekend shouldn't even count. I think next weekend is a big weekend, but when you have, like, kind of hazy blue skies, as you do today with weather around 15 degrees Celsius, which is like 58 to 65 degrees Fahrenheit, you're going to kind of go outside and enjoy it as much as possible, just not when the pollen is so bad. Right now, my voice is a little bit harsh. I feel raspy because of the pollen.

38:05 John Daub: But other than that, I'm gonna take you out next week. In fact, if we get some blossoms around Wednesday, I'm gonna take you out on Wednesday. We're gonna do a little bit of a blossom thing for about seven or eight days with live streams, and I'm gonna enjoy it, and maybe we'll go and meet some people and talk to the people. Let's make this. Instead of me trying to go out and doing, you know, just dreams of when I'm talking to you like this, let's go out and meet some people. Something that I didn't do so much since the pandemic, we kind of became a little antisocial in a way.

38:55 John Daub: I'm gonna try to be the opposite and become social. Whatever I feel like I want to do, I'm gonna do the opposite. Of that. I want to just stay home and watch TV. Do the opposite of that. Okay, this is our philosophy for this year. Whatever you feel like you want to do, do the opposite. Not what you have to do. We all have to go to work. Like, I don't want to go and do a midnight snack run. Now I got to go and do it. That's the mantra for this year.

39:40 John Daub: I don't want to run a marathon. Do it. You know what? I don't want to eat that blossom on the tree. Do it. A limit to this. I think you see where I'm going. Maybe not break the law or do something bad because you don't want to do it. You can't do it. You shouldn't do it. So there's, like, kind of a line with this. It's not quite Yes Man, but I would say, like, just be. Just don't touch the trees. Don't shake the branches and stuff like that.

40:30 John Daub: Thank you, Carrie. Don't do stuff wrong. But just kind of, you know, whenever you feel like you don't want to do it because you're lazy or something, you know it. You know you're lazy when you're lazy. Just break that. Just do it, you know. Oh, I'm not gonna talk to that person because that person looks like they're gonna get all ticked off and gonna give me. I'm gonna do. Something's gonna happen bad. Maybe not just do it, or maybe something bad will happen. I don't know. But you don't know until you try.

41:15 John Daub: So make this the year of trying. Illuminance is here. Enjoy the weather here in Tokyo as well. Unfortunately, the pollen is hitting. I know, right? The pollen is brutal. Your postcards on the way, buddy. So I said in the packages the day after tomorrow, but your postcards on the way. I believe that hanami tour. Is that a new one or the same dude? Illuminad's one of our wonderful postcard members. Can anyone read his lips? How good is this iPhone?

42:00 John Daub: Wow. iPhone doing pretty good. I'm really zoomed in. You want to see? That was a really good zoom. Same boat. It's impressive. iPhone 15 Pro. Let's try that again. It's pretty impressive, huh? There's Eitai Bridge. If you look at Eitai Bridge, you go there, walk across it. There's one spot where the American bombs from March 10, 1945 hit above. And they haven't repaired it yet. I found it. I heard about it. They discovered about 20 years ago and they didn't repair it. And it's still there up on the top.

42:45 John Daub: The rafter was hit by a 1945 bomb and it's still dented from it. It's pretty cool. Like living history. I know a lot of stuff about stuff that is not on the Internet. Alright guys, take care. I'll see you in another episode real soon. I'm gonna go back home and finish editing and stuff. There's a lot of stuff to do, but if you have any questions, leave in the comments below. And I will be doing a Patreon Q and A to help with trip planning and probably do it even if you're not a Patreon member.

43:35 John Daub: But I do really appreciate the support guys and our family is amazing. We have a Discord server. We always love your boosts. So if you have any nitro boosts, our server could definitely use it because we take full advantage of trying to help people. And I think it's a useful server for those that are coming to visit Japan sharing their photos and stuff. I don't have the link here for the Discord server, but it should be around here somewhere. Yeah. All right guys, take care. I'll see you soon.

44:20 John Daub: Probably tomorrow. Another live stream. Maybe not cherry blossoms just yet because I don't think it's exciting yet. But it will be like around Wednesday or Thursday. I think we'll do some stuff. Maybe we'll go out to Asakusa or actually Ueno Park and I'll talk about itineraries, where you should go. Probably how you should plan this out. But we can talk about it on Discord as well. Thanks guys. Mata ne (see you later). As our friend space boat makes its way. Space boat, you are so late. What are you doing? I've been waiting for you.

45:10 John Daub: Dive down deep. I always expect space boat to dive right to go under. It looks like it could, but they told me explicitly they can't and not to spread that rumor. So it can't go actually diving down despite the fact that it looks menacing. But I think it can. They just. There's no proof of that, so I can't say it, but I think it can. All right, mata ne.