Our Brutally Honest Review of Japan | Trash Taste #243
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This episode is sponsored by Shopify. Nobody does selling better than Shopify, home of the number one checkout on the planet and the not-so-secret secret with shop pay that boosts conversions up to 50%, meaning way less carts going abandoned and way more sales going...

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Also joined with me are my co-host Connor. - What was that lag? - You got some brain lag going on, Joey? - I did have a little bit of brain lag. - Your brain may be lagged 'cause we're five years in the past now living. - Well, you guys are. - Five years in the future, you mean? - No, no, no, no. We're gonna go to the past. - Oh, okay. - We're gonna revisit the past. - What a great start to an episode.

Okay, so it's been about five years for both Connor and Garnt here since they moved to Japan. And it's almost been five years since we started the podcast. And obviously, having lived in Japan for that period of time, you've probably seen a lot of things change in terms of what you think about certain aspects of Japan. I'm sure, you know, you'd live anywhere for five years. You're...

perspectives are gonna change, right? - Yep. - So today, what I thought could be fun is we filled up Trashbox Kun here with a bunch of prompts about certain Japanese things. And essentially we're gonna go through each one, talk about it and kind of reminisce, I guess like retrospectively look back on like, what was this like five years ago when you first moved to Japan versus how you feel about it now and whether it's better or worse or it hasn't changed. We kind of just talk about it from there.

Obviously I'm hosting this one today 'cause it's been more than five years for me since I moved here. So hopefully I can give you guys a little bit more of a unique perspective on it. Do you think any aspect, before we jump into anything, how has it living in Japan five years been for you guys? Like has it lived up to the expectations or? - Well, I mean, I didn't leave. - Well, yeah, that's true. - Yeah, I mean, it's- - Must be pretty good. - I mean, Trash Taste has kind of held you guys back here.

- Oh, no, Joey. - What do you mean? You're contractually obligated to stay here to finish Trash Taste? - What is the Trash Taste end game? I don't know, but either way, you know, I've stayed in Japan because I've enjoyed staying in Japan. - I'd be here with all, you know, I just, I fucking love being here. - Yeah, that's good. - But I definitely have changing opinions on many things. - Okay. - As any human would. - Yeah, we're gonna go right into that then. So let's go through the first one.

- Transportation, trains, taxis, et cetera. - I mean, that was always goaded, it's still goaded and- - It's more goaded. - It's more goaded than every time I go back to America. - Every time I go back home to Australia, I'm just like, man, how did I live like this? It's actually insane. Like, you know, when people say like- - I dread taking a train anywhere else. - Oh my God, yeah. I just dread public transport anywhere else, I feel. Like, okay, buses?

It can be a hit or a miss sometimes. At least I don't know how it's like in the UK, but- - It's pretty good in the UK. - It's pretty good, yeah. - Comparative to like other countries. - Well, you're from Brighton, so I feel like it's better there. Wales is not so great. - Oh really? - It might just not show up.

- Oh yeah, that's true. - Yeah, Brighton's pretty good. London's pretty good. - London's great. London's awesome. - Yeah. You guys have been definitely been taking a lot more taxis though, I've noticed. - I have been taking more taxis lately, yeah. - Yeah. - Yeah, I'm lazy. - Taxiductible, isn't it? - It is taxiductible. Yeah, the one thing that's kind of annoying about Seeker is that trying to get that shit to my accountant was fucking tough. - Oh yeah, yeah. - Just to like get it, like,

- I know that you're to fucking mobile app is a fucking nightmare. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Basically getting the proof and then on the taxi is super easy. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah. - Not that that's the main reason, but. - Yeah. - The main reason is that I'm lazy. That also just helps justify my laziness. - Yes. - Fair enough. - That part of me has changed. - Right. - Most definitely. I take a lot more taxis, but. - Yeah, maybe I'm just fucking stingy, but if I can avoid taking the taxi, I will avoid taking a taxi.

Because where I live, oftentimes I'll click somewhere and it'll be like 35 minute train, 20 minute taxi. I'm like, all right, well, I'm going to go shower for 50 minutes and enjoy a coffee and then I'll get my taxi. Like the big difference between me five years ago and me now is, you know, there's no way to go around it.

I'm in a lot better place here. - We're rich, Joey. - I'm rich. - I have more money. - I'm rich and I'm tired of pretending I'm not. - Does that mean that I go out and buy a fucking Gucci bag every day? - Yes. - No. - Okay, no. - No. - No. - You don't? - I don't.

But there are two places that my spending habits has changed. Number one is yes, taking taxis, yes. But you know, with that, I can kind of like justify it with like this, this is me being like pure cope justifying this, even though I know that I'm just fucking lazy. I'm like, yeah, but it's like more convenient for like the tax thing because as Connor said, you know. - We find ways to cope. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And if I'm traveling somewhere for work, then the taxi just makes sense. It just makes sense. See, the one thing I just cannot justify, no matter how many times I take the taxi, and no matter how long or short the ride may be, I'm just like, fuck, it's so expensive. I think if I was going pretty far out, like, I don't know, over a

30 minute journey. I think normally it's like a, it's a train stitch. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause normally that at that point, the taxis don't even save that much time. And then you also just spend a shit ton of money. Yeah. And like, you know, especially, I don't know how it is with you guys back home, but like if say, for example, if I take like an Uber back home in Australia, right? Like say if it's like a, I don't know,

20, 25 minute ride on an Uber. The most I'll pay maybe is like, you know, 30 bucks, right? But a 25 minute taxi ride here in Japan is like double that. Yeah. And also, you're also playing like life roulette because sometimes you'll hop into a taxi and you're like, oh, this person...

doesn't know where they're going, even with the GPS. The time when I often find that taxis get expensive and when I'm like, you should probably reconsider it is that if you need to go on a highway at any point, you're probably getting into the point where it's getting pretty expensive. Yeah, yeah. So I would just look on Google Maps. Like there are some journeys, like for example, me getting to the office here, it's like a 10 minute taxi. I normally cycle it if I can. Yeah. Or a 30 minute train because the trains, I have to go back out and come back in and then I have to walk back. So it's kind of like,

I'm like, you know what? We may be early. I'm just gonna fucking do tax. Fuck this. - No, okay. That makes sense, right? If I was put in that same position, I would also- - But I also have the luxury of that choice, right? Like I think like when I moved to Saitama, it was, you know,

- You had to take the train. - Yeah, I would take the train. - Yeah, yeah, for sure. - 'Cause if we ever wanted to go to Tokyo, I remember we'd go- - It's like an hour taxi. - Yeah, we'd go for a night out and then we all had to like communally agree to the night out. - Yeah. - 'Cause if one of us wanted- - 'Cause we could not take a singular taxi. - No. - We'd have to like split it. - Yeah, 'cause it was like 120 bucks. So it was like, fuck me. Like if one of us took that,

And if we just missed the last train, we'd be like, okay guys, we're all splitting this bill, right? Because I am paying this bill. Yeah, that's the only time where I'm like, fuck this, I'm taking the taxi is when, if I'm at a night out in Tokyo or somewhere where I'm like quite far away from home and it's, I know it's going to be more than like $100 on a taxi. But it's also like, like,

two in the morning. The first train doesn't arrive for another two and a half hours. I'm just like, I'm too drunk to make sane choices. I'm just like, fuck it. I just want to be in bed. I will pay any amount of money to get to bed. It was fun back in the day having to be like, nah, fuck it. I'll stay up till four. But now I'm like, I'll go back to bed. I can't do it anymore. And that is the part that I definitely appreciate that, yes, that has changed about me. It is

- The privilege of having freedom of choice. - Yeah. I mean, how many times do you guys ever get to the position where you're out to like past last train? - Not much anymore. - Yeah, not much, no. A fair amount. - Oh really? - I think my nights normally go to like one or like 12. - That's 'cause you go out with Pete a lot.

- Yeah, I've noticed when you go out with Pete, it's never like, he can always, he always has more than the time. - Yeah, he does. - He always, you will hit a point where you're like, all right, here's a cool place to end the night. He's just like, I got like five more bars. - I think I'm slowly rubbing off on Pete, 'cause I'm like, Pete, it's 12:30, we gotta start planning to go home. Like we gotta call it, 'cause I wanna work tomorrow. - Yeah, yeah. - We gotta call it. But yeah, it does.

honestly, the biggest factor I've noticed in my own personal life when the night will go long or not is when did we meet up? Because if we meet up at like five, I'm going to be in bed by 11. If we meet up at like 7.30 for dinner, yeah, we'll probably be up till like one. Because I feel like it's just so late when you started that you didn't really like, I don't know,

I think for me, it also just depends on like the occasion and also maybe just like the vibe, right? Because it's like you could be, you can meet up at like, I don't know, four in the afternoon because you just happen to have a day off. And you know, if you're with people that you really gel with, then sometimes I'll have those nights where I'm like, shit, man, it's 3 a.m. Yeah. Yeah. But then sometimes I'll meet up at like 8 p.m. and I'll be like, fuck, it's 11. All

- I got to get on my own boys. - Yeah, time to fucking go. - One other thing just to finalize the taxi conversation is that I remember in London when I wanted to get a taxi after like 1:00 AM, sometimes it could be a little difficult to get a taxi, rarely, but it was, I really have to like fucking look for one. And even then they might not stop for some reason. I don't know why. - Yeah, that's true.

Whereas here it's like everywhere. - In Japan, I walk two feet, put my hand up and four taxis are already lining up. - That's true. - Yeah. - Which is pretty nice. - Yeah. And there's the taxi app as well, which is like, even if it doesn't appear, you can just call one. - Uber's great here. - I mean, yeah, just transport here is just fucking goaded no matter what you say about it. - Before we move on, one other part of the conversation, obviously bullet trains are amazing. - Yes. - Bullet trains are always great. - Of course. - One of the thing that is like, I think really underrated is the,

the amount of airports that Japan has and the amount of areas they service. It's not just like the main areas. Like Hokkaido, there's pretty much an airport every like 100 kilometers or so along like every point. So like if you want to go pretty rural Hokkaido, you can get a flight from Tokyo probably like once a day that goes to a very rural part. And it's good. It'll be on time. It's great service. I mean, there's also a lot of just great features on the mainland that you can't get to with bullet trains.

- Yeah. - As well. Like it's either airport or drive. There's like no other choice. - Yeah, like if you wanna go to like- - Shimane or something. - Yeah, Shimane or Tottori or Shikoku. Like those places you can get to by train, but-

But it's almost like when you go past, I'd say like Hiroshima, like that kind of distance, like three hour bullet train, it's always quicker to get a flight. - Yeah, definitely. - No matter where you're thinking of it. - And the price isn't that much different because like- - Normally cheaper than bullet train. - Yeah, yeah, 'cause at that point, bullet train is you are basically taking a plane. You're basically buying a plane ticket at that point. - And flying is so easy in Japan 'cause they never had a 911. So it's super easy.

- Domestic, bro. - That's one way to put it. - Bro, domestic, you can really do some gold splits. You can genuinely, I don't recommend it. You can rock up, I'd say semi-comfortably 15 minutes for your flight. - I've done that before. - I've done it too. - And it was terrifying at first, but I was like, damn, I'm throwing like five minutes. - 'Cause like when they say the flight takes off in Japan at like 10,

on an international flight, they'll stop boarding like 20, 30 minutes before. They won't stop boarding until like literally like five minutes or on the time they say they're leaving. - Yeah, I've never done that before. - Every single time. - We don't recommend it. - I only feel confident doing that 'cause I've flown so many times. But if you're going to a rural part where there's only one flight a day, wouldn't recommend it. If you go to Sapporo, there's like 15 a day. Don't fucking worry about it. You'll be fine.

- Yeah, I mean, I appreciate public transport in Japan. The more I fly out, even going to Thailand. - Everything, everything here is phenomenal. - Yeah. - So still just as goaded. - Still just as goaded. - More goaded, more goaded. - Bro, going to Bangkok this Christmas, I was like, damn, they have upped the public transport so much since I lived there six years ago. So going to the city now, it used to take me during rush hour

like an hour and a half and now it's like 40 minutes. That is like, that is the improvement you're talking about. Meanwhile, here in Japan, it's just like, fuck. - There's a train that comes every two minutes. - So the improvement I saw was going into Bangkok, taking an hour and a half to like halving that time, but it's still 40 minutes. - What halved it?

They've just built a lot more infrastructure in terms of public transport. - More lanes. - No, no, no. - I saw that Thailand's economically been crushing it lately. - Yeah, yeah. - Hell yeah. - Yeah, Bangkok's changed a lot since I last lived there. - Do we have Kohi? - We do have Kohi. - Thailand's crushing it economically. Meanwhile, Japan is like, "What do we do?"

Conversing. Was it easier to make friends and communicate with people living in Japan before or after five years? Oh, I would assume after, right? Because you know more Japanese. Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's definitely that naivete that maybe can score you a couple of bonus points where you're like, I just moved here. And people are like, oh, let me show you around. But definitely now, I think, because I feel I never get...

ever get intimidated talking or like feel overwhelmed talking to like a Japanese person. Although one thing I definitely have noticed now that I have, you know, now that

I am an adult living in Japan as opposed to when I was a kid living in Japan is that when I was a kid living in Japan, I feel like people were more open or more comfortable talking to me if I spoke Japanese, right? Because I was still a child and, you know, they didn't have to dance around to try and, you know, communicate with a child, right? But I feel now that I'm an adult, I'm,

I get more positive interactions with Japanese people if I pretend I can't speak a word of Japanese. Yeah. It's like this weird dichotomy where it's like, if I start speaking in Japanese to an adult, there's that moment of like, what the fuck? Like that should not be coming out of your face right now. And then it takes a while for them to adjust to be like, oh, wait, no, he may look not Japanese, but he is Japanese.

Whereas if I'm just go up and being like, oh, hey, sake, right boys? Then it's, they're a lot more like, yeah, yeah, this foreigner knows what the fuck he's talking about. Let's go. And I feel like they're more comfortable. And I guess because it's giving them an opportunity to also speak English. Yeah. Right. So they, especially in like a drinking setting, they're a lot more comfortable immediately as opposed to me speaking in Japanese. Is that the case with you guys?

- Funnily enough, yes. - Yeah, right. - But not for Japanese. I have a very, very similar experience whenever I go to Thailand. - Yeah, yeah. - And I do that. Whenever, let's say I'm like, you know, talking to a random Thai person, I like start the conversation off in Thai. Like immediately they're like,

"Yo, Harfu? You're a Harfu? Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you were one of us, but you are Harfu." I'm like, "No, I'm not a Harfu. I just grew up abroad, okay? I'm sorry, my accent's a bit weird." - I think it's kind of like the vibe of when you get to talk to like the new kid or something, where it's like, he doesn't know anything. And so it's kind of fun that you both have this kind of, you've no knowledge of each other. And when you speak the language, like fluently, I think there's that kind of like, oh.

- Yeah. - You know everything. - He already knows. - You know everything. - Yeah, right. - There's no like fun to be had here. 'Cause I've also noticed, and I was thinking about this the other day,

When I'm hanging out with Pete and Pete talks to people in Japanese, he's so good at making people feel so comfortable and engaged. And one thing that I noticed that he does is that, so he'll speak Japanese, but he'll also always talk to them super basic in English. And I think people really like it when they can understand what he's saying. They're like, "Oh dude, this is so fun." I don't know. And I realized that today as well, my taxi driver, so this happens a lot too. I'll go in and I'll speak Japanese. I'll do everything in Japanese. And when I'm leaving, they'll go like, they'll turn around with a big grin on their face and be like, "Thank you."

And I'll be like, thank you too. And then they'll look super happy and pumped. And I'm like. - You're like a Skyrim NPC. - I can imagine the whole drive. They're thinking like, I can't wait to fuck it. I'm gonna say it. I'm gonna say it. - I've had that point where,

in taxi drivers, when I'm speaking to them with Japanese and they just like refuse to reply to me. - Yeah, the standoff. - The standoff. And I know it's because they're like,

- No, this is my opportunity. - I'm a taking this. I'm about to use all my skill points right now. - Which is fair, 'cause like they get less English time than we get Japanese time, right? So I'm okay with it. - Because I've had so many interactions where, you know, I will get in a taxi and then, you know, we'll start conversing in Japanese and then they reply in Japanese and then they'll have this one line that is just like, they're giddy to say like,

- Can you put on your seat belts please? - And he's just like, okay. - I think that's what it is. It's like now, and I think like now that I finally like recognize that where it's like, oh, I don't have to speak Japanese unless it's a situation where clearly

it would be more beneficial for both parties if I could speak Japanese. Like, you know, I'm not going to go to the fucking city hall and being like, where do I sign the paper? Like, I'm not going to do that, obviously. But if it's in like a casual conversation, like I've noticed that like so many Japanese people are so eager to use English that I'm like, well, then I'll give them the satisfaction to use that English. Because I don't know, you probably, they probably have way less of an instance to be able to use that as opposed to me using,

using Japanese. - All right, deep question. - Okay. - This is a deep question. Did you ever go through a period, this is gonna go deep. Did you ever go in a period in your life when you were like in Japan, maybe as a kid where you specifically spoke Japanese because you wanted to like, maybe subconsciously or consciously you wanted to be like,

to be accepted as like a real oh of course Japanese person yeah 100% even though you grew up abroad yeah yeah no 100% I mean I feel like especially when I was a kid that happened a lot because like I had a lot of like identity issues of like I wasn't fitting into Japan because I could speak English and I wasn't fitting into Australia because I you know I was half Japanese right so I was like fuck you know there was so many like I think I've told the story on Trash Taste before like a long time ago but uh

When I was like, I was maybe like six, seven years old, I was visiting my grandma with my sister. And we were, she took us to like a supermarket and she was like, all right, go to the sweets aisle. And, you know, here's 500 yen. You can get whatever you want kind of thing. Yeah. And so, you know, we're picking it. And, you know, sorry, my sister's picking through some stuff. And I could hear there was like kids, Japanese kids, roughly around my age. So like, you know, the second grade.

And they're like whispering to each other. Cause you know, we're in middle of nowhere in Sendai. They've probably never seen a foreigner child in their life, right? So they're just like whispering, blah, blah, blah. But I could hear what they were saying, you know? They were like, oh, look at these like fucking Gaijins, blah, blah, blah.

And so I don't know what came over me. There was maybe that like pride of like, I can understand what you're saying. So I was like, I'll show them. My six year old mom was like, I'll show them. So really loud so they could hear in Japanese. I said to my sister in Japanese, I was like, oh, you're done picking what you want. Yeah. And my sister being, I don't know, two, three at the time.

caught onto it immediately. Replies back also in perfect Japanese like, "Yes, brother, I am done. Let's go." And we decided to walk towards the kids and the look on these kids' faces, man. You would've thought they just saw the face of God. They were like, "Nihonjin?" And so, yeah, there was definitely that part where it's like, I felt a lot of pride towards that side, especially while I was in Japan. But nowadays, man, like I've lived in this country long enough where I'm like,

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- Back to the episode. - I look like this. I don't look like a typical Japanese person. So obviously there's always gonna be that wall of like, nah, you can't speak a word of Japanese. So I'm just like, I've just accepted that now. - Yeah, because I asked, 'cause I like went through the exact same phase where, obviously I can speak Thai. My Thai is not as good as your Japanese because it's very, very obvious that I have an accent basically.

because even though I've lived in Thailand, I haven't like specifically lived, I didn't like grow up in Thailand. So I've only really used Thai with like my parents, my mom and dad, which is why my specific Thai is very, very, very polite. To the point where wherever I go out with like any Thai friends, they're like, can you please stop speaking to me like you speak to your mom? And I'm like, I do not know how not to.

- Not to do that. - Right. - It was only that way. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'Cause my mom didn't teach me any slang, any cuss words, anything else. So it'd be like very, very obvious. So when I was like growing up and even when I lived in Thailand like five years ago, whatever, I did feel like that disappointment whenever people would be like, "Oh, you're a halfu? Oh, okay, okay, okay, okay. Go off you little foreigner, whatever."

But yeah, I guess I got more and more comfortable with it. It's just accepting that, hey, I think growing up in like so many different places and so many different areas has just given you a unique perspective on the world where you might not exactly feel, especially feel like you're specifically accepted as purely like Japanese or purely Thai or whatever, 'cause you didn't have X experience or Y experience.

But then I feel like we also have the unique experience where we've had, it's like the modern world of coming, kind of becoming like a cultural melting pot where we can connect to even more people because of the unique experiences that we've gotten.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, I don't, I obviously will switch to Japanese if the conversation is getting to a point where, like, maybe they're struggling to keep up with the conversation in English. Yeah. And they clearly want to keep talking to me. Or, you know, if they specifically ask, like, do you speak Japanese or, like, you know, what's your nationality or whatever, which is a very common question to get thrown out. Yeah. In Japan, especially. Then I'll switch to Japanese and then, you know, we can go from there. Yeah, I actually get that. Yeah. Yeah.

- Where are you from is such a normal question to ask in Japan. But then like, if I asked that in the UK. - Yeah, I'd be like, what do you mean? - What the fuck you mean where am I from? I'm from fucking here. - Yeah, exactly. - 'Cause it's a normal thing in Thailand as well. It's just like, oh, where are you from? Oh, you are Hafu or? - Yeah, it's like, oh, you don't look or sound like me. Where are you from? - Yeah, it's been so like, my accent has fell.

My accent entirely recently has been like fucking awful because it's like a tonal language. And the best way I can describe not getting practice with a tonal language is like, you know, when you...

know the lyrics of a song, but you don't know the melody of the song. So you say you like, you know how it sounds, but like I will have moments where I'm just like, ah, ah, ah. Okay, I got it, I got the tone. - It's like, hold on, I need to, it's like, if someone asks you like, can you speak Thai and you're like, hold on, let me do my vocal warmups for a second. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Ah, ah, ah.

- It's like, all right, I got it. - Yeah. - Oh, tonal languages seem like a nightmare to remember. - Yeah. - Yeah, I mean. - I mean, that's why it's so hard to learn for people who don't naturally know any tonal languages. - Yeah, you kind of have a, because there's only like a few tones, you kind of have a guess at like what it sounds like. But for me, since English is my first language, I know what it sounds like, I guess phonetically, but then sometimes my tone doesn't match

with my memory of the words. So I just have to like adjust it like mid sentence. - Yeah, right, right. - Which definitely people would definitely, definitely notice. - So would you say then you guys have more fun now conversing with Japanese people?

- Yeah, we might speak better. - I guess 'cause like now you're more used to it as well. - Yeah, we're used to the conversations. - There are still things that I still have trouble getting over and that is the same things I have trouble getting over in English. That's just my social anxiety. I will never get over going on a phone call.

- Terrifies me. - Yeah. - It just terrifies me even more in Japanese because I'm like. - Because there's a million more dialogue options. - Yeah. I don't know why, but when I- - Dialogue tree. - Look, when I get a random,

phone call from a number I don't know or a number or anything. It doesn't matter if it's in English, it's just even more terrifying in Japanese. In English, even if it's a call from the bank, I don't wanna pick up a phone call. - Every time I see a phone number I don't recognize calling me, 80% of my brain is like, hang up now. Don't even pick that up. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a scam. Don't pick it up. - Don't do it, don't do it. - I never pick it up. I always Google the number.

Oh, really? It comes up as a business that I like, like a postal service. I'm like, oh, okay. Oh, okay. That makes sense. Yeah. Right. Like, oh, it's the government building. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, then I just don't want to, just in case, like, I don't know, someone accidentally got my phone number and they're trying to like verify it's me. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. So just being cautious. Yeah. Yeah. Just being cautious. Just being cautious. Yeah. All right. I pick one out. All right. All right. What do you got? Uh,

- Being a foreigner. - Wow. - What does that mean? - Kind of a conversation we just had. - I'll pick another one. - Does it get better to be a foreigner? - When do I not become a foreigner? - Well, I mean, I guess in that aspect, maybe it has gotten better because when you guys moved, it was right before COVID started, right? So you guys kind of experienced the Japan where there was little to no foreigners in the country. And now- - I mean, being a foreigner in,

Japan was also kind of weird during COVID. Cause you definitely felt like- - How are you here? - Like some people, yeah, they didn't think how are you here? Or I feel like, I mean, just straight up like racism where they were like, oh God, you must have like COVID or something. Like that definitely happened. And that was definitely frustrating. Cause that was like, dude, what the fuck man? - Yeah. It's like, we're not the ones that started it. - Yeah. I will say, I don't know if this is a thing. I will say,

obviously like pre COVID, but they're definitely like post COVID or definitely during like the tourism boom. Being a foreigner has felt different. - For sure. - Maybe like, I feel like some establishments has,

had that foreigner fatigue, I don't know. There used to be sometimes this excitement when, oh my God, there's a foreigner coming to this place or come to this town or this area. And now it just seems like, oh, okay, okay. Another tourist, all right. - Yeah, I definitely feel over the years,

there's definitely been a lot more just like unwarranted stigma towards foreigners visiting Japan, right? - And sometimes warranted stigma. - And sometimes warranted, obviously. - And sometimes warranted. - The news here, definitely fear mongers with foreigners. - Oh, of course, yeah. - And we're also in a time globally where like,

I guess not liking foreign people in your country is a very common opinion, gaining a lot of popularity in the world. So it's kind of, you know, it's normal. Yeah, especially, you know, coming off the backbone of last year where I think it's like it was the most amount of tourists Japan has ever had ever. Yeah. And it wasn't even like close as well. Yeah. And then on top of that, the COVID stuff as well. Definitely in the past five years, I've noticed that there are a lot more

demographics, I guess, especially in the Japanese population that have just kind of really just gotten a sour taste towards foreigners, whether that be warranted or unwarranted, which is a shame. But hey, what can you do? Yeah, because I feel like, you know,

I feel like the thing before versus after was, you might've been treated differently, but I think it came from a place of like curiosity almost where they just never like experienced having a foreigner at this place or this establishment or whatever. And it's been like a very subtle shift and it's not everywhere. It's definitely not everywhere. I've just noticed in some places, I feel like there has been some fatigue in terms of that dealings.

And I can't really blame them, you know, with the amount of tourism that's happened. It'll be weird if they always stay the same, but that's something I have definitely noticed. I've also definitely noticed that there are way more establishments that have English menus now. Oh yeah. And I only know this because every time I walk into a restaurant, motherfuckers are always like, English menu? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm like, I'll die joking this actually. Yeah. I feel like I've gotten that lash lately. I don't know why though. Really? Maybe it's the places like, yeah.

- I've gone, especially like growing up in Japan. Like there was like, if there was a place that had an English menu when I was growing up, I was like, oh, okay. This place is popular with the tourists. - Even when we came, I felt like it was only really the big chains. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And normally sometimes the English menu was so unusable. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Like Hanbei. - Yeah, it was like Hanbei, oh my God. - I mean, that's still unusual.

Yeah. But also hilarious. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a great place to go. Yeah. Hanbei is a cool spot. You should go to Hanbei. Exactly. Yeah. It's pretty bad. Yeah. I mean, I still think it's fine being a foreigner here, but yeah, definitely it's definitely changed. It's definitely changed a lot. COVID changed a lot of things. Yeah. Oh, definitely. Yeah.

And I still feel like we're not gonna see the full effects, at least mentally, of what COVID caused for a little while. I feel like there's still a lot of people who have lingering thoughts. - I will say that one thing that has changed for the better in terms of foreigners, and maybe this is just from my perspective, but I feel a lot more younger people are way more open to talking to foreigners.

- Yes, I'd say so. - Yeah, like when I, again, when I was growing up, it was almost like the younger generation were just kind of almost fearful to talk because maybe they were doubting their abilities to communicate or, you know, they just had little to no information about foreigners and foreigner culture. But I feel now, especially with all these tourists coming to Japan and like, you know, now that the younger generation now have a lot more access to the internet and stuff like that, I just feel there's like more of a curiosity towards foreigners.

Like I get a lot more people, just Japanese people speaking to me in English in passing when I'm like walking somewhere. And I'm like, that never used to happen. There's this like weird, almost like- - You're a white boy. - Yeah, it's like, you are a white boy. There's like this weird increase of stranger friendliness, but still quite awkward. - Yeah, yeah. - You know, if you compare it to like say America, but I feel it's definitely gotten a lot more, they're a lot more comfortable now because I feel that they're just more used to it now. - Right, right. - Which is, I guess a good thing, you know?

Fair enough. Yeah. I already pulled one out. So I just need you to go for it. Seasonal menu items. Not limited to just comedy. I hate them. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like you used to like them.

- It was cool discovering it, you know, where you're like, Ooh, there's this exciting thing. And it's like, Ooh, it's springtime. What do we have to look forward to in springtime? A bunch of like fucking Sakura stuff. And I'm like, Ooh, you know, when you first move here, there is that like new kind of like new feeling of just discovering a bunch of shit. And nowadays I'm like,

If I like something, I'm just like, I just, why do I have to wait one time of the year to just to get this specific thing? - I feel like I'd never really care for much of any of them. Like Sakura is just such a whatever, it doesn't taste like anything. Sakura is shit, okay? It's not a good flavor. And they spend like three months making everything taste like it. And then, you know, like you said, maybe the stuff you do like is gone.

And like some of the stuff they choose I'm like, okay, it's like suddenly in winter everything becomes chestnut flavored and you're like, okay,

I like chestnuts too. Not everything needs to be chestnut flavor. Let's fucking hold up. - Yeah, or October is always like pumpkin flavored. - Always pumpkin. And pumpkin's a great flavor, but it shouldn't be always the main flavor. Pumpkin is not a main, let's be honest. No one's ever thought pumpkin's the main character. It really shouldn't be the main character. At best, it's like an accompaniment to a better flavor. - Yeah, true. I just have like, every time there's like a seasonal thing

where I'm actually like, Ooh, I kind of fuck with that. I just grow no attachment to it anymore. Cause I'm like, I know in a couple of weeks it's gone. It's gone. It's gone. Pretty good. Pretty good as a primary flavor. I like that they often do stuff like that. And I understand why that's a seasonal thing, but sometimes it's like, you feel like they're making shit up. Like, yeah, like the whole, just, just like the whole pumpkin being around for that long. You're like, okay, I know, I know it's not making up that it's in season, but like, why do we have to have this and only this? Yeah. Um,

I'm like, stop promoting me pumpkin spice latte Starbucks. I'm not fucking drinking it. Yeah. And then, you know, you'll go to the conbini and I'll say every single seasonal item is often so fucking mid. It is mid. It's like, there's a reason why it's seasonal and it's not around. If it was that good, they would find a way to make it. That's true. I feel like even the companies making it are just like, well, we might as well ride the train while it's running. And then once it starts derailing, we'll pull out on that shit. If they made like a bajillion dollars on some strawberry dessert, they would have that dessert around all year. That's true.

- 100%. I never buy the seasonal stuff from like the conbini or like Starbucks. I'm like, just give me a fucking coffee. - Is there a seasonal anything you've discovered in Japan where you actually fuck with it? And you're like, damn, why do I have to get rid of that shit?

Or is there just so many now that it's hard to remember? - Yeah, so many. Normally what pisses me off is the ice cream. - Oh my God, they have the worst ice cream flavors in the world. It's like insufferable. - Yeah, there's one time, maybe one out of like a hundred times at the con meeting where they're like, finally a flavor I can fuck with. Next time I'm there, gone.

It's like, fuck, can we just have, can we stop like cycling through different flavors of ice cream except for fucking vanilla? - I don't need every flavor of ice cream to be some kind of like American monstrosity of sugar. Like I don't, I don't, but.

"Have a little bit of them for fuck sake." Like why does every ice cream flavor, like every single place in Japan you go will be milk, matcha and maybe a mix or chocolate. And it's like, that's it. You're like, okay, so vanilla was never a choice, the fuck? First of all, vanilla is the best flavor and should always be available. Firmly believe that. But then like at best- - Isn't that just milk? - Milk with vanilla. - Isn't that just milk? - It's basically milk. - Milk with vanilla. But then they'll be like, "Our new seasonal flavor, gonna change ice cream forever."

fucking sweet potato. You're like, okay, it's not bad. It's not bad. I'm not saying it's not bad, but sometimes you just want a fucking double chocolate chip, fucking cholesterol stopping ice cream. Just let me be a fat foreigner. It's ice cream. I don't want to be eating healthy. Why? Why?

- Okay, hot take. - Like pumpkin, fucking so much pumpkin ice cream. - Okay, actually sweet potato is worse than pumpkin. - Sweet potato is such a mess. - Okay, hot take, I do not fuck with sweet potato. - Oh my God, yes. - I do not understand the craze that Japan has for sweet potato. - And everything is fucking sweet potato. - Anytime I see anything sweet potato, I'm like, I don't mind it as like the fucking sweet potato when you're eating it like- - Not sweet potato, sweet potato on fries? - Sweet potato is great. Sweet potato flavored things, I'm like, can you-

- Can we stop with this? Can we stop? - It's always like so artificial as well. This doesn't taste good at all. And then the ice cream looks radioactive purple and you're like, this is just like, okay, like for fuck sake. I don't need the Baskin Robbins Oreo milkshake level of like richness.

Just one. Just a variation. Would a singular like brownie in the ice cream once or a just one like nut, like a macadamia nut ice cream? Just give me a nut. Just a nut. When I went to LA recently, I always go to the ice cream places with Lott and it makes me cry that we don't have any of these flavors. They'll have like brown almond sugar. Oh.

They'll have like fucking pistachios with like the crumbs in there mixed with some other flavor. They'll have like caramel with a bit of like hard salted bits. It's like phenomenal engineering masterclasses of ice cream flavors. And suddenly in Japan, you get a plop of this radioactive purple dollop and you're like, this is sad. And you lick it and it tastes just like cold milk with a light flavoring. Come on. Well,

Well, that's why, like, you know, it's sad. The reality of it is that, you know, the best...

or unquote ice cream places in Japan is just Baskin Robbins. All the Japanese people just go to Baskin Robbins. Because you actually get those flavors. Yeah, because you actually get like the variants of flavors. You get Rocky Road. Oh, I love Rocky Road. Yeah, you actually get like a variance of flavors and then everywhere else is like maybe four flavors at most. But I get it because, you know, you don't always want like a fucking cookie dough. Heavy ass. I get it. And I've been to a lot of places in Hokkaido where they'll have, it's like an ice cream shop

and they'll have like 15 flavors and they'll actually like do some good stuff. But most places in Tokyo don't have a lot of flavors. - That's why Hokkaido is goaded. That's why Hokkaido is goaded. - I feel like there's not a lot of shops here in Tokyo that do just ice cream and like have a large selection that often,

- It's basically Baskin Robbins, like you said. - There's a couple of- - There's a couple of local ones. - What are they called? Gelaterias? - Gelato places. - Gelato, Gelaterias? I don't know what they're called. A couple of them that I actually quite like, 'cause I feel like they do it right. But if you ever go to a place in Japan where they don't, like they're not just an ice cream place, they'll often just have like three flavors and they're always the same. - Yeah. - And I'll say it, I think matcha as an ice cream flavor fucking sucks. It's just-

- It's just so bitter. - Nah, you had me and you lost me. You had me and you lost me. - I'm saying it. - You had me and you lost me. - Okay, I'll be honest, I just don't like matcha. - Yeah, I knew you just don't like matcha. - But what they do is, is they take the bitterness of matcha, add a bunch of sugar to it, and then it just tastes like

whatever now, 'cause you haven't decided to be bitter. You wanna appease the masses. So you've added a bunch of sweetener to it and now it tastes like nothing and you've ruined the milk. - I fuck with the heavy. - I like it. - Fuck you guys, I hate you. - If I have a limited quantity of ice cream flavors, but I really am just craving for like a soft serve or something and I'm just like skimming the marshmallow. - Yeah, it's just like that nice middle ground, you know?

- Sometimes you get that matcha flavored ice cream where it's actually not too sweet. And they actually leave a little bit of bitterness in it. - I wish it was bitter, 'cause then I would be more adorable. - You would like that. - No, no, no, 'cause most matcha things I eat aren't too sweet. It's just that nice middle ground. It's not too heavy, not too light, not too sweet, not too bitter. - The greatest compliment an Asian can give, not too sweet.

I thought I had like real matcha before. Then I did this video with Chris, the renting the castle. We did like a whole tea ceremony thing where I tried real matcha. I was like, holy fuck.

It was so bitter. - Yeah, boys beer is far. - It was so bitter. - It's like medicine. - And I feel like all these places that like we have real matcha, it's like, dude, none of them taste like this. None of them taste even close to what like- - That's the biggest red flag. If you go anywhere where they say in English, we have a real matcha, 99% of the time, it's not real matcha. - If it isn't like, if when you suck it and you don't immediately go,

It's not real matcha. It needs to be so fucking bitter. And one thing I think you'll agree with me is the only time seasonal menu items are goaded is when you go to like kind of a nice restaurant and they'll be like, look, it's the seasonal fish. It's the seasonal cut or something. Oh yeah.

- Even conveyor belt sushi places. It's insane that you can go to like a cheap ass conveyor belt sushi and they're like, here's a seasonal fish catch of the day. I'm like, what the fuck? I'm paying like $1 a plate. - But we only have 20 plates, so you better be quick. - They always go so fucking well. - That is true. Seasonal fish is always goaded in Japan. - Yeah. - All right, let's see. I already know the answer to this one. Japanese banks.

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Back to the episode. - Fuck them. They gotta go. They gotta go. - Yeah, I mean, I think we got, we did get very unlucky though. We did get stuck with probably the notoriously most unflexible bank. - True.

If you live in Japan, you know the one that we're probably talking about. Yeah. Right name. Cause you don't want to get in trouble. But yeah, that bank that we got stuck with in particular is the worst one. And then when I would ask people like, why, why does anyone use this bank? They'd be like, ah, it's, it's old. Yeah. It's historical. Yeah. I was like,

- Motherfucker. - Yeah, it's archaic. - Historical. There are some things we should not be using that are historical. We don't use like historical safety ropes. We change them because we need to use them all the time. - The guillotine is historical. We don't fucking use that anymore. - The rusted bridge. We don't use that. We update it. We need to change these things. Yeah, like I said, I think I mentioned like a couple of months ago, I swapped bank to a much more modern bank. It's simply been a lot easier. Like it's definitely nowhere near as good as my UK bank.

But it's a lot better. It's a lot better. Even the best in Japan still has a long way to go. So, you know, every time in Japan when you get your visa renewed, you have to normally fill out a bunch of stuff in the mail, at least with an old bank. You fill out in the mail or you go in person to get them to unfreeze your bank account. Yep. The new bank I joined online. You do it online, baby. Yep.

Super easy. - Yeah. - I was like, thank God I live in the future. - Yeah. - So Garnt, stop putting it off. Join my fucking bank. Stop wasting time. - I know, I know. - Every single time you fill out a form, Garnt, or you write a letter, you are wasting time you could be having with a good bank. - Exactly. - God fucking damn it. - Visits to the bank do not need to be half a day. That's just absurd. - All right. - Okay. - Oh, that was a lot. Kabuki Cho.

I think I'm the only one who really goes there out of us three though. Yeah. I don't even remember the last time I went to Kabukicho. Uh, look, Kabukicho is pretty bad, but there are a lot of really good places there. Problem is how the fuck do you figure that out? Yeah. Uh, it's word of mouth and trial and error a lot of the time. Yep. Uh,

Again, Caboose is an amazing place. As a tourist, if you don't know anyone, you probably will just get scammed and taken to the worst places possible. - How is it now though with, 'cause I'm sure I haven't been in a long time and you've obviously been a lot more than I have. How is it now with the influx of foreigners? - I mean, it's like ground level, pretty bad. - Yeah, right. - Yeah, it's pretty miserable.

You know, like you mentioned Hanbei. There's two Hanbeis in Kabukicho. Oh, okay. And they're on like the fourth and the fifth floor of different buildings. Hanbei's an amazing spot. Those Hanbeis are large, have enough room for big groups, and they're a great place to go. How the fuck would you know to go there if you don't know someone who told you to go there? Because the sign looks old and it's all in kanji.

It doesn't look appealing on the sign. And other places, they're like, "We got girls, we got fucking light shows, we got ping pong, we got drinks, drinks, drinks." It's like, yeah, of course you're gonna go into the place that looks way more inviting. - Yes. - And as a tourist, 'cause it's how it is. If I go anywhere, I'm the same. I'm not gonna go up to the seventh floor of a random building with a bunch of Japanese characters I can't read. - That's true. - So I think, again, there's some amazing spots in Kabukicho, and I think it's a great night out.

I just think if you can try and find someone who knows a little bit about Japan to maybe give you a little bit of a guidance, 'cause it really is make or break. 'Cause you can have easily the worst night you'll have in Japan at a book show if you don't know anything to go off of. - Yeah. - Normally, the normal rule is if there's a tout telling you to go in there, don't go in there. - I mean, that's globally, I feel like. - People think people let their guard down.

- Not too often. Mostly, most of the time it's only when people, when I have a friend visiting and they're like, "Can I go to Golden Guy?" And that's basically it. That's its own little bubble kind of thing. - I gotta tell a story. I was showing a streamer friend around and it was a Saturday in Golden Guy. They wanted to go to Golden Guy. So I was like, "All right, cool." And there was like a group of 12 of them, but I was showing around one of the group of 12.

And I was walking and there's this Japanese guy leaning out of a window in one of the buildings in Golden Gun. I just shouted at him like, "Hey, can you fit?" It's all in Japanese. "Hey, can two come in?" And he looks at me and he goes, "Do you speak Japanese?" And I go, "Yeah, I speak Japanese." He's like, "Okay, come in. Go up the stairs." So I go into this bar. I cannot see the stairs immediately. As I go right to the back of the store, there's basically a ladder. And I climb up the ladder and as I'm about to get off the ladder, he's like, "Oh, Kutsuba, don't wear your shoes."

I'm on a ladder. Bro, how are you going to? What? Finally, I take it off and I look in. I'm like, oh, my God. It's like the dingiest, rattiest half living room I've ever seen. It's literally like what I imagine happens to like the old forgotten Ikea stock. It's like the most disgusting couches and like a bean bag and the walls are falling apart and it's just him.

And I was like, oh, okay. He's like, yeah, yeah, sit down, sit down. So he's like, yeah, so the whole point of the bar is you got to talk to me.

- I was like, okay. - Was this like a side quest? - Yeah, yeah. You cannot get the drinks until you fill out these. - I was like looking in the corner and there's just a giant like hole, like a cut, maybe like a, just like here to here. - Yeah. - Hole that leads down to the next bar. No like railing and no ledge and just like, you easily just drop stuff down there.

And it's just so awkward. We have to keep like talking to him and I'm trying to translate for my friend and he never lets me translate. So I'm trying to like catch her up on the conversation, but he won't let me translate. It was very awkward. And he poured me the most strongest fucking drink ever. Imagine like it's like this cup. He pours like this much, like 25% soju and then like this much green tea.

And it's so fucking hard to drink. And the guy's nice, but it's just really awkward. Everything about it is just awkward. And then I'm just trying to finish this drink so I can go. And then I asked for the bill. He's like, it's 25...

I was like, huh? What was that increase? One drink each, 4,000 yen? Brother. I was like, you know what? I'll pay it. I want to get out of here. So bizarre. So bizarre. - You got finessed. - Yeah. - Definitely finessed. 4,000 yen. - 4,000 yen. - Insane, insane moves. But yeah, it's weird. Anyway, I just thought- - How did your friend take it? - They were introverted, so it was hell.

I think it was helpful. They didn't even come in for help. It's like, what we got to you? In my head, I was like, I'd love to see Pete just own this place. In my head, I was like, Pete would do a masterclass show right now, how to manage this guy. Yeah, Pete goes in there once and the next time you go in, it's like brand new walls and furniture and shit like that. He's the final boss. He just has a talent of just getting the conversation under control. I could...

I kept trying to get it in my pace so I could, but the guy, every time I was trying to like look away for a second, he'd ask me something else. So yeah, so anyway. - So watch out for that, I guess. - Yeah, I thought it was gonna be a short segment, so I just picked another random one. - Don't forget it. - Fruit in Japan. - Oh man. - I mean, I don't get it much. - You don't get it much? - I get a banana from a convenience store.

- I've been trying to make it a habit a lot more to get fruit just because I missed eating it. - I'm a veg fan. - Yeah. - You're a veg fan? - Veg ride or die. - Yeah. - It's 'cause you hate sugar. You just love it. - Yeah. - Sweet. - Yeah. - Ew, sweet. - That's good though 'cause like I feel like it's bad to have a lot of sugar, but not in fruit obviously. - Yeah, no, that's the good sugar. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I'm outside of that.

I made it a habit now after gym to go to, cause there's like a supermarket right next to it to just be like, oh, I'll just grab like some, cause right now it's like, you know, strawberries are in season. So you get like a pack of strawberries that are really nice or like some mandarins or, you know, an apple every now and then. I mean, I just tried to not snack at all. Hmm.

So just try to keep doing it. - Yeah, there are some days though where I'm just like, fuck man. - I mean, I said that and I had a muffin before this. - That's a fucking lie. - It's like 3:30 and I'm like, ah, just, it's too early for dinner. Fuck it, I'll just like eat a mandarin. - It's 'cause I left myself leftovers today and I left myself two little leftovers. - Ah, okay. - One of those awkward ones. Yeah, like to me, I remember we complained about like the,

fruit prices in Japan when we just first moved here. And I still stand by that. - They're pretty bad. - They are pretty bad. And I understand now after living here for five years, why they are that expensive. - Yeah. - Because in general, you go to Japan and you buy fruits. The best analogy I can give is that

maybe you go to Tesco's and you buy a packet of strawberries, right? Maybe one or two of those strawberries in that entire pack will be that S tier strawberry. - Yeah. - That you're searching for and you're like, oh, okay, that is a strawberry. Everything else is like variation from like A to fucking D tier. - Yeah. - When you buy fruit in Japan, you're basically guaranteeing that every one of those fruits in that packet is that guaranteed like S tier gacha roll. - I'd rather just be more affordable though.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what I would like- - Fruit is literally pay to win in Japan. - Yeah, no, no, it is pay to win in Japan. What I would like is there to be a free to play option in Japan. You know? We got the guaranteed S tiers, you know, but I would like it in Japan if there was a cheaper version

Yeah. Although I will say now that I have experienced kind of everything from like the cheapest option at a supermarket, which, you know, compared to the rest of the world or a lot of places in the world, still way more expensive than usual, all the way up to like, you know, the ultra rare variant of like fruits. And man, just the ultra rare shit, not worth it. No. Okay. At all. It is not worth it.

but it is like a, sometimes it's like a fucking one of a kind experience. I don't know. I had one mango that changed my fucking life. - Really? - Yeah. - I've had like quite a few variants of like super expensive fruit. Some of them where it's just like, okay, it's a little bit more expensive than the usual. And then there are just some where it's like, oh, I'm paying literally hundreds of dollars for this. - Yeah, it's ridiculous. It's not worth it. - And I'm just like, bro, it's not worth it.

when you compare it to like veg, it's so cheap here. Yeah. Vegetables are so fucking cheap here. You're like, what's, just grow more. It's expensive, just fucking grow more. True. There's not like as much of a demand for that as say like a daikon or something. Yeah. Yeah.

- Well, I think it's that whole like gift giving culture in Japan where it's like the easiest thing is fruit. - I've never actually bought like a hundred dollar fruits. I've already eaten what was like given to me, which is probably why I don't mind the experience. - Yeah, exactly. - When it's a present, you're like, wait, wait, what? I remember, so I think like- - You got to pull on someone else's whale account. - Yeah, 'cause like Mei Lin gifted me these like, I think like mangoes. - Yeah. - And you know, I think like that,

I think they're like Miyazaki mangoes or something. - Oh, the super top tier ones. - Super, super top tier mangoes that are only available in certain periods of the year. And you know what Mei Lin's like. She's like- - I know, I know, I know.

It's grass fed. Actually, it's grass fed mango. It's free range as well. Free range mango. They whisper every night. Yeah, we let them run around in the field. And I'm like, Meilin, you know I'm Thai, right? You're gifting me a mango? Seriously? Like, I am Thai. We eat mangoes all of the fucking time. And she's like, no, no, no. Just try it. Just try it.

I'm not gonna lie. I put it off. You know, I was like, yeah, whatever. Malin literally texts me on like a few days later being like, this is the last day they will be this delicious. You need to eat them today. You need to eat them now. Right. Or they will go to waste. I'm like, okay, fine. I'll do it just to, um,

'Cause I was waiting for like maybe there's like some guests around, I can cut them up, but I'm like, okay, if my boss is telling me I gotta eat them today, I'm just gonna go fucking eat them today, whatever. So I don't even like fucking, I don't even cut this up like neatly or whatever. My mom or anytime you go in Thailand, you'd cut it up neatly, you'd like slice it up, whatever. I'm just like- - Inside out. - I just cut off a piece and I remember

like cutting off a piece and taking a bite. I have never had so much juice just burst into my mouth before.

- From a fruit. - Okay, there we go. - Have you read Toriko? - Of course. - You know in one of those early chapters where they get like the eternal fruit, where you just eat it and then you just like completely like, you can eat it like forever and it just keeps like going on and on. That's what it felt like. I took one bite and so much juice burst out, I'm like,

- Jesus Christ, it was like a fucking waterfall in my mouth. And it was like, I have never gone full primal on a fruit before. This shit unlocked some fucking caveman part of my brain. Yeah, yeah, yeah, literally. I thought I'd be like a civilized guy cutting up this mango. I took one bite of this mango and I just went rah, rah, rah.

Like I had to like clean up the floor afterwards. - How much does mangoes cost for one? - I have no idea. - They're probably like three, 4,000 yen for one. - Probably $50 or something like that. - I remember I bought like a Okayama grapes. - Yeah, around 5,000 yen for two. - Yeah. - Jesus Christ. - I bought like Okayama grapes, which were like fucking 5,000 yen for like a box of grapes. - Yeah. - Small, you know, like plastic sized box.

I don't remember trying it and I was like, it's too juicy. It was genuinely just juice. - Too juicy? - Yeah, I was like, I liked, I realized I was like, you know, there's like kind of- - You're the only one who's ever complained. - Normal size grapes. The juice to skin ratio is perfect. 'Cause you get like something chewy and it's not too much, but I bit into this, okay, I'm a grape. And it was like a fucking fire hose had been left off in my mouth. I was like, this is ridiculous, who needs this?

People love juice. People who like fruit. - I was like, just make fucking wine out of these things. That'd be fire. But like to eat, I need a lot of skin. I need the skin. It's the best part. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. - What? - It's the balance. - Exactly, and the balance was all off. - It's the balance. The skin is like that little bit of, you know, it takes the edge off the sweetness. - You can never have too much of a good thing. - Yeah, but too much juice is not the good thing. The skin is the good thing.

- No, but like, were the grapes like big? - Huge. - Yeah, so there should be more skin to balance out. - Yeah, but the ratio of like, 'cause think about it, Garnt, the area is getting slightly larger, but the volume has increased a lot.

- So you just like small grapes? - I like normal size grapes. - Yeah, right. - The giant, like they were like- - You're talking about like the cure whole grapes, right? - They're like the size of Cadbury cream eggs, these fucking grapes. You're like, this is ridiculous. - I've seen those, I've never tried them. - They look amazing. - Yeah, they look great. - I've never tried them. - I'm going for a piss, all this talk about juice. - I fucking love grapes. - Yeah. - Grapes, S tier fruit, man. - I agree with you, normal size.

- Almost size grapes. - No, no, no, every size grape. Every size grape, S tier. - Have you tried those like tiny grapes? - No. - Yeah, no, no, not raisins. I've tried, Japan has this like particular, it's not even a brand 'cause they're actually quite cheap. My grandma really likes them. They're like these really, really tiny grapes. They're like the size of sultanas, literally. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, those ones there. What the fuck are they called? No, not Delaware grapes. Oh yeah, maybe they are.

I don't know. - Oh, those ones? - Yeah, but they're tiny. They're so much smaller than the regular grapes. - I don't like them. - I thought I wouldn't like them at first either, but they're fucking awesome. 'Cause it's the perfect, again, skin to juice ratio. - It's like to me when grapes are that small, how'd you eat them?

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- Just like pick them off and pop them in. Like you're eating blueberries or like raspberries. You just like pop them in one at a time. - Because in my mind, right? In my mind, they're just like too small. So I'd have to like pick like three at a time or pick like four at a time to get like a decent like flavorful. - You can do like the Roman fucking Empress thing where you just like that as well. If you want, you'll probably get a good amount. - Yeah, I don't know. Grapes are like just that perfect fruit size snack.

And I would love to try one of the, is that the one that Connor had? One of those fucking big fat ones? Yeah. I've always seen these in supermarkets and I'm just like, look at the size of those boys. God damn. Look at that. But these are the ones, wait, because like, are these the ones where you have to peel the skin off?

Because there's some grapes in Japan where they actually encourage you. The skin is so thick. Yeah. They just encourage you to peel the skin off. Just peel the skin off and just eat it. Which goes against every fiber of my being because I'm like, no, no, no. Grapes should be a thing where you can just pick it off and then you pop it in your mouth. Do you know the problem with grapes? The big problem with grapes? You can never start like a vine and then not finish the entire thing. You know what I mean? Pick the appropriate vine.

- Yeah, right. - Sometimes you just have like- - You can also split vines. - No, no, no, no. - You can try splitting the vine and then you finish the vine and you're just like,

- There's more right there. - I'll just take one. - You know what's peak? Raisins on the vine. That's so fucking fire. - Wait, what do you mean? - Like, 'cause sometimes they, you know, when you get raisins, they normally like take them off and then dry them out. When they dry them on the vine, peak flavor. - I've never had that. - I've never had that either. - You have had that. - What do you mean? - I know a place where we've had it. - When? - I'll tell you after, I'll tell you after. - What? - It's good, it's good. You'll know what I'm talking about. - I've had raisins. - You've had raisins on the vine, J.

- On the vine? - You've had raisins on the vine, Joe. - Has Garn had raisins? - Garn has certainly had raisins on the vine. It's a place we go to. - How do you know and we don't know? - Because it must not have been a memorable experience for you. - I would remember. - I didn't realize it was a life-changing experience for only me. I thought we all were. Raisins on the vine, boys. - What improvement does it bring? What improvement does it bring? - When you take it off the vine, boom, it's running out of life force.

- I forgot he's on muffin mode right now. So he's gonna start saying some shit where he just like, what? - I don't know, I just feel like mentally I'm like, I don't know, you feel like some kind of like Roman King pulling a raisin off the vine. - I understand if it's grapes. - No, no, no, raisins off the vine. - Were you doing like this shit? - Yeah, I would, oh yeah. - Oh, raisins on the vine, the only way to eat raisins. - Are we done with this fruit conversation?

- Fruit isn't that good anyway. - Yes it is. - I love fruit. - Yes it is. - Vegetables gap fruit any day of the week. - No, it doesn't. - It's a different ball game. - Absolutely not. - What's the top tier vegetable? - All of them.

You can't just say that. - Brussels sprouts, easy S tier. Broccoli, easy S tier. - Brussels sprouts need to be cooked in a very specific way to be appreciated. - Onions. - Onions, okay, onions are top tier. - Yeah, I saw the cogs in your head there for a brief moment, thinking how you could say that onions were not an S tier. - Onions are all right.

- Okay. - They need to be cooked though. The problem with vegetables is that most of them need to be cooked for me to appreciate them. - Yeah, true. - I don't wanna be eating a fucking raw carrot. I can't like, you know. - Why not? - Yeah, fuck, I used to do that. - Are you fucking serious? - They sell it at the corn beanie, the stick, the vegetable sticks. - You get a little hummus in that bitch too? - Yeah. - Ooh. - It's like celery sticks or like cucumber sticks. They're fucking great. - I gotta cook my vegetables. - Celery sticks are fire. - Celery sticks are bomb. - Celery sticks are ranch?

So good. Okay, next one. I don't really know what to make of this one. Otakus.

- Otakus was like out of date when we moved to Japan. - Yeah. I mean there are otakus, but I feel like anime otakus, you don't, I mean, problem is, anime otakus don't leave their house. So you don't really see them. - Most otakus don't leave their house. The only ones who leave their house are the train otakus and you don't wanna fuck with those guys. - They're like the mafia here. You don't fuck with the train otakus here. - Yeah, true. I mean, yeah, like, I don't know. Military otakus?

Yeah. They're all right, I guess. It's just I feel like people in Japan tend to be a bit more obsessive than normal. Yes. So every single hobby you name has otakus. I feel like a lot of the anime fans or anime otakus here have just shifted to being VTuber fans. Yeah.

- Pretty much. - I feel like that's- - They were always VTuber fans. - Yeah, so now we don't really call them otakus, they're just VTuber fans. Like that's- - It's true, right? - Just idol fans. - They're just called super chats now. - Yeah, like otakus used to scoff at the idol fans for having such an inferior hobby. - It's like, you're into real women? - And they've kind of become them now. So they became the thing they hated.

- One otaku that I currently very despise now is train otakus. The ones that actually go in front of the trains and take pictures. - Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. It's like, those are the only otakus you see in the wild. - Train otakus are the worst. - Yeah, they are objectively the worst. - And they're like super like rude. - They're so rude. - Like if you dare walk in front of their camera by accident, you'll fucking hear it. - Oh yeah. - It's crazy. 'Cause like the social skills are not there, but it's crazy how they have the confidence to shout you out. - Yeah. - And then you're like, "Hey, how you doing man?"

And I'm like, bro, relax. This next train is coming in two minutes. You're fine. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I feel like since we don't really interact with autopsies. Also, we don't go to Akihabara anymore. Not really. Not really. Even then, when you go to Akihabara, I feel like you see way more foreigners now. It's mostly foreigners. It's a lot of foreigners now. It used to be a bit more Japanese, but yeah, mostly all foreigners now. Okay. I don't know who spelled this out, but it's spelled it wrong. Global Cuisines.

- Global cuisines. - I mean, it's always getting better in Japan. - I feel like, yeah. - They have more time. - True. - They get more and more taste for it. - I've definitely spent a lot of time after COVID just kind of finding a lot more, I guess, niche cuisines in Japan, you know, 'cause there's so many restaurants already in Japan, right? - Yeah.

I've always just been curious being like, oh, I wonder like if they have this particular like super, super niche cuisine. Like I made an effort to go to every single Hungarian restaurant in Tokyo. - All two. - There's only three. I've been to all three and only one of them was good. But the problem is it's so far away from my house where I'm just like, I'm not. - But it's always good to have those far away places just in case you ever find yourself nearby. - Oh, for sure. - And your friends like, oh, there's nothing around here.

- I know a spot. I know a spot. - We got you. - Yeah. - 'Cause I didn't, we don't find a- - Estonian place. - Estonian restaurant. - It was only like, it was run by two Japanese people who'd never been to Estonia.

- That's so funny. - That's funny. That's funny to me when they like make a whole restaurant about a country they've never been to. - Yeah. - That feels crazy to me. - Like Outback Steakhouse. - Yeah, I mean, surely you would have gone to the country just a little bit to pretend you- - Can you imagine this the other way around? - It'd be insane. - Like someone in America making a- - Fucking Tim from Wisconsin opens up his own sushi store in Japan. That'd be nuts. That'd be nuts.

- You could literally have like a white guy in like the UK who's lived in Japan, trained on the best of chefs. We all be like, nah, he's white. - Yeah. - Okay, okay. Here's the question then. After five years of going to probably a fuckload of restaurants in Tokyo, because it's just so easy to do so, what is the best cuisine in Japan that is not Japanese? If you had to pick. - Like consistently? - Consistently. - Probably Italian?

- Yeah, probably Italian, just 'cause I feel like it's generally affordable to make those dishes. So I think that a lot of people know how to make them. - There are a lot of Italian restaurants from every different price points. And I generally feel like they have the, you know, out of every cuisine- - They got the core, right? They got the core. - They got the core, right? And they have their own twist on it, but still tastes fucking great. - And I think out of all the cuisines, I think like Italian cuisine has the highest peaks, but like mid Italian food is often just passable. You're like, you're like,

- When you have an okay carbonara, you're like, all right. You don't feel bad about it. When you have like an okay katsu, you're like, ugh. - Yeah, that's true. - So much grease and like pork and it's done so like, eh. - What's the Thai restaurants like in Japan, in your opinion? - Pretty good actually. - I like Thai food. I get a lot of Thai food. - Yeah, there's a lot of Thai food places. - I would like them to have, 'cause they always have like the same five dishes on every single Japanese menu. - Isn't that 'cause like the Thai government like sponsors people who wanna open restaurants outside of Thai and they force them to have certain things

- There are certain things on the menu, but I've noticed in Japan, it's different from what's on in America and what's on in the UK. - But everywhere has pad thai. - Everywhere has pad thai. Everywhere has green curry. But in Japan,

there are certain dishes that are way easier to find in Japan in every Thai restaurant than you can find in US restaurants. Meanwhile, there are some dishes that I always get in US restaurants that are fucking impossible to get in Thai restaurants. Like Pad Kee Mao, for example, is in like every US Thai restaurant, but- - Which one's that one? - It's the drunken noodles. - Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

And yeah, it's super weird that it's almost like now that I've tried Thai cuisine from like around the world in terms of like going to different restaurants, it's weird seeing how every region has its own matter in terms of like what goes on menu and then everyone will agree on, okay, we're gonna put all of these ones in this specific country and- - Wait, so what's a Thai dish that you only, or you most commonly see in Japan that you wouldn't see anywhere else?

- Kaman-gai, which is kind of like chicken over rice. It's like a very, very- - It's really popular here. - Yeah, it's so popular here. And it's very, very local. And actually I thought quite niche. - I think anything rice-based from Japan, I'm like, I'm down. - Japan is like, "It's got rice in it, put it on the menu." - Say no more. - And I'm like, I see this shit everywhere here. And I'm like, I thought- - I mean, the Kaman-gai here fucking sucks. - Whenever I see the pictures of this, I never order it 'cause I always think it looks bland.

Oh no, I get this quite often actually. It's really good. It's not the best Thai food. It's a good comfort food, which is why I was very surprised to see it here because compared to other Thai foods, this one's a little bit lighter on the palate. Yeah.

- Yeah, if I'm not too hungry, but I'm in the mood for Thai, I always get a common one. - Ever since Garnt showed me when we were in Thailand, Thai sausage, I found one place that does Thai sausage. - Oh, really? - And I always order it like two portions. It's just a full sausage cut up. It's phenomenal. It's so spicy. - Thai sausage is great. - You know what food I've actually been consistently disappointed by in Japan? Indian food.

- Really? - There's a lot of bad Indian food places I feel like in Japan. I don't know if that's my British palette talking, but there's a couple of spots I really, really like. 'Cause I always end up like fucking dying on the toilet and that's normally a good sign with Indian food. But yeah, there's a lot of places that I'm like, dude,

Just butter curry. Is that it? You got nothing else in there? I mean, I mostly now go to like places that are labeled as like Nepalese restaurants. Yeah. Because there's a lot of those in Japan. And yeah, I think I've had a better time with like curry based stuff in Nepalese restaurants than I have like actual Indian restaurants. Burgers are also pretty generally bad here, I'd say. Yeah.

- Yeah. - You have to really find a spot. There is a lot of good spots, but there are a lot of bad spots too. - But when you find that good spot, it's like, it's as good as- - It's because Japan's just obsessed with like all the chains when it comes to birds. - I think we'll all agree on this one. I think we only all like one or two Mexican restaurants. - Yeah. - Yeah, there's like one.

I know one other one which I want to take you guys to as well. But yeah, that one is like the main one. - Well, I didn't even start eating Mexican food until I moved out of the UK. - Yeah. - You know, it's something that, unless like was obviously super, super popular in America, but in the places of the world I went to, it's always consistent. - Actually, I did find one recently in Harajuku that was really, really good. In the back streets of Harajuku. It used to be a taco truck.

But then I guess it got so popular that they bought an actual like restaurant space in Harajuku now. And it's a proper, it's kind of hidden away, but it's really, really good. - Chili's, not Chili's. - Welcome to Chili's. - There's one called Chili's in Shibuya that our Mexican friend recommended me. It was really good. I was disgustingly full afterwards. If I'm not disgustingly full, it's not good Mexican. Like I shouldn't have to over-order. Like I should have my normal ass portion

And it should just be like fucking, yeah, this one. - Chili's Mexican girl? - We've been here. - Yeah, yeah, we've been there. - Yeah, this place is fine. Actually, this is in Harajuku, I think. I think it's on the streets of Harajuku. It's phenomenal. - Oh, okay. - I don't go there often 'cause I'm rarely in Harajuku, but very good. Very nice comfort. - Do you know one thing that I've noticed after living five years in Japan?

I actually, the more years I live here, the less Japanese food I eat. - I know why though. - Why? - It doesn't deliver well. - That's not the reason for me actually. I used to eat Japanese food like every single day. And then now that I've lived here for five years, I'm like Japanese cuisine, fucking great.

but I would just, sometimes I just need a like a stronger flavor profile. There's only so many times when I can just appreciate, you know, the natural flavors of things and just, and the high class ingredients. Sometimes just put some spice on that shit, please. - You know what I've recently realized? I went to this French restaurant, right? - Yeah. - And it was really popular. And I was sitting in there and I was eating this food and I'm like, this is good, it's good.

It just doesn't taste French. Right. I'm eating it all and I'm sitting and I'm like, huh? I think it hit me. I was like, oh, it's like...

someone who liked French food and then kind of adapted it to the Japanese palette by like removing a lot of the really heavy flavors and making it like really subdued. And I was like, that must be why everyone here is Japanese. 'Cause when I go to like a good French restaurant, I'll see other French people. - Yeah, for sure. - 'Cause it'll be like the classic French flavors that they'll really use and use quite heavily, a lot of butter, a lot of garlic.

Whereas this one was like a lot more, I'd say like on the Japanese side. - Right. - And so I've noticed that they do this a lot with certain restaurants. They'll make it more Japanese, AKA kind of,

maybe focusing less on really intense flavors and also focusing more on the ingredients. - Yeah, that's what I had with like the two out of the three Hungarian restaurants I went to was that like it looked and smelled like Hungarian food. But then the moment I put it in my mouth, I was like, there's no flavor. - Yeah. - Or there's way less flavor. And it's like, it's clearly catered more towards the Japanese market where they're like, they want more of the subtleties of flavors. But I'm like, that goes against

Eastern European food. Like it's Eastern European food should be heavy and giga flavorful. - Dude, I just had a cool memory. Every time I go get my hair cut, they have this tablet in front of me that just plays ads. Like I'm like a fucking like subway service. But they'll always play these ads for these like recipes, for Japanese recipes.

And it is like, I'm like screaming into the void watching these recipes as they make the most blandest shit of all. I'm British and I'm saying that. Like I saw one and it was basically just, what was it? It was a fucking monstrosity. It was disgusting looking. It was like they had sausages. They boiled these gross looking sausages, poked holes in them with a fork and then put spaghetti in the sausages and like had

had it go through. - I've seen that, I've seen that, yeah. - And then they boiled the spaghetti with the sausages. And then they put like a, I don't know what it was, some kind of nori or something to put a face on the thing. And I was like, and then they're eating, they just eat the spaghetti with the sausages with no sauce. And I was like, I was like,

At least it has some tomato sauce. It would be somewhat passable, but I was like, I'm losing it. This is like a recipe. - I'm sure that's just some shit to like, you know, please, you know, to make it so that like your kids are like, oh yeah, we have like the funky little fucking sausage spaghetti. - Then they would have like ones that like looked like they would only fucking use like daikon, I swear, as any flavoring. I was like, you put some soy sauce in it, please. - You know what's a quintessential Japanese dish?

That's not even Japanese, but it's like a Japanified dish that I see Japanese people fucking loving everywhere. And I've had it so many times and I just never understood it. Tarako spaghetti. Oh my God. I have never...

- Get that shit out of here please. - Okay look. - Do you wanna explain what that is in English? - Yeah, so is like, it's salmon roe, right? - Yeah, salmon roe. - Yeah, so it's salmon roe. Sometimes you can have, so there's two versions. There's and then there's . They're both kind of the same thing except is usually, sorry. - They love it. - is like a little bit more of the spicier ones, right? But and spaghetti, it's yeah, as the name suggests, you get some fucking spaghetti,

you put some in it, maybe a little bit of soy sauce and then that's it. - Like go to the- - It's so bad. - This is one of the few Japanese dishes where I'm like, wow, this makes British food look appetizing. - And look, to preface- - Look at that shit, man. - To preface, I like if it's like by itself and you like, you know, you eat it directly. - But on spaghetti? - But on spaghetti, I'm like, bro, give me some fucking flavor, please.

- Yeah, if I'm gonna eat spaghetti anything, I'm having the most like flavorful fat ass fucking bolognese or like something. - I swear whenever you go to an Italian place and they're always like, "Today's pasta." And it's always this. I'm like, "Why?" - I'm like, "Why?" No one's ordering this. - You have tomatoes in this country, just use them. Use them.

- Give me some sauce bro, please. - Yeah, it's very frustrating. - I've never understood the hype of this. - Yeah. - British man wants flavor, that's all I have. - Yeah. - Just some seasoning. - I always want like fucking pepper and I gotta fight to get pepper on fucking sometimes. They don't immediately have pepper, I'm like, why? Give me some goddamn pepper. - I don't know, okay, when you go to Yakitori, what do you prefer? Do you prefer the Tare version or? - No, it's gonna be salt. - Salt. - Really? - Salt.

- Tare, you're ruining it all. Only Sukhaneh should be tare. - No. - Yes. - No. - You think Negima should be tare? - I think Negima, I can have both, man. Give me like- - Bro, look, I took you to my spot, Garnt.

- We had salt, we had salt only. That's why, 'cause the chicken's fire. - The chicken is fire. - If I go to Torikizoku, yeah, I'll have tare. Honestly, I don't wanna taste the chicken. I wanna taste the texture and the sauce. - But sometimes you just want the fucking sauce. And I guess like that's the perfect analogy. - He thinks that yakitori should always be tare.

- No, no, no, not always Tare. But I definitely prefer the Tare version. I can't have like- - It should be salt. - I can't have like three, four sticks in a row of just salt. I can't, I can't. - What the, salt's the seasoning. - I'm a fence sitter. I usually get both half half, but if I had to pick, yeah, Tare is better. - No. - Tare is better. - I like, okay, one fire stick of like Negima with salt, I'm like, all right, fine.

- Fucking banger. - Yeah. - Two, all right, I can handle two. Three in a row, I'm like, come on, give me a different taste. Please mix it up. - That's literally my dream. - That's why I get half off. So I can mix it up. I'll start with one salt to make sure that like, all right, the ingredients taste good, it's nice and cooked. And then I go for the tare for that extra flavor. - Also with the tare, this is like my Southeast Asian showing. I can fucking just,

put the chili flakes on it way too many. - And it sticks. - And it sticks on it. And that's the best part of the yakitori for me, man. That is it. - Nah, if the chicken was juicy enough, they'd stay on.

- No, but see, sometimes you go to a, if you go to like a cheap shit yakitori place, sometimes the salt just doesn't cut it. - Yeah, that's why I said like, if I'm going to Torikizoku, yeah, tarry them up. - Yeah, exactly. - Tarry them up. So I need more flavors. - Yeah, exactly. - But if I'm going to a nice place, then yeah, obviously I want to taste the flavor, so I'll get, I'm more inclined to get the salt one. - Yeah, okay. - Yeah. - Basically this is me saying I want to ruin Japanese cuisine by having more dipping sauce. - Yeah, the yakitori. - That would be great. - Yeah, you don't even like sauce. - Yeah, the condiment hater is saying. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

I don't like condiments. - We've had this. - We've had this conversation. I separate them into two different things. - The actual place I always go to where the guy, we definitely didn't like foreigners initially. He doesn't even let you choose. It's always Shio and then Sukuna is Tare. You don't get a choice.

- 'Cause he knows, he knows what's best. - Well, yeah, because he's not gonna give you a dry ass fucking salted suganae. That's psychotic. - He knows what's best for the flavors. - Yeah, of course. - Yeah, I know, but sometimes you just want, you just want, okay, like for example, like going to a sushi restaurant, right? - I like when they put the soy sauce on for me.

I like it when they do that. - Okay. - 'Cause they always give you the perfect amount. - Yeah, yeah. - 'Cause they brush it on. - Yeah. - I love that. 'Cause if I had a brush for me, yeah, I'd be fine. I can't bring a brush for me. - But like amounts of wasabi you put on. - I like how much they put on. - There is an optimal amount of wasabi that every master sushi chef puts on. It's perfectly balanced.

but sometimes I just want to fucking gas myself. Sometimes there's this satisfying feeling. I know all the flavors are perfect in like omakase fucking sushi. Sometimes I just want to go to this cheap ass sushi place, order 10 pieces of the same fucking sushi, my favorite sushi, and just gas myself with probably just a bit too much wasabi. Is there a problem with that? Is there a problem?

- Yeah, because at that point you're not eating the fish, you're eating the fucking wasabi. - All right, let's just- - That's a shit take, we're moving on. - Something satisfying. - Did you do that one? - Yeah, I did this one. The Trash Taste Podcast. It's been five years- - I mean, yeah, it's just different, isn't it? I mean, I think we've run out of like older stories to tell, so it's become more reflective of current life. - Yeah. - Which I think is, you know, some people don't enjoy as much. - We're definitely just getting better at just yapping.

- Yeah. - That's for sure. - I mean, I think- - Maybe we've always been good at yapping, Joey. - It's also like, I think- - Speak for yourself. - I think when we first started, we put a massive emphasis on making sure that everything was explained. - Yes. - But as we get like 250 episodes in, it's a lot harder to keep people up on like- - Yes. - Like stuff that has happened in the past. 'Cause we just can't sit here and explain everything, you know?

Yeah. Or we've definitely just gotten to that point now where we're like, I'm pretty sure I've told this story like five or six times and you just never have. And like, so when people are like, man, it's changed. It's like, yeah, of course. It's a weekly show. It has to change over the course of five years. Of course, it's been five years. A lot will change. You know, whether, you know, and I don't necessarily like,

I don't really mind as well people like, oh, I'm done watching Trash Taste or whatever, or hey, like I'm a new viewer or whatever. 'Cause it's like, all right, like, I mean, five years is a long time to keep up with something. - Absolutely. - I think you, if it got you through the pandemic and that's all it did, fucking awesome. We're so glad we were able to do that. - Good on you. - And I think that we just appreciate anything and the fact that you guys watch.

Yeah, it does change and it will continue to change. I mean, you know what's one revelation I had, which was like, okay, I don't blame people for maybe who were there from the very beginning who are just kind of like, oh man, it's just like so much now that I just can't keep up.

you know, we've done what close to 250 episodes now, I guess at this point. - And we don't talk about much current stuff. - Yeah, we don't talk about much current stuff, but just like from a length perspective, right? Average episode is two hours long. That's like, that's the equivalent to a thousand anime episodes. - Yeah, we have more content than One Piece now. - Yeah, which is insane. So it's like, I don't fucking blame people who are not here every single week. It's fine, dude. It's totally fine. If you want to just check in on us every now and then,

- We'll be here. Still yapping. - We're doing it. We're doing it. - You know the biggest change I miss? I miss from the good old days.

- Seeing Bossman at Denny's every single week. - Yeah, Bossman at Denny's. - It hasn't been the same. - Bossman at Denny's. - It hasn't been the same. Now, Trash Taste Recordings, we just get Uber Eats. - Well, we have another Denny's close by, but the vibe is just not the same. - The vibe is different. - It's not it. - The vibe is so jank there. - When we were in Saitama, it was like, this is our Denny's, you know? - Yeah, we would walk in and Bossman would be like, "Table for three? "Got you right here, boys." And it's like, "Mommy!" - "Yo, every Tuesday, table for three? "Come on in, boys, come on in."

- Guys, come on. Yo, you got a guest today? Yo, don't worry, I'll give you the good booth. Right next to the window. - That was such a great time. I love when we went to Denny's. That was so good. I do miss Denny's actually. - I miss the fucking tuna melt sandwich that they would have at lunchtime. - You dip it in the pasta sauce. - I miss my power salad.

- Power salad. - Power salad. Dude. - Taking out the fucking orange slices out of that shit. - Yes. - Oh my God. - Oranges should not be in my salads, I'm sorry. - Oh God, that's a deep trash taste metal word. - Oh my God, yeah, I forgot about it. I had not thought about going to Denny's, the trash taste, ages. - Yeah. - Wow, what's up? - And that used to be a staple. That used to be the staple. - Yeah, that's how we'd start the day. - Yeah.

- Yeah, 'cause it was always before lunchtime. Now we eat lunch at the office like degenerates. - Yeah, yeah, right. - We should go to the Denny's next time just to confirm the vibes of that place are not good and that it's not worth. We should do it just to make sure. - All right, all right. - Let's do that. - All right, next one, next one. - As a five year anniversary, we'll bring that shit back. - Accommodation, like housing, I suppose, or like traveling or- - Yeah. - I guess it's all encompassing. - All encompassing.

I think you just, when we moved here, we just moved to where you lived and you live pretty far out. Yeah. And I only lived up there cause it was near my uncle's place. Right. Right. Right. So I think at the time we were just like, Oh yeah, fuck it. We'll move to San Jose. So we were just far out. Then after, after you learn the areas a bit more, then you're like, Oh, I actually really like this area. I want to live here or, or wherever you can afford pretty much. Yeah. Pretty much. Cause the area is very wildly in price and taxes actually. Yeah.

- Yeah. - Depending on which area you live in, your taxes might be significantly higher, so be careful. - Were you ever satisfied with where you guys first moved? - I didn't give a fuck. - Okay. - I had internet and a room for my PC. - Oh yeah, fair enough. He's too gamer. - I think, and even now I think,

there's just a lot of comforts that like the trash in my building is so good i can just take out my trash whenever yeah yeah yeah that's that's that's amazing yeah i mean i do uh i mean i don't know how much i can comment on this because i've only technically lived in two different places in the five years i've been here right um and so because i the second place i found i've just been very very happy with me too uh i very very much like that it's a house you know i

I think by the time my lease had ended in Saitama, I was like, okay, I think I'm ready to try and move into like a more like house kind of like place. Sure. I think I'm just like bored of just

most of my life living in like different apartments, whether it be in London or wherever, you know, it's just like, I want to try actually living in a house and very much enjoyed it. Had to be way more aware of the neighborhoods 'cause it's not like having neighbors anymore and like apartments where everyone's just- - No one cares. - No one cares. All right, if you piss off the neighborhood watch committee,

I eat the grandmas, you are fucked for life. People are like constantly like looking. - Coming for your ass. - Yeah, coming for your ass. So you need to make sure the garbage is out on the right day. There'll be times when the neighbor comes greet you and stuff like that. So it's a different vibe. I much prefer this vibe. The only thing I would like to change

dogs or pets. Yeah, because my current place doesn't allow for pets. Yeah. And that's one thing that is very, very, like I found to be very, very hard to find in Japan, which is a place that would allow pets. You cannot find places that would allow pets.

Yeah. Well, I mean, just lie. Yeah. I mean, most people I know lie. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of people do lie. And like, I feel that now that, you know, I have a lot of friends who live here who are not originally from Japan who own pets because they've been here for a long time now. They've had to move to apartments, more specifically newer apartments. Like if it's been usually from what I've seen, if the apartment has been built within the last maybe five to 10 years, it's,

99% of them is pet friendly. Cause I think Japan understands that like, oh, the pet culture is like growing. - And also the landlords have now slowly learned that you can just charge extra.

Yeah. It's like, yeah, there's a lot of cases where it's like, yeah, there's a lot of cases now where like if you're in an apartment or a house where it's technically not pet friendly and you've lived there for long enough and you can just be like, hey, I've lived here for long enough. I'll pay extra if you let me have a dog. And sometimes they'll say yes. Sometimes they'll just be like, no, no pets. Yeah. I hate animals. I think it's hard with like,

I think cats is a bit easier, but dogs is hard because dogs vary in size so massively. If you have a giant fucking dog. It's rare to find a big dog in Japan, though.

- You see them though. You see a lot of, especially like Yokohama, bro. I see so many big dogs in Yokohama. - Oh, bro. I have a neighbor who doesn't live in the apartment building I live in. He lives next door. He has a Mastiff. - Yeah, dude. - And then I'm like, it's a fucking pony. - So many fucking big dogs. - It's huge dog. And I'm like, what apartment do you live in where you can house this beast?

- Yeah. - In Tokyo though, it's super, super rare. - Oh yeah, it's always the handbag dogs. - Yeah, it's always like the handbag dogs. - That's so sad though. I feel so bad. And they always put them in the fucking buggies. I hate it. - Yeah, oh my, that shit pisses me off so much. Like the mother, let the motherfucker walk.

Please. But yeah, I mean, I think it's slowly getting better, but also slowly getting worse in some aspects from what I've heard. I mean, in terms of like hotels, for example, right? Like it's just like, it was always expensive for as long as I've, you know, remembered, but my God, nowadays hotels now are so expensive. I remember I was talking to my cousin about this the other day. She was kind of complaining being like,

hotels now have gotten to the point where they're so expensive and they're always so busy that like foreigners visiting Japan usually don't have a problem with it. You know, they might be like, "Oh, that's a little on the pricey side, but you know, we're on vacation and there's nowhere else to stay, so we'll do that." But now it's getting to the point where there's a lot of the hotels, especially hotel chains, it's getting so expensive that it's almost impossible for locals to afford.

- Yeah, at least in Tokyo. - And there's a lot of like places, like more major places outside of Tokyo, like say for example, like Kyoto or Osaka where like, you know, even locals want to visit.

where they just can't afford it anymore. Like it just doesn't make sense if you live in Japan to pay out the ass for a hotel in Kyoto for two years. - Well, it's because like the exchange rate just went to shit. - Yeah. - And so- - It's really easy to tax extra, make money off the foreign income, foreign tourists coming in. - So now there's like, weirdly enough, even though like foreign tourism has obviously boomed to shit in Japan, local tourism is like kind of struggling.

'Cause Japanese people just can't afford it sometimes. - Yeah, it's so weird. I think the biggest change I've seen living in Japan is because of the yen tanking and like the increase in tourism. I see like a lot of parallels to what Thailand went through where it became like this cheap tourist destination. And eventually locals because,

there are certain areas in Thailand where the prices were way too fucking high for locals. And so local holidays just didn't become a thing in that area. And even though that was like a really, really poor area, I see a similar thing happening in Japan where because highly touristy areas are the accommodation and not just the accommodation, a lot of the stuff is getting priced up. Locals can't even afford to go there anymore.

- Yeah. - It's crazy. - And it's become more and more catered towards foreigners. - Yeah, it's that problem of like, Japan is going through that inflation, but the wage is not changing. Like, do you see that like, did you see the whole thing about like cabbages in Japan? - Yeah, triple in price. - Yeah, it's like, it got to the point I think where it was like a thousand yen for a head of cabbage.

And it got so ridiculous that restaurants, especially a lot of Japanese restaurants that were very reliant on cabbages, were just like, well, we could just, you know, bite the bullet and just buy these super expensive cabbages or we'll just, I

I don't know, shut the restaurant down. - Yeah, I saw a couple of places that were like, "No, we'll just shut down." Like, whoa, why don't you just try and raise the prices? I know you don't like that, but like, my God, that's crazy. - But they would rather shut down the restaurant than raise the prices, which is crazy. - It's interesting. - It's called Japanese cabbage shock. - Of course, of course it is. Whenever we do like cycle-thons or we travel around,

around more rural parts of Japan. It's really interesting seeing the hotel prices are like, we'll book rooms for like eight people. It'll cost like 200 bucks. That's insane. How the fuck does that make any sense? How is it 200 bucks for eight people, eight rooms? - Well, probably because they're struggling, right? - Yeah, but I'm like, does this even make money?

- But I'm like, yeah, I don't know. Hey, look, I don't mind. - But to be fair, if they were charging the same prices as like other- - Oh, you just wouldn't go to them. - You just wouldn't go, right? - Nowhere would go to them, yeah. - So they have to accommodate somehow. - Yeah. - Yeah, all right.

- All right, let's see then. - Dozo. - What do we got? - Dozo. - Dozo. - Oh, this is a really short one, Jesus. - Let's see. - Akihabara. - Akihabara. - I mean, you don't, just don't go anymore. - Yeah, just pick another one. - None of us go anymore. None of us ever went since we actually moved to Japan. - Yeah, not really. - I mean, Akihabara's just changed a lot. I mean, even in five years, I feel like it's just gotten,

it's slowly removing all the weeb stuff. - Yeah. - Which, and turning it into more of just a generic office looking area, which that whole area was surrounded by anyway. - Yeah. - Yeah. - So Akihabara is just surrounded by every other station is just more a business district and they're just slowly just turning Akihabara into that. - Yeah, Akihabara is slowly turning into Kanda basically. - It's kind of strange. - Like Kanda's kind of swallowing up Akihabara. - It really is like losing a lot of its charm. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Which is, yeah, it's really sad. - All right, something a little more general, tech.

Okay. Japanese tech. I mean, you know, you hear from a lot of like, you know, Japan vloggers and, you know, all these Japan TikTokers that like Japan's technology is so ahead of the game. Because Japan is living in 2035. Japan is living in the future. But like why? Why are they living in 2035?

because they have, I don't know, fucking vending machines that talk back to you. Oh, okay. But in actuality, if you've lived in Japan or you've been in Japan long enough, it's like very rare you'll come across an actual piece of tech where you're like, ooh, that's cool or that's really handy. Like a lot of the tech is kind of just gimmicky.

in a weird way. - Yeah, and most of the tech that you use nowadays are websites, like interacting with websites. And that's where you feel like Japan is really falling behind. - Yeah, exactly. If there's one tech that Japan sucks ass at, it's fucking web design. - Yeah, 'cause think about how much tech you interact with is more UI based as opposed to like physical law. - Definitely. - So in that place, that's where it feels like it's really falling behind.

Well, it is getting better, but that's only because I think there is a lot of foreign pressure, foreign competitors who are coming into the space like Uber, you know, which is kind of forced, like almost like go taxi to, which, you know, go taxi is a pretty good app. Um,

But, you know, the only reason why it's changing is because it has to compete against a foreign competitor who has, like, amazing UI. But did you have that honeymoon period when you guys were visiting Japan or when you first moved to Japan where you were kind of, like, not really trying to seek it out, but maybe you'd see that one thing that you weren't really familiar with and you were like, oh, wow.

- I mean, when you- - Oh definitely. - Japan's living in the future. - A little bit, but like, you know, then you'd have to fucking book an appointment and you'd be back to square one. - Yeah, I think I had that more when I was a tourist. And also now I feel like the rest, I don't know if I can point to many things in Japan being like, yo, this is so ahead of the curve in tech. You know what I mean? I'd say people would say stuff like, you know, vending machines, for example. - Or like the trains or something. - Or like the trains. And I'm just like,

is it ahead of the tech or is it just like efficient? - I mean, like vending machine is old tech. - Yeah, vending machines are old tech. You can find, I mean, there was, okay, so there's- - People don't buy shit from vending machines in Europe. - Yeah, they don't. It's just not part of the culture. Like the train system is obviously, you know,

still it works and it works really, really fucking well. And apparently that's enough to be living in 2035 because you know, compare that to like the fucking tube, which is archaic, you know, and has only like one new line in the past 10, 20 years or whatever.

But aside from that, I remember the only thing that like blew my mind the first time I moved here, it was such a small thing. I was like, "Yo, what? You could order sushi on a tablet and then they have a conveyor belt to like bring it to you? Yo, Japan's living in the future, man." - They have two lanes. They have like the top lane, which is like, they have the bottom lane, which is like kind of, you know, the classic revolving sushi. And then they have the top lane, which is the bullet train.

That shit gets delivered to you. Yeah, exactly. I remember the first time I saw that, I was like, yo, we're leaving in the future. But I mean, it got all really quickly. But like now, it's just like, damn, I actually think Japan is behind in a lot of places. I agree. It's kind of just catching up. Like, I think...

I think the one thing I really liked about the Japanese technology and culture was that it really, as an introvert, it was really helpful in terms of going to places and just not having to interact with people. You'd go to a restaurant and you could order off a tablet. - Or press a button. - Or press a button or do something else.

And now COVID has just equalized all that shit. 'Cause you go to the UK, you go to Nando's, you can order it all on your QR code now. So that problem has now been solved in the Western world. - I guess in that aspect, countries like Japan were kind of ahead of the curve when it came to things like QR codes. But now it's like pretty,

fucking common everywhere. I remember there was a point where everyone hated QR codes. They were like, what the fuck is this? No one's going to use this shit. And now everyone uses it. Yeah. And so now I'm fucking excited when I see, holy shit, you are, this place has now got contactless payment? No.

No way. No way. Japan is finally catching up to the future, man. Yeah. Japan has only recently started really like rolling out content. Yeah. And even then, I think the limit is still pretty low. I guess it was in the UK when it was rolling out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It does feel like Japan is still behind and will continue to be behind. Is that a sentiment? I think so. Until, yeah, some major shakeup. Yeah. So, yeah. Bottom line is like, don't get fooled by all these like fucking TikToks that are like, Japan's living in the future because it's not.

- Like most of those things that you see like Japan's living in the future is just like, it's just like extra service. - Yeah. - It's like people doing things. - That's what I mean, it's gimmicky. - Yeah, yeah. It's like, and that they, you know, it is great service. And that's one thing that you cannot fault Japan is the service. - Japan's living in the future. - Service is phenomenal. - Yeah, Japan's living in the future. They have a robot restaurant now. I'm like, okay, that's not gonna change the way I fucking live day to day though. - I'd say the only thing Japan is living in the future is just, it's,

like infrastructure. Things just work here and things work very well and very consistently. And that's it. - The public transport tech is probably the only thing I would say. Everything else they're just like- - Life here is just convenient. You'll never be too far away from a conbini, a fucking vending machine. You'll have your needs catered to in some way, shape or form. And it's very convenient to get. And I think that is-

Outside of any gimmicky technology, that is the thing that fucking sets Japan apart from everywhere else. It just works. Back to logic. Back to logic indeed. All right. What's next? Music. I have no opinions on this. Huh? I have no opinions on this. I have opinions on this. Go on.

every fucking underground artists or bands I used to listen to when I moved to Japan is now doing anime openings for the biggest fucking anime of all time. And I just, I'm just not special anymore. I'm just not, I'm just another one in the crowd now. - What do you mean? - I will say like, I did notice that like, I don't know how to say it, but like it used to be like whenever you'd hear those like top 10 playlist, they'd always like scan through and like the trains, whatever.

Used to be like way more like cutesy, more moe kind of things would appear up a lot. And now it's a lot more like creepy nuts. I mean, there's still a lot of that. There's still a lot of it, but like, I feel like it's less as much. Yeah. I feel like if there's one thing I've definitely noticed about Japan's music scene is that like, for one, it's like the live music scene in Japan is crazy.

better than ever in my opinion i think like especially when you compare it to like where i grew up in sydney where like live music is basically dead now and it's all being replaced by fucking casinos and slot machines uh like it's just nice to be like oh my god there's like live music playing

Finally. Yeah. You know, even if it's like somewhere small and like that. There's so many like small and mid-sized venues in Japan. Yeah. Yeah. And there's like a lot of like underground jazz bars and like, you know, even some like pub like places sometimes are playing a live band and like, you know, every other artist overseas is like coming to Japan to play like one show for the year. Yeah. And that's always nice. But like, yeah, no, I've...

I've definitely noticed that with like, especially anime openings now. - Look, I'm just gonna- - It's all, it's either- - No, no, no. - Creepy nuts. - I was gonna say, when I moved to Japan, I'd be like, yo, I love this band. I love these artists like Yosabe, Eve as well. - Yeah. - Oh, Japan, they do that thing. What's that like Buzz Lightyear meme where he's like, I'm done with you now.

- Yeah, yeah. - And Tran does that for a year. I remember when like Man With A Mission was like everywhere. - Yeah. - Oh yeah. - And then I haven't fucking heard anything. - Or like One Ok Rock. - Yeah, yeah. - Like they were around everywhere and now you just don't hear about them anymore 'cause it's like, oh, there's a new, there's Yoa Sobi and Creepy Nuts now. This is the new toy to play with. - Well, I feel like it's just gotten to a new level of popularity 'cause yeah, Man With A Mission,

was like everywhere in Japan at that point. But it's not on the same level of popularity as what like "Yuasa Bee" has gotten or "Creepy Nuts" has gotten, which is now, they're like a worldwide phenomenon. - Yeah, that is true. - I mean, "Idol" wasn't, "Idol" like the most, like number one on the billboard top 100 or something globally. - In Japan? - Oh, globally? - Globally, yeah. - Fuck. - Can you search this up? - I know, definitely in Japan it was. - Yeah, definitely. - I don't think globally it was,

- I mean, it was big even overseas. - Top 100 globally. - Oh yeah, tops, wait, hold on, go up. - Yeah, go up. - 42 and 19. - Global exclusive US chart. - So excluding the US chart, Idol. - Excluding the US. - Excluding the US, Idol. - I think including US was like 42 and 19.

- Which is still great. - Which is insane. - Yeah, it was number one globally, of course, not including the US charts, which is massive considering that, considering the popularity of anime before. - That was completely like unfathomable five years ago or even 10 years ago, like a Japanese band that,

did a fucking anime opening. It's like now in the top billboard charts. Yeah, I've definitely noticed that. Japanese, there's a lot more Japanese music now because of things like anime and gaming that have just kind of superseded the anime community. And just regular non-anime fans are like, hey, this like Japanese band? Like it's like people in the West are discovering that Japan makes music all of a sudden. Yo, it's like the fucking, what's the opening to Zero Experience Lane? Oh,

- Oh, duvet. - Duvet. - That's a TikTok song. - No, that's it. It's a TikTok song now. - I couldn't fucking believe that shit. - I was like, wait. - Really? - Yeah. - A lot of people- - It's an incredibly popular song to play on TikTok. - Yeah, yeah. - It became like a meme. - Yeah, it became a meme. And then I was like talking to my nephew and he was like, "Oh, I know that song. That's that TikTok song." And I'm like, I'm happy you know it, but- - As an SEL fan, it made me want to kill myself.

- No! - I'm like, yeah, you are sad. - I'll take it, I'll take it, I'll take it. - A win's a win. - A win's a win, but yeah, it's so weird because now that is more known as a TikTok song than the banger Serial Translator. - That's so sad. - Better someone know it than not, right? - Yeah, exactly. - True. - Okay, spring season. - But there is a part of me, there's the hipster side of me that's like, don't you fucking say this name in vain. You don't know it!

- You don't know anything about this song. You weren't there. - I was there when the scriptures were written. - Exactly. - Being a YouTuber. - It's gotten, I would say a lot harder.

- You think so? Like I'm sure. - Because, you know, we've had some instances in the past where the word YouTuber has not definitely- - Oh, okay, okay, okay. - Yeah, being a YouTuber in Japan has definitely, in one regard, okay, it's weird. In one regard, it's gotten a lot easier because now Japan has finally, you know, settled to the point where there are

big fucking celebrities in Japan who are YouTubers who are treated just as well as, you know, TV celebrities, if not more. Hikakin is like fucking royalty here. Yeah, Hikakin's like a god here, right? Whereas there's the opposite side where I think for a lot of foreigner YouTubers like us living in Japan, it's gotten a lot harder because of, you know,

- Yeah, maywaku YouTubers, nuisance YouTubers. They made a whole fucking word for it. - Yeah, there's a whole word for it now of like nuisance YouTubers. - And this isn't just foreign, this is domestic as well. There's been a lot of like notorious and infamous Japanese YouTubers who have also caused a bunch of troubles. - Yeah. - So it's, you know, I think for a country like Japan that is very, very quick to jumping to conclusions and almost like,

almost like shoving propaganda, especially on things like TV of like, oh, you know, we've taken a couple of these like very, you know, standalone instances and just generalize the entire subject and giving you this whole image of like YouTubers are either fucking ruining the country or they're the next big thing. It's like there's no in between. Yeah. So if you fall into either one of those camps, then you're pretty much going to be there for the majority of your career. There's a good chunk of

some news stations that will like literally just have like a weekly segment of like foreigners who did bad thing in Japan. - Yeah. - Which is kind of crazy 'cause a lot of the times it's like, it feels like they're really grasping at straws to find something. - Yeah.

I saw one where they had a whole fucking segment about this one guy, 20, 30 minutes long. But this guy who, you know, there's some stores in Japan where you can get frozen gyoza and you have to leave 1,000 yen. He didn't pay. And they made a whole 20-minute segment on him. I'm like, that's bad. And he shouldn't have done that.

But this is really warrant a 20 minute segment about, is this really like the only crime that you could find? This is why I hate Japanese TV. I'm not trying to like tier list crimes here, but I feel like we must have ran out of foreigners doing crime that we could talk about. Like what's going on here? Yeah. And then like, sometimes I'll have other crimes where when you look into it a bit more, the story is a lot more complex than it seems. And perhaps like, maybe the, like, you know, there's sometimes like they have these, they have the, you know, like,

they'd be like, oh, this Vietnamese guy did something fucking awful. And then I'll be like, yeah, but he was also practically being held hostage on like a farm where he was being paid like a hundred yen a day. And it's like, whoa, okay. What's going on here? Like,

It's always like generalizing to like, you know, talk about a certain agenda that just works for them and their audience, right? Which is a shame. Which is all kind of, we're explaining that because it's all kind of fed into the attitude of like filming in Japan. It's definitely a little different. You do have to be a bit more cautious with things. You have to be very respectful as always. But I don't think it's been, I feel like some, it really depends where I go. I feel like a lot of the time I've had an easier time. Sometimes I've had a lot harder time. And it really just depends who

who I'm working with. I'm very person dependent. But overall, it hasn't changed that much. The one thing I would say is that YouTubing in Japan has become a lot more saturated. Yep. Like there's a lot more YouTubers here now. Definitely. Because obviously we were here during COVID and it was pretty much like us, Chris, Sharla, a couple of other people. But like in terms of like, you know, but now it feels like there's

- Fucking everyone and their mom is a YouTuber in Japan. - Especially the short side of things. - Oh, short. - YouTube shorts is just like blown up. - And TikTok and stuff like that. - I think that's also why, like, I think personally speaking, I've kind of tried to find my own niche or I've gone to generally like

that require more money. - Yeah. - Like doing the Ozu experience. - The misbeast method. - Yeah. - 'Cause it's like, for me, it's like, okay, now if everything that is normal has kind of already been covered, I don't want to redo or retread what people have done to death. - Yeah. - So I'm trying to find stuff that's kind of interesting, kind of new, which either requires more work hours to get that thing done or requires more money to spend

get the thing growing. See, that's fascinating because like this year for me, I'm actually doing the opposite. Yeah. With my second channel, I'm going back to like old school J-vlogging because it's like, I don't know. I think it's different though. It's different. Yeah. I'm trying to like cover something interesting and offer something. no, no, no. I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, of course, but you know, I've realized that like, I think because now the whole like kind of

just classic J vlogging scene is definitely not as prominent as when I first moved to Japan, right? Like almost fuck 10 years ago. Right. Yeah. I think there's a lot of people who just like miss just like the, yeah, just seeing what you're doing and bones cut and dry J vlogging. Yeah.

So I'm like, and I've been having fun with that. - Yeah, I just feel like there's less stuff that I can do. That's why I'm always doing like fucking crane games and lucky bags, which I also enjoy doing to be fair. - That's why I'm also- - I like doing it too. - But that's also why like, you know, I'm kind of bringing back the J-Voling thing. 'Cause I've realized that some people just want to see shit even if it's like kind of mundane. - Yeah, my day life is fucking boring. I don't fucking do shit.

That's why five years ago I was sitting in a room talking about anime and now five years later I'm also sitting in a room talking about anime. Can't stand the test of time. Except sometimes I'm now live when I do it. Alright, let's do one more then. Final one, here we go. Final one. Arcades.

- That's a good segue from you. - I mean, yeah, look, I spent a lot of time in them. I mean, look now- - You become the crane game master. - I'm pretty good at them, I'll lie. - I definitely do not go to arcades as much anymore. - I don't. - Well, arcades have changed massively. So the one thing that's changed particularly over COVID and it started around right before COVID

'Cause I came here as a tourist and obviously you've been here for a while, but arcades used to have like, I don't know, obviously I didn't have this, but like let's say that handshake agreement where it's like half the arcade was games, half the arcade was purikura and like crane games, UFO catches, whatever you wanna call them. And now there's a lot of arcades where it's either all crane games

And I mean, just all crane games or gacha in some form. - Yeah, I was gonna say like half of it would be like dedicated to the Fate Go. - Yeah, it used to be like the first two floors. - Do you remember that? - Yeah, and then they had the Fate Floor before, which is gone now. - Yeah, the Fate Floor, yeah. - It used to be like, okay, like if you went to a building in Aki Harbor, for example, there's a bunch of them that, there's like maybe like, what, six art arcades in Aki, but they're pretty big.

it would always be like the first two floors were crane games. That was always it. Cause those were the ones where they had a high foot traffic. People would try and win prizes. They'd give up to five times and they'd leave. So they'd be big money makers. And then, you know, the real gamers, the real arcade enjoyers knew, you know, third floor was like basically the fake game where it was like, you had to buy cards. I don't know what, what did they get? Did they have a genre? What are they called? Basically games where you had to gacha for packs to keep playing the game against other players. Instead of buying flasks.

digital PNGs, you'd buy real PNGs. Basically, gacha games that were physical and they were half gacha, half like card games, half real games. There used to be a whole floor for those and

And then somewhere they would have a gambling machine, like the horse racing. And then the fourth floor was like the fucking game games. Yeah. The Mario Kart. Yeah. They'd have the fucking, some of the fighting games. Yeah. And then the fifth floor was normally the smoking, the fighting game exclusive floor. Yeah. Just like just for fucking hardcore gamers who are living there. Yeah.

And that was like normal, you know, obviously there's some that are like seven, whatever, but that was like the normal split. It was like three to two. Now it's becoming, at least not all in Akihabara, because, you know, Akihabara also, they do have a lot of games. But at least outside of Akihabara, it's like, it's gone from either like that ratio to either 80% crane games to 20% games or just 100% crane games.

Yeah, I've noticed that it's just harder to find arcades with games because it's all crane games now. Yeah. It is... I think what's happening is that they're going to just be completely separate and it's going to be an arcade for games or it's going to be crane games. I think that's what it's working towards. Yeah. Because I think what happened is that they realized that tourists often only want to win something from a show they recognize or a property they like. And so a lot of the time when you only have like two floors, it's maybe...

conservatively 60 odd machines. Yeah. You know, you can only fill those up with so many things and prizes. So I think now they've realized how we can just keep people in there longer playing more. I think it's also just the fact that like when it comes to a lot of those like arcade games, like, you know, the classics, like, you know, the street fighters and the metal slugs and all that kind of stuff. They just don't make money.

- One, they don't make money and two, people can just play it on their computers or consoles at home. - Also the barrier of entry is higher. Crane game, you just load up a few coins, you either get the thing or you don't. With some of the arcade machines, oh, do I need a card for this? Do I need to register? - The JoJo battle royale game, it's like 400 yen. It's so complicated to just get in a game. It's like miserable from like an experience of trying to get into it. - A lot of the rhythm games as well, it's like usually need like an account

car save your progress I will say though the last time I did go to an arcade which is quite a while ago but it was sometime last year I just went with Aki just because we were like I'm like let's just see what the arcades are up to nowadays we spent like a good couple of hours on the the metal game for and

- Okay. - You know, with like all of the casino places. - Oh, okay. - Dude, fun as fuck. - I love the Mario Party game. - Legitimately really fun. - Maybe you just like gambling, Joe. - It's because like I never really gave them a try. 'Cause I always was like, 'cause you know, I'm not, I don't really like going to casinos or gambling or anything like that. But it's like, you know, if you go in with the notion of like, oh, I'm gonna spend, you know, maybe two, 3000 yen on some coins and then just throw them into the machine,

sparks flying. Yeah. It's a lot of fun. Like you just kind of go in. I don't know how to play half the games half the time, but I'm just like, fuck it. Just chuck it in. Let's just see what happens. And it's, I don't know. It's a good way to just, yeah, just,

it play around with it and yeah, I don't know. I've always neglected that side of arcades for some reason, but it's good fun. If you have a couple, you know, rather than, cause it's like, I'm not a crane game person. So it's like, I rather lose money on something like that. - I normally don't play crane games off of camera. Normally, I do sometimes. - Wow. - Wow. - Motion broken.

Mainly because I get flashbacks and I don't like it. - That's work now. - Yeah. - But unless there's like a prize, I literally, I won't play them unless there's a prize I want or someone else wants a prize. I'll be like, all right, let me handle this. But yeah, they've kind of opted from going, you know, in places like Kyoto, Tokyo, they've realized they can just make way more money if they go towards tourists because, and the thing is, is that tourists, they give up.

which they don't want you to do. Because if you give up after five turns, they've got exactly what they wanted, which is they can like reset the machine. Now some other guy's gonna come along, put five bucks in. What they don't want is you putting five bucks in, sumacening, getting into a good position. Maybe you don't get it again, you sumacening again, you've got it in 10 bucks. That's like, because they'll probably still make money from you, but you...

you're in that area for a while and not making them like the money that they want. Yeah, for sure. I mean, they buy these toys in bulk. So no matter how quickly you win it, they're not losing money. Or if you're in places like Akihabara, just go next door and they're usually selling what they have in the crane game for like 10, you know, a thousand yen. Yeah. Don't get that satisfaction.

- Yeah, I mean, the fun is winning. - There's no fun in that. - Okay. - It's the experience, Joey. - Yeah, sure. - Otherwise let's just go on eBay, yeah? Let's just go on fucking- - That's what I fucking do. - Rock 10. - Definitely like if you were a person who always wanted to come to Japan,

and you've always wanted that day experience at an arcade. Come now, please. I don't know how much time we have left. Yeah, that is true. All right, well then, overall, what would you say? Better. Better? Five years long? Yeah.

- Life in Japan. - Better man. - I mean, I'm still here. - You've taken all together. - I mean, we're still here for a reason. - I'm not leaving bro. - We're still here for a reason. - I've used it right now two years ago, I haven't left. - I'm trying to figure that out. - I love it. I just don't think I'm gonna leave. - Yeah. - I like it too much, man. It's so fun. - Yeah, of course. - It's convenient. Yeah, I'm gonna stay here for a few more years. I say this every year. I'm like, I got more years in me. - I got one more in me. - I got one more in me. - Well, there you go. That was the five year retrospect.

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