Latest / bit of a Rambler / 154 Ramble On

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154 Ramble On · bit of a Rambler

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hello, my name is Kai, and I am a bit
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of a rambler. I like to travel, learn, and tell stories.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: And today I'm going to ramble on. I got more
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Japan stories going on. Japan was some... Osaka was so
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: much more fun than I thought it was going to be.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: I was such a real poopy pants on that, similar
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: to Seoul, and I was completely wrong about the rest
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: of Korea. Well, this was specific to that city, though.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: When I backpacked through Osaka the first time I went,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: I was like, whoa. And this time, I loved it
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: as much as I've loved any Japanese city. I had
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: a great time in Osaka. I will say, compared to, like, Tokyo,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: which was busier than I like it, Osaka was pretty
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: nice where I was. It was a pretty chill place.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: I had a great time in Osaka, and I did
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: some cool things, and this is one of them. I
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: was eating this... I had some onigiri, I had some Sushi.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: I had, I think, a couple beers and a couple snacks.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: And I took them to a park and put them
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: on a bench and started my little feast, which I
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: love to do. Just go to the supermarket and get
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: all the good stuff and then, yeah, have a little
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: feast on a bench. Kick back under the tree. Oh,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: and it was really nice, too. So it was cool.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: It was like this gazebo that didn't have a roof
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: or But it had the frame of a roof, and
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: then a tree grew up in the middle, and the
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: branches tangled all around this roof frame. So the branches
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: and the leaves made the roof of this gazebo. It
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: was really interesting and cool, and a few parks in
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Osaka had things like that. Actually, you know what a
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: number of them did? Because I ate sushi under a
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: number of them and got a little bit rained on,
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: because it's not a real roof, but it's a very
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: cool roof. Anyway, I'm eating all my foods and having
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: a great time. And these kids show up and start
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: running around and kicking a soccer ball around, just having
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: a lot of fun. And then I hear smack and
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: all of our eyes are drawn to the ball. Everybody
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: sees it go like arc up into the air and
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: then plop. And it lands on the roof of this gazebo.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: And the gazebo is not super tall, but it wasn't
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: really short. It was like an easy, I'll say nine feet,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: three meters. That was up in the air, three meters
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: up there. And the tree that is the roof is
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: pretty dense. It has dense foliage. So I couldn't see it.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: I saw like where the Ark was making land. I
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: saw it land and then I couldn't see it. I
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: looked around and I was like, I don't know. But
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: the kids were already like organizing to get it down.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: And so I was like, well, I'll just let them
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: get it down because they'll they got it. They probably
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: got it. One kid tried to get it. He climbed
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: up the metal poles around the edge of the gazebo
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: and he couldn't get up there. And I heard like
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: other kids directing one kid who did get up there
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: how to like where the ball was. And they're OK.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: So there's like vertical poles. But then there were 45
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: degree like angle poles also. So they had a lot
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: of handholds to get up to the roof. And one
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: kid did get up there and the other kids were
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: telling him where the ball was. And I went out
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: to try and see because now it had been a
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: few minutes and I thought like, oh, maybe they do
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: need help to get it down. And I couldn't find it.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: And one kid seemed to know where it was and
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: he was telling me, but he was pointing right at
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: it and I couldn't find it. So I ended up
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: after the kid couldn't reach it, I just started climbing up.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: And so I have my feet braced against one vertical
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: pole and one 45 degree pole. And I started digging
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: through the trees and I know I'm in the right place.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: And then I went on the ground and walked far
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: away from the thing. And I could then I could
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: see the top of the ball. But when I went
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: back under, I couldn't see it at all, even though
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: I was in, I know, the right space. But I
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: just kept digging, and finally I found it. But it
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: was like pretty thick. It was like a couple feet
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: of leaves, so I couldn't reach up to the top
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: of the canopy where it was. So I went down,
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: and the kids, now that they saw where it was,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: a bunch of them tried to climb up there and
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: get it, but their arms were shorter than mine, so
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: they couldn't reach up through the leaves. And I just
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: walked around the park until I found a stick Of course,
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: it's a Japanese park. So even though there's 20 trees,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: there were no sticks on the ground. I had to
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: go into the tall grass and find like this really
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: reedy thin stick that escaped detection from the cleaners. And
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: it was the only stick in the park. I found
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: it and I ran back and I climbed back up
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: and I poked, poked, poked and knocked it off. And
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: the kids all cheered and clapped. They stood around and
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: clapped for me. And I was like, oh my goodness,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: this is too much, my friends. And I just said,
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: thank you very much in Japanese. And I continued eating
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: my food because I had only started when the ball
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: got stuck in the tree roof. And the whole time
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: there was this old Japanese man, before the kids arrived,
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: this old Japanese man was watching me eat food. And
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: I feel, maybe all in my head, I feel like
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: he was like, look at this fat American eating all
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: this food in my park. Probably going to leave the
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: trash everywhere. But he kept watching me, and then he
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: watched me climb up the roof tree, and then he
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: watched me sit back down, and I feel like his
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: face looked different. Like, he was like, alright, you're fine.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: I guess. I feel like he was a little more
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: tolerant after I did this kind act. And the kids
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: were so... I couldn't... I believe it because I've been
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: around Asian kids so much in my schools and traveling,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: but it's so funny to see, like, A bunch of six,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: seven year olds just like clapping when I climb up
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: to the roof tree and knock their ball back down.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: And then we played soccer and it was great. I
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: finished my very fun little park meal and I was
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: heading out and all the kids like cried out like
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: bye again in Japanese when I went and waved goodbye
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: to me. I was like, thank you. Bye. And they
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: were like, thank you. Thank you. Bye. And it was
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: really cool. It was awesome. It wasn't easy to climb up,
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: but when I saw a child climb up and try
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: and get the ball, I was like, okay, man, if
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: he's trying, you should at least try. And I'm glad
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: I did, because they got their ball back and they
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: could play. And I could finish my delicious meal and
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: tasty beers and then... Go on my way, a kickball hero,
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: to children. Oh, while I was looking for my rain gear,
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: I mentioned in the last... episode, the shower curtain for
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: the rain tarp, and then specifically the carabiners. If you
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: don't know what a carabiner is, because some people I
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: ask in stores don't know what I'm talking about, they're
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: those clips that you see in movies, mountaineering, people have them,
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: they kind of look like oval with square edges, some
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: would say a rectangle, but like a trapezoidal thing, and
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: it has one side is a clip, so you can
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: clip it around a rope, that's a carabiner. So I
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: needed some for that shower curtain, and I went and
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: to a Daiso or actually, no, this was a hardware store, Orion.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: And some people didn't know the carabiners were, I wanted
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: like strong ones. And this lady ended up taking me,
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: but really the story is I didn't need them. I
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: got Daiso ones instead. They work perfectly and they're much
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: more lightweight. But this lady, she was like really interested
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: in me. And I was like, what's going on here?
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: And then she told me that her son was a
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: traveler also. Like her Japanese son had been traveling now for,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: I think it was six years or something, and he'd
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: just been abroad and was loving it. So she always
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: loved to talk to travelers because she felt a little
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: closer to her son. And now that he was traveling
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: the world, she wanted to know more about the world
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: because she had never traveled before. So she traveled around Japan,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: but her son was having an experience that the whole
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: rest of their family had basically never had. So she
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: asked me about a few countries and I was like, Germany.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: And she was like, ah, and it was a really
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: fun conversation standing next to some hardware with this lady.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: And I love that. I love it when people are
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: interested outside of their bubble. And it doesn't even have
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: to be other worlds or other countries or whatever. It's
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: if you're in a town and you're like, I wonder
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: what the people in the other town are doing that.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: at least in correlation, seems to be such a healthy mindset.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: People who wonder about other people or about other places
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: generally seem to be more tolerant and interested in the
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: world and interesting for me to talk to personally, like
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: just selfishly. I'm more interested in people like that who
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: have open minds. So I always love to hear it
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: when someone Yeah, when someone's interested in travel, or when
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: anybody asks me, that's why I never get tired of
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: talking about travel, can you tell? Because whoever is listening
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: to me talk about travel, whoever is asking me a
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: question about what it's like to live abroad, that's probably
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: a tolerant, interesting person that I want to form a
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: connection with. So I feel like I'm doing good just
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: by rambling like this. I feel like inside here there
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: are Certainly not nuggets of wisdom, I would never claim that.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: But there are seeds of interest that an interested party
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: can hold onto. And they'll be like, wait, there's horse
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: sashimi in Japan? I've never thought about that animal like that.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: Do other countries have sashimi that I don't know about? Spoiler, yep,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: they do. I mean, they don't call it sashimi in
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: every country, of course, but they have. what is raw
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: strips of meat or fruit or vegetables in all sorts
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: of countries, and it's everywhere. It's amazing. The world is amazing.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: Let's keep talking about Japan. Great thing about Japan, there's
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: great high electronics, build quality is high, and they're at
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: a very fair price most of the time. Sometimes they're not,
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: but most of the time they are. And there's so
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: many high electronics, which means I say high electronics. Now,
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: I think I read an article. It just means advanced
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: things like phones and Bluetooth headsets and whatever. And I'm
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: talking about Bluetooth headsets. I got, I think, a crappy
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: one in Korea that was not a bone vibration headset
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: or bone conduction. Bone conduction. I need that low volume.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Doesn't mess with my ears. and doesn't cut off the
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: sounds from outside, even though when I wear bone conduction headsets,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: I also put earplugs in, which I have always thought
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: was crazy because I'm wearing a bone conduction headset and
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: then I'm also wearing earplugs. So it's kind of funny,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: paradoxical a little bit. I know it's not really, it's
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: funny to me. And then I bought a bone conduction
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: headset in Daiso and their giant Daiso into a super Daiso.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: And they had like four different nice bone conduction headsets.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: And after hemming and hawing, I chose the one that
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: had a great battery time, 14 hours, like a three
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: hour charge time. And the sound I was like, probably
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: not great. I couldn't test it out, but it just
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: had the features I wanted. It had forward and backward rewind,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: skip track, volume button is on there. I can just
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: click it. And it's there's a pause button to essential
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: for someone who listens to so many podcasts. super lightweight,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: I think it's like 100 grams for the set, and
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: 14 hour battery life, so yes please. The other ones
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: only had 6 and 8 hour battery life, and at
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: first I wanted them, but then I saw it and
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: I was like, no, I love just walking around for hours,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: so if I'm walking around half a day, I don't
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: want to think about the battery in my bone conduction
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: Bluetooth headset. So I picked one, and I took it
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: up front, and I stepped past the line accidentally, and
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: it started alarming off, and then the lady took off
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: the tape for me because, oh, the alarm went off
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: because I was trying to see the writing on the
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: box and a lady came over and disabled it and
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: took it off so I could read all the features.
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: And I was like, whoa, baby, this is the one
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: I want. Also it's made in Japan. That's a Japanese
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: product and they do make sturdier products. And I believe
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: it was under $ 40. It's either 27 or 37. I
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: can't remember. It was a very, very good price for
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: a quality set of bone conduction tape. headphones and I
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: have worn them literally every day. They're on my neck
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: right now. If you're wondering what the brand is, guess what?
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: I don't know. They were in Daiso. But it's just,
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: Japan's so great because I like high tech. I like
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: bone conduction headsets. I like new phones. But I also
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: like living in the forest and I like making the
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: rain gear. Daiso has both of those things. It's so
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: It's so great. They have such a DIY culture in
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: Japan that all of my backpacking needs and things I
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: want to make, I can go somewhere and they have
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: snap buttons. There's a sewing kit right there. There's elastic
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: cord that I can grab by the meter. It's so
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: convenient for someone who makes all their own stuff and
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: repairs stuff all the time, especially someone like me who
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: likes playing video games and also wants a wireless controller
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: to carry around with me or I need a new
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: USB or whatever. It's they have all the world. It's great.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: And it's all like if you go to the mega Daiso,
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: it's all right there. And I can compare multiple bone
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: conduction Bluetooth headsets. So it is. Yeah, it is a
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: remarkable country, as you can obviously tell, I believe. I
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: was happy to be there. I was happy to find
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: the headset I wanted, all the other stuff. So anyway,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying is I got a great bone conduction headset.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: They sell them in Daiso. That surprised me. And then
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: I was like, no, of course they do. And there's
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: a whole kitchen appliance section. What a great, what a
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: great place. Okay, so this was funny too. I have
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: friends from the U.S. who, my friend is ethnically Japanese
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: and then his wife is nationally Japanese. She's from Japan.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: He's from the US though. And I was just thinking
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: about them while I was walking around for eight hours,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: you know, lots of time to think. And I was like,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: I wonder what those guys are up to. And I
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: wondered where her hometown was because I was like, maybe
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: I'm nearby there. The apartment I rented in Osaka is
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: her hometown. That's where she's from. Like that neighborhood exactly,
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: which is, well, no, okay, that's not true. Not that
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: neighborhood exactly. but she's right next to Osaka. She's very
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: close in the country of Japan. I landed there. And
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: then when I called them up, I found out that
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: I was, I was like a 10 minute train ride
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: from her hometown, basically. That's pretty crazy. And then it
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: got crazier. The other thing I found out where I
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: had been walking around that day, they were back in
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: her hometown, but they had visited that section of Osaka
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: earlier that day. And I'm, If I had called them
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: up maybe two hours earlier, I would have caught them
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: or even an hour earlier. I don't know. He said
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: they just left that specific neighborhood where I was walking around. Yeah.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: So my friends from the U.S., they both live in
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: the U.S. permanently and have a couple of kids, happened
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: to be in Osaka at the same time I was
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: on the same on the same week. Basically, they just
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: go there for a week in the summer for a vacation.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: So that was pretty crazy to find out. But we
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: missed each other and couldn't get together because... Can't remember.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: But the scheduling just never matched up. I think I
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: was only there for a couple days. Or maybe that
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: was the next day I actually had to get on
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: the bus. It was something like that. So I couldn't... Yeah,
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: we couldn't actually meet up in Japan. And I was
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: doing so much anyway. I was still... finalizing my rain gear,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: I remember. And I was, I remember I got so
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: much gear stuff done in that condo. And then they
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: were going to the northeast of Osaka and I was
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: in the like west, southwest. So it just didn't work out.
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: But I had just seen them a few months ago
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: when I visited the US anyway. Or six months ago,
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: who knows time? Time's difficult. It was super cool that
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: they were there at the same time I was. I
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: love those little synchronicities. And they didn't message me or anything.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: I was just thinking about them and gave them a
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: ring and they happened to be there. It would have
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: been great if we just bumped into each other on
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: the street while they were in that same neighborhood I was.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: I got chicken jerky. It was good, but it was seasoned. Weird.
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: Not great. Not as good as beef jerky or red
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: meat jerky, so I probably won't get it again, but
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: as a novelty, it was tasty. I wrote exchange money expensive. Oh,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: there's a Okay, so I had to exchange money, and
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: almost nobody does it in person anymore. I didn't want
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: to go to a bank and have to give my
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: passport and wait in line and all that stuff. So
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: there's an ATM. There's like a currency exchange ATM, currency
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: exchange machine, that was a 45-minute walk away in some
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: hotel lobby. So I went there and exchanged, and it
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: was very convenient, and it charged more than I would
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: have liked. But that's the price of convenience, I guess. Okay,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: and then that night, this is, I think, the third
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: day before I leave, I'm walking back, and I see
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: this thing, and I'm like, you know what? I should
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: go in there. Now, it was a sushi restaurant, which
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: I'm normally pretty intimidated by because my Japanese, well, almost
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: all of my good Japanese is food-related. Yes. My Japanese
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: is not good. And I've been there a lot, so
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: I'm more embarrassed because it should be better. But I
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: studied it constantly during the six weeks I was living
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: in that house near Matsuyama. So it was okay. I
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: felt okay with it. And I really... I hadn't gotten
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: sushi yet. I'd been there for four days already. Or
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: three days, whatever. And it looked right. This restaurant looked
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: right for me. There was wood paneling outside. It wasn't
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: a large restaurant. The sign... was very simple. It was like,
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: we sell sushi, you can eat it here. It was
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: giving me all the signs of a good restaurant. So
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: after double taking and translating the menu that they posted outside,
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: which was very nice of them, I went inside and again,
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: I was nervous because there was five people already inside
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: there and the bar maybe held 10 people maximum. So
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: it wasn't empty. But it was just a sushi bar.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: There was a wizened old man behind the sushi bar.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: Clearly it was his and his old grandma wife's sushi bar.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: And they said, Yoroshimase. Is that what they say? Is
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: that what they say when you go there or when
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: you leave? Yoroshimase. Yoroshimase. That's it. Yoroshimase. Welcome into the restaurant.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: And they always shout it when you go in to anywhere.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: And it's cool. But there were five people there and
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: they all looked up at me because obviously I'm not Japanese.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: And they're like, is he going to be a rude
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: piece of crap? Because that's what you have to wonder
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: now if if tourists. Oh, I feel so bad for Japan.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: They had to put up that black fence to block
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Mount Fuji because tourists just were being influencers. I shouldn't.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: say tourists. I've met plenty of tourists abroad. All of
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: them are very respectful of the cultures. Influencers are a problem.
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: They block traffic, both pedestrian and vehicle, to take a picture.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: And that's rude. Stop being rude. But I think when
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: I went inside, I said, Konnichiwa. Like, I just said
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: it as normal as I could. And they were like, okay.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: And I said a couple things in Japanese. And I
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: think I asked for the menu. And then they ignored
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: me after that. And I said, Osake... No, what is it? Atatakai? Atatakai,
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: I think, is hot sake. Like, the normal way to
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: say it. There's a vernacular in each, like, province. But Osake... Um,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: you can say atatakai. No, no, atatakai is hot. Oh, man, what? Oh, atsukan.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: That's what they call atsukan. That's how I learned it
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: in Matsuyama, and I don't know if that's the Osaka
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: way to say it, but I said atsukan, and the
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: old woman was like, osake? Atatakai? And I was like, yeah, yeah,
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: hot sake. Atsukan. And it was in a beautiful sake jar, like...
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: I'm not drinking as much right now, but if she
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: was here and she was like, do you want some Matsu?
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: I would drink it immediately. Just for the aesthetic of
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: this bottle, it was beautifully glazed, clearly handmade. So in Japan,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: there's still a lot of handmade tile and clay works
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: of the dinnerware and the osake. Nice things are still
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: made by hand by artisans across the islands. So I
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: saw this Osaka like jar and I was just like,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: holy crap, this was such a good decision. It had
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: little finger indents and it was ribbed and there was
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: a beautiful blue, like cerulean blue, and then a rainstorm
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: gray pattern, like twisting across it. It was amazing. I
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: was like, I'm so glad I stopped in here already.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: And once I got it, there was, I think three
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: girls and two guys and all five of them started
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: asking me questions and And I could understand a little
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: and I answered and I didn't understand other ones. And
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: one of the guys translated in pretty broken English, like
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: my level of Japanese. But if you're both at like
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: 20% of the language, you can, you're fine. You can
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: have a conversation because he'll know words you don't know
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: and you can intimate it by context. It just, it works.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: It's great. Even if you don't, if you don't worry
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: about not knowing the language, go to a place, try
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: and speak it. You'll be okay. Everybody is. So I
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: told them I was traveling here, beer here week. I've
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: been here a couple of times. I love Japan. Thank you.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: And then they pretty much left me alone. So I
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: ordered from the guy again, very luckily there was a
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: very simple menu. It had, I don't know, 30 items
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: on it. And like half of those were different nigiri.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: And I saw whale and I'm going to put a thing.
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: I think I mentioned before, because of that episode of, um,
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Oishinbo that I saw and then looked up whales. But
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: the whales that are sold at the market to make
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: sushi out of are not endangered by any stretch of
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: the imagination. 0.1% of this species of whale are harvested
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: a year at this point. Hang on, I'm going to
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: check the numbers. So up to, as of now, 2026,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: a thousand mink whales are allowed to be harvested in
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: Japan per year. So that might sound like a lot.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: Usually the numbers are 200 to 300 per year of
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: actually harvested mink whales. The quotas are just how much
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: they're allowed to take. But there isn't a huge demand
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: for whale meat. It's certainly a traditional meat. And, you know,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: people connect with whales. So people don't eat it as much.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: But there's no concern about... They're not endangered. Mink whales
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: are least concern, not endangered at all. So I understand...
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: if emotionally you don't want to eat horses or whales
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: or cows, definitely my Indian friends, or any other meat.
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: But in Iceland, they eat whales. In Norway, in Japan,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: they eat whales. And so while I was in Japan,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: I've never tried whale sashimi before, or sushi actually this was,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: and I wanted to try this nigiri whale. And it
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: was very marbled, incredibly, incredibly marbled, And so I was
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: worried because I don't really like fat and I didn't
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: want to just chew on this piece of whale. And
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: then I bit it and it was grated with, there's
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: a little bit of ginger scallions on top. And I
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: ate that and it was amazing. It was totally delicious.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: I've had raw beef before. This was really good. I
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: was blown away by how good whale was. Whale harvesting
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: is way less in Japan. Okay, the relevant facts. I'm
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: just going to throw this up there. Before the Save
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: the Whales movement started in the U.S., the popular thing
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: that got everybody to save the whales, Japan had already
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: legally self-regulated how many whales could be harvested, down to
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: the low hundreds, and when there was a problem with
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: the population, down to like 10 a year. So they
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: were already self-regulating, and Whales were already not endangered and
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: were already back to least concern status, which is the
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: least concern. There's no danger of being endangered of a
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: species if it's designated as least concern. Japan had already
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: done that by the time, about 30 years before, the
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Save the Whales movement got started in the U.S. So,
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: save the whales or they're going to go extinct? That
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: was never a problem for the whales harvested for food
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: in Iceland and Norway and especially in Japan because they're
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: such conservationists. So they had already solved the endangered problem
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: before any other country noticed there was a problem. So
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: there are about 520,000 mink whales in the wild. Japan
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: can harvest up to 1,000 of them per year. So
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: that's 0.2% of the regular population, which if you know
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: anything about cattle farming... or hog farming, or chickens, or
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: anything like that. 2019, there were about 230 mink whales harvested.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: There were 70 billion chickens harvested. Obviously, you need a
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: lot of chickens to make a whale, but you don't
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: need 70 billion to make 200 whales. It's a much
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: larger percentage of the species population of beef and chicken
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: and pigs that are harvested each year than whales, certainly.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Especially considering how large the population, 120 million of Japan is,
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: and how traditional eating whale is. The fact it's so low,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: that's very indicative of how the cultural shift is. Young
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: people just don't want to eat whales. The same way
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: horse meat used to be popular in the U.S., and
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: then younger generations thought, now I have beef and pork,
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: I don't need the horse meat, and I'm more emotionally
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: connected to the horses because I ride them and feed them,
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: they're my pets. So horse meat became unpopular. Or pigeon.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: Pigeon also became unpopular in the U.S. But it used
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: to be popular. So harvest-wise, numbers-wise, there's no endangerment. They're
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: harvested very responsibly in terms of all the species that
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: humans harvest for meat. If you're against that entirely, yeah,
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: makes total sense. But I eat what I eat, where
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: I am where I am. And I've always been curious
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: about whale, and this whale nigiri, I could bite through
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: it so easily, even with the fat marbling, it wasn't
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: even an issue. Like, it wasn't stringy or anything. It
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: was super, super fresh. I bit right through it, and
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: the flavor was delicious. It was a meaty fish. It's interesting, too,
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: because it looks like meat. It looks like meat and
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: not like fish meat. It looks like red meat. It
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: looks like marbled red meat, but it tastes, and it
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: tastes like marbled red meat, but much a very mild flavor.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: like a very mild-flavored, soft, soft-flavored beef, and soft in texture.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: It was a delicious piece of nigiri, or two pieces
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: of nigiri. And everyone was real happy that I ate meat, too.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: They were like, oh, right, because that's like the traditional meat,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: and it's whatever. And I was ordering in Japanese. They
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: all liked that, too. If you say atsukan instead of, oh,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: can I have some sake? They were much happier if
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: you say atsukan kudasai. Ah, Japan's so much fun. And
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: it's cool. And it's cool. It sounds cool. Their language
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: sounds cool. So man, completing that first bite of nigiri
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: and having the whale, I was like, boom, I just
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Japan'd so hard. This is the most Japanese thing I
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: could be doing right now. Sitting in this tiny family-owned one-chef,
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: single-chef sushi bar. With a bunch of other Japanese people
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: talking with them in Japanese. Drinking osake, hot sake, and
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: eating nigiri while it's raining outside. Oh, it was perfect.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: It was so great. And then I got so much
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: other amazing sake. I got salmon, which I wasn't into
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: because Japanese people, they're like, salmon, whatever, man, come on.
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: That's not traditional sashimi. But I always get it because
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: I'm curious... I don't know. I'm always curious and they
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: make it good. It's good. So I try it. I
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: tried it at the end. I got maguro first. Maguro
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: is my favorite. That's some good fatty tuna. I got
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: mackerel because Oishinbo, again, that anime made a great point
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: for mackerel being a very delicate, great nigiri ingredient if
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: you can Get it very fresh and cut it correctly.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: And it was delicious. This guy's sashimi is probably the
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: best sushi bar I've been to in Japan. And I've
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: been to a lot. Not a ton, but I've been
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: to a lot. And this guy, he was just old.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: They were fat pieces of fish like how it used
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: to be. They used to be thicker, like historically. And
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: it was... Every, every one he made was very good.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: There was never like a thin piece of skin or
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: fat I didn't want. If there were skin on it,
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: it was easy to eat. It was meant to be eaten.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: It was very fresh. I talked to him. I said,
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: do you go to the market every morning? He says, yeah,
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: I get all of the fish myself, every cut myself
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: every morning. And I ordered a piece. I can't remember
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: what it was, but he was like, actually, I'm sorry.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: You don't want to eat it. That one's not fresh
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: from this morning. That is from yesterday. And so I
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: didn't get that and he threw it away like right
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: in front of me right there. He was like, sorry,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: I should have thrown that away earlier. Looked fresh to me,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: but who knows? I got octopus there and that was
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: the best octopus I ever had. It must have been
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: the freshest because I could bite through that so easily.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: Or maybe it's the way they prepared it because I
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: think all I think all octopus is boiled first before
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: you eat it. I believe that's true even in sashimi,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: but maybe I'm totally wrong. Someone let me I know
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: they have raw, raw, not cooked, but I think in
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: most sushi bars, they boil the octopus they have first.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: Let me know if you know that, because I'm not
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: sure what the percentage is of actual raw versus boiled
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: first and then served cold on sushi is for octopus.
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: But that was my favorite octopus I ever had. It
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: was totally delicious. Every time I got a piece of
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: nigiri from this guy, it was perfect. And the osake
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: was perfect. One time it wasn't hot enough, and I'm like,
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, can you add heat to it in Japanese?
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: She's like, well, I was like, add heat to the sake.
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: I want it hotter. And then her husband was like,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: he wants hot sake. She's like, oh, my gosh, I'm
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: so sorry. When she found out that she didn't heat
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: it up. They do heat it up in a microwave,
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: which is funny because they're so traditional, all that. But
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: if they're heating up liquids, they just heat up in
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: a microwave, which radiologically makes perfect safe sense. It's just
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: funny in such a traditional culture that they're like, throw
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: it in the mic. Yeah. So all the sushi sustainably harvested,
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: totally delicious. given to me by this he had got
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: i think he told me how old he was oh
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: i can't remember now but he might have been in
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: his 90s he was old he was certainly in his
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: 80s if it wasn't his 90s but i can't remember
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: what he told me but i believe we did exchange
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: ages because he kept trying to talk to me because
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: the next time i went there i went there i
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: went there the day after i went there the last
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: three days i was there because it was exceptional exceptional
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: quality fish The Maguro was so clearly fresh. It was
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: a work of beauty. And this guy, so I kept
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: going back there. And the next day I went, I
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: went right when they opened at 5 p.m. immediately. And
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: so there was no one else in there. And I
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: got my Atsukan again, the hot sake. And then I
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: got the ones I didn't get yesterday. I got some
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: roe and other pieces of nigiri. And I just talked
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: with this guy and it was super cool because I
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: was talking to like a master sushi chef in his
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: sushi bar. And he was cool and treating me fine.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: And he was working with me when my Japanese sucked
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: and he spoke zero, zero, zero English. So it was
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: just Japanese, but that's, I'm good with that. That usually
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: pulls me forward a bit. It makes me, it makes
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: my brain switch over to the other language faster to
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: my not, native language much faster. And it was always good.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: The only thing, he did have pickled cod roe or
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: something that was fine, and I wasn't too into it.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: The texture was perfect. It was clearly very fresh. It
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: was just kind of boring, and because it had been marinated,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: it had like a slight lemony texture, which I don't
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: want with my fish eggs. I just want them fishy
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: and eggy but maybe you have to preserve roe that
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: way or that roe that way i don't know but
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: i've never had it before it was interesting because it
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: wasn't super lemony or sweet like the yellow ones are
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: in a lot of um i don't know commercial sushi
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: restaurants this it was firmer for sure and it had
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: a much lighter texture i'm actually not a hundred percent
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: sure if it was if the eggs were actually marinated
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: they just had a citrusy taste but it wasn't strong
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: like the marinated ones that I get at other restaurants
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: maybe that's just what super super fresh ones taste like
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: but I think I checked the color online and it
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: said if it's that color then it has probably been
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: preserved in some way which makes sense it was very
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: interesting it was a big hunk of it it was
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: twice as large as the rice it was it was
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: crazy when I saw it I was like that's the
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: row and he's like that's the row okay it was
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: good everything was good that was amazing I'm so glad
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: I went back all three days Because that's the thing, guys,
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: if you're if you have like this is the best
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: meal of my life and you're visiting someplace. Do you
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: know if you're going to get the chance to eat
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: it again? Go back. Have it again. Have it again.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: Try the other stuff. But take life by the collar
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: and shake it very gently because you're just making a point.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: You're not trying to hurt life. Say thank you, life.
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Can I have a little bit more?
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: So that sushi bar freaking rocked. And I can't remember
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: the name of it. They had a little paper lantern outside.
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: I think it was green or maybe the curtains were green,
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: but it was so cool. Slang door, 10 seats. The
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: next two days I went, Oh, you know, I also,
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: the first day I went, the guy who could speak
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: a little bit of English at the bar next to
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: me was smoking. They still smoke in some bars, especially
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: the ones owned by old people and like more traditional ones.
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: You can still smoke inside. And yeah, I'm a fuss
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: budget about smoking. I do not want to smell smoke
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: while I'm eating. And especially in Japan, when I have
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: fresh food, I do not want smoke messing up that
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: flavor or taste at all. So that's why I went.
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: That was that was a part of why I went
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: in early the next day at 5 p.m. And then
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: again the next day at 5 p.m. Oh, this was cool.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: That day, the second day, I was walking all around
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: and I got my new Bluetooth headphones. And as soon
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: as I heard them, I was like, perfect. So I
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: took off the crappy ones that I had got in Mongolia. No,
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: I got rid of the Mongolian ones in Korea. And
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: then the Korean ones were the ones I second pair
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: I had in Japan. So I was I was like, nope,
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: these Japanese ones are perfect. So I went into just
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: a random electronic store or like a thrift store or something.
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: I think I went into the thrift store. Japan has
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: cool thrift stores. And I asked if I could just
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: give them my old Bluetooth headphones, my old, my one
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: week old Bluetooth headphones, because I wasn't going to use them.
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: I already had a new pair, but they work fine.
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: And they were like, oh, yeah, we can. Let me check.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: And he checked behind. He's like, yeah, we can just
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: fill out this form. We'll give you like five dollars
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: and whatever. And I was like, no, you don't have to.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: I'll just give it to you. He's like, I always
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: love to fill out the form. And my manager has
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: to fill out. He's in the back. So if you
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: just wait like 10 minutes. And I was like, OK.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: And then I looked behind me and there was a table.
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: There were four tables or six, something like that. Four
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: tables was of tabletop gamers. And they were like playing
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: cards and different games at different tables. And so I
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: turned back to this guy and I just typed in
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: my I didn't know how to say it. So I
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: typed it in Google Translate. I'm just going to go
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: give it to those guys. Is that OK? And just
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: give away to those people over there. He's like, yeah, man.
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: And he held up a thumbs up and I was like, cool. OK, great.
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: So the clerk was happy that he didn't have to
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: do any crappy paperwork, I think. And I went back
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: to these tabletop gamers and I checked Google Translate first
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: on how to say it. And then in Japanese, I
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: just said, does anyone want these headphones? And I saw
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: like a couple guys like start to raise their hand
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: and then pull back because they're in a group. So
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: they don't want to seem like greed or anything. And
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: I was like, because I have I have two. I'm
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: not going to use these ones. If anybody can use these,
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: they work perfect. They're a week old from Korea. They
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: they work good. But no one took them. And I
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: was like, OK, sorry to bother you. I'm just going to.
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: One guy asked what I was saying in Japanese because
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: I'm sure my accent sucked. And the other guy explained
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: it to him in Japanese. And then I just was like,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: I'll put them here on the table. And then if
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: anybody wants them, you can have them. I don't need them.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: Thank you. Bye. Have a great day. And all four tables,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: like everybody waved at me. Bye. They were all fine
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: once they, once the other guy translated. I'm sure what
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: I was saying was like, me, two headphones need, not me.
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: And they were like, what the fuck is this guy
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: talking about? So luckily when the other guy translated, they
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: all looked like happy and grateful. And I had a
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: little lighter burden. I didn't have this pair of headphones
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: I didn't need anymore. So that was really cool. And
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: then I got to walk around in the rain and
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: test out my new rain cloak some more. That was
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: really cool. And then I went back and got some
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: sushi and that was absolutely delicious. Got some more maguro.
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: And when I was at Daiso, I found some sandals.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: And between Japan and the US, I was going to
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: stop in Hawaii again and go dance in the ocean.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: have my new sleep set up. So I needed some
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: slippers or flip-flops, whatever you call them, sandals, and I
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: grabbed some flip-flops from Daiso, took out the rubber part,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: made my paracord huaraches. Huaraches? Huaraches? Oh, it's been a
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: long time since I said that. I don't know if
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: that's what they're called anymore. Waraches. Waraches. Waraches. Sandals. South
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: American sandals. Central American sandals. And I was ready to go.
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Once I landed in Hawaii, I would switch out my
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: shoes for my handmade DIY paracord sandals, and I was
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: good to go. So that was another DIY thing I
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: did while in that little condo in Osaka. The rain gear.
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: So the rain tarp for the hammock. The rain cloak,
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: my little half rain cloak. Oh, I fixed their laundry basket.
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: They have a fabric laundry basket. But I had that
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: grommet machines and a bunch of extra grommets. So I
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: just fixed it up to look all fancy. And then
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: I made my own DIY sandals. What else did I make?
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: I made a bunch of stuff. And I was having
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of fun. So I went out and I
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: got some supermarket snacks at the end of the night.
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: Went to eat at a park. while it was raining,
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: and I threw away all my trash. And then right
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: after I threw away my trash, I bought like a
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: couple extra snacks. And I was like, ah, because the
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: only thing about Japan is if you're outside, like at
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: a park, there's no trash cans. They only have trash
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: cans in private houses now. And they have them in
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: some convenient, they have them in a lot of convenience stores,
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: but it says don't throw away outside trash here. It's
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: only for food you buy in there and eat there
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: and throw away your trash right there. So there's very
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: few public trash receptacles in Japan anymore. So I just
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: threw away all my trash and I got snacks and
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: I was like, ah, now I have trash again. But
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: that's okay because I got to eat great snacks. Okay,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: and the last sushi day, I go back and I
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: got the akadashi first, which is this like soy sauce
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: miso soup mixed broth with green onions and there's some
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: fish skin or something in there. but it was super fresh,
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: so easy to bite, very delicious. Scallions, a couple pieces
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: of fish skin, and then, which are easy to bite
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: through because they're fresh, and a slab of mackerel sitting
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: on the bottom there, flavoring the whole bowl. It was
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: the best akadashi I've ever had. I've only had it
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: a couple times, but this was amazing. I could have
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: had 10 bowls of that, no joke. It was so good. Or,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: that was a lot of fish, so... It's like I
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: got a huge chunk in my bowl. But I think
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: they were happy because I showed up every day and
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: drank Atsukan and ate a whole bunch of sushi. So
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: I got all the sushi I wanted to get, except
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: I realized after I didn't get scallop that was on
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: their menu. I think I was afraid of how the
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: texture would be, but I should have tried it. I
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: like scallops a lot. So that was dumb, but it
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: was an amazing final meal in Osaka. Right after I
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: ate that, I was going to go to that Vietnamese
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: restaurant and get that first meal I got again, the
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: chili shrimp or whatever. I was going to get some
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: meal again and just close out. But that was their
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: close day. It was like Wednesday or something weird. So
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: I didn't I didn't realize it. And I didn't get
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: to eat there again before I left. And I was
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: sad because I had gone there again and got ribs
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: and some other great food. Didi, that place I was
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: talking about earlier. Can't recommend them enough. OK, and then
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: that's the end of Osaka in the next saga. I'm
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: going to begin, I'm going to leave my condo and
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: head over to Tokyo. So we'll talk about that on
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: the next one for my flight to Hawaii and then
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: to a wedding. So if you want to talk to me,
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: talk to me at bitofarambler at gmail.com or lemmy, bitofarambler,
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: or bluesky, bitofarambler. I'll get back to you. I hope
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: everything's going great for you. I will talk to you
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: very soon. Thank you so much for listening. Have a
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: great day.