#207 A cool trip from Chiba to Yokohama

Transcript

Alright, Travel Day from Chiba. If you can hear bird chirping this time, this is real birds chirping in a park. It's not subway birds chirping. It's like 11 o'clock. I can't book into my new Airbnb in Yokohama till 4. And I think it should only take a couple hours to get there. So I got all the time in the world. So why not take little breaks in places? And it's a beautiful sunny day. It's so sunny that I saw a lady, just one, but I saw a lady doing the carrying an umbrella to protect against the sun maneuver. Which I think is just more popular in this part of the world in general. I was watching a video about suntan lotion. Well, I think it's I was talking about currently Hanna yesterday. Enter video about Mount Nakagiri. Same thing. When I was trying to figure out how suntan lotion worked in South Korea, that you don't go by the SPF, you go by the number of pluses on the containers. I had an SPF 50, but it was three pluses and it was fucking amazing. But yeah, she did a video also. She's just coming up a lot lately on this podcast, but about suntan lotion in Asia versus Australia, the gold standard. And apparently suntan lotion is very good in Asia. But that's one of the things as far as like keeping your skin youthful and undestroyed by the sun. She did demonstrate like, you know, there's just things that people do in Asia that they will not do not and will not do in Australia, such as carrying umbrellas on sunny days, but also just covering yourself up like crazy. Women in Asia are not going out to get tanned. They are doing the reverse trying to avoid sun. But the point is it's very sunny and nice. And that's cool because last year when I was here was an unseasonably warm time. It was crazy nice every single day. Whereas getting back this first week has been mostly overcast. And I was like, oh, I wonder if it's going to be like this the whole time. Not so bad if that is the case because I've been sweating to death between specifically Jeju and Taipei. Man, just a sweat machine almost every day in those places. It's nice to be back in an environment where it's not like I'm a snowman melting like it was crazy. It was always just like day after day after day. It was like if I had to adjust to my shirt, like the hem of my shirt, like tuck in or tuck out my shirt or anything like that, just touching my clothing. It was just drenched in sweat and then my hand is covered in sweat. And I'm a gross foreigner who has bad smelling sweat. It's just like, oh, my God, this is insane. It's so nice to be back in a much more, I mean, it's still very nice weather. But, you know, I'm so much more used to the Canadian style of you're not supposed to sweat. If you're sweating, something's gone wrong.

And yeah, I thought I would just chill in this park for a bit because, like I said, I got no big hurry today. I was kind of curious because last time me and Norahiko went to a little sushi place by the McDonald's near Chiba Station. As I was leaving, but unfortunately he was a little disposed today, so we could not do that. But I still got to say my goodbyes to him this morning. He has like a little guest book that I signed again. And it's neat. I was looking through, just flipping through the guest book. A lot of it is various Asian languages that I can't read, but there was somebody from Calgary, someone from Germany, someone else from the UK. It's just kind of cool to see all the little various people that have passed through his place.

And yeah, he was giving me tips. Apparently, so going to Chiba Station, I mean obviously those are the big stations, right? Chiba Tokyo Station, Yokohama Station. So he said probably my best bet would be to go to Chiba Station because I can get on a train that'll just go all the way through. I won't have to transfer at Tokyo Station. I could just go straight through all the way on a rapid line to Yokohama. And I was like, yeah, you know, that is kind of a good idea because I probably don't want to fuck around with transferring a Tokyo Station and all that. But then I pointed out, and as a fellow old man, he got me on this one. I was like, you know, though, maybe it would be a good thing to take a different route and transfer because then I can pee. That gave him a nice laugh. Though I guess the train I was on yesterday had washrooms in the train. But now I told him, I think what I'm going to do is I'm going to take advantage of what I've learned at this time in Chiba that I learned about this line that continues on from the end of the monorail, which is right by this park I met now. And it seems less busy and I can like sneakily go through Funabashi up the coastline to Tokyo Station. And he's like, yeah, that's definitely a plan. And I was like, yeah, I got all day. I'm going to do it. I want to try a new train line. Try it out. See what happens. 5:00 And I mean, my luggage isn't that heavy. I could get off at Tokyo Station and go walk around. I've never been properly to the palace that's near there. But it's kind of a nice area. That whole zone though around Tokyo Station, I find very weird. My theory is that because it's where business people go that they wanted to feel more European or more comfortable to Westerners. But it's the only part of Tokyo where the drink machines just disappear. All of a sudden there's not drink machines everywhere, which I don't care for at all. I find that very weird.

So yeah, maybe walking around Tokyo Station is not probably better just to get to Yokohama early and walk around Yokohama. But yeah, I was also telling him my Mount Nakagiri was that I almost made it. That I didn't quite make it. I just transferred to the super slow train. And then I just kind of got stuck. And by the time I got there, it was 4 o'clock and I decided to come home, failed to the zero hour. And he was pointing out that next time if I try it again or whatever, or if I just even wanted to go try to get there from where I will be, that there is a ferry. And I said, yeah, I did see the ferry sign while I was down there. So I don't know how it works. I had to get a ticket or where to catch the ferry, all that. But there is a ferry. And then he mentioned the bridge too, across Tokyo Bay. There is buses that go across every hour. So there's a lot of options. That's an interesting idea. I don't think I'll do that. But I mean, even from where I'm going, I could zip over here and try to do Mount Nakagiri again. It better, yeah, just nice to be adding to all this stuff. Like I've added my little bit of Southern Chiba knowledge. I've added my Sakura Chiba knowledge.

Strengthen the friendship with one of the very few people, actually, know in Japan, or a couple of people, I guess, that I know in Japan now. Delightful. But yeah, today I'm going back to the same place I stayed last time in Yokohama, which is just this little teeny room, but I love it. So much, even though that's the room where I had food poisoning and I was trapped for two days.

But the location is so awesome. The place is so awesome. And just a little room is all I need. I just love it. I just love having a little room for my little bit of stuff. I certainly do not need space because this is like, I guess, my sort of life philosophy that got really fucked during COVID. And that is hard to do in general in North America. But it's very easy to do in Asia is what works for me, definitely, is have a very small, inexpensive place because I just don't need anything at home. I just need the very basics. And then you make up for it with, like, what I'm doing right now, like, just being in a park, just going out and being in public for the day.

I don't want to spend all day at home, so I don't need my space at home to be big, where it is kind of the reverse back in North America, especially in my hometown. I grew up in a great big giant house. I'm not complaining. It's nice to have a big three-story 100-year-old house. But it is the reverse lifestyle of like, you can't, you know, public transit sucks. You really should have a car. You spend all your time at home, so you need this great big home. If you want to go out and do stuff, there's nothing to do. I remember once, after I moved to Vancouver, I started dating this girl, and we both came back to the East Coast to visit. So I went on a double date. Me, the girl I was dating, and my friend Matt, and the girl he was dating, and it suddenly hit a wall. We're like, okay, we're back in Fredrickden, we're on this date night. Holy shit, there's nothing to do here. There's nothing. Kind of like, go bowling. There's a little bit of bowling. You can just go to the bar. I don't know, go see a movie. There's just fucking nothing, like legitimately nothing.

It's like, oh, fuck, like we'd ever noticed so much when it was just us, the single dudes, because it's like, I don't know, go to Blackbuster, rent some video games, hang out at the house, play Starcraft. It's like, who cares? It's only when you've got to do stuff with someone, and you're like, oh, this is not the town for that.

But anyway, the point of that ramble is that this little place in Yokohama is my favorite, and this is kind of this first bit of being back in Japan is all based on that. I just got the earliest booking that it was available, which is today, filled in the gap, until then, with Noriko's place, because I knew how to get here. I've been here before, and I am getting to like Chiba more and more, for its rural empty charms.

Maybe it's like a place after my own heart. Do you want a place where there's no one around, and there's nothing to do? In the classic New Brunswick Canada style, well, I got a place called Chiba for you. But yeah, then I booked it as long as it was available, which is, I think, nine days. So that's a pretty good, pretty good, chunky Yokohama. And then that's where stuff starts getting weird. I've only got one more place booked down the coast, but I really should get on that, start booking some more places, because earlier is better.

And here we go, but man, one thing that is quite weird, so I really, again, like I said before, how this is like my bonus trip. I didn't necessarily think I was going to come back to Japan. I was a little uncomfortable about trying to get this second 90-day visa. 10:00 And of course, once you get the second 90-day visa, now I definitely need to f-off for real after this, like really put some time, at least a year between me and Japan before I try to come back, and I'm sure it'll be more than that. This is so crazy expensive to get over here. And you know, I've got to spend some time in Canada. But being back in Japan, the way the timing of this has worked out is weird as hell. So today, I'm in Chiba, heading my way to Yokohama. The last episode of the podcast that I just edited last night was my last day in Ome, where I went on the south Ome hiking trail, and then I got turned around, and I came out of the mountain at a construction site. And these nice construction guys were initially like, hey buddy, you're not supposed to be here, but then when they realized I was just an idiot, they were like, hey, it's all right, dude, I'll give you a drive to Ome station. Delightful, delightful little day. But the next episode that I have to start editing is going from West Tokyo to Yokohama. So it's just weird. In the podcast, I'm going to Yokohama for my first time not knowing what to expect, kind of presuming maybe it'll just be a big city, and I will be a little non-plussed. But then I got there and realized, holy fuck, I love this, the bluffs and everything, fucking beautiful neighborhood, I love Yokohama. And now here I am, the mirror image, I'm going back to Yokohama, the same exact time in parallel. It's like I'm in some kind of weird time warp, and it's cool. But it is strange because part of this podcast is like the little nostalgia trip. I just get to be like, oh yeah, remember this, remember that. I think that might even be one of the reasons why I have not booked anything in West Tokyo yet, and I'm not in a big hurry to go back, is because I just relived all those West Tokyo adventures through this podcast over the past couple months. My brain is filled with West Tokyo, it feels weird to go back, it's too soon.

But with Yokohama, it's side by side. I get to have my little remembrances of Yokohama while I'm in Yokohama, that's just fucking weird.

But yeah, that's what I'm up to today, nice little travel day, nice beautiful day, head into Yokohama.

All kinds of various potential methods to get over there. I could go there by a bus, I could go there in a truss, I could go there on a ferry, I could go there here or there.

It's not the best run in the world. There's a ferry, there's a bus, there's many trains, that's what there is. So yeah, I'm going to take the middle route, not as weird as the bus of the ferry, but not as direct as Chiba Station.

I'm going to take the sneaky little line. Suddenly just came back to me, I believe it was called the Keo Line, into Tokyo. And then from Tokyo, you know, just probably have to cram into a train, that it might be a little packed. I'll just take whatever is the direct route from Tokyo to Yokohama.

Cool, cool, cool.

Yeah, I'm right by the station, there's a new days over there. I predict that a plum ona giri is going to go in my fucking face.

I'll write him at Chiba, Minato Station. Wow, yeah, I said that right. Oh, shit. I'm about to begin the journey, but I had to pop in because, at the new days, this ties into a little thing that's been happening lately. These putting things seems to not be a coincidence. Last episode, I was saying how I found a little... I was like custard pudding with the brown glaze on the top. I don't specifically know what any of this is, but it's very famous. It shows up in anime and stuff all the time.

And Family Mart had it in a crape format, so that was pretty tasty. And then Lawson's had one as I was coming home that was the winner. It was super awesome. It was on this fancy little cracker, and it was perfectly designed in the packaging, so you could hold the little cracker and eat the whole thing, and it was like, wow, this is awesome. But new days, they have one too, and it says new, it has new on it. So yeah, this is definitely what's sweeping the nation right now, or these pudding things, or like one company started doing it, and then everybody did...

So let's see what the new days version is. They did give me one of the little plastic spoons, though, so maybe this one will not be in a form factor that's as easy to devour. 15:00 One technique I've been heading back to immediately, and it's awesome. It works so well, because it is so tough to find garbage cans in Japan, is by something that has a little ziploc tops. So usually I get, it's just these little like rice crackers and peanuts in a mix. You can get them, I think, normal, spicy, or wasabi. I usually get the wasabi ones, but then you can keep the package and just put your various wrappers and stuff in that and zip it up. This time it's actually a dried mango that I grabbed for yesterday, for hiking around. But then I didn't eat, but I ended up mixing it with atlossens. I got this green tea matcha little cake thing, and I mixed the cake, like take a bite of the cake, and then take a dried mango piece, chew it all up together. Mango and matcha was really good, a weird mix, but it was good. But it's got a ziploc top too, I still have this bag. See, this is nice, because I can just put all of my wrappers and garbage in this little pouch, zip lock it up, and just put it in my back pocket till I eventually get to a proper garbage can, because this little teeny new days at the station doesn't have a garbage. Highly recommended, totally worth buying something, anything that comes in a ziploc package, so you can then ziploc your trash. Okay, this doesn't seem so bad, it's basically the same as the unbaked cheesecake, which I also, if I get this pudding, I can't get my unbaked blueberry cheesecake that I love so much, because I got both. And a plum onigiri. Got a fuel up for the journey, right? But I see they've changed the name, I did find it confusing last time that it was called unbaked cheesecake, they've changed it to no-bake. Well, it still says no-bake cheese blueberry, so I guess they've changed it, it doesn't say cheesecake anymore, no-bake cheese blueberry, but you can tell from the image that it's a cheesecake, and I think no-bake, yeah, I think that's what they were getting at. I've definitely seen no-bake cheesecake in North America before, so I think that is closer to what they were looking for than unbaked. Unbaked was a very weird term, and I guess they've changed it. But, this pudding thing, it's in the same basic form, so yeah, this one is essentially a crepe as well. So I think this little plastic spoon that she gave me, I think I don't need it, so I think I'm actually going to tuck this away, and I'll just put it in my day bag, I don't know when I will ever need a little plastic spoon, but you never know, so hey, why not, I'll just keep that tucked away, I do not believe I needed for this.

The moment of truth, yam yam yam.

Pretty good, yeah, pretty much the same thing as the one in a crepe from Family Mark. So yeah, Lawson's wins, because Lawson's was the weirdest, coolest, neatest version of putting it on a fancy cool cracker. But these other varieties are all extremely acceptable, very tasty. I should look this up though, because yeah, I see this all the time. But it is like, it almost seems weird to really eat it, because I almost thought of it more as just an anime thing, just like a version of a dessert, just this very specific pudding that shows up all the time, and I just don't think I've ever had it. But yeah, as long as you like custard, you will like this, it's fucking tasty. So yeah, I'm doing the custard first, then I'm going to eat the plum onigiri, then the no-bake blueberry cheesecake. Then, I will get traveling, but man, it sure is nice to travel. Man, I mean, this is the easiest of all, like I like traveling through Japan, it just feels good in general. And I'm not in any big hurry, I got all afternoon, and it's a self-check-in now, it didn't used to be, I had to check in in person last time. Now they just gave me a door code, so I can literally show up any time, I just have no worries at all about getting there at a certain time. And it's a place I've been to before, I'm pretty sure I should just be able to get there on foot. Nor Hiko's place was a little tricky, his neighborhood gets a little complicated, but I'm quite confident, I can just roll into this place, and I should have no problem finding it. It hasn't been that long.

Yeah, this is just the definition of the zero-stress travel day, it's just like the opposite of switching countries and stuff. This is just wonderful, so I'm going to sit here and yum yum yum on this stuff, and then get Motherfuckin going.

Alright, classic Tokyo feeling, my first time back in Tokyo proper, right away. I'm like, hmm, how do I get out of this station? It is not evident. 20:00 But yeah, basically, this ride, very, very short. The KO line, it was a rapid, but it only took 40 minutes. That is a handy way to get from Chiba, to Tokyo, with less people, it really wasn't very crowded at all. I mean, I still stood up, I probably could have crammed into a seat somewhere, but not a very crowded train, very nice. I went by Tokyo Disneyland to get to see it as I went by. Seems alright, I saw, you know, there's a castle in there, there's like a fucking volcano. It's not huge, but I think that's the Disneyland way, right, usually those parks are, they're like cleverly designed, more so than big. Anyway, same neat. But instead of getting off at Tokyo Station, I decided let's stick with my fucking standard issue. Let's just make it a little more awkward than it needs to be, but I'll learn more stuff, you know, I'll try out different stuff. Instead of just going to Tokyo Station and transferring, I got off one station early, so I'm at Hachibori Station, which I don't know how to get out of, but, you know, again, I'm sure I'll figure it out. Oh, there's an exit sign, nice. Perfect. Perfect. And then my plan is, I can just kind of stroll around Tokyo Station.

I don't know if this is the greatest idea, because, you know, then I'll be getting on the train at the next stop, if it gets real crowded at Tokyo and everyone's, you know, squeezed on, maybe it'd be easier to squeeze on at the source than one beyond, but whatever. Again, it's still early in the day, I'm just fucking around. So from Hachibori, I'm going to circle around Tokyo Station, and I guess the one, I'm not quite sure where to catch a line to Yokohama exactly, but just based on Google Maps and follow in the train lines, Shimbashi Station has a bunch of different train lines that stop there, like four different ones, JR and then some other ones. So I'm just going to walk to Shimbashi Station, because it's a nice beautiful day. I got time to kill, and I've been to this neighborhood. This is the neighborhood when I went to see the Tokyo Tower, but I was here at night, and it was a pretty nice walk, but I've never really walked around here. I mean, basically I have, I've been over by the Imperial Palace, it's all very close. But this specific little neighborhood, I haven't been here in the day time, so let's do it. But also at the machine here, I found how I had the non-sweet Kosta coffee the other day, and it was very good, but there was also the Velvet Flat White. I found the Velvet Flat White. This one, not just 170 yen, this one was 180. Super premium. I don't know that I've ever seen a fucking coffee mark, expensive to me. No, that's not true on Oyama Road, actually. I guess there was like a one-off machine, like super boutique. Those coffees were like, they were, I don't know, 250 yen, they were more anyway. But for a mass-produced thing out of a Tokyo machine, that's a lot. So Velvet Flat White, let's try it, and then I'll get the hell out of here, because I just realized I'm standing next to endless beeping, not the best place. Oh, I'm standing next to a stamp, where you get the Hachibori Station stamp. I don't know, stamp your touristy stuff. I don't know if you get official stamp books. I don't know how the whole stamp thing works, but I met one of these stamp things. I never really noticed those. All right, Flat White. As I mentioned last time, Flat Whites, even as a barista, have had a few different stances of barista. Technically, I know how to make a flat white, but I mean, I think the secret truth to the flat white is unless you are a super duper, mega-premo barista, and a mega-premo coffee connoisseur, and Australian, you probably can't really tell the difference between a flat white and a latte. They're basically the same, but let's see what we got.

It's not bad, but it's a bit sweet. The unsweetened one kind of gave me more of a vibe of a flat white, actually. But that's all right. It's all right, but unsweet is the way to go, for sure. This one, too sweet, for sure, but hopefully this will fuel me on as I try to escape Hachibori Station. And go for a walk through sunny central Tokyo. This is kind of nice, actually. I'll get like a little taste. Get a little taste of this middle of Tokyo, Tokyo Tower adjacent area, but just long enough to get to another station and get the F out of here. That seems just right.

Oh, man, this feels pretty good. It feels pretty good. It took me a little while to get out of that station. 25:00 It's like exit this way, but now go this way, but then go this way. But then when I finally did randomly come out, I think I'm on a street that if I just keep walking down this street, it should more or less take me to the other station that I'm looking for. But yeah, this feels so, get that little thing, that little spring in my step when I stepped out because it just again feels so different. All the different parts of Japan feel so different, so distinct. Like I think it was cool to come back and go to Chiba. That definitely felt, that definitely fit my overall personality a lot better. Like, ah, just go to Sakura and just chill out and do nothing and just like whatever. Because when I came to Japan last year, as you will recall at the start of this podcast, like I was in Sengenjaya. So I mean, that was also cool, but I was right near Shibuya, right in the middle of the action. Everything was super busy. The place was all busy and stuff, and it was this same time of year, so it was right by Halloween. And I was right by the neighborhood where they do all the Halloween stuff, and I didn't even care. I'm like, I don't give a fuck. I don't give a shit. And that's when I started to realize, like, oh yeah, why am I here? Why am I super duper central? Why am I in this like place where I'm all packed in just to have access to central stuff that I don't really care about anyway? That was a little weird. It was not the best way to approach, and it was just a long trip, such a long trip in from the airport. And then only arriving, like I got there, like after 10 at night.

Doing the little trip into Chiba makes way more sense on every level. However, and now that I'm here, I guess like what I was just saying, this little dollop, this is going to be perfect. Just a little taste of like, yeah, it just feels different. The huge buildings and just the density of people, and just, yeah, you'd never mistake central Tokyo for Chiba, you know, obviously.

And yeah, just being here now, I'm like, ah, cool. Like I don't need to settle in. I don't need to be here for a week. But to take this little stroll through, this was the right fucking move. And to just get out of the train a bit, stretch my legs a little, take a nice little stroll.

Yeah, this just feels good, man. Just feels fucking good.

All the different parts of Tokyo and Japan in general that I've been to so far, like they all do feel different. It's a different slant on things, no matter where you go. And they all just feel so cool in their own different ways.

Way more foreigners, obviously. Tons of them, I just watched by a gaggle of white people in the train I saw a black dude with an anime shirt.

My estimation that things were a lot less touristy and a lot less crowded when I was in Chiba. I guess we'll see. I guess we'll see how things go overall. But it also could have just been that I was in Chiba. Now that I'm in Tokyo, yeah, like you can't miss it. I've been here mere minutes and I'm just seeing tourists all over the place.

But yeah, this feels good. Feels real good. And that's where this is like such a pointless podcast where I'm just devagally describing stuff. And just like, ah, my free floating feelings of things being cool. But I think it's kind of important to bring up because I mean there's no guarantee. I don't know, everything wears off eventually. When I first moved to Toronto, I was very fucking shocked. Or in New York, I was excited. I was excited to be in New York. And you reach a point where New York got kind of fully turned on. Toronto, I just became neutral on it. Just stopped seeming exciting. I guess theoretically, I'm sure if I lived in Japan, like obviously that would just happen. That would also happen. It happens just the stupid human brain. So I guess that's all. Just want to report that that has not come fucking close to happening. My third time in Japan, my second time in this past year, not even close. This feels magical as fuck son. It feels fucking awesome.

Welcome to Shimbashi Station. Alright, I made it to the entrance of Shimbashi Station and I'm seeing on the little local area map the line that's J.O. I saw that somewhere else as well. That's the one that goes to Yokohama, so I should be good to go. But yeah, it's feeling so cool to walk through Tokyo. I was kind of thinking, I guess I could just stay here for a bit. 30:00 I'm going to go to Yokohama right away because I can't check in for a couple hours anyway. But I do have my luggage with me and I don't actually know where I'm going. I'm just wandering around.

But it was a nice little taste and specifically now I'm in Ginza. And Ginza, I totally just don't vibe with it. I don't know. It's like being in the Taipei Airport is all just fancy stuff. But it has been a tourist grand central while I've been here. I've only been walking for like less than an hour and I've just seen a mountain of tourists. So yeah, I think definitely whatever my estimations are, how tourism is going in Japan, definitely. I mean, just no point. I don't know. I don't know what's going on at all. But I guess what it does point out is that you only have to get like a little bit off the center and then you just don't really notice it anymore. Because even when I was in Tokyo, you know, I was out by Akigawa Station a lot or even just like Naka Itabashi, that whole Itabashi sort of area. Just off the center a little bit or recently in Chiba. And we'll see how Yokohama is. But it really makes a big difference when you're just right in the center. But that's one thing I think is kind of curious is I mean, obviously I don't I don't buy stuff. I don't do things. You know, I guess I travel a little different. But but like what is it about central Tokyo? Why are there some walking by me right now? Why are there so many tourists here? Like there's a lot of train lines. It's very convenient in that way. But like what is it that's actually here that everyone's coming to see? I really don't know. I just don't know. But I guess I'm just the wrong person because I just want to go nowhere and do nothing.

But I'm not sure. I mean, even just walking through the city today. It's like, hey, there's some museums and some restaurants and you know, whatever, a bunch of stores. But what makes this part of Japan so like why is everybody here? Spread out. Go somewhere else. You know, that's what I think is a little weird. I don't know what maybe there's something very obvious that I'm missing out on. And I mean, I got nothing against this part of town. Like I was saying, it's fucking great. It feels very cool to be here. It feels very nice. But it doesn't feel better. I don't I don't know what's better. I don't know what makes this a big draw. Works for me though. It's good for me that I can spread out a bit. That being said though, I really do need to book more places because even though I'm drifting further and further away, I'm not doing myself any favors by waiting to book a place. And book more Airbnb's because there still are a lot of tourists and even if most of them are staying right here in the center, all it takes is a few of them to just spread on out to where I'm trying to get to to fuck my shit up. So yeah, I got to start booking some more places. But yeah, wonderful, wonderful to be in central Tokyo. It feels awesome. Great place to spend an hour. Probably a great place to spend a day. But hey, there's some more tourists. But I just, yeah, I don't know. I am a little confused about what... I mean, besides I guess like Akihabra, I understand Akihabra. Or it's Cousin Ikibukuro. Maybe that's it though. I mean, those make sense to me because it's like, well, they're full of anime and video games. I guess... I guess whatever makes central Tokyo good is what would make any big city good. And I don't like any of those big cities. I just don't like it. Just a big density of restaurants and very boring stores. Don't do nothing for me.

So anyway, yeah, that's one thing I have not picked up any information about. It is not clearer. But as far as just wandering through, doing nothing and buying nothing and just soaking in the vibe, as I do everywhere, in that capacity, central Tokyo is awesome. It's just as awesome and differently awesome than all the other places. Super great.

How's that for a mess of confusing nonsense that doubles, speak backward, talk pointless nonsense? All right, time for me to go get on the train. Get the hell out of here.

Man, that was fast. That was ridiculously fast. So, I mean, I guess like I was saying, the only time I came into Yokohama before was from West Tokyo, from Hachioji.

And it wasn't bad. No complaints. Considering that distance, it actually wasn't too difficult, but coming in from Tokyo was way fucking faster. 35:00 That was like five or six stops. I in fact went a stop past Yokohama, just as is my tradition. Let's get off somewhere different, somewhere new that I've never been before. But since I got to get to Naka Ward by the bluffs, it's a bit of a walk either way, so I met Hoda Gaya Station. It's like quarter to three in the afternoon. That was like crazy fast. I cannot believe how fast that was. So it ties into what I learned last episode that when you're going against the flow of traffic, things are so slow and so painful that you might not make it. But then as soon as you turn around and you're heading back toward the center, once I was flowing back toward Tokyo, crazy fast. And similar thing here, just coming into Yokohama, it's not really that far away. And yeah, when they say a rapid train, they're not kidding. Man, it's funny just again listening back to last year's podcasts because they're lining up perfectly. They're coming out at this exact same time. That was when I had like a bit of an injury. Luckily my only hiking injury had a sore hip. And I was kind of saying, having never been to Yokohama, just assuming because it's by the coast, I was like, it's probably good to stop this hiking. Good to go to flat ass Yokohama. It's just very funny that I assumed that because I'm already just stepping out of this station. I'm on an overpass and look at these bluffs. There's just houses in the sky. There's a big apartment building but then behind it, just a bunch of normal houses that are higher up than the apartment building. Like right there, just these tiny little crazy ass mountains. It's actually kind of Taipei-ish. I guess is what I would say. Yokohama is like, yeah, I remember being very surprised by that when I first got here. And it's still just awesome. It's like my favorite kind of terrain. I love, I love, little teeny mountains everywhere. I just fucking love it. That's so cool. Yeah, and this, for this particular neighborhood, I don't believe I've been here before. I wandered around quite a bit at random in Yokohama. But this doesn't look too familiar. But yeah, I'll just mosey from here.

Get to where I'm going. Nice and slow. Even though I've got my luggage, I suspect I will probably head up to... I want to go up and see the bluffs by Nakawar just because it's an awesome view of the bay. But I'm also curious if that big dumb Gundam is gone. I remember that I thought that was the stupidest thing. Just seeing a big robot on the coastline. I thought it was as much of a door because I am. I found that a little garish. But it was not permanent. I wonder if it's still there. But another thing I've been seeing at all the stations that I keep forgetting to bring up is the little booths to do work in. Those are all over and they're definitely a Japan exclusive. I've never seen that anywhere but Japan. If you have anything, there might be even more of them now. I keep seeing them all over the place.

And I noticed they have their own little Wi-Fi thing. So if you pay to go sit in the little capsule, looks like a little phone booth, just do some work in the station and you get Wi-Fi. Cool. Or maybe you can go in there and go to bed. I don't know. And also, after having a bit of a run where there's hand soap in all the washrooms, it's like, oh yeah, I always feel like I'm exaggerating. Like, oh yeah, maybe who cares? It only cost me a dollar fifty to buy a little thing of soap to have tucked away in my inner pocket. But I started thinking like, yeah, maybe I didn't need it. Maybe I was exaggerating. But it only takes one time. Just one time. After you've been traveling all day and you get to the station and you go use the washroom and then no soap. And then suddenly I feel like the smartest, most fucking prepared man in all of existence. Where I can just, I don't even have to dig through bags or luggage. I just reach into my little inner pocket, tucked away behind my collapsible umbrella, a little tiny bottle of hand soap, and soap up them hands, and wash them my fuckers. This is like, yeah.

Amongst the best 150 yen you could ever spend in Japan. It's really worth it. It really just, I don't know, I guess if you're not neurotic about washing your hands after you wipe your butt, then maybe it wouldn't be as effective for you. But you should be. Don't be gross. If there's one time when you really got to wash your hands, I feel like that's the one.

That was a bunch of buses here. I never really, really haven't taken buses at all in Japan. I think one time, the very first time I visited me and my friend Brad, way in West Tokyo, we went way out to see Sawa Falls, I think they were called. 40:00 And I believe that's the only bus I've ever taken. But I've certainly gotten more comfortable with bus culture in South Korea and Taiwan. But I'm not sure. I'm not sure that I need a bus. Maybe though, as I get further away. But the subways plus walking, sure dude. They work pretty good. They work pretty fucking good.

Nice. Here we are, man. Back in Yokohama. Good old Yokohama. But I'm dragging a bag behind me, my wheelie bag, and I'm on kind of a busy street. So this is a good time to shut the mother fucking air up.

Yeah, flat ass Yokohama indeed. The very first thing as soon as I got off that busier street was to go up a very steep hill, way up, way up through this, you know, it's like a whole neighborhood that is just fully built up but just on a mountain. Like that's definitely a difference from, you know, there's a lot of mountains in Busan and a ton in Taipei, but they still generally kind of, you know, like let's just build on the flat parts. That's what I think is so crazy feeling about Yokohama is everything is just like, I mean, they just have no choice. So mountain is here. They're just like, I just build it everywhere. Just, just the city is just going to flow up and down and up and down all along these, you know, maybe not mountains hills though, just hills everywhere. And now I'm passing through a cemetery by Shimizu Gaokapark, S-H-I-M-I-Z-U-G-A-OK-A. And not only is it just this cool, amazing looking park with all these tombstones again just flowing up the mountain and then down the mountain. But this time of day, little past three o'clock now, sun's on its way down. It's that perfect time to see Fuji. But it just is like, it's crazy. How the fuck is it that close? I mean, I guess because I'm thinking of this time of day seeing it from Chiba, which is on the other side of the bay.

But yeah, man, Fuji is so huge from here. It's so easy to see. It's so big. It's like, man, eight times bigger than it is from over in Chiba, it is huge.

This is one of the best views of Fuji I've ever fucking seen. Yeah, because even, I don't know, it feels very strange. Even from like Hachioji, and even when I saw it by Akigawa, I mean, I guess all those places are up further north. Maybe that makes the difference. But Fuji was not this big. It's fucking huge from here. It's so weird. So I've got the cemetery all around me, and this amazing view of Fuji on the horizon. And then just the city of Yokohama, just flowing down into a bowl, flowing back up into another hill on the other side. Amazing, man. It is amazing.