You Be Trippin' - Japan w/ Dragos | You Be Trippin' with Ari Shaffir

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

Follow Dragos @‌dragoscomedy SPONSORS: -Get $80 off your first month with promo code SPACE80 at https://Talkspace.com/TRIPPIN On this episode You Be Trippin, Dragos Giugula and Ari are in Romania talking about Japan, where Dragos worked as a salaryman and saw some really weird sex stuff. On the show, they discuss the arcades, busy streets, bright lights, culinary mastery, and buildings full of porn in the country with the best bathrooms. They also talk about Kanji, gyoza, Asian flush, respecting the customer, Sumo wrestlers, and hiking Mt. Fuji in a giraffe onesie. Domo arigatō! You Be Trippin' Ep. 65 https://www.instagram.com/arishaffir https://www.instagram.com/youbetrippinpod https://store.ymhstudios.com Chapters 00:00:00 - Intro 00:00:25 - In Romania 00:03:24 - Lived in Japan & Sumo 00:08:01 - Friends, & Salarymen, & Language 00:15:51 - Food, Work Culture, & Dining Tables 00:22:17 - Arcades, Kanji, & A Visual Culture 00:28:58 - Racism 00:32:17 - Video Games, Shibuya Crossing, & Drinking 00:39:07 - Subway Pushers 00:41:02 - Weird Sex Stuff 00:47:40 - Lots of People & Interracial Relationships 00:51:47 - Mastery, Gyoza, Respect for the Customer, & Bathrooms 00:57:27 - Bathrooms 00:59:33 - Trains on Time 01:00:03 - Hiking Mt. Fuji in a Onesie 01:05:22 - Male Dominated & A Japanese Strip Club 01:12:34 - Drugs in Romania 01:14:19 - His Social Media 01:16:20 - Travel Tips Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Where you been and where you going? This is Ari's Travel Show. Yeah, we're gonna talk about travel today. It's UB Trippin'. Yeah. Okay. Hello. Welcome to UB Trippin', the world's only travel podcast. Today I'm here with my friend Dragos. How's it going guys? Good to be here. Yeah, we did a great show yesterday in Cluj-Napoca. Cluj-Napoca, Romania that's where we're at at the moment you can see behind us there's the number one landmark here at Cluj-Napoca. Is that the number one landmark? I would think so yeah that's number one it's a celebrating history I'm pretty sure that's what it is. Who is that guy? I'm pretty sure that's I think it's Matei Mateus, Matei that's uh I thought it was Stefan Jelmary but it's not it seems like it's Matei of some sorts.

I'm pretty sure he was one of the warlords that kind of helped found this area of Romania. Dude, I love a fucking warlord origin story. That's what it is. My name is actually based on a warlord. It's a lot of- Yeah, yeah, who's is yours? I used to be like the Voevod of Moldova, one of the warlords of Moldova,

the region we're in at the moment. Yeah. I used to kill people, get a point across, get his point across. Yeah, wonder if that gypsy lady's gonna take a look at shit. I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like,

I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like,

I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like, I think she's just kinda like,, nothing bad's gonna happen. But you just gotta exercise caution wherever you go. The beggars here are a different thing. Like in San Francisco, it used to be like hipsters who were beggars, and in New York, it's like heroin addicts.

And then here it's the gypsies, they're like another thing. The Roma community, as we like to call them back here in Romania, it's a whole different story. I think we gotta do a whole podcast about that. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. Okay, so we're gonna do this as a backdrop. We can't, let's go sit in there,

and we'll do it in a cafe. You can order for us in Romania. We've got a rainy day here in Cluj at the moment. Yeah, would've been a perfect fucking backdrop. Yeah, I mean, yesterday was a lot better, but it is what it is. You gotta take what Christian Orthodox Jesus gives you. Yeah, okay, so where are we going today? What's the story? It's very fun. I'm gonna

tell you guys a little bit more. Let me get there. Set this up. Oh we gotta order coffee before we can just bum the place. Yeah. Let's try a Romanian. What do you, so I'm with you. What would you like to get? Let's see if we can get a cross. If I can try it? No, you tell me what you want. A coffee? Yeah maybe just a cappuccino with oat milk. If you want to get that, you have to say Un cappuccino con latte de ovoz te rog frumos. Can you get that in?

I said that right, I said it right, right? Un cappuccino con latte de ovoz. Ovoz. Ovoz, that's oat. Yeah, exactly. That's like Spanish. Yeah, un cappuccino con un lapte de ovez. Te rogo, frumos. That's please.

We gotta add a little bit of politeness to the discourse here in Romania, right? Yeah, oh yeah. Stop. Okay, and you wanna try that eggplant thing? Yeah, and then the siu ostate divinite. Yeah, you okay? Muitum esk. There you go, you got that mutum esk down. Yes, Ari. Ari, the Romanian blood. Yeah, it okay? Where's the mouse? There you go, you got that Mutsumes down. Yes, Ari, Ari, the Romanian blood.

Yeah, it's coming out. It's resonating. So, Drago, tell us where you wanna make sure. Is that good? You want me to jump on there? No, you're good. Alrighty. Where are we going?

Tell me where you're gonna tell me about. I used to live in Japan for three years. Yeah, oh wow. That was three years. Three years, it was a wild time. I went there in the end of 2012. I don't know if you remember, 2012 was supposed to be the end of the world.

Yep, Mayan. Mayan, yep, that was big on the end of the world. And I was like, if it's going out, I'm going out to Japan. Yeah. That wasn't the reason, but I relocated to Japan and finished my studies. I was studying. Wait really? That's where you went? Yeah I went there for three years. No no you didn't go there because of the Mayans. No no no I didn't go there because of the Mayans. I'd like to think that I was kind of keeping an eye on the thing. Yeah. And

there was a little part of me was like you know. Rooting for it right? Yeah I'm rooting for it. I was like you know if it I do, right? Yeah, I'm rooting for it. Yeah, exactly. I was like, you know, if it, I do hope it comes and it gets me in Japan cause that would be like a nice bow tie to the whole life story, you know? So I ended up going to Japan. I worked there for three years. What'd you do?

I was working in recruitment, which is, it sounds like a basic job. Yeah, because the thing is I didn't speak any Japanese. So then like, I wanted to, to at a time like my girlfriend was Japanese as well, she had to go back and I had figured like, let me just go check out the country, you know, and see what happens. And I got there and didn't speak any Japanese,

but turns out that if you only spoke English and you had a bit of grit, you know, basically if you could handle cold calling, Yeah. It's very, Wait, you did it in English? I did it in English, yeah. So I was recruiting basically for banks. I was recruiting different kinds of professional

for banks, international banks, like your JP Morgan's Goldman Sachs for like an outside agency. And all this work was done in English because you got to call people while... Japanese people have never changed jobs in their life. You got gotta call them while they are at work and convince them to change their job. And this is, Japanese people are doing it more and more now, but at that time it was considered very rude. Yeah I bet. It's very rude to call somebody while they're at work. And also to be like, hey, your life's not really going well.

Yeah. Here's what you should do instead. And then what? Hey, I'm a stranger. Yeah, and then what would happen is like if you're a foreigner, you're already rude, you know? Do they not like foreigners? There is, Japan has changed quite a lot, but at that time. Japan is, true or false, the number one Asians.

Number one Asians, I would say so, yeah. In their minds for sure, right? I think in their, I mean in their minds, undoubtedly. Yeah. There's definitely. It's so funny, you can't really talk about the hierarchy, but if you ask them about the hierarchy, they will tell you, unless they're in the lower half.

And then they say this on such things. I got a lot of Asian friends who will clarify that. Break it down exactly. They'll be like, let me tell you how it's gone. How it looks like. But yeah, I was there for about three years, and I was living in Tokyo. Yeah.

I was living in... Go on, yeah. The station where I was staying is Morishita, is the station where I was staying. I Morishita is the station where I was there I picked up a little bit of Japanese while I was there but not really extensively yeah it's like a little it's called like Izakaya Japanese and Izakaya is like the place where you you go and drink with your friends right so it's like a little bit enough to speak to drunk drunk Japanese people so

that I was staying at Morishita Morishita station somewhere in the east of Tokyo yeah and as a point of reference it's two stations away from Ryogoku. And Ryogoku is the sumo arenas. Did you go to those? I did not go to the sumo arenas because I just couldn't find fucking tickets all the time. And then sometimes you're there. Three years you never went?

That seems like the number one thing I would do. I regret it to this day. Yeah. Okay. But I will always see. You're like, I'm not proud of it, are you? I would always see sumo players on bikes around my house. Like they can get around on bikes?

Yeah. Are they like wobbling down the middle? This is what I'm saying, like it looks very, very funny. Yeah, it's like a crasher on a bike. Yeah, you got a big sumo guy on a bike and they're going to the groceries, right? Because they live in that area. Yeah.

And it was always, I was sitting around the place and I'd be like, yeah, we'll always kind of like, you know, have a bit of a chuckle. Look at this, this bear. Just a fat fuck on a bike. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like wobbling down in the middle. Very honorable fat fuck.

Are they revered there? They are, yeah, I mean, they're like, the sport is like, you know, it's like, Were you there when the American, that was before you, when the American came in and started dominating? Uh, I'm not sure exactly. When I was watching it, there were a couple of American guys because there was a big, uh,

it was a big thing where you could watch it on TV and there was a couple of American guys, there was a couple of, uh, I think guys from Azerbaijan as well. I remember that some American guy came in and he was like, had a real respect for like, the history of Sioux and everything, but, but there, honestly now,

it's almost exactly like a transition. right like that's not right like us it's okay you know this seems like a Japanese thing you know yeah I mean I'm happy to welcome in everybody and stuff but like it doesn't look as fun yeah did you make friends there did you like locals yeah I had a couple of so basically because I was in I was in a the company I was working for is actually British so they will hire foreigners and also Japanese So I had a good mix of friends that are like Japanese locals Tokyo such a it's a very it's a massive city, right? Yeah, so you'll get a lot a lot of diversity in terms of you get a lot of Japanese educated in the US that come back and they work for the back cool. You will get a lot of Japanese educated in the US that come back and they work for the bank.

You will get a lot of Japanese that go to international schools in Tokyo. So it's a quite range of people. Then you have Japanese people that moved over from different parts of Japan, the inaka as they call it in Japan, that would kind of be like the villages. But it's not the villages, just like the rural areas and they would move over and you kind of get a bit of a look into the society, right? But because I was working very closely with bankers and I also had a couple of friends that are there, it would be very interesting because I got to see a couple parts of Japan that normally I think you would normally see You would not be exposed to right? So I led for three years. I was like a Japanese salaryman Salaryman Sal, you know the salaryman concept. No, it's like these guys like I have a suit They got their little their little suit get that little like bag and they get on the trains in the morning

They do the commute. Yeah, and they're like exchange they go into like like like a beehive you know yeah and then they shoot themselves when they're fucking 62 yeah well they prefer jumping in front of trains it's it's not a gun really like everywhere but yeah yeah good point okay so you know they got it you really pay attention to the cultural supple least yeah we got we have a foot coming in here there we go look at that's the eggplant that's the yeah a lot of the answer is the whole lot of the vnet there and then your coffee your uh... you want to think more coffee split the subliminal yeah it's a little bit of a little bit busy coffee over here and then i was really just to see your uh... your magic word

they got for salaries got it out there they also say mercy here yet is in this yet so you gotta go for the most mess what thank you in japanese uh... the law the laws of all its arigato it's uh... Yeah, this is mess. Yeah, you gotta go for the Mutsumasa. What's thank you in Japanese? It's arigato it's uh It depends on the thing about Japanese language It has different levels because you've got like, you know, like colloquial Japanese and then you've got like keigo and keigo is like You know basically business Japanese, but with a high level of respect

and it's like almost a different language, right because like all the phrasings are are quite different yeah like for example if you were to say sorry like in colloquial Japanese it'd be like sumimasen which is like I'm sorry but then in keigo it would be like moshiwake arimasen. Whoa. Which means like, I have no reason for existing. Which is like a very, you know, like samurai type of a way of saying it. I love they had that one, it was one of my favorite phrases in Spanish.

It's a, it's a no pasanada. No pasanada. Yeah. It's just such a like, it's like, oh, hey, thanks for bringing it. And it's like nothing, like nothing happened. Yeah. Yeah. Don't even worry about it.

Don't worry about it. There's no, don't stress about it. Yeah. Yeah, so even in my company, like there would be people that would have difficulty with keigo because it's a, it's a keigo is like business Japanese is a whole different skill, you know? Yeah. My sister has difficulty with keegles. What's that? Kegels. That's a vagina thing, right? Let's say over and over again. Yeah. Anyway, I mean, hey, every culture has its unique aspect. But so what was saying about yeah, so the idea was that within Japanese, there's a lot of there's a lot of structure, you know, there's a lot of they have like a lot of a lot of

things going on. And with the with the salaryman culture is like you go into the work and you you know, you start at eight. And because you want to be a good salary guy, you want to be an employee, you finish at nine or 10pm. Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah, this is the, the intense stuff. That's the stereotype of that. Yeah. Yeah. That's, yeah. Then that's, and that's basically the problem with having the, because I was in recruitment there, you'd have to convince these people to move jobs, you know? And they're like, I'm working here for 11 hours a day, 12 hours a day. Yeah. Exactly. And then they go home and it's like, there's a lot of elements of Japanese culture that, you know, we can discuss in a lot of-

It's weird, like during COVID, I don't know if you had this where it's like, you had a moment to reflect. And I think a lot of people are like, oh, I don't wanna do this job, or I don't wanna live in this city. Because you needed a second to think, and no one had a second to think.

And if with that lifestyle, you don't ever get a second to think. There's never a second to think, yeah. And that's the point, you gotta do your job, you know. But yeah, that's kinda like how I got at the, I started doing comedy full-time because I was like if I didn't have to work for money yeah what would I be doing and then the answer to me was comedy and then I even made it happen yeah. Oh that's nice good back rest what more could you want in life guys let me break into today's

episode to tell you a little bit about the guest, Dragos. He's a great comedian, lives in Berlin, and he's making his first tour to the United States. I got some dates for you. Check out all his dates on dragos.com. It's spelled Dragos, but it's Dragosh because he's a third generation vampire. Yeah, it started in Transylvania, and then that was first generation. They moved over to his region, infected a few more. And then another generation came, got his people and then he moved to Berlin and he's spreading it now to Berlin.

May 8th, New York sold out. May 9th, tickets available. May 10th, sold out New York. Ah, it's killing New York. The Romanians are all coming by. Ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta ta duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh 21st, 7pm sold out, 9pm added. Go to dragoscomedy.com. No, I'm sorry, yeah, dragoscomedy.com. And check out a special, the Shenzhen special available on YouTube right now.

We had a blast in Romania. We did a podcast, as you can see, in the town square, Inclusion of Pocot. A place you probably will never get to, if I had to guess. You'll probably never go there. I tried to get a postcard from that lady directly behind us selling postcards,

and my bill was too big. It was like a 15 second postcard. I tried to pay with like a 20, and she was like, no. I was like, credit card? She was like, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. That was their impression of her laugh when I said credit card for 15 cent postcard oh that country is I'll talk about it in the outro but I've also got some dates not many guys I'm gonna be in Anchorage

Alaska June 18th and I'm going to be doing a gig in Charlestown, West Virginia on July 12th or 14th. Let's see here. And then that's it, I'm gone. You can get, subscribe right now, 12th, July 12th, Charlestown West Virginia, a casino. That'll be my last, last, last, last, last one. Get tickets at rhfair.com and subscribe to the podcast wherever you're listening or watching, I appreciate it. I wanna go to more fun places like this to bring you guys a little piece of my

travels, this is Ecuador, from west to east. The Amazon's over there. You can't see it. Flag. Linked forever. Yeah, everybody keeps asking about Israel and Palestine. And nobody's asking about Ecuador. I've spent way more time recently there. I'm way more connected.

Why don't you ask them about Ecuador? What could it be? What could it be to make you ask one thing and not the other? What could it be? I can it be to make you ask one thing and not the other? What could it be? I can't put my finger on it. Let's get back to the episode. Dragos, what did you get into?

I wanna know what the food was like. I wanna know how expensive it was. I wanna know what the bathrooms were like. Yeah, yes bro. The food is just another level. I mean the food was amazing. Like the food is just another level. I mean, the food was amazing. Like the thing is, the balance between quality and price was insane.

You got very high quality food at very low prices, right? Yeah, it's insane. Like you go to Japan and you have like the ramen there and then the sushi and you come back to Europe or the USA and it's like, well, I guess I'm gonna eat like a pig out of a fucking. And it's the same thing. You're not eating know I guess I'm gonna eat like a like a pig out of a fucking and it's been it's the same thing you're not eating like like well a meal here and a meal there it's like I'm eating the same meal yeah I mean ramen here it's yeah but the thing is they do it they have

the you know they've been doing it fucking hundreds of years so they have like this I think the thing is they're they're very proud of like mastery yeah the best example I can give you is so the the food is like really, really good and very accessible. Like for example, I would get a bento for lunch, which is like a packed meal from downstairs. Yeah. Go back and eat it on my desk because that's how much of a salaryman I was because you know, you want them to see you working, right?

It's not necessarily about like output of quality. It's more like how dedicated are you to this company? How many hours of your life are you giving here, right? Dude, it's funny because you live now in the country, you live in Berlin, in the country where, it's my standard of like, they respect the fucking human experience. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

They're like, take your weeks off, take them off. And in America, it's probably in between this and Japan, where they're like, look, you get two weeks off, but don't take them. Work through those two weeks, work at your desk also. Yeah, the Japanese culture does reward how many hours of your life you give to them. And not necessarily in an efficient way.

Look at those goth gays. Yeah, yeah, it's got a lot of- They have that inclusion, oh those are students probably. Yeah, I think they're students, yeah. They look like, that's the Berlin little cap. Yeah, that is a Berlin cap. Dude, I wanna shave my head like the Berlin, like, shave it there. Yeah, you can definitely do it, bro.

I think when I get home, I'm gonna do it for the summer. I saw it everywhere, I'm like, yep. That's why you go over, right? Yeah. So yeah, Germany does reward, there's a bit of a focus. It's not as aggressive as France in terms of the quality of life focus.

They take August off. Yeah, exactly, they give you a whole fucking month off. But they do, it's a good system in terms of, you don't feel bad for paying taxes in Germany because you're getting, everybody's getting fucking, like if you get fired you get like a year unemployment you know my brother got got downsized right and and he goes yeah we get a year unemployment at like 80% of your salary it was just like a little

bit and I was like you can look for another job maybe didn't hear me yeah I'm getting 80% I've had friends in Berlin that basically used that one year to kind of get their comedy careers off the ground. Well, that's what it's for. Yeah. I was on unemployment in Los Angeles for nine years. I would pay and do a commercial and then like get fired, type of thing, because it was a two-day job. And it was like people like you're abusing the system.

It was like they're letting me achieve my dreams. Yeah, yeah. It's, and it does work. I mean, obviously some, there's different opinions in Germany about like there's a bit of a stigma on if you go on welfare, like if you go on unemployment, then you're a loser or whatever. But like, yeah, there's a bit of a stigma on if you go on welfare like if you go on like unemployment then you're a loser or whatever. I'll take it. Yeah it's a tool you know if you use it the right way you can really get a business off the ground that is going to pay more taxes on you know.

Hold on, let's get back to Japan. There's always that problem. I get all over the place. So in Japan basically. So ramen what was good? Ramen was great man like if you like just walk into a random place and you've got like the most amazing ramen experience right like this is the thing is the level of uh the level of mastery for like a particular dish was something that I really take pride in and my favorite thing is I used to live uh next to this um kushiaki place uh where it's basically skewers you know like they do different if you put different things on a skewer and you kind of like put over a grill and bro I, I would love this place. It was so fucking good. Like the prices were, like we're talking about, like we're talking about like 30 yen, 30 yen,

which is a, let's say a hundred yen is a dollar, right? Yeah. Now the dollar is like the, the conversion rate is like, it's 124. Like when I was in Japan, I was like 124. It was 30 yen for what? A skewer? Yeah. So wait. So like 30 cents. What? Yeah.

And then you just- Wow, yeah, take a chance. Yeah, man. If you're like, I don't know what that is, you're like, let me just go for it. Exactly, yeah, and it was great. Like- Do you ever have something that you're like, nah?

And then just like- Sometimes, yeah. Bro, they would make these cherry tomatoes wrapped in bacon with a little bit of cheese. And it was like, I think it was like 75 yen. And it was like, amazing. It was like an orgasm in your mouth. Like the food in Japan is something that I do really miss.

It was just high quality, especially living in fucking Germany now. Yeah, we were talking about it. What fucking terrible taste food. It's like, it's breaded shit. You know, you gotta, there's trade-offs to be had in life, you know? Yeah, no wonder they're in the scat barn.

Yeah, but it's like, shit tastes better. Yeah. It's like, I need some flavor. Let me eat your ass. Yeah, give me some spice, bro. Oh man, but the food was great. And the skewers, the Kushiaki place,

this place would just, they would put like a lot of stuff. Sometimes you have like a tongue of some animal on a skewer and there'd be just like the chicken. I don't know how the fuck they did it. But it was just like insane. I think they like did a little brush of soy on it as well. It was like amazing.

And the thing is you can go there and spend like 20 bucks and it would be a feast. I had some of my friends visited me from some of my Romanian friends that live in London. They came over and I took them to this place and they were like, I can't believe this is real. Like this cannot be real. This is like, like it was insane. And you get the whole thing. Like, cause like you're also sitting under like a table. You're not sitting on the chair, right? Yeah. Oh really? The pillows thing?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, I think it was a tatami mat, which tatami, tatami is what it's called. It's like they're made out of like, it's like this form of a, what's it? This form of what's this plant that what do you fuck I don't know what it's called it's you know like when it's bamboo of sorts yeah yeah I think that's what it was right and then the tables are the tables here you know see it's sitting under and you have like sometimes in the winter you have this blanket that's called a kotatsu and you can go under it and you stay warm and you need the things and it's just like it's a thing about Japan it's like it's like another world like because they developed so much in isolation like for so many years oh yeah it just created a different ecosystem you know like

culturally like the way they eat food the way that they prepare it I heard there's a type of seaweed that everyone's allergic to except Japanese because they've been eating it for years and they're just like we know how to develop it could be like I just had that but like there's different parts of Japan and I think if you want to talk about food again the sushi fucking oh yeah sushi must be great let me tell I want to do more of this but it's like just the feeling of long-term travel three years is like you're there yeah it's not just like oh like here includes this is nice but I don't I'm not there's like but I don't, I'm not, there's like, I'm seeing stuff,

but I'm not like feeling the feeling of travel. But like, when you have friends kind of visit you, it's almost like, tell me if I'm wrong, right? This bragging thing, like showing off, like look at the meal, look how expensive it is. Bro, it's like, it's like you're taking them, you're taking them by the hand, and you're basically leading them into Narnia, you know?

Like, I don't know any other comparison, you're taking them into the Lord of the Rings world, you know? And it's like, look at this, look at this. And in a very cool way where they're just genuinely curious about it and they're very appreciative about it, you know? So it's like you can take them around to the different areas, just from the Ginza area, which is the commercial shopping area, to Omotesando and some other areas were like more they're more focused on like you know temples and like you know the Imperial Palace and

just taking them on sightseeing shit yeah just seeing a lot of stuff it's really cool to like be a guide you know yeah like act like like a guide for some showing them the things you discovered yeah you know I was telling you before we started recording about like Akihabara, which is like the electric city where they have a lot of the games, the arcades and- This is in Tokyo? Yeah, in Tokyo, yeah. And it's just like, what the fuck, you know?

What did it look like? Do you have pictures from that time? I think I do have some pictures. Yeah, you gotta send me some. Yeah, I'll check them out. Basically, there's, it's just like, you know those billboards you see in the movies about like Japan, like those big like lit up type of like- Yeah. What is it with Japanese and like, you know, those billboards you see in the movies about like Japan, like those big like lit up type of like, yeah.

What is it with Japanese and like, and like that bright lights and anime and fucking all that shit? What is that? It's you know what it is? It's bullet train that that look of bullet train that movie. Yeah, exactly. Where did they get that aesthetic? It's I think it's it's it, I think it probably does have to do something

with the writing typography, you know, the kanji. Because like, if you look at kanji, the writing style, you know, like they have like three ways of writing in Japan, it's hiragana, katakana, and kanji. And kanji is basically just the symbols, right? Okay. And then the symbol means something. It's like basically, it's kind of like a,

it's like the old version of an emoji. Like, you know, like that's the easiest way I can explain it, right? Okay. And then the symbol means something. It's like basically, it's kind of like a, it's like the old version of an emoji. Like, you know, like that's the easiest way I can explain it, right? Yeah. So like, uh, it's very visual because when you learn kanji... Can I guess something? Yeah. So if like one, let's say you had one that said, that will say like Bush and then another symbol that said smelly. Yeah. If you put those together, it means pussy. Yeah. Something shorts. Yeah. Yeah. That's not far from the truth yeah that is how that happens right so then the idea but then like you the kanji for smelly would be like like the very simplified version of somebody holding it like somebody's holding their nose you know so if you use your imagination you can actually see because like for example the kanji for forest is basically it looks like Mori right

because the area where I would what I would live at it was called Mori Shita, and then Mori means forest, then Shita means bottom. So the station, the metro station was the bottom of the forest. Oh, interesting. But the Mori is basically like a square with like three little elements that look like trees. You know, so it's like very visual.

So the writing style is very visual. And I think in turn what happened was everything else kind of became a little bit more visual. You know was like let's go in all the visual stuff so like for example you'd have the like this big billboards are super visual if you go to some of their like websites the websites in Japan are very different from the websites that are created like you see in the western world right because they're full of like visual ads if you go to like their amazon it's called Rakuten and Rakuten is just like it's it's fucking if you don. If you go to their Amazon, it's called Rakuten. And Rakuten is just, it's fucking,

if you go for the first time, you're like, I can't. It looks like Yahoo back in 2004. Everything was going on. Everything is at the same time, right? Yeah, but they just know how to concentrate? Yeah, exactly. Because it's just like second nature. Because even the way you read stuff in Japan,

you read a book in like here in like in Europe you read it from like left to right in Japan if you start a book you read it from right to left like I was like that yeah it started like that and then the way that the kanji is on the paper it's not like this you know it's not hard it's vertical oh yeah so you read like this you know you have to like root root oh so they're just used to like yeah yeah so like it's vertical. Yeah, so you read like this. You know, you have to like root, root. Oh, so they're just used to like. Yeah, yeah, so like it's a different kind of like way of like doing things in terms of like,

that's what I'm saying, like it developed in a completely different world, right? So like with regards to like Akihabara, like I would go there quite often because it was next to my house. And I always like games and stuff, like I just bought the new Zelda game, you know, like I have like a Nintendo Switch and I'm on the plane,

I'm like playing and stuff. And Japan, you know new Zelda game, you know? I'm like, I have like a Nintendo Switch and I'm on the plane. I'm like playing and stuff. And Japan, you know, a lot of- It's a city of games? Yeah, it's basically, yeah. It's kind of like, I would say like, cause in Japan, like the size of the place is massive, right? So like, it's actually, Bada probably has like over like 200,000 people,

you know, or something of those sorts. Oh. But it's basically like, I think maybe it's easier to explain as a whole block, but like your concept of a block might be smaller than their concept of a block, right? But it's the, they call it the electric city. Yeah. And effectively it's within Tokyo, right? Yeah.

And they've got like all kind of arcade games. So all the arcade games you might have known from the from the US, you know, a lot of them come from Japan, like for example, like Sonic, Street Fighter. Oh yeah, yeah, Nintendo. Exactly, exactly. Mario, Mario Kart, you got a lot of them come from Japan like for example like Sonic, Street Fighter. Oh yeah, Nintendo was Japanese. Exactly, Mario Kart, you got these big big places. That's just them being racist against Italians. I don't know what the history was there but like yeah it's a me, I'm Mario. Hi guys, today's episode of YouBeTrippin is brought to you by Talkspace.

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Today's episode of You'll Be Trippin is sponsored by Smart Travel. It's a new podcast from NerdWallet. You know that feeling when you're trying to book a trip? Too many choices, too much fine print and no real way to know if you're actually getting the best deal. Smart Travel helps you skip that stress and book with confidence. NerdWallet's travel journalists break down the pros and cons of travel decisions, like when lounge access is worth paying for, how a travel agent can save you money, and which

hotel loyalty programs give you the best value Before you book learn how to get the most of your travel dollar Follow smart travel on your favorite podcast app I heard I saw some breakdown and who knows what it's based in but they were like it's like The Donkey Kong will capture the princess right the Italians have to do whatever and it's just like It's the Japanese be like look at these fucking whites black people are fucking their whites yeah yeah and they're trying to get them back and I'm sure like there's some there's some racial context in there you know yeah that's not because

they initially Donkey Kong was the villain of like Mario yeah he wasn't Bowser was like Donkey Kong yeah and then they switched it up because of that yeah they were like well it's a guy this is on the nose over here you know yeah Mamma Mia you know there's some add- in I forget where it might it's China or Japan but they're similar and it's some black guy and this woman's like shoving him into a washing machine then he comes out white or Asian and he's like thanks. There's some there's some there's some inbuilt I mean look every nation every nationality every culture has some inbuilt like biases and stuff but then there's this video online of this guy

who has white gloves, he's a black guy, right? He's got white gloves and he has a mask and he goes to this Korean lady and he has a mask under the mask, right? And he takes the first mask off and the lady's like, oh, and then he takes the second mask off and his face is black and she's like, ah! Yeah, there is some degree of-

It's so wild, we're so far past that, that it's like, oh, what ha ha ha! Yeah, there is some degree of a- It's so wild. We're so far past that, that it's like, oh what? Yeah, yeah. Japan does have that. I had a couple of friends in Japan, they were like, they're mixed race, right? So like one of their dad is like Jamaican or something of the sorts.

And they did have issues because Japanese people tend to be, you know, particularly discriminatory against people of color. Yeah. It's getting better every day at the moment, but they would call them, and I think this is a derogatory term, a hafu. Hafu? Yeah, because it's haf.

Yeah, but you wouldn't want to use it in Japan because it's derogatory, right? It's kind of like them using the N-word. People would get quite offended. Wow. Yeah, it's just, again, it's so many layers of the culture because it's such a big, you have this massive culture, you've got like people coming in, now they wanna get more people in, you know, they're getting Filipinos in.

And they're like, guys, can you quit yelling halfling at these fucking black people? It's really hurting our tourism. Japanese racism is not like in your face, they don't yell it on the street. But they just ice you out, out of things, you know? I got so sick of it in Indonesia once, I think it was Malay, Farong, no, Farong is Thailand. Malay. And I think it translates to white but

then just became all foreigners and I just hear it here and it's it's it's not racist but it started as racist and then just became like foreigner right but I remember being on a bus and then like they're all looking at me like I'm alive and I speak and then just keep hearing it and eventually another person got in like my line like my like'm a liar, I'm a liar, like, I'm a liar, I hear you! It was like, enough! It's a lot of times they don't mean it in a,

it's not with malice, you know? Right, right, right, right, the malice was taken out. Yeah, for example, like in Malaysia and Singapore, like, people would refer to me as Ang Mo. Ang Mo is like the word for foreigner, but it means, I think, if I'm not mistaken, feel free to correct me if you if you see this it means red hair because like the the first white the first white people that they got were the Dutch and

then like that's what the association was white people are Angmo so that's how the this guy's a red hair I got no no red hair yeah but unless I'm shaving my pubes with a razor, am I right? All right. Oh. Which, yeah, it's a story for another time, guys. All right, let's back to Japan. Yeah, let's go back to Japan.

What did you get into? What'd you like to do? What kind of things do you remember? Yeah, I mean, I would like basically going out in the weekends and kind of getting some food. I was very happy the fact that I got my first Nintendo DS in Japan, you know? Oh, that's cool.

What year was this? It was like 2014 to 2012 2013 ish. Yeah, cuz like you wouldn't get a lot of video games in Romania Like, you know, we were talking about like the scarcity of stuff like fucking had never saw a PlayStation Until I was like 20 like 20 in the UK. That must have been wild coming from fucking recently freed iron iron Japan. Yeah. Yeah, we didn't get like the the Gameboy the nice Nintendo's we didn't get him in Romania That must have been wild coming from fucking recently freed iron iron current Japan Yeah, yeah, we didn't get like the the Gameboy the nice the Nintendo's we didn't get him in Romania or the playstations We got these Tetris games, you know, I don't know if you know the Tetris was actually it's a Russian game Oh, really? Yeah Tetris was developed in Russia

Yeah, when you win on Tetris you go to like a Kremlin type thing. Yeah, there's a yeah exactly There's this there's American comedian that has a they're all dancing like this what is the name is something greenbound roe bob this is a very good as a joke about like a person green mom he's a i think is a gay guy i was thinking is that is that the guy not officially okay okay

but anyway it all that may have made us automatically assumed i don't know but i think it does just about it. He seems scary if he's not. He's got a good joke about like, yeah, Tetris is a, you know, like we had, Japanese had Mario, the US had like whatever, and then Russian, they were like blocks. You know what I'm talking about?

Blocks. You know, and what happens? We take them away if you completely, you know? Yeah, there's a really good joke. And I'm like, yeah, this is exactly it, yeah. Yeah, so basically we had like Tetris and we played Tetris and stuff. I might be Kurt Metzger's joke Sorry, I should get back to it, but he goes um Ben and Jerry's is like is like Capitalism is like oh look at all the crazy flavors. We have it was hogging does is German what flavors pure vanilla

No chocolate. That's the way. No. And then basically what happened was... So you sat home and played video games all day? No, basically I would go to like these arcades, right? Because like the video is there, so I would go to Japan, I would go to the arcades, I would go to that Kiyabara place, I would go to like Shibuya, you know? You know Shibuya, the crossing? You know, when you hear Japan, you hear about the Shibuya crossing. Which is like this massive crossing in the middle of the Shibuya train station.

It's like the biggest crossing in the world. And then you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade,

and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and you would go to the arcade, and know Shibuya the crossing? You know when you hear Japan, you hear about the Shibuya crossing. Where? Which is like this massive crossing in the middle of the Shibuya train station. It's like the biggest crossing in the world, the busiest crossing in the world, right? Oh.

So maybe you've heard about it, you've seen it. And then I was always like, fuck I've only seen this on TV, I wanna go there and be in there, right? Yeah. So I would go every now and then there and I'd walk around and I'd go to some of the malls. The Shibuya crossing is just like so iconic, right? And then I would just hang now and then there and I'd walk around and go to some of the malls. The Shibuya crossing is just like so, it's so iconic, right?

And then I would just hang around there with my friends and we'd go to like the Izakayas. Izakayas is like a drinking place, right? It's like a fucking, what would you call it? What do they drink? What was their... Yeah, so you'd have like different kinds of alcohol, like you know, you get like sake and you can get like, but what we would go for because you know we were salarymen and then we were like relatively you know not we weren't we weren't bathing in money right we were like the entry-level salary at that time was like I think if you join there's like 200,000 yen out of which you get about a thousand two hundred in a month

a thousand dollars in the month right we get to pay rent which is like 70,000 700 and then you got like 500 for the rest of the you know not $50,000 no no it's basically a thousand two hundred dollars you'd have in your hand at the end of the month right out of which like six hundred or seven hundred would go on rent so they need oh yeah you're poor the rest to stretch right so then this is this is how the salary meant like fresh graduates like live right that's a lot of like fresh graduates like a 20-29 right this is how like this is how Japanese Culture works right society, and they don't have a lot of depending on the sales job You are there's not a lot of commission based stuff. I was in the commission based place

So I did better in the second year, but the idea was you would go to No, mi hoda and no mi hoda is basically all you can drink to nomi hodaj and nomi hodaj is basically all you can drink. And then you'd go there and you'd get beer and it's like nomi hodaj sometimes you'd be like a thousand two hundred yen, sometimes you'd be like two thousand and you'd go like three times a month, right? Which is like you spend 30 bucks, it's all you can drink. I know that tabi hodaj was all you can drink

and all you can eat. So for two hours, you go there and you can- Oh, you can drink and all you can drink? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this works with Japanese people. Because they're not animals. Yes, yes exactly. So they would always like, what would happen is if you had a table full of foreigners,

they'd be like, fuck. Can I tell you the two examples where it doesn't work because you don't know cultural? Yeah. When I was in Israel in Yeshiva they did two things. They had a all-you-can-eat Tuesday Pizza Hut and you can just keep eating until you get pie by pie but you have to finish your pie before you get another one and we starve ourselves for a day, eat a whole pie, get another slice and then we wrap this up. And then Subway sandwiches had the free like refills on cups and they people they

didn't they underestimated what Jews are right and people would like go home with their cups and come back people come and look you know they never sold a large only sold smalls and they just like I think they had to do away with the system they were just like they couldn't have they didn't do the market research doesn't make sense yeah these people no control yeah they're not they wouldn't even think they're doing anything wrong. Yeah. They'd be like, dude, dude, use my cup

and then bring it back to the dorms later. Yeah, it's crazy. So then you have this system, and then whenever they get foreigners, whenever they get foreigners, they'd be like, fuck. Oh yeah, the loopholes. Because what would happen is, they, in order to kind of bypass the fact that foreigners,

because you know, foreigners have a higher alcohol tolerance uh... you know japanese people are you know i call it a few receive like how do you have a few of the big is the red uh... because i think they don't have an enzyme that i probably uh... uh... breaks down alcohol something of the sort right

that's what the reaction so they did a lot of times they can get drunk faster uh... and uh... basically what i and so it works to have all you can drink when the person's gonna have free drinks and they're gonna be like, you know... Pass out. Yeah, exactly, yeah, you know.

They're like always on antibiotics. So that, exactly. So what happens is like if you get like a foreigner who's fucking an animal, like drinks seven beers and he's like, yeah, another one, you know. They get Shane Gillis in there, they'd be like, we lost our business. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

You know, that's like, you get like Shane Gillis in there and it's like, we gotta, we gotta pack you know that's like Shane Gillis in there it's like we gotta pack it up. Yeah Shane and Bert just go take over Japanese places. What they would do to kind of get around that is they would stagger the orders. Oh yeah. You know so they'd like fucking take extra long to get them over they were taking extra sorry it's so busy you know I said my say you know it's very busy. They do it on purpose for you. Yeah yeah yeah so you have to kind of always like press there's a button on the table when you, because that's how you get the waiter. There's a button and they come to your table. And then you have fucking. Disconnected.

Yeah, they would come over and be like. So we would do that basically. That was a big part of the culture, like going to the Tabe Hodais and Nomi Hodais. And doing it like, it's not the place is next to Shibuya, the cross station. It's like really like, like a fucking movie, you know? Did you do that thing with the subway

where they shoved you in with a fucking stick? Yeah, but bro, yes. Wow bro yes yes I got shoved in a couple of times it was pretty insane what literally that's one of the things I want to do in Japan yeah you should definitely do it like if someone's definitely gonna touch your balls wait by accident or like well it's always up for a debate right I'm like someone's a little bit that's a that's a cup bro yeah yeah that's not a brush, bro. Yeah, that's not a brush.

You're fondling, you know? Yeah, man, that was one of my first experiences because it's rush hour, right? So everybody's trying to get to work at the same time, and everybody's trying to get a little bit more sleep. So what I would do is I would just go to work earlier, which would make my fucking work day even longer, because it gets fucking sweaty, you know?

Yeah, so throughout the Yankee games where it's all packed and then you go like, wait, just wait, just go drink, let's wait. work day even longer because it gets fucking sweaty you know yeah so you're like a game where it's all packed and you got to wait which way just go drink exactly and then you're also fucking you know you're you're in a suit so you're getting sweaty in a suit and especially when like summer season comes and it's like super humid you're just fucking sweating it's it's yeah it's what is it about people that like in like you've seen everywhere where it's like, hey, can you move in so I can get on? Yeah.

And be like, oh yeah. And they'll move aside. And like there they're like, look, we're just getting on. We're all gonna do it. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I'm not, I'm missing work, you know? Yeah.

How do you get off when you're shoved in like too far off? I mean, the people got to get out. You got to push your way out. You got to push like, it's like, it can be passive, right? So like this is the situation, you know, like Japanese people are very polite in this situation. There's no fucks given you know wow I'm missing work and what happens sometimes the trains are late and even when the trains are late They give you a note from the train station to say sorry. We were late. That's why he's late You get a doctor's note. Yeah doctors know from the train station. Yeah, it's a it's very you can like say he's not lying

He's not lying. Yeah, yeah, he's not lying. Yeah, it's it's the train station. So you can like say he's not lying. He's not lying, yeah, yeah, he's not lying. We had some fault. In New York they should do that like, sorry I had to take another train because someone was masturbating and looking at me. Yeah, and that's sometimes, it doesn't really happen as much in the trains in Japan, but like, let's get the masturbation, that's going to be a fun one. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is the ditty gritty like Akihabara the Electricity yeah there's a building where they have four stories it's a four-floor building and all of it is full of porn and sex toys and that kind of stuff right so you go you've got like the Jav the Japanese adult video models

which is like the sensor porn you see from Japan traditionally they're playing it on screens in the building you know so you can you go there you watch porn you know is it called Yoshi obi-ashi's? There's uh, it's it's it's insane I went there and I was like I'll go there just to masturbate no joke, but What yeah, what you you would go into this building and I took some of my friends to check it out It's a pretty cool building and there would be guys just masturbate in front of the videos and I'm like, whoa is it a Guy runs like a spaz yeah I was like did he take something yeah it looked like it but his

hands are down wait wait wait so it's not it's not a porn it it's it's like a jerk-off place so no it's not it's not officially a jerk-off place but some one guy sometimes they'll just whip it up you know like so you know like you ever hear you hear like stories from the US were like, you know, you, back in the day, you'd have the blockbuster and then the curtain thingy? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This building is every, is just that, what's in the curtain thingy for a whole floor,

for like a five floors. And then it's also legit? Or it's only for degenerates who want to do that? No, but you don't go to the master way. That's not, that's not the purpose, but people will- The curtain thing is for that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, it's for that.

Oh, you just go there to master way, for the lady. No, you don't go, you don't do that. Like, yeah, yeah. It's for that. Oh, you just go there to masturbate in front of a lady. No, you don't do that. It's not. It's frowned upon to think you're taking out in public. They stay too far down when you run. He's got a style. The purpose of the building is to purchase porn and sex toys or outfits or whatever.

And they do screen the porn in the building so you can see what you're buying. Sure. But some people will be a little bit enthusiastic about the porn. Well let me test it. Yeah yeah be like let me see if it test drive this porn. Works for me yeah yeah so then my friends basically they walked into a corner and this basically this Japanese dude was just wow yeah it's wild. It's a completion? Well we didn't we didn't you didn't we didn't stay for the rest of the show. We didn't want to see what happens. How does this conclude you know yeah we didn't stay for the rest of the show. You didn't stare around, yeah, yeah, yeah. We didn't want to see what happens.

How does this conclude, you know? We didn't go all the way in. But it was definitely a fucking wild journey, right? But they have places in Japan, like my friend. These fucking kids here look so fucking old. How old are these kids? I don't know, I think they're like 14, 12. But they have like mustaches and shit.

They're fucking old here. You get that Suikun Rakkyu from when you were four. You know, you had, it puts hair on your chest and your face on everywhere. Oh, right. Builds, you know, gets the testosterone pumping, right? Yeah. So anyway, but basically because I was in Japan for like these kinds of places, they have like,

like, you know, outlets where you can really get all your frustration out because you build a lot of frustration right so there are a couple of like different places one of my mates told me that he went his japanese friend took him to a place where they put like fucking like 20 guys in the room yeah and then this is a real place by the way i couldn't believe it when i heard it but they put you in a room it's a dark room and then the the ceiling lights up and the ceiling is a screen It's like a see-through. It's a see-through like glass pane, right?

and then what happens is the two girls come out and they take a shit on the glass and Then the guys are like dude Yeah, take it all in I mean it's like when you hear a story start and you're like your your mind just naturally goes to like what this where this could go yeah and I was like what do they look up skirt stuff I mean I didn't even consider yeah I would be interested in that. My friend Ronald told me. How far above it is you? I think it's like about a two meters above It's not like there's their space, you know, you feel like where this where this yeah kind of yeah Yeah, lay down you just sit down and look you just sit up

You just stand up and look and they jerk off to it. Well, this is what my friend told me I've never been to this place, but my friend said he his Japanese friend is like, let me show you real Japan This is in Tokyo is it okay? Yeah Yeah, they've got different sex clubs. It's real Japan, exactly. This is what I say, and this is what this podcast is, it's not like, oh, you're in New York, you gotta have Pizza Suprema. It's like, no, no, no, what are the cool bars

that nobody knows? That's what you wanna tell people. And this is what the guy's saying, it doesn't smell, you don't feel the smell of the shit. You just see it. Yeah, great. All the benefit, none of the negatives. And it's like some, you know, some people like it,

it's kind of their thing. But then when I heard about it. Obviously, if it's a working business. Yeah, it's like some you know some people like it It's kind of their thing, but then I heard obviously if it's working. Yeah, yeah, it's working business You pay like whatever the fuck it is. You know you get in there. I want to go there so bad Yeah, I'll put you in touch with my friend. Maybe you can hook you up. Okay get you in the can you get like a diarrhea room? Well, I I just like look deal is choice. There's definitely different packages. Yeah, you know you can you can choose what's on the menu You want to have like you want to have them like cherries with seeds Look, there's definitely different packages. You can choose what's on the menu. Wow. You wanna have them like cherries with seeds. Yeah, all right. And I suddenly couldn't figure out there was some tomatoes.

I want you to have like a whole fucking jar of olives and swallow the seeds, the fucking olives. Yeah, and I wanna see that come out. Yeah. Wow. So there are this kind of, cause you know know there's places like. What is it? They're just pent up. I don't know man. It's Japan. It's a lot of frustration. Or they're just free or like we what do

you think in America they would do that as well if they were allowed? But we look the there is Japanese does have less uh it's you know it's considered a bit of um you know shy country but uh you know in every family mart in every convenience store you have hentai a books on the fuck is off that point yeah exactly people just go and read you know

you've got a guy getting off work and going to use really this very visual you know graphic sex happy you know what it takes right like it's not good but thank me later you know i have a reading in the fucking thing is a really on the train stuff like of course is not everybody's like the one guy right right right but it's part of society yeah exactly but it's you will see you know you go to Japan you see a guy reading the fucking hand typing you know it's not I like how

in Amsterdam they will take kids on class field trips to the red light district in in in Copenhagen will take it to the Christiania and they're like we're not embarrassed about this exactly this I think I think American culture is a little bit more prude it It's so much more prude. And especially like in Midwest or whatever, a lot of places. It's gotten to everywhere too. If you ask a girl, hey, can I jerk off in front of you?

And she says, yes, then you will be an ostracized society. Things are gonna happen. Yeah, it's become like, yeah, prudish. But in this situation, like in Japan, like the hentais, they're in the store. You know, not everybody goes pick it up and sometimes they are considered like you know you're a pervert if you're doing that but like they're like who the

fuck are you you know it's like there's such a big city like a chance of like bumping into that person ever again it's like you know good point is there a level of anonymity there because it's such a mob city there is yeah because it's you know it's just just like I think the first thing you kind of experience when you go to Japan. Have you been to Japan? No, I gotta go. It's just the overwhelming amount of people.

I mean, you've been to Hong Kong, right? It's a lot of motherfuckers. And yeah, so if you go to Japan at like 8 p.m., 7 p.m. on like a Shinjuku station, which is the busiest train station in the world, you will be overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people. There's like, all these people are individuals, they have lives, they have dreams, like what the fuck?

Yeah. So it fucks a bit of your mind. I noticed that in like, I hate Chinese immigrants, not Chinese immigrants, sorry, Chinese tourists. Just to stop you for a second, you see those guys with flowers? They put those on graves here. Yeah, that's for funerals, right?

Yeah, funerals, yeah, I don't know if you've seen them before, but somebody died. So they're going to celebrate, not celebrate, but like they're going to put the church. Yeah, sorry, carry on. But Chinese tourists and they have no sense of personal space. Yeah, why don't you just bump into you and then when you finally go there you're like, oh right, that's not enough. That's not a right there afforded. There is none so they don't get used to it. Yeah, like this is my area. It's a lot of people man Yeah people in the you know, like population density You don't really think about it

Like if you if you if you look at around here, I look how much space we have wide open space So somebody comes right next to you. Like what are you doing? Yeah, like what the fuck man? Yeah, well like in Japan this is like, you know, if you walk around like she boy, I should you could use either the ginsa there's a lot of people you know, there's a lot of motherfuckers and Did you fuck it all there? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I had some I've got some Buya, Shinjuku, Ginza, there's a lot of people, there's a lot of motherfuckers. And- Did you fuck it all there? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I had some- You got lit.

I've got some interracial relations, but I had a girlfriend for a long period of time there, like for three years, so I didn't go crazy, but I had a lot of friends that were really going into it, right? Like my, if you're a white guy in Japan, there is the white privilege thing, right? You are the exotic element right

well that's cool you know so i can that's it's a cool to be treated like a king well i i i i think it's it's it goes into the direction where you know you have a lot of people from uh... these countries were in their countries they can get and they would spend it's like fucking the bonanza you know and there is like some people are not big fans of this, because like you're nobody there,

now you're here because of the way that the culture is. You know what we're talking about, even here in Romania, you get a halo effect, right? Yeah. The halo effect. So people will just be like, oh yeah, this guy's a foreigner, you know? But you know how it's- You know, in Shanghai, it's the opposite.

It is. So all these people would go there, especially outside Shanghai, like Wuxi, and like Suzhou and stuff, because like you used to being a pretty woman, and whatever, and like a percentage of people looking at you if you're like an eight, you used to be treated like an eight and then you get a city like that where there's eight million people and only about 20,000 of them will be interested in you and the rest don't even want to look at you and so then you're like, am I ugly?

And they have to like deal with like why is nobody hitting on me? But the thing is it's also like, you know how like in the USA in Europe you have like these Some people have a fetish right like like like a race fetish or whatever. Yeah, I like pussies. Yeah But in Japan as well, you know, there is it's kind of like a bucket list thing right sometimes, you know, it can be a bucket list thing, you know You know fuck a white guy one of the reason I moved to new york is like I want to fuck a black chick There you go, and I'm like they're more entertaining, mission accomplished. And the situation is like you have that as

well right so some people kind of like go a bit crazy in that direction because like it takes over like with any any form of like excess right? Mm-hmm. It takes over your life and yeah there's a lot of stories in that direction as well. Like I myself like I said, I had a girlfriend for like three years when I was there. And only at the end, like when we broke up, I kind of like dipped into the pool. But it is, there is an advantage.

And you know, it would be like- I mean, you use it, especially as a dude, you never get an advantage. Yeah, exactly, you know what I mean? Like you experience a situation where you're on Tinder and suddenly you're getting matches every swipe, you know? I'm like like what the fuck Yeah, wow. Yeah, because like that's usually how it goes, right?

So it is some of that angle but like if you're a trans person and you go to Thailand you're suddenly like wow I'm accepted here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah exactly. So like it's different different angles different cultures, right? But yeah, then when I was there basically to go back to some of the But yeah, when I was there basically to go back to some of the mastery of things, right? We went to this city and I was like, where are we going? It's the city called Utsunomiya, which is like, I think it's Tokichi or something, prefecture, which is like under Fukushima prefecture. You know that Fukushima name, right?

Yeah, we all know now. Yeah, exactly. And my friend was like, let's go to this city because this is the, the gyoza city, you know, gyoza dumplings. Everybody, everybody in this fucking city makes gyoza. This is what they were saying. Like, what do you mean everybody? Every, this is, this is where they develop mastery for it. Right. So it's like super famous for gyoza. And I was like, oh, the fucking gyoza.

I've had gyoza with fuck, right. And we go to the city and we go to this place and the line five hours no bro no five hours no no five hours we waited for five hours for a dumpling for a dumpling or a dork and no way my friends wanted to do it then I was like I was like I was just my phone but like bro Best dumplings really I don't know if it's because I was so hungry at that point But these were the best Yoza dumplings I have ever in my life like even to this day. I'm like man. That was a fucking good So remember it yeah, and the thing is this is the crazy thing is, is I was expecting they're gonna fleece us, you know? Yeah.

The price was normal. It was like fucking 800 yen or some shit. You know, we paid like, I think we ate for like four people and at the end we paid like, I mean like, in total like 2,000 or 3,000 yen, which is like $40. It's for an amazing thing. And I was like, what the fuck? Yeah, anywhere else they would raise,

they would jack that price. This is exactly because you've got demand and supply, right? Yeah, mission burrito and fucking in the hate or wherever, I guess the mission. This is the thing is, this is what I really liked about Japan is they don't do that. Right. Because they're like, you know, I am making this.

It's my craft and I'm making it accessible. And they want- This is the right price for this. Yeah, exactly, yeah. That's why I have $20 tickets to every show. And I want people to enjoy it. Because normally you'd think these guys should fucking, because my mind-

You could get more, you're a capitalist. Yeah, my mind is like fucking bro, go fucking, start a fucking franchise, you know? Fucking get these dumplings out there. But then they couldn't do it. Then they'd have to trust someone else to do it, right? Yes, exactly, because someone's gonna fuck up your Then they have to trust someone else to do it. Right? Yes, exactly Someone's gonna fuck up your shit, right? So you take such pride in your work Yeah, but have you ever seen like zero dreams of sushi? No, I've heard of it, bro

It's like it's like that, you know Like you got to spend the before you can touch the fucking fish you spent five years just fucking touching the rice Wow, you know and I'm like what the fuck? You know, so the same thing with this gyoza situation I was like the gyoza was so fucking good. And then these guys are like so down to earth, so modest. Like this is what I've dedicated my life to. And then I live in a modest place.

It's a modest place, but I have a big line in front. Because this is like, this is the, everybody's definition of success is different, right? Like we're talking about this the other day. It's like, I'm getting this many subscribers, this many followers, this many views. I think for day it's like you know I'll get it this many subscribers this many followers this many views I think for them it's like yeah just like maybe if it's good people come and I think in a way for them like having the huge line is like the the thing you know that's

like hey we're doing this good we're doing this good yeah yeah they all want yeah excited people are people are like a street performer and people gather around it's like cuz they're good yeah yeah exactly so they're like and then they're like I am NOT they have this respect for the customer yeah you know what I mean cool yeah like for example like Japan I think this is one of the like whether it's in ramen whether it's in gyoza and even electronics or like machinery they have a respect Honda's are the best this is it this is it and I think my friend said if you buy a Honda

or Toyota you can just weld the hood shut for five years yeah and this is the thing is I think this is the big difference between like, you know Like a capitalist culture like just Western culture and Japan Yeah, there is a higher degree of respect pride in your craft Yeah pride in your craft like I think at the moment like, you know, my fucking iPhone is like, you know I had it at two years and slowing down. Yeah Yeah, like when that thing was the iPhone was like fucking obviously slowing it down. Yeah and slowing down, you know? You know like when that thing was, iPhone was like fucking purposely slowing it down?

Yeah, I too was like, why is it? And this, at this point, at the core of it, you don't respect the customer, right? You just wanna fucking get as much money out of them as possible. Dude, this is what comics do. We talk about this in terms of comedy, like putting on a show and making sure,

having good openers and like, and like you can't charge 100 bucks for your show when you're a month out of your special, where you're like, oh, what else? And it's like, it's not fair to this crowd. It's yeah. And you know, they will, because they don't know any better. They will give you like, oh, cool.

I saw this guy, but it's like respect them enough to really bring it. This is the thing. And I've, you know, I've, I've, I've paid like 60 euro for a ticket and I'm like, oh, this is, this is an open mic. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So your music who's like, are you guys phoning it in? Get your set list down. And, and you know, the situation is the situation is the respect the customer comes across in every area. I do a little bit of gaming, so the Nintendo Switch, right? Nintendo Switch has been out for like six years now, and it's basically a tablet from fucking 2016,

and it's like super underpowered. But then they invested all that time in optimizing games for it. So you would get more life out of it. So you would have to buy another one. You know, you don't have to buy one. They want you to keep that one. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Yeah, so they invest a different, because there's some pride in making good things, you know, making reliable stuff. So this comes in question of like, you see it in the food, you see it in the fucking, you see it in the fucking clothing, you know manufacturing from Japan and I think that's the biggest difference if you were to there's a little bit more respect. Right. And that's the core of Japanese culture, respect right and

pride and honor and yeah you see it man like the fucking guy with the gyoza, the fucking good fucking gyoza right because like after a point it's like the bathrooms are bathrooms are all clean? Yeah, exactly, yeah, the bathrooms, man. The fucking best thing is, one of the best things about Japan is the toilets. Yeah. By the way, every time I ask this, it's either, you know, the same as always, or a horror story.

Yeah. This is the first time I've gotten like, they're awesome. No, bro, like in my office building, they would have the toilets with the sprinkler, you know? Like, you know the Japanese toilets? Yeah, the sprinkler you know like you know the Japanese toilets? Yeah the bidet but like it's basically it's a toilet seat and it has like a little remote on the side and then you can press buttons and you can change the speed of stuff I have

a joke about it and it just shoots water in your butt like I don't know why though we don't have it all over the world it's much better it feels it feels it feels great. My friend said this is how we should do it because because imagine just filling some Coca-Cola on a table. Yeah. And you take a dry cloth and wipe it off. Yeah. It's sticky still. Yeah.

So you take a wet cloth and wipe it off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it. It's next level, bro. And I like, they really put a lot of work into that. Like even for like, for girls toilets, you can play music from it. So the person in the next cubicle doesn't hear you pee.

There's a- Me and my friend went to Noma, this restaurant, it was like the best restaurant in the world for a while. They just shut down because we can't do this sustainably. Is this in Copenhagen? Yeah, I heard about it. And then there was an American head chef, not the guy, and he took us on a tour.

We saw these chefs, because everybody who worked there was a chef who was just trying to like, I'm high level, but I wanna work for this guy, and he wants to help me, so I could like, learn from him. And they're peeling walnuts, like the little thin skin on the outside, not the shell.

And I'm like, what are they doing? They're peeling walnuts, he goes, why? Does it taste better? He goes, no, I'm like, then why do they do it? He goes, you don't like to get that shit in your teeth. Like, you have two high level chefs take the whole day so you don't get a little shit in your teeth. Just to play music so that the person next to you doesn't hear you fucking fart. Yeah, it is like

It's glorious. Not level of respect for your customer and the experience. It's another level man. It's like I said like the... Justin demand that on all my shows that we have music playing in the stalls. It's definitely a different world and I think the respect for the customers is really like next level. And yeah, one of the things that I did like there as well was like the trains are always on time and if the train is not on time, they apologize. Like one time they had this thing where like the trains were like, I think they were late in total for the year, like 60 seconds.

And they issue out like an apology for everybody, you know? Wow. Like we have failed, you know? You know what they do with Delta? They're like, hey, flights not coming, sorry, wait to seven hours. Yeah. Like, are you going to book us? Like, nah.

And yeah, it's, and I think this is- What was that hiking story you were going to tell me? Oh yeah, the hiking story. Okay, I was going to tell you. What happened was sometimes, you know, it's because you're working so much, and I think this is the thing is like, it just takes up so much of your mind space, right?

It's so working all the time, you know, this pressure, and sometimes other people kind of organize stuff, and I'm like, yeah, let's do stuff, right? So one of my friends is like, you know, Friday night, let's go, we're gonna go to Mount Fuji. And I'm like, oh cool. So then I basically, Mount Fuji is like two hours and a half away from Tokyo.

You take a train, then I think you take a small bus, right? So I was like, fuck, I'll just get off work and go to Mount Fuji, right? So I basically, I left my shit at home and I got a small backpack, and actually like sneakers and like jeans on. And in my mind, it didn't fucking process, right? But Mount Fuji is 4,000 meters, you know?

Yeah. And basically, I thought we... 1,000 feet. Like I completely did not, I wasn't paying attention or whatever the fuck was happening, but basically we went there and then we're gonna climb Mount Fuji. I was like, yeah, we're gonna sleep here

and then climbing on Saturdays? No, no, it's Mount fucking Fuji. If you do it there in the day, you're gonna get sunburned, you're gonna fucking get dehydrated, you're gonna climb Mount Fuji. I was like, yeah, we're gonna sleep here and then climb it on Saturdays. No, no, it's Mount fucking Fuji. If you do it there in the day, you're gonna get sunburned, you're gonna fucking get dehydrated, you're gonna die. So what they do is, if you wanna see the sunset, you climb Mount Fuji at night. So basically you go there

and you start the climb at like midnight. And it takes you like five hours to go all the way up to the top, right? Like, so you get out, you get there like 5 p.m. Or 5 a.m., sorry. And so basically I've got like fucking, you know, normal shoes on, tennis shoes on. I've got jeans.

I was like, I'm gonna get a snack for the bus ride. I got like four bananas and a bottle of water in my backpack. And no fucking flashlight. In the fucking darkness. So we're like and my forest or desert or you're like no It's more like dusty. Okay, so like my friend is like what the fuck Do you know what the fuck we're doing now? And then like you don't even have a fucking jacket. It's fucking it's the fucking mountains 4,000 meters is you're gonna fucking freeze

so then one of my friends basically had like, for whatever reason, because they wanna take some photos on top of the mountain with like a giraffe onesie. So then I wore the giraffe onesie. All the way up? Yeah, yeah. To save yourself.

Yeah, yeah, and it's like, you got like different stops, different camps, you know? So then basically we're climbing this motherfucking mountain in the middle of the night and we're going from stop to stop. and I'm like it's fucking rubble It's like it's like I got like fucking these are like fixed souls You know I got like fucking like like it's like converse type stuff. Yeah, it was Japanese. They're called onitsuka tiger Yeah, but then I fucking have like thin souls? And I'm fucking suffering throughout this whole journey.

I like it's darkness. I don't know what the fuck I'm putting my hand. Only the guys in the front, like we're four people. Only one guy has a fucking lantern. So you're all looking at his like. Yeah, exactly. It's a fucking pitch black darkness. And I'm like, what the fuck am I doing?

But it was great. We got all with, it was exhausting. Because the problem with like climbing a mountain is the fucking oxygen goes away You know, yeah, the more you go up the mountain the less fucking oxygen you have and the more difficult it is Oh, yeah, exactly. We did this in in in Guatemala and you're going straight up and you're like trying to catch your breath But you just keep getting less oxygen exactly. So like we're running I I've got like little water on me We get to the and then like the art and he gets tougher and tougher as

I'm like what if I gotta fucking die on Mount Fuji here and then we get some of the camps and luckily some of the camps They have like tea and you can pay and you know, it's overpriced and stuff and the camp is like, you know Like a little fucking shit, you know, yeah you go there and you take a small break and you know, just uh, And then people are like what the fuck are you doing? Yeah Why you dressed this way? Yeah, I'm alive. Yeah, fuck? And then people were like, what the fuck are you doing? Yeah, why are you dressed this way? You're a stupid foreigner. Yeah, you're malign. Yeah, you fucking, you Baka Gaijin.

That's what they call him? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Baka is stupid and Gaijin is foreigner. And then, yeah, it was a fucking, it was physically exhausting. It was like, it was just as such completely underprepared. And you know, cause you know, Mount Fuji is a fucking volcano, right?

Yeah. And then we get to the top of the crater and What do we see at the top of the crater? vending machines There's full of fucking vending machines like free for yeah, you know like those Japanese traditional vending machines Yeah, they basically got like four of them up there And I'm like what the fuck some old man on his back. I don't know how the fuck they got it I don't know what the fuck happened, but there were vending machines on the top of my Fuji and you could buy like fucking you know plug them in Yeah, I don't know. I don't know how they got it. Maybe they flew man

They they and you know obviously they're like, you know, it's like fucking eight eight eight dollars for like a fucking can or whatever Cuz I was on the Great Wall China. Yeah, and it was already got the price. I'm very told me cuz um Turner and Andy right out there like this is the price of water They'll try to charge you this cuz yeah, but this is the price of water. They'll try to charge you this because you're white, but this is the price, so I'm like no, no. And let's say it was 100, whatever. And as soon as you get up there, they're like 600. I'm like no, no, it's 100.

Not when you have to lug it up all the way to the top of the fucking wall, and you're like, all right, fair. Yeah, exactly, yeah, that's because it's, what are you gonna drink? You gonna drink your own piss? You're welcome to do it. So that was one of the craziest stories

that I was like, what the fuck? And then- Wow, how was the sunrise? It was great, man, it was great. I think I have some photos I'll try to take them up. It was like fucking 2015, 2014. I think they were on Facebook or something. But it was wild.

It was definitely wild. That was one of the intense experiences. And I'll tell you one more, because basically I was working in the corporate environment, right? I was working with a lot of, it's very male dominated. Japan, let's get this out there.

Japan is a very sexist society. Women are not treated very well. And it's mostly men at the top. And men in banks are also like- Tud's rule, Tud's rule. Yeah, and men in banks are also a different layer. Let me give you an example. I met one of my clients.

And you gotta do this client meetings. You gotta play the game. Because you're working for, you gotta entertain the clients. And what? You gotta entertain the clients. If you wanna get business and deals, there's a lot of man kind of entertaining for clients. So you gotta take them to get shit on.

You gotta take them to drink. You gotta take them to host bars. And host bars is like where the girl comes down sits to you, you know there's the hostess clubs, or in Japan there's hostess clubs where basically men they go there, it's not like a strip club, you go there and then the girl comes and talks to you and you pay her. To flirt with you. Yeah, yeah exactly like, and she's like, yes, you know, you're such a strong man, or like this is what Japanese people do, right? I like that idea. Yeah and you go there... there's some fucking respect for now yeah yeah yeah

they talk to you yeah it's kind of like they don't tell you what chores to do yeah it's a weird it's kind of like a it's kind of like a therapy thing you know but it's a different format for it right yeah so you take them and then you come there and then you you know you they pour drinks for you that kind of stuff nothing sexual nothing nothing nothing for you, that kind of stuff, nothing sexual, nothing, nothing, nothing happens. But they kind of like, it's this weird emotional kind of like brothel, you know? Where there's no touching, there's nothing, anything,

but then like they- Do they dress hot? Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course, yeah, they've got like, everyone's wearing suits and like dresses, you know? And like, you know, they have like cleavage and stuff, and it's a very weird, like I said, it's like an emotional brothel. You know what I mean?

Oh, that's interesting. But there is no physicality whatsoever. They sit to you, they pour stuff for you and you know there's everybody's mind in their stuff and you talk to them and they're like how's work and you know. Damn, that's interesting. That's really cool. I mean that's definitely something that you don't see anywhere else I think the hostess thing. Yeah. And you know there's also maid cafes but that's more like a commercial thing where like people just the girls dress as maids and they're like you know the true church. Yeah. But yeah so then this we take them to these hostess clubs and then my boss would like. That's foreign right. I don't know.

Is there any one that's this fat there? But I think it's it might be from I have no idea could be but there's a lot of foreigners coming around here. We just saw American fat people as well. American fat, yeah. But basically one of my bosses this one time took me to Kabukicho. And Kabukicho is kind of like the red light district. And then he told me like, this is where you can, if you have a tough client, you take him here.

And it took me to like this very like, the guy if you're, cause like at that time I was working with clients that are like super Japanese. Super Japanese, they were like very senior, like 60 year olds, 65 year olds. I was like 25, 26, and then this is where you take them. And it took me like basically a Kabuki show.

Not a traditional Kabuki show, but more of an underground one. Because basically it's kind of like a strip club because the girls get naked yeah but there's no but though there's no poll and there's no for money there's no religious

walk around so what happens is uh... who went to this place it was a very dingy place because uh... you go downstairs and they don't have a liquor license see if you're doing something that losses of any machine you gotta buy something to go down right the vending machine you got to buy something and go down right you get booze out of any machine some of them yeah but this is in the situation they're not allowed so basically for this this is the thing they don't sell alcohol in this place so you're not allowed to bring alcohol in

because they're rowdy it's yeah disrespectful yeah and then basically they put it see the situation in the room and it's kind of like a little theater it's like they're doing a room at the fringe yeah you know yeah yeah and then the girls they come on the stage they're dressed in different stuff and they slowly take stuff off and then the table is basically like a rotating table it's like a rotating top and then the end of the performance they get naked and they sit on the table spread it out and then the thing rotates like they sit on the table they spread the legs and you can see the and so you just like wait and the way wait and when they spread the legs

everybody's clapping wild and then there's a guy at the side throwing confetti and like I was like what the fuck like we did it we saw that pause yeah yeah and then like she puts another pose and I was like whoo and it's very respectful it's very respectful and at's very respectful. And at the end, like five guys from the audience gave the performer a bouquet of flowers. Because it's a performance, right? It's like, it's a nude performance, but it's a performance. It's more like, um... And if you wanna, if you wanna do something extra, the only thing you can do extra is you can take a Polaroid with her. And they charge you like, uh...

Naked? Yeah. The only thing you can do extra is you can take a Polaroid with her And they they charge you like yeah, and they charge like a hundred thousand yen for the Polaroid which is like ten bucks Okay Yeah, and what did it went and when it rotates around so where you can see the post like they just kind of like stare into it They definitely they definitely gaze no touching. No, they won't you know not a touch you don't allow touch. There's no touching. But you just go like, you know, you go eye to eye with the pink eye. You get right in there and like, okay. It's like you can't, like this is the table,

you don't fucking reach the bar. Right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right. It's like volleyball. Yeah, exactly, so you don't go beyond it. But that was very interesting and I never took a client there because I was like, this is... It's a risk, maybe it's not there there but it seems like a risk like yeah you're

very upset yeah exactly it's like it's not I don't think like yeah I mean the thing is like my my boss would be working with a lot of investment bankers yeah and then you know sometimes there would be there would be more rowdy because like the amount of deals that they would be doing they'd be like you know half a million you know like they were like a lot of money on the table. So like a lot of times there's things, they go the extra level, because they know like for example,

they know that you want the deal, so they'll milk you. They'll milk you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then they're fucking degenerates as well. And things kind of escalate, right? So then I was dealing with like a more toned down part of the bank, I was dealing with like the legal compliance part. But one of my bosses was dealing with like a more toned down part of the bank, I was dealing with like the legal compliance

part, but one of my bosses were dealing with like the front office, the traders, the fucking. And they're like the gems. The fucking coals top out of their head. Like they want it. Like it's part of the job to do coke, you know, because you gotta be on all the time. So things would escalate.

So you tell me some crazy stories, but like I never went, that this is the craziest thing I saw from that direction. Because yeah, this is where I take my clients. And I was like damn man, this is fucking, but this is like a part of Japan that you will not normally see, you know? It's like what the fuck, this is wild. I wanna go to one of those too.

Kabuki? Kabuki Cho, yeah. Kabuki Cho? Kabuki Cho, yeah. What's Cho? I think it's just like a neighborhood. Because it's a... the the finer. But yeah, it's in Shinjuku. It's where? Shinjuku is one of the neighborhoods. So like the the more popular neighborhoods are like Shibuya and Shinjuku. I've heard Shibuya. Yeah, and

then Shinjuku is like the biggest train station. It's a lot of commercial stuff and also the red light stuff right like where they do and you know that's where they have like the like one of my friends basically he was a bit off. Is there a scavenger hunt going on? Sorry I just keep seeing people stare at and underneath these chairs. Maybe there is. I'm seeing like multiple people do it. Maybe. You know what happens? What? I saw a woman doing it. I don't think this is the I don't think this is doing it. I think what happens is... He's looking for something specific. I'll tell you what happens. Sometimes what happens, because it's illegal to get drugs here, people get it off the dark web. And one of the strategies that they used to use is,

you pay the guys in Bitcoin, whatever, and then they basically have a drop-off point and a drop-off point is they tape it under a bench oh so they're trying to intercept it yeah so I think what's happening wow yeah because basically I saw a woman doing it over there yeah she was like had lost something she's looking for so yeah and I think basically a lot of times what happens is a foreigner comes in and they do that that chicks looking to over there yeah I think this, maybe they have like regular chickens, but you know, like for example, if you're ordering Coke or if you're ordering something, they take it under the thing and you know, and a lot of, what's the, what's the easiest place to fucking find it?

Like the point of reference. Oh yeah. So maybe it's that, maybe it's something else, but this is just a guess, speculation. It's a fun speculation. It's a fun speculation. Yeah, we're guessing. She's looking for something for sure. Yeah, because look, they're fucking looking at the bush,

right, like why would they be looking at, what the fuck did you know? And they're talking, they're just talking, yeah, exactly. Yeah, so I think that might happen, because I think they're trying to crack down on stuff. Even now they're like, you know, the anti-narcotics or whatever.

They're trying to crack down on stuff. Okay, let's wrap this up. Yeah. We're in the middle of a story? I forget. Yeah, I was talking about the Kabuki show. I kind of wrapped it up basically. It's kind of like Yoda and like, you know,

the very respectful, Bukka the flower is showing up of JJ and that kind of stuff, right? JJ, yeah. So I got two questions. First of all, everybody follow him on, what do you get mostly, Instagram? Yeah, Instagram, DragoshComedy is where I'm at, D-R-A-G-O-S, comedy.

D-R-A-G-O-S. And it's pronounced shhh. Dragosh yeah. Dragosh the Dracula of stand up. That's what I'm doing. Yes. I saw a comment on a picture we posted that you're Europe's best comedian. I mean I'm definitely active in Europe. It sure helped that the UK left. Yeah. You guys all leveled up. I mean I'm taking advantage. You left every car out and you're like, oh nice. It's not hard. European unions.

And I guess it's a lot more coming up now, but I guess it's a lot more difficult to do English comedy when it's your second language and there's not a lot of stage time because people feel, Berlin has the biggest stage time in Europe, if you take out the UK. And they did. So then yeah, it's kind of growing, growing.

It's been growing on Instagram. My TikTok is like where I initially started growing but they don't count somehow because they're blocked. Yeah but my TikTok was like the one that kind of blew up initially and then that kind of started getting a bit I started doing some China jokes and now I'm fucking in the dumps. What? Yeah I had a joke about like one of my friends was studying political science and then she did a year in China so I did a joke about like oh did they change your whole degree to political silence? And then fucking I put that up and then the fucking algorithm started punishing me. No way!

Yeah and you know maybe all the other jokes or clips I've uploaded afterwards are shit. That's also a possibility. Oh dude when you see it it's like what? But! But! Because you spoke out against China! Maybe there's an algorithm there and they're like that that that maybe I'm also you just like What are you on tik-tok? It's all same situation comedy. Yeah

Damn you see you could feel it. You're like it didn't just go down 10% went down 90% bro We went for 200,000 like tick tocks. I got I was getting like 200,000 a clip and then down to like 8,000 Wow I'm like wait a minute, this smells like shadow banning Yeah You know, this doesn't come out of the blue Okay, well follow him. He's a fucking hilarious comic. He puts up great stand-up clips all the time So this is something I ask everybody and so there's no right answer here

But like so you've been I mean you've lived in Singapore Japan you've been all over especially for comedy you've been a Moldova and all these places in Malta do you have any travel tips I mean the best one like that you comes to mind doesn't have to be the best yeah let's let me what one thing like Danny Brown was like travel light I'm like okay yeah I mean I if I would say like get on like for, a big travel hack was like, get a backpack with wheels. Oh.

Like, because the thing is, so like, you saw like, I've got like a suitcase, and then I got a backpack with wheels. You could strap it and then take it. Because the thing is like, you're, you know, technically you got two suitcases, but then it doesn't fuck up your bag. It's like, the problem is when I'm carrying a lot of stuff

in my back, I used to have like a very heavy backpack and it'd fuck up my back, but then I found out that the suitcase, the rolling backpack, is almost as big as a suitcase, but if they ask you at the airport, it can be like, no, this is a backpack. And then you strap it on? Yeah, yeah, strap it on.

That's not bad. And then basically I just fucking put it in the top or put it under the thing, fucking shove it under the thing, but you get like, Kick at it. Yeah, you get like Double the space you are you did tell me that you were happy when you were traveling You would not get a data plan because it yeah, man. That was a fucking like when I started doing the

When I started far to do a comedy full-time I just wanted to be really immersed in it and the problem is the phone now it takes up everything and for a year A year of traveling around Europe, I did like almost 70 cities, no data. And it gets you in a little bit, but the thing is why it's so important is because you got a plan, you got a plan. When you leave the fucking hostel hotel room,

you need to have a plan. You know, I'm going here so I know kind of which direction it is. Exactly, you got to download the fucking offline map on Google, and you got to to have like it helps you like get a fucking Structure planning. I heard you just interrupt yourself. You just like it gets you into Predicaments whatever you're gonna say. Yeah, but to me like those predicaments is the joy of travel. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, it's it's not nothing bad happened or anything. But sometimes you're like fuck

I don't I something takes you a little longer to get somewhere Yeah, yeah, like I took a wrong turn and I got a fucking figure out and stuff but like the best thing is like, you don't just leave the wifi area without a plan. Great. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so now you gotta like-

You're moving with direction. I gotta sit down and I gotta figure out what am I doing? Yeah. And I'm not just gonna, like I like wandering aimlessly as well. But then like when you have, we don't have like Google Maps working or the data or whatever stuff, you gotta have a plan.

Yeah. And it's great. What I'll do is I'll like be a little more observant of massive landmarks. This tower is like, okay, that's center. So no matter where I am, if I can spot that tower, I know how to get back or really the sun. So I'm like, hey, I know what, dinner,

it's gonna be in four hours. I wanna get to the northwestern part of the city. And I'm like, all right, the sun, all right, just kinda like get that direction. So wander all over, but then that'll help you get back. And just more where the Empire State Building's a big one. Yeah, so that's the kind of thing. I think in smaller, for example,

like a place like fucking Brussels, it's fucking chaotic all over the place. How are you gonna? Yeah, it all looks the same too. But yeah, it's just like very freeing not to have to look at your phone all the time. Yeah, it really is. And I've got data back on now because I needed a lot of the communications and stuff but it was a good time. You know you just get the it's a different way of experience

in the city it's like you're looking around you're paying more attention you're more present in the moment you know. All right buddy. Man, thanks a lot to Bucharest. I hope you enjoy. Yeah, let's get Bucharest and see you back again in Romania next time, Yash. All right, yeah, for sure. Yeah, next time, yeah. Cool. Guys, that's the episode. I hope you enjoyed it.

God, that was fun. We had a blast, guys. There was a time. Make sure to check out Drago's, wherever Drago's Comedy.com. Check out a special, the Shenzhen special on YouTube right now. He's a very funny comic and a Berlin comic. He's kinda leading the Berlin comedy scene,

which is one of the burgeoning scenes in Europe. It's like pretty much, from what I see, Amsterdam and Berlin are like the top two scenes. And Berlin is like worldly everywhere. And then Amsterdam has like the clubs. And just the local scene is like the Amsterdamian whatever what are they called what is a local I'm Sam we call a stoop waffle stoop waffles shows are really kicking all the time don't forget to see draw ghosts you get

tickets at Drago's comedy comm May 10th York, May 9th and 12th is sold out. May 13th, Philadelphia, Chicago, May 16th, Toronto, May 19th, the 20th is sold out. May 21st in Montreal, 7pm show sold out. Nine o'clock show added. And you wanna see him on Facebook and Instagram. He's got a great TikTok that recently got, well, he shouldn't have made fun of one country that delivers us with formerly our good fentanyl and

now our bad fentanyl. He made one joke about them and got a hell of a take it down. But really good TikTok if you're on there. And that's it. Today's episode was edited by Alan Caffey, it's produced by Your Mom's House Network. Chad was the one looking at pictures and putting those in. So we were flying from Cluj to Bucharest.

I mean, I will do a whole episode about Romania for sure, because I learned so much. And this didn't come up in the episode, because we recorded before. But we went to the bathroom, we were like in the, checked in to the gate. And then we went to the bathroom. Oh, you know what I'll do?

I'm gonna pause this for a second. Went to the bathroom and some dude's smoking in there, in the airport bathroom, through security. Just smoking in the stall, a cigarette. That's Romania. That's Romania. And we were like, what? Do I smoke? I'm like, yeah, I do. like, what? Do I smoke?

I'm like, yeah, I do. Like, what? And then he was in there, just smoking. And then we were like, kind of looked. That's right. We looked away when he came out, like, embarrassed. And the guy, like, saw us. He knew we were laughing at it.

And he was like, what? I got to smoke. Ha ha ha ha. That was so great. Oh, man, Dragos. What a good time we had. And then he left and I stayed for another week or so in Bucharest. I kind of did my own thing.

But what an interesting country and what a gassy food. Anyway, this episode is not about Romania. It's about Japan. I'll be back to Japan in more place than just Tokyo when Che Durena finally has a special out and that'll be, I don't know, whenever. Probably in the next two, three months. So make sure to check in for that one too. Next week, the innumerable Tim Dillon, the one and only, Timmy D, come on to talk about London and he has his own take on it and that's exactly what I'm talking about.

Way, way different than Danny Brown's grime core tales of London. Tim's is way more about the high level Illuminati. Okay, before I go on today's episode, I'd like to read you guys some postcards. I get these postcards from around the world, I haven't mentioned one in a while. Oh no, do I have them? I do.

But you guys have been sending me postcards from my travels and I love it. Vietnam, oh hell yes. Wow, with the Vietnamese Vietnamese look it says nam Yeah, come up here Come up come here. Come here Yo, come here come here I've been inspired by a travel story since you had on Henry Rollins on skeptic tank finally in my mid-30s

I'm getting out there. Just spent a month in Vietnam and a week in Cambodia. Damn. Just wanted to say, just wanted to thank you brother. Aaron Gifford. Instagram. Well, I'm not going to tell your Instagram. You can send these postcards to 151st Avenue, New York, New York. Wait, 151st Avenue, number 49, New York, New York, 1003. Got him, look at that. Lookin' Vietnamese stamps. Pretty cool, yeah, it's the address. Got the whole thing there, pretty fuckin' cool.

Postcard from Vietnam. Nice, buddy, nobody saw me trip there. I don't think I saw those markets on the water. God, those look good. That Henry Rollins episode was so good at Skeptic Tank. I know I keep saying this, but I gotta go down and take down all the old Skeptic Tanks. And I just never have. That was for me. I think some of these are money All right, well this is too fucking difficult.

Should have thought this out before. I had postcards. There we go. Yep, got one. Dear... Do we have to ARI? I don't know. Love the show and all you bring,

and all you do to bring a positive attitude and change a perspective to Americans. I'll take that. I do a lot to change perspective to Americans. Tell them to stop claiming Irish heritage. We don't care. Yeah, bro, great point. All these fucking whites

especially the white Irish here in America that really are American bitching about fucking oh we're on team this we're on team that we're on team for shingle team Palestine dude you're, you live in a country that has bombed a fucking 60 countries since you've been alive. Get fucked. We don't care, this is my original art. A night out in Ireland, love Lorna. Wow.

I'll just show the original art. Not bad. Look, check it out. We got fucking Irish stamps. Pretty cool. 151 1st Avenue, number 49, New York, New York, 1003. This probably is what is this? $50 Canadian. Some of this is probably money. I bet it is. I'm also still filling up that wall. I got a new backdrop that you'll be seeing. Not the Tim Dillon episode, but something else. We did it, we got it, we got it, postcard.

Okay, whoa, mangning. That's Vietnam, Vietnamese money, another Vietnam. Hi Ari, my husband and I love the new podcast, the only one brought to you by Travelers Diarrhea. Not bad, that's a decent joke. Listening to your stories about Myanmar reinforced our desire to visit. So we crossed that off our list in 2018.

Nice, you probably went right after me. As I write this, we are currently on the Ha Giang Loop. Ooh, what the fuck is that? We look forward to seeing you in April in Vancouver. Well, you've already did. Kate and Steve Perry. Keep on tripping November 11, 2024.

You Be Tripping podcast, care of Ari Shafir, 151 First Avenue, New York, New York, 10003. And they sent me this postcard that I will hang up and some Vietnamese money that I will put on the wall over the guests shoulder. Wait, two of them two bills Wow is that is that uncle ho it looks like it

Fucking rule check it out. I got some fucking bills here Not bad all right guys well, that's the episode I'll baby do nor of these Hug young Vietnam ha young Vietnam you know what Ha Giang, Vietnam. Ha Giang, Vietnam. You know what? Hey Siri, what is Ha Giang, Vietnam? Ha Giang Loop. Four day road trip. Oh wow, that's pretty cool. High in the north of Vietnam is a place

where the road winds through the jaw-dropping canes and breathtaking mountain passes. The Ha Giang Loop, a dream come true for adventurers, travelers craving the open road. Wow, so it's not a hike, it's a drive. Pack your gear, charge your batteries, and prepare for adventure. The four-day route follows. It's a four-day road trip on a dam damn this is what I want to do with Paul Morrissey when we went

for fucking motorcycles and got up there the Vietnamese border damn oh I gotta get to this Ha Giang group thank you guys fucking Kate and Steve Perry good note I gotta get there I'm gonna add it to my list the hug young loop fucking road trip by yourself kind of like the in Australia Adelaide Great Ocean Road Guys that's the episode please subscribe wherever you're watching or listening

Go get yourself some merch from my merch store See you next week. What's it doing? Oh, Moza Besk. We're turning in. No wait, we did, uh, we did it from Romania. We did it in Japan. Don't you love these on location?

They're cool, right? They're legitimately cool. You can get yourself out. You couldn't do it in the town square because of the rain and you gotta like face the sun the way I'm doing now and you're gonna go blind. But man, I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind.

I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna go blind. I'm gonna the sun the way I'm doing now and you're gonna go blind. But man... anyway. Yeah, what's the best? Goodbye.