We've Had Enough of Japan | Trash Taste #51
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- Welcome to this episode of the Trash Taste Podcast, where we talk about not anime, but we might talk about anime today actually. - Who knows? Who knows? Are we feeling spicy today? - We'll never tell.

I might bring up anime and then immediately tangent from it. Who knows? - Who knows? Not even we do most of the time what we're gonna talk about. Unless it's like a themed episode. - I did think what I was gonna talk about today 'cause I was the host. I was like, Connor, you have to think about what we're going to talk about. - Go on then. - Go on then. What do you wanna talk about? - Yeah, I will talk about- - Do you wanna introduce us by the way? We're the boys. - No, I'm not introducing you. They know who you are by now. We're on episode 49. They should know who you are. Nearly 50.

But yeah, no, so a few weeks ago I watched the JoJo event. - Of course you did. - Of course I did. Where part six was announced, which is great. Which is why everyone watched it because they were like, will part six get announced? Who knows? - Imagine if they didn't announce part six after all of that. - I think it would have been very sad. I just want to explain, if you're not a JoJo fan, don't worry, don't need to explain. Basically there was a whole event around JoJo. They didn't say they were gonna announce the new anime adaptation, but everyone was like,

They said it's the biggest event in JoJo history. So I think they're gonna announce it. Otherwise, I don't think this is the biggest event. - Do they normally do JoJo events just randomly out of the blue? - I've never heard of one. - Well, this has been planned for a very long time, apparently, actually. - Right. - A year ago, I think, actually. - Have they done one before this?

I feel like they have. But then if you go to YouTube and you type in JoJo live on TV, they constantly get the voice actors to do kind of what they did in this event. So I guess I'll walk you guys through the event, basically what happened. - Yeah, 'cause I didn't get to watch it. I didn't get to watch it either. I just saw the reaction. - Yeah, the reactions, we'll get into that. First of all, the event, we weren't really told anything. So you didn't know anything that was happening. All we knew is that there was a $40 price tag

- To watch the live stream. - Oh, it's pay-per-view. - Pay-per-view, yeah. 40 bucks. - Jesus. - Wow. - Which is a little steep. - Eat your heart out, Jake Paul. - And we were, yeah, right. YouTube boxing now, JoJo event, please. But it was, yeah, so it was a pay-per-view and we weren't told anything before. We were just told it's gonna be the biggest event in JoJo history. - Add an echo, add a reverb to that. - As if they don't say that for every event.

- You know how they are in Japan. I feel like they hype things up way beyond belief. And yeah, again, we weren't told anything. So essentially what happened was that they did like kind of like a game show kind of thing in the start with some of the voice actors. So every main character, Joseph, if you don't know Jojo, don't really worry about it. It's not important. Basically the voice actors, they were like, they quizzed them about the show. It's kind of like,

- It's basic Japanese TV variety. - Yeah, it was basically like Family Feud, but with the JoJo character, which actually sounds really good actually. I could make that, I wanna watch that. - How old did you do in the quiz? - Well, I didn't, we'll get into this actually. And then, you know, it was like cool and the voice actors performed some of their scenes, which was like the best part. You know, they would do, they would all do the most dramatic scene from their respective part in the show, which is really good.

Yeah, and then in the end they announced it and it went over the time. So it was supposed to be a two hour event. And my God, did they talk a lot. They very much, it wasn't like fast. It was like, let's just talk about the show, talk about the scenes. How did the scenes make you feel? Tell us about it. And yeah, it was fine, it was fine. But there was a few things that were noteworthy about the event. First of all, is that the subtitles were unusable, unreadable, awful.

- So this was a live event. - Yeah. - But a live event that was pre-broadcast. - Yeah. - Like pre-recorded. - Yeah, it was all, yeah, not broadcast, sorry, pre-recorded, totally.

I'm not sure if it was intentionally gonna be- - So it's a live playback in other words. - It's a live replaying. - They basically just made a YouTube premiere. - Right? - I mean, that's basically it, right? - It was edited like a live Japanese TV show where like it was very minimal, I guess minimal in terms of Japanese editing and stuff on screen. - Next time we do a Trash Taste special, we gotta make that pay-per-view now.

- We do, we should be paid. What are we doing? We're fucking dumb. Just giving it for free? What? - And it's self-funded? - Oh my God, we're fucking, we're smug. - Losing out on our money. - So yeah, it was $40, which, you know, for a live event. - It's a bit hefty. - You could buy a whole season of JoJo on DVD for that or something.

- You can buy four episodes of a JoJo on Blu-ray for that. Don't get me wrong, the event was very good. It was very well made, but it was just tragic because you know, how many events charge $40 for you to watch them?

- Not a lot, I mean, maybe like a concert of like a mid-range artist is like $40, right? - Online though? - Yeah, not online. - I feel like boxing events are the only thing that are up there. - Yeah, I feel like boxing ones are the only ones that, maybe wrestling, although I'm not like a, I don't watch wrestling, but.

- Those are the ones I think of when it's like high pay-per-view price. - Yeah, usually it's like, you know, if you're paying 40 bucks, it's an in-person experience, right? Most of the time, I would like to think. - But with boxing as well, they do it online as well, and it's always like a fucking 80 bucks. - Oh yeah. - I mean, I feel like with boxing, it's different to a lot of sporting events

other sporting events 'cause people like you're building up months and months to this one moment. Whereas other things like football or basketball, there's like constant matches throughout a season, right? But with boxing, you have one event that people build up months to and that's it. So I can understand the pay-per-view price or that model kind of.

in that kind of sense. - And boxing fans are hardcore as well. - This is where I think like, do I not understand the Japanese market enough? 'Cause I'm like, is this like the same level as like an international boxing event in Japan? Like this JoJo event? Is it like the same level of like,

everyone's stopping what they're doing. - Well, you know JoJo fans are. - Yeah, but I wonder if this is like, is this the price is this high because they're banking on JoJo fans being as dedicated as they are, which they are. - Which they are. - Or is it that they think it's that big of an event in general in Japan? - I feel like it's a Japanese business model period. 'Cause I feel like it's the only country that can sell Blu-rays for like hundreds of dollars for like four episodes sometimes for a special edition.

people here will still buy it. And what

- Watching this live event was fun 'cause the live tweets were quite interesting. People were not very happy. - On the English side. - Yeah, on the English side. It was really interesting seeing how all the negativity got wiped away the moment that like part six was announced. And everyone was like, "Guys, guys, it's worth it." It was the event was worth it. - Two hours of shit sucks, boom, I sleep. - Essentially, right? Again, it was prerecorded. So this could have been subtitled like

It's not, you can get budget subtitles and translations done for this kind of length. Like we get subtitles done for the podcast. And I think to get the podcast captioned

it's like $150 an episode. But if you wanted to translate it, I think it would be into Japanese for like an episode like this, which I think is around the same length is like maybe like 800 bucks. So it's not in terms of a big business, 800 bucks for that kind of thing for like low end translating, probably not that much, right? But instead they decided for some reason to do auto-generated subtitles.

- It's never a good sign. - There was like, people were just posting screenshots of the subtitles where it was like, "I'm gonna kill a kid or something," was one of them. Or something really funny out of context. It was just really, really bad. To the point where it was like, this is unwatchable if you don't know any Japanese. The subtitles were so bad. And it was just like,

I just wondered why, like, this is such a good event. Like you have a, if you're a Jojo fan, this event was amazing. - Yeah. - It's the kind of stuff that if it was on YouTube, it has like 5 million views guaranteed. - Yeah. I'm wondering, like, do you think they even thought about the international audience or were they just marketing towards the Japanese audience? - I don't think they were. - 'Cause like even me living in Japan, I only heard about it like the day before and that's 'cause you fucking posted about it.

did not know, like this wasn't talked about at all on my timeline at least, or I didn't know about it until just as it was happening. - Yeah.

if this was an event, right? Where they, it was only really able, you're only able to pay in yen. You were only able to buy from a Japanese website. I would be like, that's a fair argument. You know, you went on the Japanese website, you went out of your way to pay in the currency. - You're expected to listen to it in Japanese. - You knew what you were getting into. Some super fans, if they don't understand a word, that's fine. But for me, it was like, all right, so they're premiering the show and like,

Singapore, US specifically, they have website in English. They're charging you in dollar and they're telling you that it's gonna be subtitled. I think it's kind of fucked up. Like the event was great. And it's just so sad that they kind of, I feel like they mislead the people a bit. - Oh yeah, absolutely. - Like it breaks my heart. - I mean, when have automated subtitles ever worked?

- They barely work for captioning, the language that they're doing. - They barely work for our own language when we upload it on YouTube, right? There's auto subtitles. - What were they thinking? It's been known to be one of the hardest languages to translate into English. - Yeah, yeah. - I think- - Completely different grammatically. - I think in terms of,

per minute of translating Japanese to English is one of the most expensive. - I'm not surprised by that. - Because it's the hardest. And there's not many people that can do it. - It's grammatically completely different as well. - Right, so then,

who decided that this should be like, this is a great idea and we're gonna charge $40 for this. - I mean, I would think for a $40 price, you would get like more professional subtitles. - 100%. - 'Cause I guess this is the first I'm hearing about this, but like when I hear live events, I think, you know, you understand there's some leeway in an actual live event where it's happening right as it's airing, right? But if it was prerecorded, then yeah, I mean, you could have done some subtitles. - Yeah, there was nothing about this show that needed to be live.

There was no aspect of it that required a live audience. - Yeah, if it's pre-recorded then like, it's not like the host can interact with the chat or anything like that, right? - So you're telling me you paid $40 just to see a part six announcement. - And I do it again, Jon. - JoJo fans. - JoJo fans in a nutshell. - Pay for some gig I would've got like five minutes later anyway, but you know. I don't know, I sat down, I was like, this isn't,

- Yeah, yeah. - Just the subtitles. The subtitles is just, it's like, you know, at what point is it like, do I need a refund? You know what I mean? How bad do the subtitles have to be where it's like, I can't understand anything that's being said. - Well, I mean, I think that's worthy of a refund, right? Like you paid for something that you didn't even really understand.

And they didn't even like give you the chance to try and understand it. - It was really unfortunate as well. 'Cause people were like dogging on them on Twitter and then the JoJo anime account tweeted out being like, "Hey guys." 'Cause there was a lot of people streaming it on Twitch. And they were like, "Guys, please don't pirate it." And then there was one, this is like, I feel like as a company, you should never ever say this. You should never ever say the words, "There is no excuse to pirate."

- Right, right. - Because I guarantee within 10 seconds, there is gonna be 10 people with 10 semi-decent reasons why they pirated. So for example, and this is terrible. So this show was only available in the US, Singapore, and I think a few other Asian countries. - Yeah. - Yeah. - No Europe, no Europe at all.

- Right, no, none of the other American countries, nothing. - Not even Canada. - Not even Canada. So they were like, in this tweet, they said, "There is no excuse to pirate this thing." And then in brackets, they said, "Sorry for the territory limitations." And I'm thinking like, what is, what?

- Oh no. - So what is a European fan supposed to do? - Every European is unanimous. - As a European, what am I supposed to do? Tell me what I'm supposed to do. - Just be born better. - Just be born in a better country, obviously. - Obviously, come on. - Obviously, I'm not promoting piracy, but there is a way as a company where you can word things or go about it. - Just fly to Asia so you can watch it from Asia during a pandemic.

- Just live in Japan. - It's so frustrating 'cause it feels like- - I mean, it feels like this,

- You get shafted. - I feel like companies should already have an understanding that territory limitations are, in my opinion, the biggest reason why people pirate. - Absolutely. - It's been like this since fucking the internet was invented, basically. - Like lost media, I firmly believe you should be able to, if it's abandoned ware or completely lost, there's no...

Honestly, I think that's okay to pirate. Why would that not be okay? No one has a stake in this anymore. It's literally history. - Isn't like PlayStation or Sony shutting down the PS3, PSP and PS Vita stores now? So like, even though like, 'cause I own a PS Vita,

And when I heard that, I was like, shit, what if there's a game that I want on the PS Vita? I don't know what it is now, but like, I'm not gonna be able to obtain it. It's just lost media now, right? And if you're not gonna make it readily available, then someone's gonna archive this, you know? And it's,

it's a gray area, but I feel like there is a reason why people do want to pirate and do want to like archive this stuff. - There's definitely like, it's not a matter of like, oh, there's no excuse to pirate when it's like,

- There really is an excuse to pirate because it's literally the only way I'll ever be able to get a hand on it, right? - I mean, it's like if you would get someone who gets into your product who never would have been able to and never would have had a chance to, right? And again, with this live stream, it's like, why is this live stream only in,

Is it because they're perhaps showing scenes from the anime? Is it probably a license? Probably is actually. - It's probably a licensing thing, but still it's like. - It's a live stream, you know? I mean, it's not like you can't get it in every country.

- I mean, I feel like that kind of mentality just hasn't adapted to just how the internet works and just how the community works now in 2021 or even fucking 2010. - Yeah, 'cause all the laws are just completely outdated. - All like the laws are like completely outdated 'cause they're all laws that are made for like television broadcasts and stuff like that, right? - Especially in Japan.

- Yeah, especially in Japan, it just wasn't designed. - I mean, we don't even have fair use laws here, which is ridiculous. - Well, I mean, I feel like at least in the US there is a mentality of, okay, well, technically, you know, live streaming a game and not paying for a license to do that, 'cause technically, legally speaking, you're not allowed to do that. - Yeah.

all the US companies just kind of agreed, it's beneficial, let them do it. But I feel like in Japan that thing doesn't really happen. There's not really a thing of, it's beneficial, so let them do it. - It's just another, it's like when you get events like this, you're just reminded that you're another one of those anime fans being a westerner that, yeah, they don't care about you.

- I feel like the mentality is slowly, I mean, it took this long for it to change with like Western companies. So God knows how long it's gonna change with Japanese companies. - It is changing out of fucking snails. - I mean, I would say at least Japanese companies know that we exist now.

- That's the biggest difference, right? 'Cause imagine like five years ago where they had a American or they had like an English site to promote a Japanese live stream. We are taking very small steps. - We've gone from snail mail to dial up email. - It's interesting 'cause it's,

- Almost similar to how Japanese games are brought over here, right? - Yeah. - Up here, well, I'm in Japan. - To the West. - Yeah, Japanese games are brought to the West, but I feel like the whole way the gaming industry has gone, it's like decades ahead of where the anime is at. And I wonder if that's because

they kind of grew at the same time. Like the culture of gaming in America was its own thing and the culture of gaming in Japan was its own thing. And they kind of grew together benefiting each other. Like they sent games to each other. And I wonder if that's the reason why that industry went so fast and why,

sometimes people can't even tell if a game is from Japan. - Well, yeah, I think it's also because like, yeah, like American games now, like now they're making games in America and in Europe. Whereas like, I feel the anime industry won't do that until we get dedicated people who are making it in America and making it in Europe.

Because I guess when maybe when the Japanese businessmen in like the 80s or 90s are making video games, they were like, "Oh yeah, there's tons of gaming in the US. "Let's go and send our products over there." Whereas it's like, "Oh, there's no anime there. "Let's not bother doing anything." - I mean, I would also say that from my perspective, I feel like the anime industry has always been like, in my opinion,

kind of like 10 years or so behind the gaming industry. - I feel like 20 something. - 10 to 20 years in terms of the popularity and how big the industry is. 'Cause like gaming right now is probably the most mainstream medium, entertainment medium there is now, right? - Gamers? - I mean gaming makes more than movies now, right? - Yeah. - Yeah, so gaming right now is- - Well, 'cause you can't put microtransactions in a fucking movie.

- That's true, that's true. - You can't roll for your gacha in the middle of Parasite. - Would you like to watch the rest of this movie? $5 please. - Yeah, but I would say within our lifetime, we've seen gamers rise up to become the most biggest entertainment medium in the world now, right? - When are the memes gonna rise up, man? - It used to be movies. Now, do I think anime is going to become as big as gaming? No.

but I would say the anime right now is also rising up. - It's on its way. - It's on its way. It's getting more popular. - But isn't it weird though that I feel like all the money that the weebs have is being siphoned off in anime games. - Yeah, that is true. - Anime games and VTubers. - I bet weebs spend way more on anime games than they do on anime merch and anime. - 100%. - 100%. - 100%. - 100%. - So all the weeb stuff, all the weeb money,

- It's going to the gamers. - It all comes back to the games. I mean, I feel like probably if you interviewed like the average anime fan, like not the average anime fan, the average weeb I would say, the average person in the weeb culture, they probably spend more money on like games or like VTubers than they do on an actual like

- Like a figurine or a manga or something like that. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - No, absolutely, 100%. - It's weird how that's just the way weebs work, but that's what I feel weebs put most of their money into. Maybe in 2020, maybe it's 'cause there haven't been like anime conventions or other things they can buy. But I would say that the more I watch anime, the less I buy like figurines and stuff like that.

Do you feel like, I mean, you're a hardcore JoJo fan, right? So you put a lot of your money into JoJo merch. - I invest in JoJo stock. - Yeah, yeah. But now you look for the most exclusive stuff, right? You don't just buy the cheap cash.

- No, I don't. If the figure's under like 50 bucks, I'm like, I'm not interested. I'm like, that's peasant stuff. Get that out of here. 'Cause those figures are also cheap. And also when you realize that you start collecting a lot of figures, the one thing that becomes more valuable than the figures is the room they take up. So then you're like, all right, now I have to decide which figures are worthy of the display. - I'm starting to do that too with like exclusive paintings

like limited items and stuff like that. - I'm sure that sounds so fucking- - Sounds so fucking- - I'm so wealthy. - Yes, I'm an art collector. - But it's like, you know, when you do start collecting figures and you start getting a lot, you're like, you know, this $5 Goku figure, you know, I kind of can't argue it deserved the same spot as this $200 hand sculpted REM fucking like DNA engraved.

- Like not even figurines though, but like any time I go to an anime convention or stuff like that, I much rather buy shit from the artist alley and things that independent artists are doing 'cause most of the time they make cooler stuff than the official figures most of the time or the official merchandise. It's just like, I don't understand people who go to anime conventions and they buy buttons.

- To me buttons are the stickers for me, right? - Like the metallic. - I hate buttons, man. - Japan is fucking obsessed with those. - I know, I know. - I don't know why. - Whenever I go to like a pop-up shop for like, you hear an announcement where, oh, there's a pop-up shop for like X anime series or Y anime series. And I remember the first few times I thought, wow, cool. They got exclusive merch there. And it's like 90% of them are just buttons.

And to me like buttons are the merch you buy when you don't, when you can't commit to buying an actual merchandise. - That's why you have that chump change in your pocket. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You're like, I can pay for this. - It's like the equivalent of, you know, when you go abroad and you're like, oh, I guess I got to buy a souvenir, right? You go to Paris and you go like, oh, I guess I got to buy like a fucking Eiffel Tower key ring. - It's literally the equivalent of like,

- I was here. - Yeah. - It's like, I was at that pop-up store. Here is physical proof I was at that pop-up store.

a 500 yen shitty like tin can thing. - But then they gatchify it, so you can't even buy the one you want. You have to buy like 500 fucking buttons until you get the one you want. - There are people though that I see that have like- - Oh, the whole bags. - Their entire bag or their entire like denim jacket or whatever is just like covered in them and they just, they sound like a fucking festival. - Why would you put a bunch of barnacles on your clothes as far as I'm concerned, right? That's what it looks like. It looks ugly.

- It's ugly and I won't stand for it. - People like it, man. - Yeah. - I don't know what to say. - One thing about the JoJo event though that I wish that anime did have more of these kinds of events. 'Cause I would say like one thing that always makes me jealous as an anime fan from watching the gaming community is that having this live event where they have like a load of things announced at once, right? Like I've always been- - You want an E3 of anime? - I kind of do. - I would love the presentations.

- Honestly, half the fun of E3 is just feeling like you're part of a community and just watching it and just reacting to it, right? 'Cause to me, the closest thing anime has is the anime awards, right? But we don't really have any, what? - Just the mental image, right? - Just the thought of just some guy coming up like, "Guys, I'm proud to announce Incest the anime."

- Me and the team at Incest Anime have worked really hard. - This time in 8K. - Most anime, I do not want to know the thought process as to why this came to be. And I do not want some 50 year old man telling me why he thinks this 12 year old girl should fuck this 20 year old man.

I don't want to see a presentation of that. That is the last thing I want. - We hear you. Guys, we hear you. You guys want more sister fucking, right? - Last time we heard that the plot got in the way of the incest. So we decided to just go to Bang Bros. - Guys, we hear you. You want another Easter egg? - I just imagined that like, check this out. The fucking Pornhub fucking thing place.

- No, but like, do you care about most of the games that get announced that are like any, you know, you wait for that one JoJo part six announcement, you wait for, I don't know what else. - I just think that we should get more live events to announce anime just for the hype factor. Like it makes such a- - Yeah, no, no, that's what I miss. I want, I like the hype factor in, that the gaming community have, you know, I feel like it adds to this community aspect and it adds to the fun, you know?

- Yeah, I mean, Japan kinda has that already. - Do they? - Yeah, on Nico Nico, they have this event called Tsuzukimi, which I did the English version of at AX last time.

But yeah, it's literally like a live event where they get a bunch of like voice actors and hosts to announce the next season of anime. - Maybe they should subtitle this. Maybe you could subtitle it. - Like imagine how hype it would be when like you hear like a chainsaw man adaptation. It's like just seeing it on Twitter, right? You have this event where you're like, oh, it's fucking, you know, is the next show- - The teaser trailer. - Yeah, the teaser trailer where you're like, oh, is this chainsaw man? Is this like Jujutsu Kaisen 4? They just got animated, you know? - And they just play like scenes of the anime.

- Like there are some manga series I know people are waiting for. Like imagine like one day Vagabond gets announced or some shit like that. I'd lose my shit. And I think it would be cool if anime had this kind of event where we just announce a bunch of new anime getting adapted. - Why? We should do that.

Honestly, like we're saying this idea, I'm just like, no one's gonna do it. - Anime companies, reach out to us. - Yeah, please. - We'll do it. - This episode is sponsored by ExpressVPN. Going online without ExpressVPN is like not having a case on your phone.

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- And by getting it, you'll be doing yourself a solid and supporting this podcast. - I never recommend something I don't use. - Get honey for free at joinhoney.com/trashtaste. That's joinhoney.com/trashtaste. Back to the episode. - And it's like people watching award shows, right? Because, okay, here's the thing. Nobody actually watches an award show to like see who wins or to like congratulate the winners. We watch it to get salty and to feel like we're part of a conversation. - Like a sporting event. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. It is kind of like a sporting event for,

like entertainment, right? I mean, that's why people watch the anime awards, the gaming awards and also like the Oscars as well, which apparently just aired yesterday and nobody watched. - At the time of recording. - At the time of recording. - I didn't know it aired until the day after. I was like, "The Oscars aired?" - I only knew about it because I saw a tweet of some guy who like put down a list of the past 10 years worth of like viewers. And apparently it was like the lowest in, I think,

- I think it had halved in one year, but that's also because we didn't really have any big theatrical releases this year. - We didn't really have any movies in 2020. - Most movies went to HBO Max or Netflix or whatever. And also I feel that,

I didn't realize now until this year, oh my God, all those ads that these movies pay for and all the promotional tours and whatnot really do work. 'Cause I don't know anything about movies unless they're doing these promotional tours. - Yeah, yeah, same here. - I haven't heard of a single really big movie that came out in 2020, obviously because- - I only know about the Snyder Cut 'cause that was like a meme.

'cause it was four hours long. - "The Snyder Cut" was probably the biggest kind of movie and then- - Yeah, it was a re-release. - I think the only movie I watched last year, not even in cinemas, but like afterwards was "Tenet".

- Oh yeah, I watched "Tenet" in theaters. That's really good. - I didn't even watch that. - It was so fucking good. - I know. I heard so many people saying it was great. - It's the most Nolan movie you can ever imagine. - I'm okay with that. - It's almost as if South Park wrote a parody of a Christopher Nolan film and then they made it. - Do you know what the main character is called? - Tell me. - He's called the protagonist.

- The main character is just called the protagonist. He doesn't have a name. He's called the protagonist. - It's like a fucking initial issue. - Even if the story is kind of dumb, the visuals in that movie are so fucking cool. - Yeah. - It's so good. - Robert Pattinson, I fucking love. I think he's an amazing actor. I will watch it. - 'Cause I feel like watching "Watching Tenant", I was just like,

- Nolan's obviously just given up on the script. He just has a lot of cool ideas for visuals and the visuals were fucking cool. But I pay attention to the plots and the characters for a second and I'm just like, what the fuck is going on right now? - Watching it in the movies was like so exhausting. It was literally like, I was posing like this.

- So it's backwards in time, okay. It's pretty good, it's really good. It was one of those movies that I couldn't imagine watching at home. I feel like the big screen helped. - I watched it at home. - Broke. - It took me two times to watch because the first time I just got really, really bored in the first half.

- In the first half, right? Because the first half is all plot, right? - They had us in the first half. - Yeah, yeah. 'Cause I was like, I'm not following what's going on. I really don't care about any of these people. - I'm like, I sleep until Robert Pattinson comes on and I'm like, I'm paying attention. All right, what's up? I love him. He's so good. I love him in everything. - He's a fantastic guy. - He's so fucking good. Have you watched "The Lighthouse"? - Yeah, I've seen that. - I love "The Lighthouse". - What's "The Lighthouse"? - It's a movie with him and who's the guy who played Jesus Christ? Fuck, what is his name?

- Willem Dafoe. - Willem Dafoe. - Ryoch, who couldn't forget his famous reel of Ryoch in Death Note live action. - The famous four lines he said in that movie. - Yeah, yeah. Willem Dafoe is a fucking amazing actor and they're both in it and they're both going crazy. It's fucking amazing. I won't spoil it, go and watch it. It's kind of an artsy film, but it's really good. It's really, really good, you should watch it. - How many films do you watch? - Not many, maybe- - You probably go to the cinemas though the most out of all of us though, right? - Yeah, but I don't care what I watch at the movies.

I'm just like- - How do you not care about what you watch? - It is just stimulus in my eyes. - We'll come back to the Oscars. We'll talk about that. Okay, 'cause I enjoy just the experience of the theater. I like the popcorn. I like the fact that I can ignore my phone. - How often did you watch films at home?

- Never. - Yeah, 'cause you're mostly just like a Netflix documentary kind of guy, right? - Netflix, yeah, Netflix documentary kind of guy. - 'Cause I'm like, I'm the complete opposite. I only go to the cinemas if I know there's a banger film I need to watch. If not, I'm just like, I just watch it at home. - Pre-Rona, I was going like maybe once a week, maybe once every two weeks. - Damn. - Because it was just like, there was always something on and they would always do reruns. So I watched, in Japan, I watched "The Shawshank Redemption." - In cinemas? - In cinemas.

- Isn't that weird? - Why would you still watch that at home? - I just, why not? I never got to watch it on the big screen. Let's go and have a look. - The best film of all time according to IMDB. Why would I not want to experience it on the big screen? - It's a great film, don't get me wrong. - It's fantastic, but you can also watch it. - I also don't feel bad if I want to go and get more drinks and popcorn. I've already seen it like 10 times. - So what you're saying is you just want the popcorn? - I really, okay. - You want to eat popcorn in a bigger room. - Can you not eat popcorn at home?

- No, not really. I legitimately don't go to the movies, the theater now because they don't sell popcorn in the Rona. I don't want to go. - Not because there's a pandemic. - No, no, no. - Just no popcorn. - Well, they're not selling that because of the pandemic. But if they, let's say the pandemic was still on, I would very much socially distance. - You could sneak some fucking popcorn in. - I don't want to bring my popcorn. I want their popcorn. - You want the overpriced fucking popcorn. - Actually, it's reasonably priced in Japan at least.

- I do not wanna go. I'm sure there's someone out there who agrees. I do not wanna go to the fucking cinema if I'm not getting popcorn. It's not, I just don't want it. - I don't think I've ever bought popcorn at a cinema. - I'll legitimately go to a restaurant before, I'll be full as fuck. I'll be like gagging at how full I am and I'll be like, "One large popcorn please."

- I don't know what's going on. - Yeah, I'll literally be dying, but I do not care. I have to get popcorn. - What I don't understand is some people, like some of my friends who, you know, we go to the movies or we go to the cinema and it's at this awkward time of like one or 1:30, you know? - I'm getting popcorn. - And it's just like, do you eat lunch before or do you not eat lunch before? And some people were just like, the popcorn is my lunch. And I'm just like, how the fuck is popcorn lunch? - Popcorn is not anything. I'm pretty sure you can't even live off popcorn.

- It's not a meal. - I'm pretty sure it's negative calories, right? It feels like it. - When you're kind of just eating air, right? - Yeah, one time in Japan, I spilled my popcorn over the floor and I think that ruined the whole movie for me. I think that legitimately made the whole- - Wait, did you spill it during the movie or what was the movie that you were watching? - Before it started, I don't even know. I don't even remember. I was just so, I was literally distraught.

For the first 40 minutes of the film, I was actually just so sad. - Like don't buy popcorn. - I was genuinely, when it fell over, you know when you're so sad about something bad happening that you just sit there for like 10 seconds and just let it soak about how sad you are. You're like, all around me. You know when you break, like you drop your phone and it smashes, you don't go like, oh my God, you're like,

- You guys just stare at her. You don't even go to pick it up immediately. - You're just so overwhelmed with emotions and sadness that you just stand there. - Yeah, I get that. - And like that, I had that moment. - I get that feeling, but not when I drop popcorn. - I mean, I get it. It's whenever I drop any kind of food item or drink item I've just bought. - I've broken my phone before, I've broken expensive items, and there is something that just hurts so much about dropping food or drink on the floor.

- There's nothing that hurts me more than buying a fresh pint and then like immediately dropping it or like a pint just falling off a tray as you're taking it to the table. - I think I'd rather drop my firstborn child than my popcorn. I'm completely honest with you. I heard Meily laughing. - At least you can pick it back up.

- The baby can take a hit. I'm pretty sure I took a many hits. My popcorn doesn't take a hit. I can't eat that shit. Right now especially if you pick that up, everyone will look at you. - Yeah, exactly. - As much as I would want to pick it. Part of me is like, is the top layer of the popcorn on the floor okay at least? Can I at least scoop some of it back in? - At least it's not directly touching it. - It's like how much of this popcorn has fallen out? - I'm not gonna lie. I wanna say that I'm hygienic, but if I see, if-

- Shut the fuck up. If like, let's say a bunch of nachos fell on the floor, I would be tempted to just be like- - No, not nachos. Not nachos is where I draw the line, man. - I would be tempted to be like the bottom layer is cushioned, I will grab the top layer and I would eat that. - No. - I would eat that.

- Popcorn, it comes in pieces, right? Because popcorn, you can scrape off the top layer. You can scrape off the layer. - Let's say you could get the bucket that you have with it. Maybe I would like kind of shuffle some of the top ones back in if they were in. - You float it up slightly. - I would tilt it 40 degree angle and see what I can like kind of scoop back in from the top layer. - Nachos for me is a little too wet. - Nachos is way too wet. - It's like chili. I spilled chili on the floor. - Scrape the top layer.

- Like French fries, right? Let's say that all the French fries fell on the floor. A part of me would be tempted to be like, you know, the top 40% of these French fries, perfect. I'm gonna start grabbing. - Okay, okay, okay. So there are two facts. - I'm gonna sound so vile to someone. - No, no, no, I'm the same. - There are two factors you need to consider. One, what is the ground? Is it like a clean-

- No, no, no, no, no, 'cause if it's like clean carpet. - Carpet is the worst. - Carpet's the worst 'cause you got like all the shit and like you got all the dust and shit. If you drop it on a street floor, that's just like, that is game over. You have to say goodbye right there. - Wood laminate flooring?

- Okay, yeah, yeah, okay. - Maybe we can salvage most of this. - Secondly, you need to consider what is the food item that you've just dropped? Is it liquid? How viscous is this food item? - You're gonna get a year's straw.

Like popcorn, it comes in little pieces. You can just scoop off the bottom layer and just leave that on the floor. It's like the safety layer. You have the bottom layer and then a safety layer just in case anything on the second layer touch the floor. - In case the germs have made its way off. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - What if you drop a chocolate bar on the floor? You just pick it up and scrape it off with dirt? - Chocolate bar. - I'd do that.

- Chocolate bar, yeah, honestly, it depends. It's a solid piece of food, right? So it depends on the floor that it's touched. - I treated it like an NES cartridge. I just kind of blow on it. Just blow off the dust. I was like, "Yeah, it's good enough." I've got an immune system for a reason. - One week later, we have the Rona. - I won't do it now, but during high school, if I dropped a sandwich, for example, right?

depending on how it landed. Like if the sandwich perfectly lands on the ground, that bottom piece of bread rip. I'll take everything else. - You're tearing that piece off. Let's be honest. - I'm taking everything else on top of it. - Yeah. - I'm not wasting food, fuck that. - Like how we let the sunny went from, yeah, ew, disgusting to wait, maybe. Wait, maybe there's a situation. - I don't wanna waste food, man. - The point is I would rather drop my child. TLDR. - TLDR. - I'm pretty sure my parents dropped me. I'm pretty sure I'm fine.

- I don't think that a single parent who didn't drop their child. Come on now. - This is why I am terrified of holding a child. I don't think I've actually, I don't think I've, in my 30 years of being alive, I don't think I've properly held a baby in my life. - I've seen people in Japan where they're on their bikes, they have the kid in the carriage behind them and they have the kid in the backpack on them. And I'm like, this is just, this is an accident. - That's hard mode. - This is an accident waiting to happen.

- It feels sketchy as fuck. - Whichever way you fall, you got cushioning. - God, Joey. - Just kidding.

- I don't know, that's why I never understand whenever one of my family members has a baby or something and they dead ass look me in the eye and go, "Do you wanna hold this baby?" And I'm just like, "Why would you trust a literal life in my hands?" Like, I don't trust myself to hold that. Does this thing come with a fucking instruction manual? Like, how do I operate this thing? - I always wonder, like, I'm like, how do you...

- As somebody who has many pictures of me holding babies, I can tell you. - Do you take it from the bottom or like under the arm? - You do like this. You kind of like rest them like this. - I know how to do it now, but like when I was like 14, someone gave me a baby. - Who told you how to do it? No one's ever told me how to properly hold a baby. - It's maternal instincts, isn't it? - Trial by fire. - Many babies are sacrificed. - I used to grab them by the temple like this.

- I realized I didn't like that when I saw you. - I think because like, I'm terrified of it 'cause every single time, bar none, that I've tried to hold a pet, it's tried to wriggle out and...

And I'm just thinking, shit, if this fucking animal was trying to wriggle out of my grasp, I do not want to hold a human life in my hands and risk dropping a human life on the floor. - They just complain. They're like British people. - I don't think I've ever seen a baby get held by someone and be like, fuck off me. - What are you doing? - It's like, no!

- Anyway, back to movies. What were we saying about movies? - The viewership sucked for the Oscars. That was the overall part. - But then again, I feel like the Oscars just can't win right now. No matter what they do, they're gonna lose. If they pander more to or change the demo and focus more on mainstream movies, the movies that people are actually watching, I feel like the whole integrity of the...

- The artistic integrity, right? - You can't fucking give 10 Oscars to "Fast and Furious." As much as, you know, like for the fact that the Harry Potter movies never got an Oscar for anything, the whole movie run, I do feel is a bit of a shame. 'Cause I do feel during that time, they were just kind of shunned for the fact that they've seen as just mainstream garbage. And I genuinely think that Harry Potter could have won in certain areas, especially like, you know,

set design, well, there was so many times that Harry Potter could have won an Oscar. - Oh, absolutely. - And I feel like a lot of disdain was built up during that period. - I mean, I feel like the Oscars just has not aged well as time has gone on because like,

- And then they got caught up in the whole woke culture. - Yeah. - Which I felt like when you get into that debate, you've just lost. - Yeah. - 'Cause you're gonna upset someone. - Yeah, because once you get into the woke culture debate, then you lose whatever side you go on. - Yeah. - You lose whatever side you either pander on or even don't pander on. Or even if you say nothing, you are still losing. And I feel like that was the start of really the decline of the Oscars along with just the fact that

- It's all kind of the same. - Along with the fact that the more years I watched the Oscars or the more years I, 'cause I don't even like watch the Oscars that often, but like more years I watched it, the more years I realized, man, I just don't know any of these movies. - No, I don't. Well, 'cause I think they had a few years, you know, where there was a lot of artsy films that were winning, which, you know, I'm sure they deserve them. But I think as a mainstream viewer, most people don't fucking know what that is. - No.

- Like what was that one movie that I didn't know? There's been a bunch of movies that have won best picture. I'm like, what? - Oh yeah. - Yeah. - Like "Parasite" was the first movie that won best picture that I was like, I know that movie. I've seen that movie. Good movie. But like a bunch of other years I've been like, what? - I mean, I think the problem with the Oscars for me is that even if something wins best picture, I mean, "Parasite" was one of the only best movie winners where I was actually- - I feel like everyone was happy. - Yeah, everyone was happy without,

that was the first time when I saw people actually happy, like mostly unanimously be like, yeah, "Parasite" deserves it. It's a fucking great film. Because most of the times when I see a best picture winner on the Oscars, I watch it and I'm just like,

- Yeah, this is a very much an Oscar movie. And I can see why it's so highly rated, but I just didn't find it that interesting personally. - This is what happened to, you know, there's an institution that goes on for too long, right? It's got all these built up, you know, things that they've been doing for years. Like the whole, like if you wanna be in the Oscars, you have to do a bunch of dumb shit and hold events for the people doing it and basically just pay them.

- Pay them out, yeah. - Pay them to get considered for it. And that whole shit is dumb. That's not how it should be done at all. I don't think anybody wants a system where to be included in an award show, you have to, there's a pay to win essentially. I mean, obviously you don't pay to win, but you pay to enter, which, I mean,

I mean, why not just make it so that the best picture gets nominated for best picture? - You literally have to like win the heart of the judge by catering to them, not by making something good. Which is like kind of ass backwards. - Yeah, I mean, it says something when I think that like somehow, you know, something like the Crunchyroll Anime Awards has a better system than the Oscars where they have a mix of like fan vote. And obviously if you do fan vote,

- People were still salty, but yeah. - But I think having that kind of fan vote in the equation to say, hey, this is what the fans are thinking. Just letting you know. - But it's also, by making a fan voting system, it gets those fans to actually watch the show as well, right? - No, it doesn't. No, fans vote for what they watch. They don't vote for every show that they, on the list. - No, no, but what I'm saying is like, they're more inclined to actually watch the awards show to see who won.

if they vote for it. - I'd say- - More so than like leaving it to an unknown committee of people, right? To be like, this is the best film, no one can argue about it. - I mean, let's, I don't know how many judges there are. There's quite a lot, it's like 500 or something. I'd be completely estimating. Maybe Ashley can you check how many Oscar judges there are? - I don't think, is the exact number known? - I'm not sure. But I think having some form of waiting, you know, like 5% by the fan or just something, like where the fans can kind of have some form of sway. - Yeah, like the Game Awards, right?

- I mean, the game was, I feel like, I don't know the exact number. I feel like it's like 10% is like the fan voted part. - That seems good to me. Why not? - At least we know what everyone else is thinking. No, even if, 'cause I feel like the Oscars is everything I hate about pretentious Hollywood. Because it's putting these people, it's putting this work on like a fucking pedestal

where an award show should be just about like, you know, celebrating what everyone loved that came out in the year. It's become like this whole other political message and fucking- - Yeah, I mean, I think that's what happens when the weight of an Oscar becomes what it is, right? Like you can make your career off winning an Oscar, right? If you win one early on, I imagine the amount you just start charging people for your work goes up significantly. So it's understandable why it all comes in, but yeah,

- I mean, that's why I've always enjoyed other kind of award shows. Like whenever Ricky Gervais holds, like host the Golden Globes, that's just like- - That's like rich people get roasted 4K. - Like I'd rather, I'd take that any day over the Oscars. - That's very good, I do enjoy that.

'Cause the Oscar is always the same shit. It's like, and now for somebody who worked hard, there have been struggles and sacrifices, but they worked hard and won the award. And it's like, great. - As if everybody is not working hard. - You could put all the Oscar speeches into a learning algorithm and I bet it will predict what the next speech is gonna be. - Auto-generated. - Genuinely, like it feels like it sometimes. Like you got fucking Brad, 'cause Brad Pitt did the speech for Best Picture.

I don't know, it's best actor, I think. Or one of them, I can't remember which one. And you know, it's like you have Brad Pitt and then you give him this napkin-esque McDonald's, you know, McDonald's like commercial speech. And it's like, why not get them to do something fun? Why not get them to do something that'll get people interested? Like to actually talk like properly, I don't know. It's just like, I don't wanna fucking watch a McDonald's ad read. - Go on, Ashley. How many people are in the Oscar committee? - The Academy is made up of more than 9,000 voting members

Jesus. So roughly 10,000 people. Whew.

- I do also think if there is 9,000 people who are judging who are from the film industry, that's also kind of a problem in itself. Is that the people who are working in the industry are the ones who are deciding the votes. - 'Cause I guarantee none of them are like film critics or anything like that. - Well, I mean, yeah, exactly. - They might be film critics. - But I mean, if there's people who are working on the films that are voting, I think that's a problem. - That's a bit of a bias happening, right? - A little bit. I mean, obviously you might not, I don't know what the rules are. - I mean, to me, there is no perfect system for like an award show, right?

- Either way, the way it is now isn't working. - Either way, the way it is now is just not capturing the public's interest. - Interest. - Also, why isn't it being live streamed? Come on, Oscars. We're in the fucking 21st century. Live streaming is shit. - How do people watch the Oscars? Is it pay-per-view? - It's on US TV. - It's on TV. - Well, why is it not on fucking YouTube or Twitch? Come on, I want a pogchamp with the fucking... Could you imagine best supporting actor and there's just fucking MonkaS right before it gets announced?

- I want that, you know, like best actor, Shrek wins the Oscar, just fucking like Shrek pogs in the chair. Like this would be fun as fuck. Like, what are you doing? This is great. This is how you get people into it. Like if you could do Channel Point, like gamble, 'cause you can do gamble, right? Like I can do mods. Mods do this thing on my stream, right? But do this prediction. Could you like imagine you're like,

- I bet so and so is gonna win. - Right when they're announcing the nomination, boom, the prediction comes in, pressure channel points. You know what I mean? This is like, why? - I feel like this is why the Game Awards is just so much more fun to watch as like a viewer than any kind of film award show or other kind of award show. - Absolutely. - You can still stick all the sponsors in, you can fluff the viewership numbers 'cause they'll definitely be higher. You can do so much more. To me it's like, I mean, it's just the whole system of just old systems in place that they're, you know.

- Yeah, just not bothered to change the system. - Yeah, I mean, to me, the Oscars has always been that thing where it's just been on in the background and people have talked about it, but I'm just like, yeah, I mean- - When was the last time you cared about who won an Oscar?

- I don't even remember the last time I sat down to watch the Oscars or the Grammys or anything like that. - Where the fuck do you watch it? You're American. - I mean, you can watch it like back in Australia, but not here anymore.

- I didn't even know where to watch it in the UK. - When was the last time you cared about a winner? 'Cause I feel like before "Parasite" I can't even remember. - "Shrek" was the best animated picture. - I think the last time we did actually. - Yeah, it did. "Shrek" won. - Oh no, okay. Best animated picture. I feel like that's a...

It's either gonna be Shrek or it's gonna be either Disney or Trek. Like wake me when an anime actually wins best anime. - Well, Spirited Away won, right? - Yeah, that's the only time an anime- - That's probably the last time I cared about it. - That's the last time I- - And that was like 2006 or something like that? - I think that was 2002. - Surprise. - Was it? - Your Name didn't win anything.

- It got nominated though. - Did it get nominated? - It did get nominated, but it obviously didn't win. - Yeah. - This is so sad. Imagine this Pepe hands. - I mean like the anime has always just been fluffed by the Oscars no matter what. I mean, wasn't it that one year that Boss Baby got nominated for a silent voice or something like that? - Let's go!

- I mean, I think as well, I heard that like the only reason why "Spirited Away" won is because like one of the head people at Pixar, like really personally vouched for it. - Yeah, I mean, I mean- - Yeah, they also got a dub by Disney. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. - Ghibli's the only thing that's been noticed by, no, yeah, Ghibli's been the only thing that's been noticed by Disney. - Well, 'cause they certainly like, "Holy shit, this is better animated than all our stuff. What the fuck? What's going on?" - Holy shit, these guys are still doing 2D animation? - Yeah, what the fuck? - That's the fucking dedication right there. - Yeah, exactly. - Tell the art, nobody cares about the Oscars anymore.

until they live stream it and I can do monkey ass. - Live stream it then I'll be away. - Honestly, I'd watch 'cause then people would be like, if they let people live stream it as well and watch it live, man, their viewer numbers would be massive. - Yeah. - Yeah. And maybe that'll get me to watch more films as well. - Yeah, exactly. - No, I do wanna watch more films. It's been weird seeing films released online on HBO Max. - I do not like it. - And stuff like that, right? - Yeah.

- It's just reaffirmed for me that I just love the movie theater and I love the experience and that I hope that it never goes away. - No, it's great. Like I love going to it, but it's like, I'm not like you where I can just watch anything. Like it needs to be a movie that I want to watch. - Yeah, I just enjoy the atmosphere so much that I will go and watch anything. - I feel like there are some movies that I would prefer to watch in movie theaters than others. Like, sorry? - Tenet.

- "Tenet" maybe actually. I feel like that would have been cool in the movie theaters, but like any action flick I feel like would be better in the movie theaters. - 100%. - Like I feel like I missed out on something not watching John Wick. - Well those fucking car scenes in "Tenet" where they're like fucking going back in time and zooming forward, it was so good in the theater. It was amazing. - I need to watch it this week. - It's so good, dude. - It's good just for the visuals. 'Cause it's by far one of the most visually interesting films I've ever seen. - Super interesting. - Yeah.

But yeah, I mean, I wanna watch more movies. I just really can't watch movies at home 'cause I put it on and I see that fucking two hour thing counting down, I'm like,

That's a long time. That's a long time to focus, damn. - Right. - To me, to me- - But then I watch an hour and a half YouTube video. Like no questions asked. - Yeah. To me, it's, I don't know, something about a movie and it's the commitment. Like once I've put a movie on, I'll fucking watch it. But it's bringing myself to, it's willing myself to even put that movie on in the first place. That's what I find trouble with. - Yeah, I'm like, I think to myself, I'm like, all right, I can watch this movie. It's like an hour and a half, but-

At the same time, I could also watch like three 30 minute YouTube videos that I want to watch. I could do that. I think I might prefer that. - I could just watch random YouTube videos for an hour and a half that I don't really care about. - I could watch like 320 second meme clips on YouTube.

- True, true, true. I've been doing a lot of that recently, oh my God. - I mean, that's, 'cause that's all that's been coming up on my recommended. - I don't know what's going on with YouTube recently, but they just stopped recommending YouTube videos and started recommending YouTube shit posts. - Yeah, yeah. - Twitter videos. - Yeah, legit, it's so weird. - If I get a recommendation nowadays and it's above a minute, I'm like, "Oh, this must be a fucking special video."

- Oh, okay. - What was the one we watched before we started recording? - The Chonk Chart. - The Chonk Chart. - That's my favorite video. It's been recommended recently. - It's brilliant. - But now it's gotten to the point now where like even all the common sections can all agree on what, like everyone's got recommended the same playlist 'cause everyone's quoting the same videos even though they're quoting a different video on a different meme video and everyone gets a reference even though it's not on any kind of playlist or anything like that.

- Well, it's like people watch two hours of "Trash Taste" and they'll be like, "No movie for me. "Two hour of "Trash Taste" podcast, let's go." It's like, "Oh wow, okay, thank you, I'm on it." - Yeah, thanks. - Did you guys used to watch more movies back in the day? - Oh, 100%, yeah. - Yeah, when I was like 15, I loved it. But that was when you discover that you can watch things online. You're like, "Well, she can tell me I can watch

any movie I want by just typing the name into Google? What the fuck? Are you for real? That was like a massive revelation in my life. I was like, oh my God. - Did you guys go through that IMDB top 100 movie phase? - Oh yeah, 100%. - Oh no, top 250 movie phase. - You know what the first movie ever I've watched illegally was? - What? - It was the Hannah Montana movie. - How do you remember this? - I just remember that was when I discovered that you could watch it. - Is that the one where it's like the thing?

- I think so. I don't know what it was, but I remember- - It's like the one which is on tour or some shit. - There was like a dance to it as well. - Yeah. - 'Cause I remember that someone kept walking up and getting up in front of the camera for the movie.

- I was one of those. - Well, the way you see this is the thing, right? This is like, the more you get older and the more you have money, your tolerance for the quality that you will. So when you first, when you're like 12, you will watch anything for some reason. You're like, people standing up in front of the camera, shaky cam quality.

- No problem, I'll watch it. The moment you get like a HD DVD rip, you're like, I can't go back. - It's like a 480p unacceptable. - Why isn't it shaking? Why is there no artifact? Why is no one standing up in front of the camera? What's going on? - Oh my God. - Yeah, to me it was always like the ripped DVDs that I thought,

sellers in Thailand would just sell. So we'd have like literal shops where you'd have like just DVD cases. - They still do that now, right? - Yeah, they still do that now, right? This episode of Trash Taste is sponsored by Liquid Ivy. - When you push your body hard or just feel run down, it's extremely important to stay hydrated. Making hydration a priority helps us feel healthier on a day-to-day basis. And luckily with just one stick of Liquid Ivy in 16 ounces of water, you get two to three times the amount of hydration as plain water gone.

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- Back to the video. - I mean, that's probably from the internet speeds there in Thailand, right? Are they fast in Thailand? Does everyone have access to internet in Thailand? - I mean, internet speeds in Thailand are like faster than what I get in the UK, at least for uploads. - Really? - I mean, yeah. I mean like upload speed in the UK sucks and most people won't. - Yeah, for some reason we've been really cucked on the internet speeds. - Yeah, like download completely fine, but like upload you get like 20 max, isn't it? - Don't talk to me until you went to Australia.

- 20 is like fucking luxury in Australia. - It's just weird seeing that like I was paying, you know, $70 a month in London for a promise to 100 megabytes down and six megabytes up. I never got more than three up. I never got more than 60 down. - Yeah. - Dude, I paid 60 bucks a month for 0.3 up.

- Yeah, but you live in a prison, so that's like- - We still have fucking copper wire. It's ridiculous. In like 2020, we have copper wire. - I know a joke because whenever I lived in the UK, I would be, I remember being a YouTuber, being a YouTuber, you'd have to pay for the most expensive internet available. So I'm like, okay, who's the most fastest internet provider? And at the time it was Virgin Media. - Fucking awful. - Yeah.

the best they could provide is like 20 up. And when I say 20 up, it's really like 10 up in like the quieter times in the day. And then I would like- - It's like fucking $200. - Yeah, yeah, exactly right. And then I remember living in the UK and before like I had more American friends, I'd see like screenshots of people on Twitter being like a hundred up, a hundred down. And I'm just like, this is obviously Photoshopped.

There's no way, there's no way. - That is a fucking lie and I won't stand for it. - There's no way people get this upload speed on any kind of internet. - It's just tragic in places like Europe, you can have, your neighbor could have like one gigabyte upload and down and just because the wire stops at his house and you're his neighbor, you won't have it. You'll have copper.

I just couldn't imagine not living in Japan with this God tier internet that never breaks. Nothing ever bad happens. - You say God tier internet, I have shit internet compared to you. - Bro, my internet is just like Jesus came down and fucking blessed my router. - Wait, what are you at? - AU. - AU? - Yeah. - What speeds are you getting? - One gig down, like 400 megabytes up.

- Yeah, I'm getting 70 down, 70 up at most on wire. - Really? - Because yeah, for some reason my apartment's like semi new, but even then they apparently can only do like copper I think, or like some really outdated system. - 'Cause I'm on wifi and I get 500 up, 500 down. - What the fuck am I on?

I don't know what they gave you Garnt. I upload like nearly like half a terabyte of files every week. And that would actually just be impossible on my old lintel. - Oh yeah, absolutely. - So like right now it's like, oh, that video I just filmed was 150 gigabytes. Oh, no worries, it'll take four hours to upload. It's like whatever, it's crazy. Like this podcast I upload every day after we film it and it's like 300 gigabytes of video files and uploads overnight while I'm sleeping.

And I wake up, my PC's on, it's all done. - Meanwhile back in Australia, it's like 800 meg file, give it eight hours. It'll be done by the morning. - Exactly, it's ridiculous. - It's fucking tragic. - But yeah, I mean, I really appreciate that. Back to the whole watching shitty quality stuff. I recently watched Chernobyl.

And I wanted to watch it, you know, in high quality. Cause I just- - You can actually. - Yeah. - Yeah, you can buy it on YouTube. That's how I watched it. - So you watched it? - Yeah. - Oh really? - I watched it on Amazon Prime and I had to pay for every episode individually. - Oh no. - Yeah, I had to do that as well actually. - But this is like how done I am with not watching stuff in like high quality that I would rather pay. I think it was like $3 an episode. - Right.

And he offered me, "Did you wanna pay $1.50 for standard definition or $4 for HD?" I think you should be shot as a company. Whoever is in charge of this decision deserves to be shot. - Right. - Okay, I'm joking. That's terrible.

- That is a joke by the way. - For legal reasons it is a joke. - This is a joke obviously, I'm just exaggerating. Who on earth is willing to spend like $1.50 for standard definition, but not the extra dollar? It is so scummy of these companies to do. Why would you downgrade? This is what I hate, if you have a product and then you downgrade it and sell it on purpose.

- No. - What I wonder is like, they obviously know no one's gonna buy the standard definition. 'Cause if you're willing to buy standard definition, then you're gonna be the type of person who's probably gonna find other ways to watch it rather than watch it as standard definition. - It just makes me so irrationally angry. I was very much happy to pay the 15 bucks to watch this whole series. It was really good.

I just hate the fact that one, it made me pay for every episode individually. And I like in some weird way, give me a package deal. Give me something. - Well, I think it's for the people who are like, oh, I watched two episodes.

- I mean, there should be some kind of package deal for a seasonal TV show, right? - Yeah. - I think I rented, no idea why I did this. 'Cause again, I don't know why I just can't be bothered of doing the whole dance of watch something online, spend two hours trying to find a link that doesn't give you viruses. Like I don't wanna deal with that shit anymore. It's just, it's too stressful. And watching movies is already hard enough as is. I'm not doing this. I'm not doing this dance anymore. I refuse.

I think I watched Borat on YouTube. - You watched Borat on YouTube? - I rented Borat on YouTube 'cause for some reason I wanted to watch it again 'cause I wanted to, I don't know why. - I don't think I've ever rented a movie on YouTube. - Don't, it was awful. - Really? - Because for some reason when I rented it, I was like, great.

- It was only in like 480p on YouTube. - Really? Is that because it's an older movie? - No, I'm pretty sure that Borat is at least in like fucking 720. - I'd like to think so, yeah. - I'm pretty sure it wasn't in 480. I was like, what is this?

"What is this? I don't remember looking at this shit." - Did you rent the standard version? - No, there was only one choice and it was like three bucks. - Yeah, there's only one choice, standard definition. - And then also I just found it really interesting that YouTube actually tells you how many views the movie has. - Oh really? - And it had like 20 on YouTube. - It might not have been legit in that case. - No, it was definitely like legit. - Really? - It was legit and it was just weird 'cause I was like, "This is so strange."

- Yeah, I've been watching a lot of films on YouTube here in Japan because I find like if there's a film that's not on Netflix or something or Amazon here, it's normally on Japanese YouTube. I don't know why. Like I started watching "The Wire" on YouTube because- - Are you paying for it all? - Huh? - Are you paying for it all like one by one? - No, I'm paying like season by season. - Oh wow.

because I tried to watch "The Wire" in the UK and it just was not available on like any platform that I was subscribed to. Basically, if it's not on Netflix and it's not on Amazon Prime, I'm probably not gonna watch it, right? But I feel like here in Japan, YouTube's like the golden child. There are so many films here on YouTube and so many TV series that are blocked off when you're in like Western countries. So yeah, if you're in Japan, use YouTube. There's a lot on YouTube. - I feel like I'm repaying my debts as a teen.

You know what I mean? Just paying for all these movies. - Punished with the standard definition. - I sit there as I order my 300 yen Borat SD quality 40p thinking, "Old Connor would have gone online "and found a HD version today." No, here you go, movie, billion dollar movie companies. Here's three bucks. - But alas, I don't have two hours to kill to find it. I'm gonna have to deal with this.

I just don't care anymore. I'm just like, yeah, I don't know. I value my time too much now. I'm so busy now that the thought of spending 10 minutes to try to find a link. If I get to the five minute mark, I'm about to give up. I'm like, no, I'm not watching it. - But like 10 years ago, I'd be like, day seven, still not even looking. - I'd be like, maybe it's my location. Changes VPN to other country to try and get a different Google search. You know what I mean? Like I would do whatever it took. Like I remember I tried to watch the documentary about Pepe.

And I just, it was fucking, I couldn't even find a place to buy it. Like it was fucking impossible to try and find this movie to watch it. - Were you in the generation where people were watching things on mega uploads? - Yeah. - Oh yeah. - Do you remember the dance you had to do with the 72 minutes?

Time limits. So for anyone too young to know, there used to be this site called Mega Upload, right? Where people would upload, you know, full TV series and full movies on it. Now most movies, the runtime is normally like at least an hour and a half, right? - Like a hundred minutes. - Yeah, like a hundred minutes. So Mega Upload for free account had a time limit

of 72 minutes and for every 72 minutes you watch, you had to wait

to watch it again, right? - Such a dick move yet amazing marketing choice. - Oh my God. - Such a dick move. - Like, I don't know why, was it because it was the only sites that was available for people to watch? - It was one of the only file sites that was like, welcome, everything, come on, put anything you want on here. - Yeah, and I remember back in the day when, 'cause this was when I was still in university. So I think,

I think back when mega upload was popular, I don't think VPNs were as popular, right? 'Cause VPN would be like the easy answer to this nowadays, right? And I remember feeling like I was like so fucking five heads where,

where what I would do is our university had like a private network that we would connect to, to upload like our files or upload our projects and stuff like that. And so what I would do is I would watch the 72 minutes then I would connect to the university internet and start uploading on there. - Was it like the eduroam? - Something like that, right? And then that works great until I did something stupid. I started blabbing in my mouth about it.

So unfortunately I lived in a shared house.

So this 72 minutes, the 72 minute limit became like five minutes where everyone in our house started watching mega uploads and you use like the same network and use the same IP address. - Rookie mistake. - And yeah, that was, and then I realized it's just much better to live by yourself and just not have to deal with people sharing your internet. Do you remember having to, do you remember trying to game online on university internet and how fucking awful that was? - Terrible.

- Yeah, it's a memory I don't want to think about. - I have flashbacks of just the ping going from 10 to 500. - Who's uploading porn? - I mean, it wasn't even that bad for me because of Australian internet, our default ping was like 300. So it was more like going from 300 to 900. - Yeah, remember when I came with Australian, they were like, "Yeah, they've got great ping." "Oh, what is it? Oh, 300." I'm like, "That is not, by no measurement is that a good ping." - If you have below 250, you're like, "Damn, this guy's paying for the premium internet."

- I don't know. I feel that university internet was just the most temperamental thing ever. But it's really cool 'cause I remember that, because a lot of them use the Eduroam network. I remember one time I went to Germany and I walked past university and I was like, oh, I connected to the internet.

I connected to that university's internet. - Right. - 'Cause I was, it shared the same ID for like wifi or something or something like that. - Right. - But if I walk past any university, you get free wifi when you're in university soon. - Wow. - If it was using the same network, which most of them were, I think in Europe. It's really cool. Fun fact. - Wow. - Life hack. - Yeah. - Life hack. Just, I don't know, do something. - Walk past the university. - Just get free wifi. - Just get free wifi. - Stop complaining, it's free.

- Actually I have a really awkward story about when I set up the wifi here in Japan. Because obviously we just moved to Japan and one of the hardest things, especially when we moved here was fucking setting everything up initially. - Joey knows all too well. - Joey knows all too well. Connor moved here like two weeks before me. So Joe, Connor had the cheat sheet of just having Joey set up everything for him. - I was like, I wanted to get in first with Joey. I was like, Joey, I need help.

- God's coming, I know you're gonna be sick of God. - He like perfectly planned out where I'd be burnt out right as God was about to ask me. - 'Cause like I could see when you asked Joey, like to help you set up, I could see like just the hope just wash over his face and be like,

- This is the last time Connor, this is the last time. And I remember when you were talking about setting up like your driver's license and like, I could see Joey's just like, no, don't ask me Connor. I'm not gonna do it. - I mean, that I feel bad. Luckily that was someone else who I hadn't bothered yet to help me.

So yeah, so as I was setting up the internet, as you know, I have like really, really slow internet compared to you guys, right? And I- - Peasant. - Peasant internet. I can't remember who I'm with. It's not AU. It's the other- - Softbank? - No, it doesn't matter. - It's like Yahoo something, right? - Yeah, they have like English support, which is why I picked them, right? Because I had to try and sort this out by myself.

So when they said they have English support, it's the most, it's basically just like, here's a person who translates using Google translate. - Oh no.

Japanese companies that like English support or for foreigners only, 95% of the time, it's just someone who doesn't really speak good English and just a way for them to hike up the price. - Oh yeah, yeah. - Like if you go to the, like what is it? Like Gaijin pot, is that what it's called? - Yeah. - Like that real estate website. If you go and find the same properties on a Japanese website, they're much cheaper. - Yeah. - It's just like- - Yeah, it's like 30% cheaper at least. - It's just like, ah, it's like, okay, I've been taking advantage of, 'cause you know.

- They do do that. - Just ask someone who's Japanese to help you. You'll save a shit ton of money. You might lose a friend, but at least you'll have saved a few hundred bucks. - Just make a Japanese friend to eventually lose said Japanese friend. - Pay him the money that you saved. - Honestly, there should be a service for someone to help you 'cause that could save you a lot of money. - Someone's thought a service. Hire a Japanese who speaks English to come with you to stuff. - Basically. - I'd pay. - That's my first really, right?

- The reason I was able to set up my phone was 'cause luckily my cousin was here at the time and I asked her to do it and she works for JAL. So she can speak pretty fluent Japanese and she helped me set up. Perfect, no bumpy roads. Setting up the internet was a fucking nightmare. - I don't remember my phone so I'll tell mine after yours, go. - Okay, because firstly you have to set up with the internet provider

and then also set it up with something else as well. - I didn't have to do that for mine. - You didn't have to do that because I get billed from two companies and I don't exactly understand why. - That sounds like a scam. - No, no, no, no, no, no. It wasn't a scam. I made sure it wasn't a scam.

- How would you know? - Because I had this English support. - The Google translator assured me it was this guy. - No scam. - Microsoft tech support, they were very nice. They assured me that my Windows PC was-- - There was an Indian guy on the phone, they assured me. - I paid through Google Play cards, it's totally legit.

- No, but from what I understand, you have to set up with like the person who provides the ISP and then- - I did not have to do that. - 'Cause I think AU provides both services, whereas my company did not provide both services at once. - Yeah, I think yours is like Yahoo mobile or something, right?

- Yahoo Mova. - It's probably like a version of like Yahoo or something like that. 'Cause I remember I had that and I had to do something similar. - Yeah, 'cause the person that provides the line and the person that like installs the router and rents out the router and stuff for you is like two separate companies. - Rents out the router? They're like fucking 40 bucks. - Yeah, I know. No, no, no, but the thing is you can rent one out and have them set up for you or you can set it up yourself. And so I chose, no,

with the internet option I had, I didn't even have that option. 'Cause I would have loved just to rent out a router and have the engineer set it up. No, I wasted a day trying to figure out how to set up my fucking router and connect it to the ISP in Japanese, in Japanese menus and everything. It was a fucking hell. But before that, I had to even just set up the deal that I was getting, right?

And so I phone up and I'm just like, okay, yeah, I'm living here. I choose the English option. And even then it's like- - It's rough. - It's a fucking rough kind of like, it took me, I think an hour of, an hour phone call to communicate 10 minutes worth of stuff. And just to make sure that everything was correct. And I tell them all my details. And so we're going through it. And then they tell me that,

"We're sorry, this is the fastest internet you can get "at this house, at this apartment." And I'm just like, "That's like your lowest option "that you have on your website." 'Cause they have like different tiers, right? They have like the high paying option and they have like the fucking peasant option at the bottom. - As they always do. - As they always do. - And they were like, "We're sorry, "you can only get the peasant option." - Why? - And I was like asking why, right? And they told me that, "So your building is not new enough."

and it doesn't have the newest internet installed. - Yeah, that's the problem with Japanese internet is that like, depending on the building and the wires built into it, they're just like, we can't do it, sorry. - Yeah. - It's ridiculous. - So I was like, doesn't know whether this is true 'cause my apartment's pretty modern. It's like, I think it was built- - It's newer than mine, much newer than mine. - It's newer than your one. And I heard about the speeds you were getting. So I was like, I was like, I was like doubt. - Where's this phantom speed going? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like doubt. - I'm actually stealing the next door building.

- Building, building. - So I'm just like, let me consider this deal. So I hang up, I phone up the next day so I could talk to someone different. So I can just make sure that- - It wasn't just that person. - It wasn't just that person that I was miscommunicating to. So I phone up.

go through the same fucking hour phone call, doing it again, explaining, "Yes, I just want to make sure that this is the best option I can go for. This is the best option and there isn't a higher option." And the second person that I was talking to goes, "Hold on a second, let me just talk to my manager." And so she gets her manager and her manager comes on, it's the same fucking guy I talked to yesterday.

And so I was just like, yeah, can I just make sure that this is the highest option available? And he goes,

"You're the guy that phoned yesterday, aren't you?" And I was like, "Yeah, this is awkward. Can I just double make sure?" And he was like, "Yeah, I mean, I just made sure again, it's the best option available." - They're smaller phones. - I wonder if you tried a different internet company. - Yeah, I wanted to. And so I go through the ordeal again and I give them all my details again. And this time I actually have to send my,

Send my ID or scan my ID just to make sure everything's all kosher. Shit you're not. First bill I get, right? I open up, Grant Manitapo. I send them my ID so that they can verify my name and address. And they get...

- And they fucking auto correct my name again. - Nah, nah, nah, his name on the ID must've been wrong. We're all fucking idiots in the UK. - I think the visa people just spelled it wrong. - Fuck the visa people, fuck the government. - What the fuck's a guard? - So what you just bought the shitty internet and it's shit?

- Yeah, I mean, I like- - So I bought the shit in it, turns out it was shit. - So yeah, I mean, I couldn't be bothered to fucking go through another like two hour phone call with another company and I just settled for it. - I mean, trust me, like even if you were perfect in Japanese, it probably would have taken just as long. Like, 'cause my God. - Well, yeah, so when Jerry helped me try to get my internet and SIM card and originally I got internet and a SIM card with the same company.

- Yeah. - Turned out the SIM card just didn't work on my phone. - Yeah. - And 'cause they were like, "Oh, we don't sell this model of phone in Japan." So in Europe, I don't know if it's the same as the US, but you can basically just buy SIM cards anywhere and they'll work with every phone. - Yeah. - Like it doesn't matter what it is, you just put it in, it works. - Yeah.

But yeah, apparently that's not the case in Japan. 'Cause of course it isn't. Found out that Japan is the only country on earth that uses the very specific type of like bandwidth or whatever it is that the phone lines use. So a lot of phones don't work in Japan because Japan was like, no, no, no, we're gonna be different.

- Of course you watch me. - Of course you watch me. - Everything's gotta be different. And that's why like getting a phone here is fucking hell. And that's why like SIM cards are so expensive. I think recently they did something about, they're gonna change it because I think the government is like, it's getting out of hand. Like the prices of phone carriers here, ridiculous. - I mean, I'm paying more for my phone than I am my internet.

- Yeah, I'm paying 90 bucks a month for my fucking phone. And that doesn't include the phone. I bought the phone myself. - I think I'm paying like 70 bucks a month and I get like four gigs of data. - It's insane. It's like, what is this shit? This shit is stupid. This is way too much for shit. Okay, it's good, but I mean, it's good. But it's shit. But it's shit that they're charging me this much.

I paid $15 in the UK for what I was, 10 pounds, for what I was getting. - Yeah, I think I paid like 20 pounds a month in the UK for like- - That's expensive. - For like unlimited data. - Yeah, it's ridiculous. - And in the UK, when they say unlimited data, they actually mean unlimited data. I've never been throttled in my data in the UK at all. - The speeds are fantastic here, don't get me wrong, but- - Speeds are great. - Not to the point where we're talking $100 a month speed, come on. - Yeah, yeah. - It's more than my internet bill.

- Yeah, exactly. - I mean, it works really well, but I just, yeah. And that's why like a lot of people I know don't even bother getting SIM cards 'cause you have to sit there for like four hours talking to them, answering dumb questions and they try and sell you a ton of stuff. 'Cause I think Aki doesn't even use a- - No, she still has an American thing and just pays for pocket Wi-Fi because she's like, she looked at like all of her friends getting the SIM cards and whatnot, she's like,

I'm not going through that shit. Fuck that. It's hell, but I just don't want to have to charge a fucking...

portable wifi thing all the time. - Oh yeah. - Having a Japanese number does help sometimes with things. Like a lot of forms require you to have Japanese numbers for some reason. - Yeah, she just uses my number for that. - Wow, isn't that convenient? Where's my Japanese fucking fluent boyfriend who translates and does everything for me, huh? - Yeah, no, so if I were her, I would totally do the same thing, to be honest, yeah. - Honestly, like the only reason I wanted a phone was because I didn't want to carry an extra thing with my phone just to get wifi. - Same, same, same.

- And you're not carrying like a purse with you all the time. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. - So it's just annoying. - Exactly. But yeah, I know several people who just have pocket wifi here just 'cause they don't wanna go through the trouble of switching their phones or getting- - Well, I mean, Raina still has pocket wifi. She's been living here for like however many years. - It's insane. Do we even have-

Pocket wifi isn't popular in Europe, I don't think, and the US. It's not mainstream. - I never really heard of it until I moved here. - It exists, but it's not nearly common as it is here, 'cause clearly they've made a market where the cell phone carriers are so fucking awful that there's a whole industry about avoiding them. It's ridiculous, and the price of these pocket wifi's are much cheaper than the cell phone. - Much cheaper, yeah. - It's just stupid. - I legitimately dread whenever I have to sort out the smallest thing,

within like my living situation here in Japan. 'Cause like, I don't know how they somehow always turn like a five to 15 minute meeting to like a fucking hour long, an hour long ordeal. - I'm waiting for the day where, you know how sometimes when you're on a website, you have to change your email. They'll be like, please come in person to change your email. And it would be like four hours. And it's like, I could have done this online. - Okay, fucking Japanese banks, man.

I'm about to go fucking mad. Like, okay, so- - Oh God, he broke the table, he's so mad. - I have so much salt towards Japanese- - Foreigners complain about Japan, volume 10. - Honestly, Japanese banks. - Do you wanna preface before we get into this? We do love living in Japan.

- Very kind country. - We do. - Very great. But we all British and we complain about everything. I complain about everything in the UK, America. - I'm an innocent bystander in this case. - Oh bullshit, like you don't complain about the banks. - We complain about everywhere we live. And especially if something like is inefficient to a Brit, you know. We will happily wait in line, but if that meeting takes any seconds longer than it needs to, we are gonna complain the shit about that. So Japanese banks, we have to fucking,

- Since our visa only last six months, we have to go to the bank every time to tell them not to cancel our card, right? And the thing about Japanese banks is that you can do fucking nothing

- On the phone, right? So just so they don't cancel our card every time our visa runs out, every time we renew our visa, we have to go there in person and not just any branch of our bank. We have to go to- - The branch that you started the bank account. - We have to go to that specific branch, which if you don't live anywhere near the branch you open your bank account, you're pretty much fucked. - They didn't give me a warning. They didn't tell you when. So you could be like stranded in the middle of fucking nowhere in Japan and not be able to get any money out. 'Cause they've canceled your card and not told you.

- Yeah, and another thing is I needed to go there for like, I needed a bank statement, right? You think for a bank statement, that's a pretty normal- - Just go on the app, go online. - That's a pretty normal documents you can obtain from a bank, correct? So I go to the bank and I asked for a bank statement and they have like fucking 70 million different kinds of bank statements. And I'm just like, what's, how,

- How hard is it? - Tell me money go in, money go out. Print money go in, money go out. - What is the document where you can see money go in, money go out, transactions, you spent money here, I just need that document. And they're like, okay, maybe we can do that. - Maybe. - Maybe. - Maybe, let's see. They go away. - I think they'll talk to the manager about that. - Literally, literally go away. They talk to the manager. They give me like two forms to fill out and go,

and go, "So are you okay getting this in three weeks?" I'm like, "Is there any faster way to get this document?" And like, "No, if you want this document, "because you didn't sign up for it before, "you have to wait three weeks and we'll send it to you. "Now, do you want this document monthly "or do you want us to like just hold it?" And then I'm like, "No, from now on, give me this monthly "cause there is no other way to obtain a statement "unless you just go to the bank and ask for it."

and you have to ask for this option when you sign up for a bank account or when you've realized that you need a bank statement for whatever, you know, maybe- - What is the point of like the 900 printers that they have back there? - I know! - Like what are you using these printers for? - And so I'm waiting for this document for like, you know, 'cause I needed to file some stuff. I needed a bank statement. Took five weeks for it to get sent.

I didn't realize when they said three weeks, they meant three, like three- - Three weeks minimum. - Three weeks minimum. - Working. - Yeah, basically Japanese banks, I don't know if we've just been really blessed with UK banks.

- Our banks are really good in the UK. The apps work amazingly. - The apps work amazingly. You can just transfer money on an app. It's pretty secure. And I can have my statements if I have like three to four, no, fucking five years worth of like bank statements that I can have. - Download them in PDF, do whatever I want with them. - No, Japan has those as well. Like I use a bank currently that has a great fucking app and I can do transactions all on my phone. The problem is they're not the major banks.

All of the major banks are like, you have to go in in person, bring your fucking stamp and sign like 17 pieces of paper and we'll send you something in two years. - Yeah, because I've wanted to transfer money back to my UK account for like, since I moved here, I'm just dreading the ordeal I have to go through just so I can move money from one place to another. - It's like a whole day event. - It is. - But it should be five minutes long.

Like every time I go to the bank, I lose at least an hour or two of my life. - Yeah, it's unfortunate that like things that should take 10 minutes or 15 minutes tops are always like four hours in Japan. And that's where the frustration comes from where it's like, you've put middlemen and checks in places where there didn't need to be any. - It's like, why do you have to ask your manager if this dude needs a bank statement? - Everything.

- And anything you do, they will always ask the manager. It's like, do any of your employees have the ability to do anything on their own? - Are your employees like trained at all? Just make a fucking decision for yourself. - Yeah. - Jesus, what are you employed for? - Yeah, I mean, like by the time I got the statement, the statement was like already out of date because it was a month old statement, right? So I had to fuck, I like fucking begged.

because I was filling out tax stuff and I was fucking begging my accountant to be like, please let this be like, please, please let this be usable 'cause I don't want to fucking do this again. I don't wanna go through this ordeal again. - I don't wanna wait five weeks again. - I think the most frustrating part about it is that when you're like, please help me with this thing, they make you seem like you're the weird one for like wanting to like make stuff go quicker or do things simpler.

They're always like, why would you want to do that? This is the way we do it. - This is the way that where it's 100% success rate. So it's like, why else would you make it any other way? - Well, I remember, 'cause I think Dogen did a video about the Japanese banks as well. And he mentioned something else one time where he was like, sometimes you just have to tell them like, no, just tell them no, that's not gonna work. And then maybe be like, you have to do this or help me do this. And the manager might be like, okay,

- But it's sad, isn't it? That sometimes you have to put your foot down to get anything done here. It's just terrible. It's just so sad. - Is that you have to like pull tooth and nail to get the best service that they offer, right? - Yeah, which is why I hate, sometimes I feel bad when I ask Japanese people to help me with it. 'Cause if I'm like, can you ask them to do this? Like, no, no, no, they don't do that here.

- It's like, no, no, if you have a foreigner friend, they'll at least ask. They'll be like, "Hey, can we do this?" But if I'm asking a Japanese friend to help me, like who's 100% Japanese, you know, fluent in English somewhat, I'll ask them, "Hey, can you ask them this?" They won't even ask 'cause they'll be like, "No, no, no, you can't ask them that." I'll be like, "No, no, just ask, just ask."

- That's such a Japanese way of thinking about it, right? Because they don't want to like embarrass themselves. - They don't want to ask questions that they feel they already know the answer to. 'Cause they feel like that's like humiliating at times. Whereas I think I always, of the mindset of there's no harm in asking. - Yeah. - Right. - I mean, like I never thought I would go to a place where it's like a 50/50 on whether you'd be able to get a fucking credit or debit card. - Well, I got rejected for all my cards.

in the start. - Yeah, yeah, exactly. - I had to apply two, no, three, two or three times until I finally got a debit card. - Really? Fucking hell. - Yeah, so, so, so. - And it was like the worst one. - So, so, yeah, so in Japan, right, whenever you sign up to a bank account, in most countries that I know, you get a fucking debit card. - Oh, yeah, you do. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, so in most other countries, you get a debit card in which you can spend your money, which you put

In your bank. In Japan, they're like, "We do not do that here." - We don't want you spending your money. - We'll give you a bank card. - They will give you a cash card. - A cash card, yeah. - In which you can take out money at the ATM and also charge you a fee for taking money out of the ATM. So when you go to the ATM and get money out, you better be taking a large amount of money out. Otherwise you'd just be like fucked for fees.

- Oh, and by the way, you can't pay with anything with the cash card. This cash card can only be used to take out cash from ATMs. You also can't take out any money with your debit card. Debit card can only be used to pay with things. - Of which, if you apply for a debit card, you have the possibility of being rejected.

- Why? Like credit cards, maybe? - I understand credit card, 'cause it's like, you're using their money. - But like most countries I know, like fucking America, they give out credit cards like they give out free candy. - Same in the UK. - Same in the UK. - 'Cause they want you to get in debt.

- Yeah, so they can make your life hell. Take you for all the money. - It's like, do you have a pulse? Brilliant. Here's a 2000 pound debt. - You joke, but that's how it is. - That's how it is. - Because all the credit card companies make all their money off of people who are failing to pay back the credit cards. Like that's where they make all their money. - Yeah, in Japan it's just like, oh, you wanna pay for stuff not using cash? I don't know about that one, chief. - It's like, if I'm paying for like my rent or something or I'm paying,

- I'm paying cash. Why are you making me paying cash? This is like a thousand dollars. Don't make me carry a thousand dollars around. I don't want to do that. - After paying the ATM fee. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like I tried to buy a new camera and my card, my debit card had a limit on it. I didn't know that. How do I change the limit? Gotta fucking call them up, haven't I? Oh for fuck's sake. - Of course you do. - There's not an app or anything I gotta do. I gotta call them up, explain to them. And they're like, why would you want to increase the limit?

None of your fucking business why I wanna create, it's my money. I wanna use it, what do you mean? - It's like now that I've lived here for like one and a half years, I've realized that it would be more convenient for me to use my foreign card here than it would

have been to like set everything up. 'Cause like the fees that they charge you whenever you take money out is exactly the same. Like it's about the same fees that you use when- - Sometimes. - Sometimes, yeah. - The only real difference I feel is like the exchange rate. You know, that obviously goes up and down. - You're fucked by the exchange rates. That's why I wanted the debit card 'cause I was like losing a lot of money 'cause I was having to use my British card and I was just losing money on exchange rates. - Because the pound's so strong compared to the yen.

- Well, yeah, as well, like right now I wanna use as much yen as possible 'cause the rest of my money's in pounds and it's really strong and I don't wanna use that. I wanna get rid of the weak money that I have, right? Like spend it all, spend it like. - But like in that case, it would be like, it's way more convenient to use like a third party company like Revolut or like TransferWire to like get it. 'Cause you can actually get like a physical card where you put money into this account. - Well, yeah, I used to have one. - Yeah, yeah, exactly. - I used to have a card, but when the UK left the EU, I lost that card and I stopped banking.

for the UK. So the one good card I had that was perfect for transferring, for using foreign exchange was just useless after a while.

- Look at us talking like adults about credit cards and banks and whatnot. - Well, it's just sad because they've made a system that makes it hell at every turn and you need to answer for every, like little things that you just like comfort or you have to explain why you want them. And it's like, I shouldn't have to explain to you why I wanna up the limit on my card. Like that should be a myth. Why do I have to tell you?

I'm getting interrogated because I want to buy a fucking camera. Like, what is this? I don't like this. Not that I don't mind telling them. I'm like, yeah, it's for a camera. But the fact that I have to answer to you, like what? Like if it's for like a couch that you don't like, you'll say, no, fuck you. That's an ugly ass couch. Fuck that. Yo, let me check this out. Yo, really? The thread count on those sheets suck, bro. I'm not up in the car. Why are you asking me this? Is there a situation where you're like, I'm going to launder more money?

- Well then of course you're gonna say no, 'cause I'm doing something illegal. When, why is this ever gonna work? Like, what is this point of this question? Don't ask me this shit. You make a conversation, if so, fucking stop. - Meanwhile, like UK banks, I just got the text the other day being like, we've upped the limit on your credit card. And I'm just like, well, I didn't ask, but I guess. - Cheers. - Cheers.

- But UK banks always really good. They update me all the time. You know, the app's fantastic. I can transfer money to anyone. No questions asked. - Well, I mean like fucking bank apps are like, I think only maybe like a thing that was invented two or three years ago here. When I first moved here, like none of the banks had that. - Did you have online banking when you moved here?

when you moved here? - No. Literally, and I still don't have it here because it's fucking horrible. - I don't know how to transfer money online in Japan. I still haven't figured it out. - Well, I mean, some banks don't even let you do it. - I don't even know if it's possible. All I know is that somehow when I buy things- - Have you been able to log into your online banking? - I've logged in. So the online banking that I have to send money is like, okay, I have logged into my bank, but if I want to send money, it's through like a different, it's through my card. It's really weird.

This whole shit, it's been separated. I don't understand what's going on. It doesn't make any sense. Japanese banks suck. Please, this is why, if you're a tourist, you got it lucky, man. You have to deal with this stuff. This is why everyone says Japan is the best place to visit, worst place, not worst place to live, but. - It's an amazing place to live. - It's an amazing place to live. - There's just a lot of things that I took for granted that I thought were just little conveniences or just the way the world works in first world countries, I guess. - You get mega angry and then you go outside, you go to Matsuya and you get your Matsuya and you're like, nice, all right.

- All right, it's all worth it. - It's all worth it. - But for that one day where you're dealing with this stuff, you're like, I'm finna book a flight home. I'm getting real tired of this. - No, 'cause it's not just about it, 'cause I've lived in Thailand as well. And even they've got their banking system more convenient than they do. I have an app that I can transfer my money in my Thai bank account to my Japanese bank account if I wanted to. I can't do that in Japan. And Japan's a first world country. Thailand's like a second world country. - When I left the UK,

closing everything and getting everything all sorted, moving everything I need to do. I did everything in like half a day, just making phone calls, just being like, "Hey, can I do this? I'm leaving." And they're like, "Oh yeah, totally fine. Yeah, okay. Oh, hey, can I do blah, blah, blah?" Yeah, it's all good. Every phone call lasted like at most, being on hold took longer than the phone call. It was like, it's so easy. Like it's so frustrating. - Whereas here it's like, "Oh, you're moving?"

- Oh, you're moving? That's a whole month process. That's not because you gotta unpack and move stuff around. That's 'cause you gotta go to these- - You gotta call up and go to fucking in store everywhere. It's ridiculous. - So absurd. So again, we complain a lot about these aspects of Japan, but we are very grateful to Japan for allowing us to be here. - I mean, there's a reason why you guys still here. - Yeah, we love it. - We're probably gonna stay here. - I'm gonna be living in Japan for a long time. I think that when you live in a place, you have the right to complain about certain things.

- Absolutely. - I complain about everywhere equally. Everywhere sucks. Everywhere sucks. - Exactly, there's no utopian country. - Yeah, exactly. And so, I don't want people to get the idea that we're not fucking grateful. We're not like happy with Japan. - Yeah, we get some comments like that sometimes. - Yeah, we do get comments like that sometimes. And we are very happy here in Japan. - We're just being real with you guys. - We just like to complain about the little things. - You guys like it when we're annoyed about shit.

That's why we're annoyed about shit. - If you guys are gonna move to Japan, I wanna be honest with you and tell you what's gonna be fun and what's gonna suck. - Yeah, there's gonna be lots of fucking great things about it, but just be prepared for those little inconveniences. - Whenever you have to do anything to do with Japanese bureaucracy or just setting up your living situation, I empathize with you. - You will be writing your name, address, and phone number more times than you'll ever think. - You will lose at least a week just

- Yeah, I think that's the thing that annoys me. In the UK when I had to deal with this stuff, it was maybe an hour out of my day at most and I'd get on with my day. If it happens here, it derails your whole week. Like it takes it completely. You have to reschedule everything, cancel everything you're doing 'cause you got a call from the bank and they said that your card's canceled and they didn't tell you until then. It's canceled, bye. - I just remembered, like, I don't know if you guys have it in the UK, but like in Japanese and Australian airports, there's like sometimes that service where like, you know how,

on your suitcase, you can put like a belt around it so that it doesn't burst open. Some people forget that or don't buy that. So instead you can use a service that you can like wrap up your bag and like- - I see that in the UK. - In Australia, it's like 10 seconds. You just like wrap this up. Here's the money, they do it. All right, see you later. I did it in 100 once in Japan and they were like, okay, can you fill out this form?

Write your name, address and phone number. I'm like, I'm never gonna see you again. Just wrap up my God damn bag. - Get the fucking cling film out, wrap it around and I'll give you 20 bucks. - I like, I dead ass, I looked at this woman. I was like, what do you need this for? Like, why do you need to know my name, phone number and address? And they're like, oh, you know, like just in case. I'm like, it gets,

- You're wrapping my bag in plastic. - I'm a customer. I will do it myself. Give me the cling film. - Give me the cling film. I'll fucking do it myself. - I will do it right now. I will pay you to not fill it that full. - It was ridiculous. - It's frustrating, man. - And I just wasted like, you know, two minutes of my life filling out this form that for one, I don't even know what they're gonna use it for. But second of all,

- It's just frustrating giving out your whole fucking information to shit that you feel like it just totally doesn't need it. Like, I just don't want to deal with that. I hate doing that. - But it's also like, you know, I feel as well, like there's so many situations where you're canceling something or you know, you're upgrading something. Right. And you're just like, all right, can you write your phone number and address?

I'm pretty sure all my information is on system. Just look it up. I'll give you my fucking name. Just look it up. - I'll let you know. - Yeah. - I'll keep you updated. - Like how often do you think I'm changing my name and address? - Like one thing I'm fucking dreading when we move, 'cause we're all planning to move from where we are now. I mean, you're already in the process of moving. - Yeah. - Is just the process of,

changing my address in every bill that I've had. And I'm just, I wake up in a cold sweat at night sometimes being like, I gotta do that. - I have been suffering for the past month on that. And it shouldn't be a suffering thing. - It just sucks 'cause I feel like your life just comes to a halt for a month because they've designed systems that make it so. - And it's got nothing to do with like, you know, people who don't understand the language having a hard time. No, even if you're fully Japanese,

it's still hard as shit to do. And it shouldn't be that hard to do. - You get pretty good customer service in most aspects of Japanese life, I think. But this, for some reason with personal information companies, I feel like it comes to a halt and it doesn't improve at all. The customer service isn't any better for it. I think that's why, I think Japan has one of the lowest productivities out of first world countries. - I'm not surprised. - 'Cause they work the most. - We would have flying cars by now.

They work more hours than any other country and have less to show for it. You know what I mean? Like, you know, I think in some European countries they're considering a four day work week even. And you know, which is like fantastic. - You bring that up to government officials in Japan. They're like, how does that country run? How is that not a third world country?

- How is their economy not crumbling to the ground? - Because again, it's just like, how do you fix it when everything in society has been made to be long-winded, bloated and slow? Like, what do you do? Like, how do you fix that? 'Cause it's like a whole cultural thing at that point. - Like this is a country where a lot of schools are still six days a week.

- Yeah. - Ridiculous. Let alone four day work week, what? - Yeah, I mean, it took like a fucking global pandemic, right? For the country to embrace working from home and online meetings, right? - They were throwing out like the buzzword of like home workstation or whatever the fuck it was. Like it was a new thing that was just invented. It's like, we've come up with this revolutionary thing. Get this, you can work.

- From home, Japanese people are like impossible. That is. - Telework. - Yeah, telework. - They call it telework. - Also I think they're now slowly starting to face out the Hanko because of it. They're finally putting in like the government, they're bringing it up and trying. - Have we ever explained Hankos? I don't think we have. - Have we? - Hanko basically is like the, it's like a stamp essentially that has your surname on it or company name or whatever. Basically it's the Japanese equivalent of a signature.

- It's incredibly tedious. - It's incredibly tedious because that means you have to carry your hanko everywhere. - Yeah. - Whenever you're like, if you forget. - I've had moments where I'm like, I have everything except the hanko and they just don't accept it. And I'm just like, this is a stamp I bought at Don Quixote for like 200 years. - Don Quixote is like the dollar shop here. You can just get it at a dollar shop. - Imagine your name is Connor, right?

And then you go to those gift shops and they have like the license plates, like Connor, it's like that. Like imagine you just go to the store, you find your name on the license plate and then you bring it and go, look, it's my name.

- It's my name, look, take a picture. - The thing is, is like, I read up a thing as to why Japan still uses the hanko and not signatures. And the most accepted excuse, I guess, I'm just gonna call it an excuse. As to why they don't use signatures, they were like, "Well, anyone can copy a signature."

Everyone can go to Don Quixote and buy a $2 stamp. What are you on? - Yeah, it's so dumb. I mean, if you have a popular name. - Yeah, what happens if you have a popular name? - What is it? What's the one that you always see Tanaka? Is that the one that you always see? - Yeah, Tanaka or like Sato, like any of like the common ones. Everyone probably, every Sato probably has the same fucking Don Quixote stamp. So I'm like,

There's bullshit. Like it's signature is way harder to copy than buying a stamp. - Did you hear about the fucking Josh battle royale that happened recently? - Yeah, yeah. - What? Did you hear about this? - No. - So like, I think like a year ago, some guy in like some state or something, he looked up every, his name was Josh. - Josh Swain. - Josh Swain. - Josh Swain. - Josh Swain. - Josh Swain. He looked up like every Josh on Facebook in his area and added them to a group, right?

And he just sends a message, "Guys, you know why we're here." - We're gonna battle for the name Josh Swain. - There are only Joshes here. We are gonna have a battle royale and whoever emerges victorious can keep the name Josh. - So that's how it works with hankers. - I feel like they have to do that with hankers, right? - There's literally a fucking battle royale movie in Japan where it's that exact same concept. - Is it really? - Yeah, yeah. It's called "Real Tag."

where basically it's like a survival horror movie. It's actually a really good movie and book, but basically it's set in like the future where the King of Japan, his name is Sato, which is the most common surname in Japan. And he's like, I want to be the only Sato. So what he does is every night at midnight, he's like all of the Sato's in the country have to come out. - He picks legend games.

- Yeah, literally. And they're like, "To all Satos of Japan, there are too many of you, so we're gonna get rid of some of you." And it's like literally a survival horror movie where all the Satos are like running for their life not to get fucking eliminated. - It sounds epic. - It's a great fucking movie, yeah. - Sounds like an anime. - Yeah. - Yeah, it really does.

- It's not a great move, but it's literally like that. - I'm just trying to think, is there anything in like UK or Australia that is like unnecessarily like slow? I feel like we just kind of get rid of it. - Oh yeah, I mean, we've already complained about that. - I feel like as in like the systems that we have, I don't really think there's anything that's like, everything's been like easy to do. - I mean, I didn't really have experience living on my own.

- In Australia, so I can't really say. - Everything that could be done online is done online. - Yeah. - I mean, yeah, most. - I cannot even, I don't even think I ever went anywhere in person for anything like government. Like it could all be done by phone or online. - Yeah. - Water bill, internet, phone.

government documents, like local tax, like all of it was done online. - I think the only thing really is like, you know, going to get like your driver's license fixed or something, right? Like you probably have to go in person for that. - Even then in the UK, you can get it mailed to you. - Yeah, like when I renewed my driver's license, I literally just sent them the license in the mail, uploaded a scan of my picture and then they just renewed it for me. - Okay, you can't do that in Australia. - I mean, we've really been like, the UK has gotten really good at making things

- It's efficient. And I guess I just took that for granted. - You sure did Garnt. You sure did. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You were like, "Everywhere's like this." - I'm like, I thank God that we're signed with Geeks Plus and they handle our tax. - Yeah. - 'Cause like- - Oh God, I can only imagine doing two. I've heard horror stories. - I mean, I did my tax before joining Geeks Plus and it was the fucking worst.

- If you are a freelancer in Japan, good luck in tax. - I've heard of freelance tax forms in Japan. - Oh, it is god awful. - Doing tax in the UK is bad enough. And I'm just like, if that was bad, how was it in fucking Japan? - Oh, it's god awful. I hate it. I regret it. - You know, I thought it was bad in the UK, but now I look back at how doing taxes was in the UK, I'm like, everything can be done online. - Yeah, everything can be done online at home. - It's pretty good. There's an app, you know. - In Japan, you have to take a fucking bag full of receipts to like the town

ward and like yeah go through all of it and like fill it in yourself oh it is the worst

That's why there's no freelancers in Japan. 'Cause they're like, fuck that. I don't wanna deal with that shit. - That's so sad. - I'll join a company. - That's so sad. - It's the worst. - I will say though, it was pretty cool the first time I discovered the hanko. - It's cool for 10 seconds until it becomes a burden. - Yeah, it's cool for like the first week you live in here when like, ooh, I'm- - Oh, I'm part of Japan now. I'm part of the culture here, guys. - Let me put my signature. - Look at my clan. It's the Manitou clan.

- That's what it feels like, right? When you're fucking stamping your second name down, you're like, bro, this is legit. - And then make it like a really like traditional, like kind of swirly, like feudal Japan style stamp. It looks dope. - It looks dope. I can see why they haven't like gotten rid of it. 'Cause it feels like I feel cultured as I'm stamping my fucking name down. You know when you see like an old,

in old films where they're writing a letter and then they fucking stamp down the wax. That's what it feels like every time I stamp down my hanko here. But then it gets to a point where you live here for a year and you're just like,

"Fuck sake, can we not just go back to signature?" - Just give me a pen. - Then you stamp it and they're like, "No, it's not good enough. You haven't stamped it enough." And I'm like, "What do you mean? I can read it." - It's like, "Oh, it's slightly crooked. Can you fill it in again, please?" - Oh yeah, if it's slightly crooked. - They don't accept it. - And if there's slightly not enough ink on it, they just won't accept it. - Yeah, also I remember I filled out this three page document and I made one mistake and I did the line through it. And the guy at the driving lesson place was like, "You gotta redo it all."

I'm like, why? It's like, you've made a mistake. You gotta redo it all. - You can't cross things out here. - I'm like, I crossed it out there. - 100% accuracy only in Japan. - I'm like, what do you mean? You can clearly- - There is no 80% in Japan, only 100% right. - I'm like, you can clearly make out, there is absolutely no problem here. You know that I don't mean the thing that I crossed out and you know the thing, what I meant to put. Why are you gonna make me fill out this three page document again because I made one mistake?

- It's like everything is a fucking like trapeze act where if you fuck up, you gotta redo your whole life. Born, do life again, reset life. - Jesus. - Yeah, only perfection here. - I'm surprised that when you fill out a document, they're like, "Nope, no license for you, come back next day." "We'll redo it again." - Basically, if you want to live in Japan, I hope you like filling out forms.

- Correctly. - Correctly, 'cause you are- - No mistakes. - Expect perfection in every way. - It's like moving here is kind of like form simulator 2021, honestly. - Some papers please, but every day. - It's exhausting, man.

- Yeah, that's kind of why I'm dreading these next few months when we move studios and move houses. - I'm gonna be in a foul mood in like October when I have to move. I'm just gonna not wanna talk to anyone. Fuck you. - Yeah. - Yeah, if we're complaining now about this, when we actually start moving, my God, our podcast episode is so much more depressing. - It's 'cause I know I'm gonna lose at least a week just from this alone. So sorry if you don't get any videos for like that.

- My fucking video schedule is like the slowest it's ever been because of this shit. It shouldn't be like that. It's ridiculous. - How do normal people who work nine to fives, oh sorry, I mean, sorry, nine to 12s in Japan, how do they have time to do this stuff? I don't understand because people don't stop working here and stuff closes on weekends here. So what do they do? I don't understand. - They take pay leave.

- They take a week off, are you serious? - They take a week off to move? Wait, don't they only have by law a week of paid holiday anyway?

- 20 whole days in the year. - So you lose what, like five? You lose a quarter of your paid holiday if you want to move here in Japan. - Japan, the country we're moving is a luxury. - If you wanna do anything in Japan, you gotta take a day off to call them up and do it. - Yeah, exactly. - It's ridiculous. You wanna, oh, you know, you can't, you know, if you wanna change your phone provider, you gotta take a day off work. How weird is that? What the fuck?

- The fact that you can't just do it like during a lunch break is ridiculous. - It's tragic, it really is tragic. - So as someone who has moved before Joey, what is the moving experience like here in Japan? - Hell. - 'Cause you've already moved once here in Japan, right? - I've moved twice now. - Oh, you've moved twice. - Yeah, so the place I'm about to move to will be my fourth place. - Oh shit, okay. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Well, you've moved twice, but you've had four places.

- Well, yeah. - How does that work? - Well, I mean, I moved in here and then I moved to separate times. - Oh, okay. - Sorry, sorry, sorry. - I was like, wait, those numbers don't add up. - Two plus two equals four. - Well, the first time I moved, when I moved from Australia to Japan, it was a lot easier for me because I had help from my auntie. So she did all the paperwork for me 'cause I didn't know fucking how to do it. But then she was like, "All right, well now you know how to do it."

- What, do I? Do I? - It's like when someone builds a PC for you, like, great, you can do it on your own now. - Yeah. - She's like, you've passed the tutorial stage. - Yeah, yeah. - Like, I hope you're paying attention. I'm like, thanks. - Expert mode beginning. - It's not even like a, would you like to listen to that again option. It's just like, I hope you were listening. Yeah, so the first time when I moved here was fine. But then from the second time on, when I moved to my own place,

- Yeah, it was hell and it's still hell. This is the third time I'm doing it now. And it's not easier at all. Like the only thing that makes it easier now is that you know exactly the list of things you need to do. But the list of, but the process of going through that list. - The time is not any more efficient. - The time is not any more efficient.

It is just as time consuming and fucking ridiculous. - So no one moves, right? No one wants to improve their life 'cause they're like, "Well, I do wanna improve my life." - But that's what I'm saying, right? - "I've got asbestos, I've got mold." But frankly, putting up that paper is more. - Well, that's what I'm saying. It's not an understatement to say that, or not an overreaction to say that moving in Japan is a luxury and it shouldn't be a luxury. It's fucking ridiculous.

- That's ridiculous. - That's why they're able to charge the same amount when you have to renew your contract. - That's why they charge you up the ass. - I don't know if we explained this, but the reason we're all moving is because when your contract ends for like your rental periods, normally you'd think it can just easily roll over and stuff. - That's how it does in the UK. - That's how it does in the UK. That's how it did in Thailand for me. - Most countries, yeah. - Yeah, that's how it did in most countries. Nope, you got to go through the same process again and pay the same fees.

- You gotta pay two months of rent for free. - Yeah. - For no reason. - Yeah. - Because they want it. - Because you got a roof. - No, fuck you. I'm not fucking giving you two months of money for free. For what? For this shitty apartment, fuck off. - Yeah, it's ridiculous. - Yeah.

- Yeah, I hate it. - Did you use like a moving company the first time you moved? - Yeah, I got a moving company, but I mean, the moving company we're using for now, the new places like has like a service where like they'll come in and like pack it for you. Like weirdly enough, the moving company is probably the easiest thing to sort out when moving. It's everything else that's a pain. Like the internet is the fucking worst. - Oh, I can imagine. - Like setting up internet for a new place is,

- That's hard in the UK as well. That's like the hardest one. 'Cause they're just like, "Oh yeah, so are you okay going four months without internet in your new place?" It's like, "No, no I'm fucking not."

- Yeah, but at least like without current price, like they'll give us like a kind of portable or not portable, but like a rental wifi kind of thing. So you're not like completely out of internet. - It still sucks though. - Yeah, it still sucks that I have to wait for like the full price to like kick in, but yeah. I mean, yeah, the moving company is weirdly the smoothest thing. - Sick. - Yeah. - Awesome. - I remember in the UK when I moved all my stuff to my parents' house,

Again, I was trying to do it as cheap as possible. And there was like a service that had like vans but for Uber. I don't know about this. It was called like Anyvan or something in the UK. - Right, right. - Paid a guy.

- Guess how much it cost to go basically from London to North Wales. Like that's like basically half the UK. - Right. - How much do you think that cost to hire that van? - Like one van? - Just one guy in a van just driving. - Normally I'd think maybe like, I don't know, 300 pounds maybe? - It was 120 pounds I think I paid. - That sounds sus as fuck. - And I was so fucking scared the whole time when I put my, 'cause this guy was just like, "All right, what are we doing? "What are we putting in the boxes?" - What are we doing?

- What were we doing? It was just like some guy who just like, again, again, like Uber for vans, just chilling. - Wow. - He was really nice. My mom was like, "Yeah, he was really nice when he got there." I was like, "Sick." - That just sounds like- - It was so cheap and I was like, "This guy can't be getting much." So I gave him a fat tip 'cause apparently he was really nice and was really helpful to my mom. - That sounds scary though, doesn't it? Like that just calls for some dude who has all your stuff in his van and just drives off into the middle of nowhere. - There was a GPS tracker on his car, but again, he could just take it. - Oh, you went with him? - No. - Oh, okay.

- Oh, that's more scary. - I just gave him all my valuable stuff. I was like, "See you later." - Jesus Christ. - So your laptop, your PC, all your equipment. - Yeah, everything. - Gee, that's scary. - And somehow we fit it all in a van and everything. And yeah, somehow it was fine. And the service was great. It was pretty much cheap as fuck. - Yeah, Jesus. - I'm thinking, I'm like, "The fuel must have been like half of that."

- I don't know what that costs. Like this man cannot be getting any money from this. That's why I was like, fat tip. - Yeah, he might be living just strictly off tips. - Yeah, I don't know if I can feel bad, but yeah. - I mean, I don't know, like, 'cause like tipping culture, I don't know, tipping culture is different everywhere in the world, right? And in the UK, it's, the UK is like kind of in the middle, I guess, of tipping culture. Japan is non-existent, which, you know, there are times when I wish that I could tip people in Japan, 'cause I get some of the best customer service here

I've ever had worldwide and I can't tip people here. - It's because it's the whole philosophy of, you know,

the best customer service is expected. - Wait, what was the tangent that we were on before I started talking about my van? We're talking about your moving company, right? - Yeah, moving company. - I basically just said the moving company was- - Doing it. Oh yeah, true, easy. - 'Cause when I moved in the UK from London back to Brighton, I just used Gumtree. And I feel like with the UK, I don't know anyone who's actually used a moving company. Everyone's just known a mate who has a van. - At least one friend has like a

- I mean, that's just pretty our age. But I think when the people who use moving companies are like families, absurd amounts of stuff. - That makes sense. - 'Cause at my age, when I moved out, I recycled or threw away probably about 70% of my belongings. 'Cause I'm like, I don't need this anymore. 'Cause I was like, oh, well, you know.

I put everything for free on Gumtree, all my stuff. I was like, "Come get it." Who wants my wardrobe? Who wants my fucking- - Oh yeah, that's what I did with our current movie as well. There's like a Japanese side where you can just throw like couches and beds for free and people just come pick it up. - People go on like Craigslist, like fucking give things away. - Yeah, because throwing out trash here costs fucking money. And like an absurd amount of money to throw out where I'm just like, why would anyone do that? - Paying the ass. - Just give it to someone. - True, true. - I know.

- Shit, I just remembered, banks, sorry. Sorry to shit on banks again. You can't, I remember I was out in Shibuya and I was out till like 2:00 AM. I was like, all right, well, I wanna go home now.

So I'm gonna get a taxi. And I was like, great, well, I've got no money. So I was gonna quickly go and get some money from the ATM. Turns out that after working hours, you just can't withdraw money. So, you know, if, fuck me, if I was stranded in the middle of nowhere, I can't get money. I have to wait until what? 8:00 AM until the banks open up for some reason so the ATMs stop fucking working. - Is that right? - I've never, I don't think I've ever had to.

- I don't think I've ever had to take money out like that way. - Sometimes I have a good night, I spend more than I intended to, I got no more cash left. No biggie, I'll get some from the ATM. No, fuck me, fuck me. And even if it is during working hours, I gotta pay anyway. What am I paying for? It's an ATM, there's no one there.

There's no one in the machine giving you money, is there? Is there just a small man sleeping in the machine who's awake, doing these out? Why is it this much? - Yeah, like there are some ATMs, like to explain, there are some ATMs in the UK that do charge to take money out, but they're like the like no branded ATMs at some sketchy like corner shop or something like that. - Those are the ones where like there's probably a man inside.

- Just taking your money. - Those are the ones where it's fucking 2:00 AM or something. You just need some fucking money out to go to the club or something. And you're like, sure, I'll pay five pounds to take out my 20 pound entry fee to this club. Whatever, I'm drunk enough to do it. Now imagine that before every transaction you do and that's taking out money here in Japan. You have to take out a lot of money at a time. - Yeah, they charge like five bucks I think each time or something. - Yeah, they charge like five bucks every- - Just like, want to access my fucking money. - Unless you go to that,

- Banks branded ATM. - But even then sometimes they charge you.

- Yeah, because you have a limit as to how many times you can take money out per month. - But that depends. If for some reason you're a rich motherfucker and you have X amount of money in your bank, it's free. They're like, "No, no, no, it's on us. It's on us. You have a lot of money with us, we ain't gonna charge you." - Punish the poor, feed the rich. - Why are you taxing the fucking poor people? What the fuck? That's just like, what's wrong? It's like everything in this system is designed to make you hate them. - Damn you, capitalism.

- When I wanted to get the taxi home, I was like, I'm so goddamn lucky that I have a foreign card that I just carry on me at emergencies. 'Cause I'm like, you never know. - Yeah, my foreign, my British cards is just like my get out of jail free card. It's like 100% more reliable than using the card

in the country it was made from. Like, how does that work? - My British bank card works every single ATM. Any time of the day, whenever they bet, they don't charge me. They just charge me the exchange rate costs, which I accept, you know, 'cause I'm changing the money. Whatever, they gotta do that. But you know.

I genuinely don't know how I would have got home that night if I didn't have my British card. What does Japanese people do in this? They just go to the fucking manga cafes, don't they? - Well, no, because you'd have to pay for the manga cafe. And if you don't have cash, you can't even pay for it. They literally sleep outside of the station. - Homeless simulator for like six hours. - No, I mean, you've probably seen it before. They literally sleep outside of the stations. - Or is that like the Shibuya Meltdown shit? - Yeah, Shibuya Meltdown is something else, but like...

Sometimes I've seen walking past the station or whatever, there's like couples and like businessmen just sleeping outside of the station waiting for it to wake up.

Like it's ridiculous. - Absolute insanity that this is what has come to. - Talking about this now, I'm like, I'm really starting to sweat this year, right? Because of the world situation, haven't been able to travel back to the UK. And I look at the expiry date on my card and it's like creeping up, right? 'Cause it was like, 'cause before I moved out- - It's like the death note counter. - It sends you an automatic one though, at least my bank does. - Yeah, it sends me to my UK address.

which no one is living in right now 'cause my parents are in fucking Thailand, I'm here in Japan. So my, I'm not gonna say what the exact date, but my- - My exact address. - It is in 2021, my expiry date for my British card. And I'm just like- - Hey, when's mine expire?

- I'm starting to sweat 'cause I'm just like, shit man, if I can't travel back to the UK to get my new cards, then I'm kind of just like resting on my Japanese cards to work now. - Mine's 2023, we good, we Gucci, we Gucci, we Gucci. Fuck you, Gomp.

- Yeah, it's scary. - Yeah, I mean, that was a nice little rant. - Banks of hell here. Sorry, I'm sure most people have absolutely no care in the world about Japanese banks, but now you know a lot more about them. - There's a lot of audiences of Trash Taste who are like, "One day I wanna live in Japan and live that weeb dream." Just be prepared. - I think we've done a good job at least, you know,

- Bigging up the stuff that is worth giving praise to. And we're brutally honest about the ship parts. - Honestly, like all things considered Japan is like,

I don't know if it's the best, but it's definitely like either comparing the UK to Japan, it's been a fucking amazing place to live. And I don't know if I'll put it as the best, but it's definitely top two. - Plus is definitely outweigh the minus. - I think I enjoy living here in the UK more so. - I mean, I'm definitely have enjoyed my previous year and a half more than I have in the UK. We'll see how I am five years down the line, you know? But right now I can, I'm definitely living here for like- - I'm approaching my fifth year.

- I'm definitely gonna be here for at least two, three more years, I think. - Definitely, definitely. Because I fucking love it here. It's so much fun. It's an amazing country. - So expect Trash Taste for at least another two or three years. - Just don't tell me I have to move house or fucking change my internet or change my phone 'cause I am...

- Just tell me ahead of time when that happens, 'cause I'll just fucking get out of there before I'm like- - This rant is me like mentally preparing for like the month in this year that I'm gonna have to dedicate to moving. - Yeah, I mean paying taxes was way more like much, much more enjoyable than doing any of the forms I had to do in Japan.

- But anyway, you know who doesn't charge us to use ATMs? Our wonderful patrons. - Oh my God, look at them. - But look at this guy here on the screen. - They live rent free in our heads. - I would charge them to get their money out. - I bet they have a good banking system. That's why they're supporting us. - I bet this guy.

- I bet this guy could get his bank statement online. - I bet they can pay all their bills online. - Of course they can. - Hey, if you'd like to support the show then- - That's what they're doing right now. - Make sure to go to patreon.com/trashtaste. - I just look forward to the day where I don't have to pay my bills by carrier pigeon. - Yeah, exactly. - Can't wait for it. But thank you so much for watching this episode of "Trash Taste." Hope you enjoyed it. Don't forget to listen to us on Spotify. Go to the Reddit and check out the memes.

- Oh my God, you said it for once. - I didn't have to do it. - I did it for once. Sorry, Joe. - I got to do that next time. - Damn, my job is obsolete now. - You're obsolete now, Joe. Thank you so much for watching this episode of Trash Taste. See ya. - Bye.