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monday.com. Wow.

1:35

Hello and welcome to the

1:38

Abroad Japan podcast.

1:47

Probably the best way of learning about life in

1:49

Japan by actually being in Japan. I'm your host

1:51

Chris Broad and we're joined as always by England's

1:54

top Japan enthusiast, Mr Pete Donaldson himself. Pete, how

1:56

the devil are you doing? What's going on? Howdy

1:58

Christopher. I... I have

2:01

bought spectacles off the internet. Access

2:04

subtle exerciser is that people are watching

2:06

on you tube see that my am

2:08

my eyes are a little bit more

2:11

kind of reflective and glassy of them

2:13

before and that shoots out a dad

2:15

dad does stateside broke my glasses and

2:17

or other baby did the baby grub

2:20

my glasses a naughty baby and broke

2:22

my glasses and and then I lay

2:24

a walks into a wall unrelated and

2:26

and both a couple of situations. men

2:29

the my glasses. Brock and of my

2:31

you know off of got my prescription I'm

2:33

just gonna cheap out and go to a

2:35

expectancy spectacles average iq is expensive if he's

2:38

of a dose Chris and they are an

2:40

opposite York there is a massive monopoly for

2:42

like two or three companies and actually my

2:44

only be one company the basically own at

2:47

all of his last com in the world's

2:49

and that yeah I went saw that I'm

2:51

going to go and buy somebody's t on

2:53

the thing that so and I don't mind

2:56

the design but they were already fifty quid

2:58

and they're very reflective. I didn't. Go for

3:00

the em. Especial courting you

3:02

know, the special corners. Our policy

3:04

was bit more active than usual

3:07

and but yeah, averaged ever go

3:09

to May I'm gonna be taking

3:11

some moral receipts. A rather

3:13

my father in law as good as

3:15

his fifth seed because he got a

3:17

drive with of of the car of

3:19

they know nothing of been fighting it

3:21

to went to M O T last

3:23

friday and and it didn't pass less

3:25

minimum specs that was never gonna pass

3:27

because it's twenty four years old now

3:29

and but i was very surprised at

3:31

how few things needed to be done,

3:33

how many to defeating in a bid

3:35

on and it was literally just couple

3:37

of windscreen wipers which he always made

3:39

a name would say am a seat

3:41

belt as a fan seat. belts and

3:43

buckles had disappeared and in inside

3:46

the yeah inside the track such

3:48

pull out when i get rusty

3:50

events and just the gus struts

3:52

in the in the hood and

3:54

also i'm a spent you know

3:57

so i've spent most of the

3:59

week dealing with

4:01

amayama.com and yoshiparts.com

4:06

trying to find official Toyota

4:12

arms and bushes for the front of my

4:14

car. So I'm quite excited Chris, it's going

4:18

to get through MOT I think and

4:20

it's going to pass with flying colors

4:23

hopefully. Well I mean yeah, it's been

4:26

a long time coming, it's felt endless, and

4:29

the maker still haven't got possession of it or driven

4:31

it. Most importantly though, is the Encarta 95 hat

4:33

you're wearing, he's wearing

4:36

a hat if you're not watching on YouTube, is that

4:38

the encyclopedia from Microsoft 95? It is,

4:41

yeah. Yeah,

4:43

yeah. I thought that was good. For the summer

4:45

I thought I'm going to get a hat, I'm going to

4:47

be a hat guy. The problem

4:50

with having a moustache and

4:52

a baseball cap is that you do

4:55

resemble someone who should be on some kind of list.

4:57

I don't have the sort of head that can hold

4:59

a baseball cap. After

5:01

all, we're British people

5:04

Chris, I think baseball caps can be

5:07

difficult as the libertine once sang. So

5:09

yeah, so we've both got, what's

5:12

your baseball cap saying Chris? I've

5:14

got like four here, I like this one. Yeah, it

5:16

says to protect

5:18

by might factors, let

5:21

things take their course,

5:23

an axe of ravage. An axe! I don't know

5:27

what that is. An axe

5:29

of ravage. We need to screenshot this and put

5:31

it out. We're just two hat guys, we're

5:34

just two hat guys hanging out. I look like with

5:36

this moustache as well, I look like I'm in witness

5:38

protection. Well this hat now

5:41

can kind

5:43

of conceal my awful weird rash that

5:45

I seem to have had the other day, as we

5:47

mentioned in the last episode. Also got this hat here,

5:50

that says, I think this is

5:52

like my collection of hats, I got

5:54

like the 100 in store. They've always got weird, creepy

5:57

English on. This just says, don't you think so?

6:00

What happened afterwards is of no concern

6:03

to me is that light. That

6:06

boxer versus wrestler fight is

6:09

advertised, splendid, advertised.

6:11

That's a lot in there and that's

6:14

all been kind of needle-painted. That's a

6:16

machine has gone and actually created like

6:18

a hundred of those. It's incredible. I

6:21

wonder where these hats are made. I

6:24

think I'll find out. A bit of

6:26

documentary. Yeah. Seeking out Japan's

6:28

hundred yen hats. It

6:30

was weird sweatshop in Miami. I

6:32

said to them so weird crappy

6:34

sentences in. I turned up

6:37

with this hat and my partner Sarah who's

6:39

about three years older than me. Might

6:41

be four actually. And she

6:43

she won't like me to turn that

6:45

she she said what is

6:47

in Carter 95? I was

6:49

like Sarah. I mean

6:51

it wasn't moment in time but I mean

6:53

if you remember it Chris and you're like

6:56

eight years. I do. I've got I've got

6:58

like seven years on you. I think so.

7:00

Yeah, it's crazy. That

7:02

was what we had before Wikipedia right in cards

7:04

in cards are nice. I was like a encyclopedia

7:06

had a cool animation at the start and

7:09

then he could look up anything and learn

7:11

like my man. All amount of information. Yeah,

7:13

I mean it would never it would never

7:15

give you I don't think anybody used

7:17

it for research. I think they just it

7:20

was a nice you would just watch the Maradona

7:22

goal the hand the one

7:24

before. It was after hand the God

7:26

goal. I'd watch I'd watch

7:28

David boy singing. I think

7:30

let's dance or

7:32

heroes. I think I was on there. Yeah, it

7:35

was like a 30 second clip of heroes in

7:37

the very much in the

7:39

fair use category of Microsoft and that was

7:41

it really. That's all I

7:44

remember from in car 95. But I'm repping

7:46

the brand repping the brand and next I'll

7:48

be using maybe speaking speaking

7:50

typing tutorials. That'll be

7:52

my next hat. It

7:55

was a simple time. There was no Wikipedia or

7:57

maybe there was but it was very simplistic in

7:59

it. fairly form and come a

8:01

long way. A terrifying way. We got one

8:03

question, sorry not a question, a story from

8:05

Megan who says, hello lads,

8:08

I currently live in Hokkaido and

8:10

I have a fun little story from a recent flight

8:12

in Japan. To set the scene it was December and

8:14

I was on a flight from Sapporo to Tokyo. I'd

8:17

snagged a window seat when I booked and

8:19

as Japan is one of the few countries that boards

8:21

planes efficiently, I was seated pretty quickly

8:23

and settled in. Soon I saw

8:25

who I'd be sharing the road with, a

8:28

young mother and her two children. She ushered

8:30

her and a guest four year old into

8:32

the middle seat and she with

8:34

her young baby, perhaps one years old, took the aisle

8:36

seat and I was trapped. But

8:39

thinking the Japanese children are

8:41

generally well behaved and I had my

8:44

headphones, in any case I wasn't too

8:46

worried about the relatively short flight. I

8:48

understood enough Japanese to get by so I overheard

8:50

the child ask his mum

8:53

why a gaijin was in the window seat

8:55

when he wanted to be there himself. The

8:57

mum tried to explain the whole process

8:59

of airline ticketing to him but

9:02

I thought I'd help by telling him that if

9:04

he wanted to look out the window he could

9:06

switch seats when the seatbelt sign was off. When

9:08

we started cruising and as promised I

9:11

asked if Korkun, his name is Korkun,

9:14

would like to switch a seat with

9:16

me now. Before I had managed to

9:18

even unbuckle my seatbelt, Korsun or Korkun

9:20

had thrown his off and

9:22

climbed into my lap to

9:24

gaze out the window. My God! Not

9:27

what I had in mind, suddenly I was stuck with the

9:29

child in my lap and he seemed quite comfortable. I looked

9:31

over to the mum for help but she seemed preoccupied with

9:33

the baby and I suppose she wasn't at all fast. Korkun

9:37

sat in my lap quite happily looking out the

9:39

window for some time and then

9:41

becoming engrossed in his Ampanman

9:43

book. Eventually he returned to his own seat,

9:45

the plane landed and the family made their

9:48

way to wherever they were going.

9:50

Maybe this is an unusual occurrence as

9:52

a few podcasts ago there was a

9:54

survey noting that Japanese travellers were stressing

9:56

near strangers but this certainly wasn't the

9:58

case for this young family. family. I'm

10:01

not particularly maternal so I'm always

10:03

surprised when kids decide to like

10:05

me for whatever reason. It

10:07

might be different for men but have either of

10:09

you guys had similar experiences where kids have taken

10:11

a liking to you and acted in a funny

10:13

or strange manner. That is oddly

10:16

specific. Thanks for the podcast

10:18

guys. Always enjoying your trips

10:20

and travels around Japan.

10:22

Meghan, to which I say

10:24

no Meghan, no kids like me,

10:26

I'm a monster. I'm sure

10:28

Pete Donaldson fares a lot better in

10:31

that topic. He's a nice sort of

10:33

happy man. I'm sure you do well with the

10:35

kids. Yeah but I've got this mustache

10:37

haven't I? Parents don't

10:39

necessarily need that in their life

10:41

do they? I think

10:44

the first time we recorded a podcast

10:46

for YouTube, for use on YouTube, I

10:48

told a story about being in a

10:50

hotel onsen where a naked child was

10:53

running around really close to my face unhelpfully.

10:56

We had to take the story

10:58

out because you would

11:00

not let me talk about my

11:02

unfortunate experience with a

11:04

naked Chinese baby. To be fair,

11:07

not telling that

11:09

story makes that sound more suspicious. I had

11:11

nothing to do with me and very much

11:13

to do with the parents. They

11:16

didn't seem to give a shit

11:18

about their very loud annoying naked

11:20

child running around a pretty nice

11:23

onsen. But yeah, sometimes with babies

11:26

and children I find it quite hard

11:28

to figure out what to say. Do

11:30

you know what I mean? I

11:32

start to talk to them like a grown

11:34

up. Like a kid who lives a couple

11:36

of hours down who turned up a little

11:38

while ago at the door because

11:41

the parents couldn't get back in time.

11:43

They went, hey can I

11:45

come in? And he loves me because

11:48

he knows that I know

11:50

what WWE is and there's very few adults

11:52

in his life who know about wrestling. The

11:55

gateway. I mean

11:57

he is very, it's quite upsetting because

11:59

he's He's quite surface level. You

12:01

know, he loves his Roman Reigns. He loves

12:04

his Cody Rhodes. Whereas I don't

12:06

like those people. And I like

12:08

people who died in the 90s. And

12:15

yeah, I've tried talking to him about Junkyard Dog

12:17

and Ravishing Rick Rude, but he's not interested. The

12:19

lad's not interested and I understand that, I respect

12:21

that. But I do sometimes, he

12:23

came around the house a few weeks ago and I

12:25

went, do you want a cup of tea? I

12:29

don't know. I don't know whether kids drink tea. I

12:32

used to drink tea when I used to hang

12:34

around me nans, but I'm not sure whether kids

12:36

get to enjoy the sweet kiss of caffeine.

12:38

Either way, give him a cup of tea,

12:40

send him on home to his mum and

12:42

dad, who should have been home. So

12:44

enjoy that caffeine. My

12:48

Lord, I remember when I first moved here, like on

12:51

the jet program, you never know where you're going to end up.

12:53

You don't know what school you're going to get. I'm bloody lucky

12:55

I got a senior high school, 16 to 18 year old kids.

12:59

I could broadly just about connect with them

13:01

on some level. But

13:03

if they're younger than 16, I don't know what they're doing. I

13:05

don't know what's going on. I remember I

13:08

came to North Japan

13:10

on a plane with another teacher and he

13:13

was like this nice guy,

13:15

but quite tall, quite stern,

13:17

quite shy. And he was tasked

13:19

with running a daycare center. And

13:22

I was like, how does this work? How

13:24

does this connection work out? And

13:26

I think he did all right in the end, but

13:29

it seemed like a bit of a mismatch. But maybe

13:31

I just misjudged him. Maybe I was scary. Maybe he

13:33

just didn't want to talk to me. That is probably

13:35

the most likely reason why we didn't have a good

13:38

chat on the plane. But yeah,

13:40

thank God. If I'd ended up with

13:42

children, young children, I don't know if

13:45

I'd have... It would have been abroad, leaving

13:47

Japan probably after 12 weeks. Would

13:49

have been straight out of there. No thanks.

13:53

Now you might recall guys, about a

13:56

week ago, we had a story about

13:58

Miss Japan 2020. 24

14:01

we came to a few conclusions number one the

14:03

miss Japan beauty pageant is

14:06

ridiculous and just sorely outdated Having

14:08

women come up on stage in a swimsuit Bored

14:11

it around like cattle. It should have

14:13

should have stayed in the 1960s alas.

14:15

It's here people still watch it for

14:17

some fucking reason But

14:20

miss Japan the winner this year

14:22

was a Ukrainian girl

14:24

Ukrainian woman His

14:26

parents are both from Ukraine, but she had been born

14:29

We're not born here, but she'd been raised here from the age of

14:31

five and you know spent a lot of time in Japan fluent in

14:34

the language thinks like a Japanese person

14:36

a lot of ways a but

14:39

but Yeah, I mean, but

14:42

she kind of what was her name Carolina?

14:44

She named so again. Her name was Japanese

14:47

But a lot of people weren't happy that

14:50

someone who wasn't ethnically Japanese

14:52

won the contest They thought

14:54

it was a bit kind

14:56

of unfair to you know, Japanese

14:59

beauty standards I would it would it be fair

15:01

to say Chris the sort of people who are

15:03

really into Miss Japan and Miss

15:05

world are probably Quite

15:07

antiquated in their views anyway. I

15:10

love it. I watch it every week. I watch it all the time What are you all

15:12

about? I love it. I'm watching the region.

15:14

I'm watching the region. I've never met anyone If

15:17

you I've never met anyone he went oh, yeah,

15:19

I'm gonna go watch the miss XYZ pattern. Yeah,

15:21

it's not about the babes It's about the competition.

15:23

It's about the spirit of competition for crying out

15:25

loud It's about

15:27

the broadly poorly thought-out sentences about

15:29

how good world peace would be

15:32

free And and twisting

15:34

around us with anyway regardless She

15:37

won and whether you think that's good

15:39

or not. That's up to you to decide but then

15:42

we only record this the other day and Brand

15:44

new exciting news. She's given up

15:46

her crown. Yeah Because

15:48

turns out she had an affair

15:51

with a married man and

15:53

in Japan having affairs At

15:55

least if your woman is really bad if you're a man It's

15:57

kind of accepted that you can get away with it in your

15:59

career But if you're a woman though, your

16:01

career is done. It's gone. It's

16:04

finished. And unfortunately, Miss

16:06

Japan. It's a

16:08

really cristo crown. And I said, Pete,

16:10

what's going on? What have I missed

16:12

there? Do you ever get the feeling,

16:14

Chris, that when we do these sort

16:16

of new stories, every sort of week

16:19

we'll do a new story about Japan or

16:21

what's been going on and stuff. And

16:23

it's generally like reviewing the

16:26

1950s, isn't it? Very

16:28

like sort of like, right, this has

16:30

happened. Yeah,

16:33

how did Japan file this one up

16:35

to be quite frank? Yes, I mean,

16:37

last month's Miss Japan winner has relinquished

16:39

her title currently, she know, after a

16:42

magazine report reported, because that's what they

16:44

do. They report reports that

16:46

she was having an affair with a married man

16:48

is the first time a Miss Japan winner has

16:50

relinquished their title. The organizers

16:52

said the post will be vacant

16:54

for the year. No second chances

16:57

for number two, the person who

16:59

got the silver medal. The Shukan

17:02

Bündchen reported on Wednesday that she,

17:04

no, twenty six was dating a doctor who

17:06

is married. However, the Miss Japan organizer rebutted

17:08

the claim on Thursday saying that he had

17:10

claimed he was single and that she was

17:12

unaware that he was married. The

17:15

Miss Japan Association believes there's nothing wrong

17:17

with Karolina Shino, it's a website, but

17:19

the association said on Monday, it comes

17:22

to light that she had dated him

17:24

and the knowledge that he was married

17:26

and that she had apologized for lying

17:29

about it. The association accepted Shino's offer

17:31

to step down as Miss Japan. I

17:33

mean, it's yeah, I just I

17:35

think my main takeaway from this is I

17:38

do feel bad for Karolina Shino. This isn't

17:40

her fault. She probably thought, you know, I'll

17:42

go and do Miss Japan in it. Why

17:44

not? And then she won,

17:46

they got the backlash, then cheating came out.

17:49

And that's not so good. They were

17:51

not actually realizing he had a partner. God

17:53

knows. But I think a little bit bad there at

17:55

the same time, I think the competition, if you're

17:58

going to have a Miss Japan competition. They

18:02

should check maybe that you

18:04

are at least like 50%

18:06

ethnically Japanese historically. I do

18:08

think there's

18:11

got to be some degree of ethnicity in

18:13

some respects, especially with Japan, right? Has no

18:16

multicultural history per se. It's not like Europe

18:18

where there's lots of different countries all blended

18:20

together and lots of

18:22

awful empirical stuff that's led

18:25

to things happening in multicultural

18:27

society. Japan hasn't had

18:29

that. People can trace

18:31

their ancestry back here hundreds of thousands of years

18:33

and to sort of negate that seems

18:35

a bit wrong to some extent.

18:38

So I get there has to be some sort

18:41

of line there. And I really think they shouldn't

18:43

have let someone who has not a single element

18:46

of Japanese ethnicity take part at

18:49

this stage anyway. That's my thoughts

18:52

on it because it would

18:54

have saved a lot of hassle and a lot

18:56

of just horrible

18:59

pain for everyone involved here. But

19:01

that's my thoughts on it. As

19:04

I said, it's almost as if

19:06

that this competition should

19:08

have been left behind in the 1970s and

19:11

we shouldn't really have to think about it to

19:13

be honest. Well, I'm going to apply

19:15

for it next time. Yeah. I'm going

19:17

to apply for it. Please do, Chris. Stupid

19:19

competition. But yeah,

19:22

it's definitely, you know, whether

19:24

you guys think, I don't know if she should have relinquished the

19:26

crowd or not. I think

19:29

she just kept it. Sold out about best

19:32

for a tenor. But

19:35

I don't know what vetting is in place for

19:37

the candidates or anything like that. And

19:39

I think private life shouldn't necessarily factor

19:41

into it. I don't know. But again,

19:43

like if you are a celebrity or

19:45

a model or an idol in particular

19:48

in Japan and you're caught

19:50

cheating, your career is sort of done

19:53

instantly. Even though it's quintessentially

19:55

Japanese, they're worse than the French most times. Everyone's

19:58

cheating. Everyone's having an affair. that

20:00

makes her more Japanese. Surely they

20:02

should give her another crown. It's

20:07

true. I mean that is a good point though. Like

20:09

affairs are familiarly

20:12

popular here and you

20:15

know, there's so many.

20:17

Like I can't remember if there was a

20:19

statistic that was like people in Japan don't

20:21

have affairs. Like on the record, the

20:23

number was quite low

20:25

compared to the west. But

20:28

off the record, it's very high.

20:30

Like it's really common here. Where

20:33

marriages are sort of more of

20:35

a business arrangement that's for publics, you

20:37

know, public facing purposes, you know, to

20:39

look good for friends and family. But

20:41

behind the scenes, often, men and women

20:43

in relationships and marriages are doing

20:45

stuff on the side to keep

20:48

themselves happy. So it is very

20:50

common. It

20:53

would be interesting to delve deeper into that, like a

20:55

video or a documentary. But it's

20:57

a very touchy subject of course. But

20:59

yeah, a sad episode really. Overall, I feel

21:02

sorry for the Caroline

21:04

Ashina. All of this stuff, you

21:07

know, she probably didn't expect all this to happen. And

21:10

I think the Miss Japan competition, if

21:12

it continues to exist in any form,

21:14

it should probably just, I

21:16

think to take part as a Japanese citizen,

21:18

you should also have some

21:20

Japanese heritage as well personally,

21:23

to avoid this situation happening

21:25

again. And we'll be back just a moment guys,

21:27

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p dot com. Bounce, that's Japan. Wow.

24:10

And we're back with the facts machine. What do we

24:12

got this week from our listeners, Mr. Doles? Fill us

24:14

in. We got a message from Vass from Greece. Hello,

24:16

Vass from Greece. Um, hello, Fights Chris and PresumptiousP. Whenever

24:18

I hear the word Vass, uh,

24:20

the name Vass, I think of Vass

24:22

from the video game Far Cry. Great

24:25

game. Um, Als. There he is. The

24:27

ridiculously overpriced drinks. The overpriced water bottle.

24:29

Oh yes, yes, yes, yes, agreed. Well,

24:32

Vass will be visiting Japan for the second time

24:34

in August and I'd love to know if you

24:36

have any recommendations for festivals and fireworks shows. No

24:38

particular area in mind. No particular place to go.

24:41

August. Um, have you

24:44

been to any, uh, any in particular

24:46

I'd best to avoid? I mean, around

24:48

about that time you get a lot

24:50

in August of like, um, beer

24:52

festivals and stuff in parks. Uh,

24:55

things like that. Beer festivals. Beer

24:57

festivals. I mean, they have Oktoberfest

24:59

where you can drink delicious German

25:02

beer at a formidable price point.

25:04

It's like 3000 yen for a drop. It's

25:06

awful. It's a shame because I like German

25:08

beer. But if

25:11

you come in in early August, there's fireworks

25:13

displays in every corner of the country. Uh,

25:16

the first fireworks display I ever saw, I

25:18

think was on August 2nd, 2012 in Sakata.

25:23

So you can go up there. But like, yeah, a lot

25:25

of the countryside, Akita and

25:27

Niigata, Yamagata have really big,

25:30

really epic fireworks festivals at

25:32

the start of August. And, uh, yeah, I'd say go

25:34

to like Niigata because it's easy to get to my

25:36

bullet train. And the biggest one, the

25:39

biggest fireworks festival in Japan is,

25:41

uh, Nagaka. And it just looks like a

25:44

scene of a war film. Like all the

25:46

whole explosions from the fireworks were ridiculous.

25:48

And, uh, yeah, I would love

25:50

to go and see that one, but that gets my vote. You've

25:53

been toward yourself, Pete. No, no,

25:56

I always wanted to go to one of those, I want to go

25:58

to a penis festival. Let's make that very clear. I don't know

26:00

if that is actually, do you know what

26:03

that is? No,

26:07

but it's one of the things people very much

26:09

get involved with and get very excited about

26:14

when you see it on documentaries and things like

26:16

that. But I would say that when you are

26:18

at one of the festivals, I imagine getting yours

26:20

out not welcome. I

26:23

think they talk about the game Japan but they don't want to see

26:25

yours. That's what I'm saying. Everyone

26:28

is messed up about that festival. I

26:30

like the idea of like celebrating fertility. That's

26:33

great. But

26:35

then they have lollipops that people

26:38

suck in the shape of that. We've

26:41

got to be careful how we word it because we only get

26:43

demonetised but you get the idea and I

26:45

don't know how I feel about that. I

26:48

like the fact Japan celebrates all these different things.

26:52

I would like to go and check out some more

26:54

festivals this year as I've not done a

26:56

good job in the last few years. We've got one

26:58

here from David Kent who says, David and Kent rather.

27:01

That's where I'm from. Well hey, hello Chris

27:03

and hello Pete. I've been a fan of you both for several

27:05

years. I'm

27:07

a big fan of Japanese language, food

27:10

and culture. My question is

27:12

about tofu, something that no one will get

27:14

excited about, me included. I've tried tofu a

27:16

few times in the UK and I was

27:18

always disappointed as I found it to be

27:21

kind of like flavourless scrambled eggs. That's quite a

27:23

good comparison. I read a statistic that in Japan

27:25

people eat tofu at least three times a week

27:27

so I wanted to know have you

27:30

found a region or a dish where this stuff is

27:32

palatable or could stand

27:34

toe to toe with the many delicious

27:36

looking meat dishes? Kind of regards David

27:39

from Kent. Tofu,

27:43

they do like batter it. You can get batter tofu.

27:49

There is a lot of Chinese restaurants that

27:51

do more interesting things with tofu or vegan

27:54

restaurants as well. I used to go to

27:56

a vegan restaurant in Sendai station,

27:58

it was called T's Tunta. And

28:00

they're like tofu, chicken, tofu, pork. It

28:03

was bloody amazing. And then it got

28:05

shut down. And I don't know

28:07

if it exists anymore, sadly. Alas,

28:10

tofu is good. The

28:12

only thing you need is some bonito fish flakes

28:15

to give it a nice fishy taste and a few drops

28:17

of soy sauce. And then you get rid of the flavourless

28:19

problem, right? And then it's kind of nice. It's got

28:22

a kind of umami flavour to it with a

28:24

few fish flakes and a bit of soy sauce.

28:26

So that's the easy way around it. But I

28:28

like tofu. I say I eat

28:30

it once every week at most.

28:32

But it is pretty good. Are you a

28:34

fan Pete? I like different

28:37

ones where it's, I like the kind

28:39

of like variation, the silky sort of tofu

28:41

you get with a kind of like rice

28:43

noodles and stuff. And then you've got like

28:45

the stuff that you fry is really good

28:47

as well. I like it. I like it.

28:49

I'm a big tofu guy. I went in

28:51

there sort of hedging my bets a

28:53

little bit. And then now I'm like, fucking yes. I love

28:56

tofu. It's delicious. The best. It

28:58

grows on you. It does grow on

29:00

you. But yeah. But just put some

29:02

soy sauce with it and you'll learn to love it

29:04

David. Trust me. Trust me. As

29:06

somebody who only eats salty meaty fatty

29:08

things, even I like tofu. There

29:11

is hope for you yet. We've got one

29:13

here from Cole Zimmerman on YouTube. He says,

29:15

Dear Curtius, Chris and polite Pete, as a

29:17

fellow cheese lover, I deeply enjoy

29:19

hearing you talk about your passion for cheese

29:22

and the holy camembert, which I did

29:24

have yesterday. You have some deep fried camembert.

29:26

I wanted to try more cheeses from around the world.

29:30

Not just the ones in my local area in the US.

29:32

In the past, I've heard you

29:35

despair at the lack of quality

29:37

cheese in Japan. But

29:39

I hope there's at least some decent cheese to

29:41

be had. I was wondering what cheeses Pete enjoys.

29:44

What kind of cheese in Japan that you

29:46

would recommend? All the best. Cole

29:48

Zimmerman, 8000. That's a very

29:51

retro name. Ah,

29:53

Pete. Do you like cheese? Of course

29:55

you do. I hope you do. Do I like tofu? Do

29:57

I like cheese? Do I

29:59

like food? It's great. to please um yes

30:02

I like cheese you know what you know I haven't had

30:04

for ages I'm not a big raclette you

30:07

know see it like a European town is

30:09

carving a big wheel of cheese and sort

30:11

of like pretty popular in Japan

30:13

actually quite easily very

30:18

theatrical yeah it's that theatrical like the

30:20

the theatrical nature of it they bring

30:22

over a slab and they're like

30:24

haha are you ready and then they like you

30:26

know chop it off in front of you and

30:28

that's quite popular oh yeah

30:31

my friend bought me some Cathedral City back from

30:33

the UK that's your cheddar cheese I haven't

30:36

opened it yet I'm a bit wary is

30:38

it okay to have it in your suitcase

30:40

for 15 hours and

30:42

then is it still edible I

30:44

think careful about it yeah I think

30:47

it might be a bit sweaty but

30:49

I mean it's not gonna get my

30:51

fucking trousers or his pocket he was

30:53

a suitcase not you bringing me like

30:56

supplies you bring crap over from the

30:58

UK in your underpants like he did

31:00

put it in a suitcase in

31:03

foil well there was a there was

31:05

that picture it was that advert it's

31:09

at the airport of say

31:12

don't bring in like meat products and stuff

31:14

and then image they used yeah bottom of

31:17

the suitcase underneath all your

31:19

clothes big hamburger just a

31:21

loose foil wrapper who's doing

31:24

that hamburger in like that so

31:26

maybe that's how it was brought to

31:29

me imagine I go I will I will

31:32

go home now and I will try the

31:34

cheese and I'll let you know how edible

31:36

it was in the next episode of the

31:38

abroad Japan podcast keep the questions stories comments

31:40

coming in guys to broad Japan [email protected] or

31:43

leave a comment down below and we'll

31:45

go look for it and feature it in the podcast but

31:47

for now no matter where you might be out in the

31:49

big wide world of yourself some cheese and we'll see you

31:51

right back here to do it later again on the abroad

31:53

Japan podcast bye for now the penis festival

31:56

happens on the first Sunday in April

31:59

in Kawasaki There

32:01

you go. Take your cheese with you. Enjoy it. Rub

32:04

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