Exposing What's On My Bookshelf | Room Tour

so this is my my Vladimir Putin calendar it's on sale and just about every shop in Japan they love I love people in Japan I might not agree with the man or the politics but there's no doubt the photos in this calendar bring me a lot of joy in my everyday life so here is with some binoculars just looking through some binoculars here is it's casually sitting on a rock yeah it's a great reminder that you can run a country of 146 million people but you can also you can also have a little bit of fun along the way as well lovely [Music] they say you can learn an awful lot about someone from having a look at their bookshelf so I'm not really sure this is a good idea I call it my disappointing bookshelf because by the standards of most bookshelves it's pretty small just by virtue of the fact I do live in a tiny Japanese apartment with walls made of paper I'd like to point out most of my more intellectual books they're all on Kindles so don't judge me just buy these books all my goods you know intellectual books they're definitely definitely on my Kindle I do you think now more than ever there is a place for physical books in a world where everything's digitized I like to just walk in here if I'm feeling like I haven't got any ideas or inspiration I can turn my attention to this bookshelf just simply pick up a book and you know dive in and find ideas and inspiration it's not all books on here though there are various objects and narcissistic items designed to inflate my ego like this paper newspaper and this is the Japan news the English component of the OBE Shinbun biggest newspaper in Japan here on the back on the back of the paper it's about videos videos like a party videos like a party look for the real Japan and then beneath this huge headline there's a large photo of me standing alone in the middle of a road filming myself with a camera alone videos videos like a party nevertheless it was a privilege so thank you to the Yomiuri Shimbun for that and where to start let's start with some of the more weird things we've got here let's start with a shitty tantor literally detective arse face he is a detective with a asks for a face and it goes around solving crimes really I'm not really into or shitty tumti even though he's a really quite a big figure in Japan's particularly for kids he's designed for kids don't know he thought that was a good idea really and the reason I own it is not because I like this character or the concept in any way shape or form but it reminds me to think outside the box because you don't need to write a masterpiece with great narrative structure or four characters you literally just need a detective with an ass for a face to succeed and the money will come rolling in the bar can be fantastically local also got this DVD here of this is a superhero Japanese superhero planting tree man let's make the forest of life with dream courage and hope his motives are simply to encourage the planting of trees I got given this when I was at a Buddhist ceremony once the people working there I think they've had too much money to spend in for tax reasons maybe they wanted to you know spend the money on something and that's where planting tree man came in well though given the sheer amount of youtubers who seem to be planting trees at the moment and it seems like it was ahead of its time bit prophetic if anything planting tree man continuing on the theme of slightly odd stuff this is a notepad I bought from a hundred yen store well they often have weird English written on the front this isn't so much weird as why it made me think let me reflect on my life and how I do things it says you alone can change your life no one else can have a really fun day meow meow meow I don't know why this is there I don't know if it's the cat saying it seems like a slightly odd juxtaposition nevertheless I like that and whenever I'm having a bad day I don't look at it while we're up here we've got some artwork some of the coolest fan art I've had handed to me in person an event in Tokyo in February I've got myself there nasty with the balloons I don't like the fact that real sorrow is on a cloud sort of insinuating he's got some sort of godlike status that's my only criticism other than that fantastic artwork and thanks again to the person who made that you're awesome there's a few books on here that I'm a little bit uncomfortable with being on the shelves for one reason or another I think this is one of them the big book of philosophy it's it's a bit awkward in conversations when you bring this up to be a list yes I find in these highly irrational times people tend to underestimate the important Road philosophy can play with in contemporary discourse wouldn't you wouldn't you agree oh yeah definitely it's important to him think about stuff web gee where'd you study yes but I was initially adopted for three years I did a awfully long thesis on the unified account of rationality in belief desire in action oh yeah yeah I like that one that was quite the adventure down the academic rabbit hole so to speak how about yourself where did you do your reading the big book of philosophy oh gosh I didn't actually buy this book for a good reason though other than a nice well presented overview of philosophy about four or five years ago when I got this book I was studying Japanese and I stumbled across this memorization technique that meant I could learn 4250 japanese kanji characters in a day how to write them and their meaning I started applying that memorization technique to just general information so the idea was I was to get this book go through every single one of the 300 pages and memorize all the Philosopher's call kind of terms the people the times you know Wow for the first 30 to 40 pages I actually succeeded I was able to memorize the people the places the facts pretty well and then I realized at the end of it all I needed to get out more and that was the end of that complete waste of time I think the second most embarrassing thing on this bookshelf is this well what was that know as a receipt from from a bookshop 14 pounds that's how much my relatives spent on this book at Christmas this was brought to me by relative who knew that I loved filmmaking but didn't know that I despise the for dummies series which tends to oversimplify things is true it's written by an award-winning filmmaker but I just don't like them I can't stand them I think they're hideous I think they're ugly you see them on coffee tables people never read them the only time I actually find practical application practical use first is when I'm using it to prop open my door you know you need to keep the door open it's actually the perfect size and weight to make that happen and that is why I still carry it besides I'm not dumb II don't think a dummy could make videos like a party if you do actually want to learn about filmmaking highly recommend the big screen by David Thompson's fantastic overview no criticisms they're better than filmmaking for dummies quite a few books that seem to revolve around creativity and self-help I've got this book here little book 642 tiny things to write about and inside we've got loads of random prompts and things to kind of give you ideas like write a breakup text to yourself if you could time travel to last week for one hour what would you do if I corner drunk as much sake on Friday write a one-line ad for a rubber band bendy Dalek fart oh [ __ ] you know write the first line of a constitution for the new country you just founded in the country of broad topia nobody can buy or sell legally the for dummies guide series of books they are completely outlawed on penalty of death there are some things on this bookshelf I look at and think arts disappointing like this book here the daily stoic journal this is a diary and you're encouraged to reflect on your day basically the good and the bad and I brought this with a real sense of optimism for the first time in my life I was actually going to sit down and keep a journal keep a diary and I got to how far I get that's empty oh dear didn't even make it to the end of January I mean January 23rd and then I gave up sounds unfortunate it's a good book though I do recommend it and it does kind of make you think about what you're doing in everyday life so I mean this one May 13th write about the bad habits you're fueling in my case not write in the diary or suppose one thing you might notice is there's a complete lack of fiction on these shelves the only fiction that I have is this animal farm George Orwell's Animal Farm fantastic book even then that is essentially nonfiction it's one big allegory for the rise of the Communist pie in Russia nevertheless great book fantastic guide on how not to run an agricultural business and the artwork is fantastic look at that I used to be something of a self-help junkie around the age of 18 19 I was a bit lost in life I didn't know where I was going or what I was doing don't think I do now but back then I needed some help and I did buy a lot of self-help books along the way such as the seven Habits of Highly Effective People I don't really like it instead of reading books like this I would just recommend reading autobiographies about entrepreneurs and what they went through to build their company or what they battled against to get there what are the seven Habits of Highly successful people spoiler alert be proactive think and win synergize sharpen the saw it sounds like all right some pretty dodgy advice to me these are gonna make me look really bad given what they're called not do myself any favors here the 33 strategies of war and this one is the 48 laws of power straight off of a Bond villains bookshelf above all they are really just history lessons for example law number four always say less than necessary and then we've got case studies here from Roman history French history backing up that principle so it's quite above all it's basically a history lesson that just sounds a lot more sinister than it is but I highly recommend it if you're into business strategy history really good books highly recommend them very well written by Robert Greene I should probably turn some attention to the Japanese books given that that is overwhelmingly what I have on these shelves and that is because for the most part I find when it comes to learning materials and Japanese they're still better in printed form and that's because in Japan printing is still much bigger than digital there that in mind if you want to learn Japanese I think my favorite learning Japanese book is down here as you can see it's ripped a piece it's just because I've actually used it quite a lot over the years I still occasionally use it now the ultimate Japanese phrase book this book has 1800 sentences used in everyday life in Japan it doesn't teach you the grammar but what it does do is teach you casual useful phrases like my wife is having an affair Sumer our lucky staring this sir useful phrase today they have a section for just about every situation you'd ever face often in chronological order for example this one has the private zone and it talks about dating can I sit next to you till 90 hit tonight II thought Emily this car sweet talk I'm having a great time with you sure you toss the cook whatever Sheila can I walk you home yeah good or is there a love hotel near here scappini but open Pokemon do you have protection get the idea it takes you from going on your first day to kissing and doing stuff enough hotels to having children babies kids and teens and then eventually and inevitably it ends with divorce got some manga books here which are used for learning and reading one piece and detective conan i never really got into manga though so don't ask me questions about manga because I don't know anything and then also for the next level up there's breaking into Japanese literature where they have on one side they have the Japanese and then on the other side there's the English translations now there is a book here on this shelf that is a little bit odd it's not something I would normally buy or get or read and it is this one on ago rim is basically a book filled with fantastic photos of rims of girls or girls rooms Wow it go in a room I was in a bookshop in Sendai I was strolling through it and this book caught my eye I think the front covers quite provocative it's quite cool and I picked it up and had a flick through and I was just completely in awe of the sheer variety of rooms one of the things you find when living in Japan is we don't have a lot of space to live in you really have to be creative and flick you through this but just seeing how women across the country have adapted their rooms and managed to pack all their belongings into such a small space and infuse their own kind of sense of personality I find it really kind of hypnotically brilliant and interesting some rooms are tidier than others as you can see and also as somebody who's into film and cinematography I really enjoyed looking at the composition of the images and the lighting it sounds like I'm making this up sounds like I'm trying to justify why I bought this book which may appear to be a little bit sleazy attend a great book on a gay room and it's by Sione Kawamoto because most of my favorite books aren't here on this bookshelf and I don't feel like it's an entirely accurate representation of Who I am I'm gonna list off a few books I do recommend that I do love the first one is the obstacle is the way by Ryan holiday the ancient art of turning adversity to advantage it basically uses stoic philosophy as saw earlier with this book I think he wrote this one as well Bryan Holaday he loves stoicism but it kind of gives you a framework for everyday living that helps you take on lots of challenges and feel like you can actually win Sameera William by Charles Milton chronicles the real-life adventure and story of William Adams a British guy who got on a boat for two years sailed to Japan and ended up becoming the right-hand man of topping our ear you see the most powerful man in Japan that's quite an incredible story it is real you can have an amazing memory by Dominic O'Brien a lot of techniques are used in that book helped me memorize in there japanese kanji characters japanese vocabulary without it I think I would have really struggled to learn Japanese absolutely instrumental in my ability to learn and remember Japanese ghosts of the tsunami and people who eat darkness both by Richard Lloyd Perry both them cover pretty serious topics one the tsunami and how it affected a school Okawa elementary school in in the Argy which is terminal story about how lots of children passed away in the tsunami as a result of poor leadership and inaction by the staff as a horrific story but kind of teaches you how collectivism and collectivist thought can often fail spectacularly sometimes in certain situations and also the people who read darkness an equally unpleasant story about a British girl who came to Japan worked in a hostess bar and disappeared suddenly and it was a big scandal about 10-15 years ago but it kind of chronicles what happened there and some of the failings by Japanese police and finally the Japanese mind which is a series of essays discussing every aspect of Japanese culture but mainly the mindset of Japanese people I've never found a book that has explained Japanese thinking as well as this book has the Japanese mind fantastic book if you want to understand what's going on the people around you if you come and live and work here in Japan today I have it my bookshelf tour and what have we learned we've learned that I'm a terrible person which is why you should definitely subscribe to this channel who knows what could be coming out here on a broad perspective next week but I hope you found at least one book that you like here on this shelf or one book that interests you feel free to ask me any questions about the books here in the comment section below I'll linger around and answer as many as I can and also I've linked many of these books in the disc in box below if you want to buy them because some of them are a little bit difficult to find online particularly the Japanese ones so hopefully that'll save you some time but for now no matter where you might be out there the big wide world as always many thanks for watching I'll see you next time I'm off to think about the big philosophical questions in life such as come up with an imaginative nickname for your least favorite person well we've already done that haven't we he's called risotto

Channel: Chris Abroad

Views: 191,215

Keywords: abroad in japan, language learning, learning japanese, japanese, language, self-help, studying japanese, books, reading, bookshelf, abroad perspective

Id: 8idSIoKVq18

Length: 16min 15sec (975 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 24 2019