Japan “Reopened” — Tourism Declined | Travel Update, July 2022

[Music] hello everybody welcome to okachimachi in wayno that there is ameyoko market the infamous amiyoku market we're gonna walk around here before it opens and gets really crowded how you doing everybody i'm gonna come over here to the corner and talk for a little bit uh it's this this this is gonna be a very interesting episode i think for those that are thinking about coming to japan because japan has reopened uh june 10th according to prime minister kishidu made a really uh big speech in london say asking people to invest in kishida who is the current prime minister of japan in order to do that he needs to reopen the country it's quite loud out here so it seems like i'm shouting it also might be because the microphones are switched because of the youtube app but uh he announced that on june 10 a couple of days later the government did japan will reopen and people on packaged tourists with a uh not a consumer a chaperone would be able to go around the country like tourism was back again on a bus tour or something now that started on june 10th and the numbers are in for june 10th to june 30th this news has been out for a few days a grand total of 252 people came into japan as a packaged tourist on this deal between june 10th and june 30th i've been looking at the airports around the streets of tokyo looking for anybody that was considered a tourist here on one of those package deals and i could find nobody although recently i'm starting to see what looks like could be tourisms but they're not western tourists the data that i got in recently is from the japan times actually i'll put a link in the description states that i think it was the most international visitors not tourists visitors came from vietnam then from china south korea and the united states vietnam had 22 000 last month i believe the united states had 9 700 international visitors which i guess could include me since i'm returning i don't know how they decide that but most of international visitors are um foreign students coming here to learn japanese or study at japanese schools which is a great great progress because this was suspended for like years so that that's actually working business travelers i don't think that ever actually really stopped because i've seen foreigners that were here and they were business travelers i keep doing this because it's confusing to know who qualifies for what and the others could be family members that are visiting um residents who live here in the in in tokyo but for packaged tourists and tourism is what most of you would be coming here as [Music] that's a really bad number 252. the reason why is because um i believe it was watasan who is uh in charge of this program or tourism in general i'm not sure who he is but including the article he said this is the early days so you can expect it to be slow and i think that that's possibly true let's not be too hard on the guy uh on the on the government because it is not an easy thing to restart tourism especially in japan uh people a little bit older here it's the oldest population in the world is that an excuse but things just move slower here and i found that um according to the article 17 000 or 18 000 people have signed up for the package tours for july so it's now getting to the end of july and i'm still searching for those packaged tourists getting the visa for this tourism thing is so hard and it's the hurdles are so high you have to do pcr tests you have to do all sorts of uh um vaccinations vaccination proof but like it's confusing because the policy just started anytime something starts off in japan it's confusing as hell because you don't know all of the steps because they i don't think they even know all of the steps or they've announced the steps and the government institutions including the embassies and consulates might not be up to speed so there are some consulates and embassies that are several days behind that when they get the news it doesn't seem like it registers in the staff members minds that yeah you can accept visas for this situation because i have people telling me that they can't come and visit family members it's like what you people have been doing that for the longest time so there's not really an excuse for that so i'm i'm as frustrated as a lot of you and i'm gonna in this livestream kind of show you around the town here this is a place where a lot of tourists would typically be a lot of tourists would typically be here and we're not seeing that um jill writes in here i get japan has its own way of doing things but it seems pointless giving it shut the foreigners when cases are rising regardless foreigners or not that was one of the biggest issues that people been discussing for a very long time i said uh this this pandemic doesn't care about your passport and if you've got business travelers coming in what the heck is the difference there were 120 000 people who came into japan as international visitors that means students that means people interns for technical jobs that means business travelers investors and whatnot not tourists 252 were packaged tourists uh 120 000 which is a big increase from 2021 i think it was like five or ten times it's a massive amount compared to 2021 it works in comparison to 20 to 2019 which was i think three percent of the tourism numbers 2019 31.8 million international visitors came to japan uh last year it was like point one point zero one percent of of that so uh 2022 is supposed to be a bigger year and we're not seeing that you can see as this light's about to change there's almost no people at the crosswalk and on a weekend at amiyoko there'd be a lot more people i think it has to do also because of the seventh wave we had a record number of people getting infected in the city of tokyo it's over a hundred thousand which is a mind-boggling number when you look at the other waves that we've had um so it's it is real but hospitalizations are down and what you know it's not really a point people are just gonna get infected and people are vaccinated we have access to the vaccines people are wearing masks okay we get it it's time to move on so i'm going to go for a walk now as the keihin tohoku line pulls on right above us that's okachimachi station um let's go down namayoko markets the street here just to get a quick look it the stores typically open at 11 but some are open to 10 you can see here they're still setting up i came here early on a reason because i'm trying my best not to get to get it even though i'm probably gonna get it but i don't want it before a trip like we're doing a hokkaido motorcycle adventure on kickstarter right now you can back that i'll put a link in the description because it's going to be pretty awesome uh 10 days of motorcycle and rv camping and we're making a documentary on that which is going to be awesome panda there's a bunch of new stores panda yaki so this is panda ningyo yaki i think interesting and thank you whole for for joint for signing up if i see any notifications for supporting the kickstarter i will read them out well thank you for 1500 yen i think that's the postcard level really appreciates the support jennifer french is here can we all intern from you and come yes i know right yes i would call you all family if i could i don't care i have a lot of cousins leo has a lot of aunts and uncles it's true it really is um eric johnson is here i read in the kyoto times the government will allow individual tourist visas this fall i cannot confirm that because right now what i've read i don't know who what what their source is the the uh kishidasan recently in a speech said that he just despite the wave he does not see uh think he's going to be decreasing tourism or closing the borders again there's no state of emergency the governor koike got online and said they're not going to declare a state of emergency uh despite i think it's uh it's inching up on 200 000 a day nationwide that are getting the virus the hospitals are now starting to get overrun i'm not sure why japan has a really high vaccination rate but not a lot of the people got the booster so immunity waning there's a bunch of reasons but nobody's really dying from this anymore that's the point all right so will i'm right in here i was supposed to go to japan for a business trip to tgs tokyo game show but sadly can't because of the business visa is is so complicated to obtain i know that's that's part of the issue and bradshaw studio always great to see you here thank you so much for being a member willem that means a lot to me this is the shops closed i'm social distancing so i only remove the mask even though i don't think this has much purpose um basically i think what we're seeing from japan is despite the dismal numbers is a good thing i'll turn it around here there's a shrine up above the store here which is pretty cool despite the dismal numbers in june i believe that tourism will return in fall because uh they're not doing anything despite a massive amount of infections it's a tidal wave compared to all the others and they're not closing the country they're not going back on anything they're just moving slower and that's a good sign believe it or not um what is frustrating is that singapore has increased tourism greatly compared to japan and thailand's on a completely new level they had 7 million visitors compared to japan's 500 000 this year so thailand is rocking it thailand had 700 oh they got it this is what i wanted to get for the um for the daimyo supporters today that's one of the reasons i'm here they have the lemon salty lemon kitkats so i'm going to get that for our backers i'm sending those packages before i leave to hokkaido by the way ems for the u.s backers and uk is back on germany portugal canada australia still off the books for a year it's crazy i always i'm coming here to look for for snacks and this area has a lot of them what can i say come before the crowds that's even possible so what do you think i want to hear i want to hear you all sound off on this as i'm going to walk around this direction to the main point of amioko do you have book strip for books planned for the fall and are you worried about it the fact that the numbers seem low how concerned are you have has anybody changed their destination from japan to another country because japan just doesn't seem like it's open to tourism [Music] does anybody in the japanese government watching want to weigh in and add a comment here sean greetings for nyc we're wide open here so come on come on yeah new york city the u.s has always been wide open and uh yeah i kind of had a culture shock when i went back last month i was really happy to not have to wear a mask but i was freaked freaking out for the first couple of days because i didn't have to wear a mask because i'm just so used to having to wear a mask hey natasha thank you so much for backing the kickstarter we're just passing um uh 2.7 million yen which is awesome and we're going to have another stretch goal so i think we might do two stretch goals now i'm talking with peter so maybe we announced this before the trip because i want people to to keep backing the project of course so we're going to see if we can we can announce two stretch goals so if we get to this number we do this if we get to this number and by the way we're getting close to three million yen so that's probably the goal for the first first goal so it's super exciting we're just like six days away from that trip a franco's here john please have a supper on me you're i absolutely will but not here it's a little bit too early it's like a little bit too early for beer maybe a juice but i will have one tonight i hope by may 2023 they will they will absolutely be open there's nothing that could stop it did is is that marilyn monroe or a look-alike i i can never tell these amiokar t-shirts are weird [Music] i didn't know she had tattoos there must be somebody else [Music] our chong 89 also from nyc here might switch my destination to japan and malaysia since japan tourism doesn't seem to have a i love malaysia singapore malaysia thailand malaysia has amazing food too especially up there in the north i remember some of the best indian food i had was in malaysia believe it or not kl is a pretty cool city so i don't blame you i would i just always hope that maybe you add in you add in japan with malaysia maybe maybe change it narita and hope that they allow it um well that's funny they still have some places i've noticed that they still have like olympic stuff it's a year ago today that the olympics right i think it was is it a year ago today or very close to that the olympics had started that's pretty crazy that seems like 10 years ago to me now all right we're back on amioko here natasha ford writes in here do you think japan will reopen by february 2023 the answer is yes i don't know how what it'll look like the reopening but they'll be quote unquote open they're reopened now just not to independent tourists so everything moves in a step but i see despite the the pandemic is no longer an issue and you can see the trucks are here because it's just early in the morning earlier than than uh normal i'm not gonna walk down here [Music] but i i love amiyoko um and in about two hours it's gonna get five times more crowded the signal is probably going to get a lot weaker you can see i'm a okachimachi station in the center of your screen uh it's also very accessible to wayno station which is just around the corner there quiz does anyone know the name of this character right here he's been here for ages [Music] all right i can kind of uh it's getting hot as well sunny kanai and lee are visiting grandpa today i'm going back to finish editing the video um to upload uh very shortly so i got a lot of work to do before i leave to go to hokkaido next week um like i don't want anybody to despair i do these live streams it's not a waste of time some people who are not interested in coming to japan just watch this to go while you're doing these i've been doing these travel updates since january of 2020 before it really hit because we could notice that this was going to come as a wave to japan the diamond princess a cruise ship created international news in 2020 by docking in yokohama and the japanese government not letting them enter japan that was also not kind of pointless at the time because as you can see the pandemic doesn't care about your passport um but we've seen japan's response been different that's the best way to put it without being critical or is that critical different than other countries and there's not much that you can do about it i'm a resident here i had a chance to to leave and come back i know a lot of you have family here or you really want to come here and just can't and i'm going to continue to do what i do bringing you with me on adventures around the country um until you can come and even then afterwards we'll be doing meetups then and that's what's exciting hey tam has pledged thank you tam has pledged 11 500 for the hokkaido trip i think that was the solo writer or the family pack i appreciate that we'll be sending you some teeny gooey which are the karate kid bandanas as well as a uh echo bag from hokkaido the uh for the with the trip logo on it dakota's design for the postcard is freaking awesome it's peter and me riding through purana lavender on one side cow pastures on the other and a big uh oni which is really famous in parts of the onsen areas in japan especially nobody bets in hokkaido which we're going to ride through is chasing us down with a spiked club toby's in there as well lots of trees um i think it's yotesan i think that's the mountain and niseko is in there and maybe some background mountains for uh daisetsukon national park which is near asakawa so he's he's kind of adding in a lot of the elements we're wearing you body melon and densuke watermelon helmets i believe so it's going to be a lot of fun this postcard that just represents the trip and i i really appreciate you guys back and especially the documentary and the postcard these are digital rewards um and the doc the postcard will be sent pretty quickly right after the trip so i appreciate everybody making this trip possible [Music] susie you're very welcome i'm just glad you guys are watching i'm trying to find new areas to go to but because i'm taking it really easy and not traveling that much before i travel a lot i'm just at home editing and packing and preparing with peter i've got an insta 360 camera so we're going to be doing some pretty interesting shots from the motorcycle so we got to do that safely as well as the drone we have a cameraman that we've hired uh did we hire i don't know peter peter knows more on that information but we have a cameraman coming for two days to help us out a little bit and uh yeah because we can't it's not easy to film ourselves so we have to have somebody do that for us it's gonna be pretty awesome documentary if you've seen the travel documentaries that i've made before they usually uh like full-length movies length like a uh hour and a half to three hour only in japan episode which is a lot of work but peter's gonna help me with the editing this time and um it's nice to have a buddy along hey juha h welcome as a new traveler i'm happy those that are joining this support yeah i'm still gonna be doing live streams up in hokkaido next month i think i can hide in here this shade ah shade i'm still gonna be doing live streams on this channel uh if you're an insider or traveler or patreon supporter you're going to get a lot of photos as well so you don't have to worry about not being left out if you don't want to join this project it's cool my goal for the project isn't so much about money but more about having as many people want to uh come with us on this adventure um as a backer uh i set a goal of 500 backers we're at 300 almost 300 now i think we're gonna be 300 after this live stream so we're hitting that goal that's super exciting um we had 750 people backing my hitchhiking project in 2017 so we can get 500 because i know that uh yeah it's getting harder and harder but yeah let's see if we can hit that 500 number and i'd be super excited we still got 20 days i think we got 20 days to go and we're we're doing pretty good [Music] it doesn't matter if it's a buck we just i just really would like to have 500 people back this budget everybody gets their name in the credit i i think from the maybe from the postcard level i'll talk to peter you know i used to do these kinds of jobs like modeling in japan and i was in a couple of big magazines but i never got on a billboard or something i thought it'd be fun if i was there on the side surfing but a lot of these people do it as a second job with these agencies they take head shots this dude looks like he really got the gig of a lifetime [Music] surfing on a ufo [Music] but that suit could fit better i know that they probably said bring your own suit and it was an english teacher none of my suits fit that's what i'm saying yet oh look you can get tokyo 2020 t-shirts on sale that's really cool all right i'm back where i started i got to get to get this candy and then get out of here i hope that this is useful everybody please comment leave me your thoughts below because it helps other travelers you can talk about your travel plans too everyone's reading the comments this is also a live stream so you can activate it if you're asking why isn't it 4k it's because it's a live stream ask youtube and i'll be back in the live stream tomorrow and and then i think peter's going to join me tomorrow and we're going to talk more about the trip uh how we're setting up the bicycles i think i'm meeting him in akihabara in the morning so there you go oh this takoyaki is really good they took away the the korean stretchy cheese place and turned it into another korean restaurant which looks pretty good too but the takoyaki place i think they're making it now or oh yeah they have some so i might bring some back with me he's he's on the move here takayaki this this is the most affordable takoyaki in the city i think with the biggest takoyaki because they sell so many of them you can get it starts at 200 yen for four of them that's an awesome deal all right everybody thanks so much for thanks for watching uh give me a like button and i'll see you in the next like like click and i'll see you in the next live stream tomorrow as i finish up the daimyo shopping for the packages to send off on monday tuesday bye everybody what's on the other side the train's going by

Channel: ONLY in JAPAN * GO

Views: 66,365

Keywords: Only in Japan, Japan, John Daub, Japanese, Tokyo, travel, Japan travel update, Visit Japan, Update, Tourism

Id: j1dZLRt5scE

Length: 24min 15sec (1455 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 22 2022