let's go back

2020 was certainly the strangest of all the years I spent in China and Japan but

this story goes back a lot further than that

whoa did you see that like I really went to

work in the editing room there yeah but all that stuff like the music ah come on

yeah come on that was cool all that was cool well I had fun making

it and I've been making little videos since I moved abroad so many years ago

but the question presented here today is why did I move well it wasn't because of

a boy it's not because of Japanese anime it's not because I couldn't get a job in

my own country it's not because I wanted to come here and party all the time no

it's none of that I just really like adventure and I like to document it as

well hello that's what my camera looks like if you were wondering what my

camera looks like that's what it looks like usually without this it's really

small I love it it's perfect for what I'm trying to do is way less

intimidating than some of those giant cameras that people carry around looks

like they're coming in with a full camera crew I just got this little thing

and it seems to work out pretty well just go that way go that way that way

uh it went in my ear get out well new youtuber here give me a break

one of the benefits of being a new youtuber is that I have stockpiles of

old footage I've been in China and Japan for many years but I haven't released a

lot of the videos that I've made over the years so I can just dish those out

slowly and I put pictures on Instagram sometimes that were from like five years

ago and nobody nobody knows the difference so when I look at these old

videos in old photos I can't help but laugh at myself sometimes like the first

time I ever came to Japan I was living in Beijing I spoke fluent Chinese I

could read Chinese characters and about the only thing I could read was the

Chinese characters around here and I went to a Japanese language school that

was in West Shinjuku and every day after class was over I would walk around

Shinjuku and go exploring and go look for stuff to take videos of and I was

looking for flashy stuff stuff that looked cool and somehow ended up in the

red-light district and couldn't read the signs so I didn't know what I was

looking at and I was taking selfies next to these like hostess clubs just because

I like the flashy lights and I didn't realize what it was so I looked pretty

ridiculous but I really did not know Japanese at that time

when I went back after that month in Tokyo... I went back to China I enrolled in a

Japanese language school and that was after passing HSK6 which is the

highest level on the chinese proficiency test and chinese and japanese are

similar enough that knowing one will really help with the other it's kind of

like buy one full price get one 25% off and that was my experience so

especially with the writing Chinese was very helpful in learning Japanese and

then I wanted to stay in China and go to grad school to get into Fudan University

and by 2016 I had applied and I was just waiting and waiting and waiting and

waiting for the results and not getting them and calling the school and asking

and by the time my contract with the English school ran out I was like well

my choice is to sign another contract or leave and I just felt kind of rejected I

felt like the school didn't want me that my whole goal for going to China just

fell through and I wasn't gonna get to go to grad school I was just really

disappointed so I said forget this I'm leaving China

I had already visited Japan multiple times by that point I just said forget

it I'm gonna move to Japan and maybe see if I'll apply again later I was just mad

I was like fine china you don't want me I'm gonna move to your neighbor maybe

they'll take me and I ended up going back to Japanese language school again I

had already studied for a year at that point in China but then I got to study

intermediate Japanese all the way to advanced and then the worst thing

happened the very first day that I moved to Japan I had moved my bank account all

my money was taken out of my bank account I moved all my stuff I got rid

of my apartment I got a new apartment in Japan I got rid of my old job I got a

new job in Japan and then the very first day I came my friend in Beijing said

Yeah some school sent a letter to you I got it here and

sure enough it was my acceptance letter into the university in China and I had

already moved and I was in a bad position I was like oh no crap now what

do I have to move back Oh what do I do it was really really nervous about that

and I ended up working it out with the school and delaying enrollment one year

and I did spend that year in Tokyo studying Japanese at the Japanese

language school and then teaching English on the side and after one year I

finally entered the grad school in China and that was 2017 when I went back to

China spent another two years there in Shanghai studying and then I ended up

going right back to Japan to study at Waseda university and then I'll end up

going back to Shanghai when this is over and go back again I kinda just go back

and forth between China and Japan and I always try to get the best of the

country that I'm not in and try not to forget Japanese while I'm in China and

try not to forget Chinese while I'm in Japan so the result of that is I have a

ton of Chinese friends in Japan and I have a ton of Japanese friends in China

it's like wherever I am I'm missing the other place I'm trying to reconnect with

the other place and that's just kind of a weird thing so that's why my life is a

little bit strange

I'm so lucky to live near here I don't have to

bosozoku can you shut up shut up for five seconds so I can make the video

gosh it's not even a long video I'm so lucky that I live really close to this

beautiful area it's not always very quiet but I don't have to take a train

to get here which is wonderful because I've been avoiding the trains like the

plague recently that's not snow those are flower petals oh it's so pretty

they're just flowing down can you shut up why you're messing up my video

Ok, they're done I'm not doing another take I did enough takes of that every 5

seconds they're revving that engine man that's the difficulty of filming in a city

you got to deal with that background noise it's really hard and wind

Making the decision to move to China or Japan is one thing but staying for 8 years or

longer is an entirely different thing would you believe that after the very

first year I gave up and moved back to America well it's true and after I moved

back it wasn't more than about 10 months before I was itching to get back to Asia

and I was on an airplane again so I did move back at one point I found that I

really enjoyed being over here and that's not just the reason I moved

it's the reason I stayed it would be impossible for me to sum up the last

eight years in a 10 11 12 minute video so if you want to hear more about my

adventures abroad please stay tuned and watch some more because there's gonna be

more to come we are far from finished with this alright see you next time

welcome to Waseda