guess this is where our day starts today it is just before noon I've just arrived

and Yasukuni shrine right here in Tokyo I've got my shamisen on my back because

well today today's a shamisen day can you hear the sound of the cicadas well

summer summer is here the main part of the festival doesn't start until later

on today which gives us an opportunity that we don't usually get which is to

see what the shrine looks like while it's still quiet let me show you

alright guys so this is actually pretty exciting so this festival had become so

big and so popular for a while that they had actually taken down all these food

stalls or a Japanese call Yatai this is the first year in a couple of years

that they put the yeah thigh back up and there's a lot of them check this here me

oh wow this is new I've never seen little watermelons before look at like

the size of my hand that is so neat and this place is gonna get so crowded later

on today if you can eat any one of these right now what would it be

and did I mention that the location of this shrine is by far one of my favorite

things you see Tokyo one of the things I love about Tokyo is the fact that even

within the city there's always some form of nature or shrine hidden over on this

side we have the Imperial Palace and everything like that and Yasukuni Shrine

and the whole festival we've got going today is over on this side I'm very

excited about having the opportunity to play today but I'm also just as excited

about how wonderful this festival is and sorry it's really bright and blown out

but look at this

next I get to go in here into the Kaikan. an area that I never get to go to but

I've got to change into a full kimono and hakama for today's performance

that's right full kimono and hakama in 36 degree

weather this is gonna be a fun day

I know you guys aren't used to seeing me like this vlogging at a kimono somehow

feels raw it's so hot little behind-the-scenes we are backstage right

now it is hot out there like it was hot before but kimono and that heat is just whooo....

that was so unexpected I did not expect that last-minute surprise for them to

ask me to come up on stage and play a solo piece exciting times

so that all happened really really quickly let me get changed and then we

can reflect on this and do the thing that I'm probably the most excited about

right now which is just get to the festival the sun's gonna go down pretty

soon we still got a few hours but so many people have showed up so many

and there are few greater challenges than going up the stairs in hakama

you just always feel like you're gonna fall

in reflection the opportunity to play at this particular festival one of my

favorite festivals here in Japan is one that I never thought in a million years

that I would have it's kind of mind-blowing and I feel like I'm gonna

need a little more time to reflect on it but for now I will say that I'm

moderately pleased with how the performance went it definitely could

have gone better I'll leave some more of it at the end of the video for you guys

to watch but since we're here why don't we take a minute and do some beautiful

b-roll of this festival before evening hits because when evening hits things

get really good

it is do you yeah nice to meet you I'm norm come up and say hi anytime awesome

bad again I keep running into people like like I ran into Drew here what did

you think about the performance it was awesome

I got it all taped this is Victor from frame of travel we ran into each other

in Shinjuku one day I think I did a video called like I love days like these

in Japan it'll be linked here

another brief interruption I just ran into this guy this is Tyler you might

know him Doga TV all that stuff

there is a really cool secret that I want to show you do you like secrets yes

okay because because I have a secret what seeing is that you see hidden

behind Yasukuni Shrine there's actually a secret garden in pawn no way really

yeah this is our second time shooting this I messed up the audio so bad the

first time let me let me take you guys through it so the situation is we had

actually started out on the other side of the shrine and there's this little

pathway that leads behind it now this is a pathway that I've used every year for

almost 10 years to explore this little hidden pond area you see Victor here had

never seen the pond so I was like oh I've got to show it to you

yes yes I do lose the audio quite often but anything is viable to check the

audio of every single clip no you're gonna waste your entire day doing that

yeah I do check like during intervals though which is how we figured this out

somebody lost their watch and people were kind enough just to like leave it

right there but I kind of feel like leaving it on the edge there might run

the risk of it like when you turn in a lost item in Japan they'll ask to take

your personal information in case the owner of the item wants to send you a

personal thank-you or give you some kind of reward it's a lot of paperwork and

you don't need a reward for turning in somebody's watch like you just hope that

someone would do