Living in a tent - being homeless in Japan [rduQ0KRBhyM]

Do do do.

Who's over there? No one.

Hello and welcome back to the river. As

you can see, it's raining a little bit,

and I have my tent. Got it from the tent

shop. It's nice and blue. We're going to

look for a nice place to set it up.

Weather isn't too bad. It's a little bit

rainy, but there's no wind, and it's good

because there's no people.

10 AM in the morning. Pretty good

conditions apart from the rain. So you

might be wondering, why do I have a tent

and why am I coming out in the rain?

Well, well, I've always had an interest in

camping and being homeless, so I thought I

would give it a try. I'm thinking over

there might be a good space for the tent.

It's not too close to those bridges.

Which are very noisy right now, and

there's a nice open space, good view of

the city. Okay, so the problem is there's

this pretty big puddle of water that

I have to walk through. I can't jump over

it because it's too big. My feet are going

to get soaked. Oh, it's not too deep,

but this is all mud now. Look at this.

Can you hear that?

I think if I set up the tent— if I set up

the tent behind that green thing, then

people walking past— there's a person over

there— people walking past won't be able

to see my tent. There's a sign over here.

Let's see what it says. It says no

practicing golf. Wow,

I found the perfect place for the tent!

Look at this. There's this opening here

with this great view of the river between

these lines

of long grass. Whoa, that person

is— what's the word— water skateboarding.

It looks pretty good. Look at that, it's

so easy to set up. Is anyone coming? I'm

scared someone's gonna come and tell me

off. I found them, I found them! Here they

are. Get out my bag.

Okay, so I just poke them into the ground

like this.

Do— is anyone coming? I don't think

no one's coming.

I don't think anyone would tell me off.

Okay, where's my— there's a, there's a

little plastic— not plastic, but there's a

cover that goes over the top to stop the

rain getting in. Ah, keeps falling off.

I'm gonna put the camera away.

Okay, I got the rain cover on top.

I don't think anyone's coming. So this is

the inside of my tent. It's gonna get all

wet and muddy now. Suppose you're supposed

to take your, your feet off— I mean, your

shoes off. Oh, oh, that's a

I'll give you a quick tour of my tent

features. So the rain doesn't come in

because of the top bit, and you can hang a

little light here. And you've also got

a pocket so you can put your phone into

that pocket. Let me get

So your phone goes in there and it's safe.

My bottom's getting soaked.

Maybe I'll sit on the case.

Huh. So you may have guessed by now that

I'm not actually homeless and I have a

nice Airbnb to go back to, and I'm not

actually going to spend the night in the

tent, although it might be fun. I'm just a

bit scared because, you know, there's wild

animals roaming around and there might be

sketchy people roaming around at night as

well. Also, I don't know if it's legal to

just set up a tent by the river and sleep

there. I don't think it is legal,

otherwise you get loads of homeless people

just setting up their houses or their

campsites here and then not leaving. So

I'm not actually going to sleep here, I'm

going to go back to my Airbnb after I

finished filming, but I thought it'd be

fun. I've always fantasized about being

homeless in Japan. I think it was when I

was about 22, 23 I got very frustrated

because, well, I saw all of these

foreigners coming to Japan and they just—

it seemed like they were just able to get

visas to stay here so easily, and I was

just stuck here as a tourist and I could

never stay here for longer than a few

months. And I saw all these other

foreigners living here for years and

years, and it just seemed like they, they

just came here and they got handed a visa

and I didn't get a visa and I wasn't able

to get one. I've always been very envious

or jealous of foreigners who somehow

manage to live in Japan for years and

years and years, decades even, and it just

seems like they didn't put any effort or

hard work into getting the visa. It was

like they just landed here and it was

given to them, whilst I'm stuck here as a

stupid tourist all the time. And because I

got frustrated about the whole visa

situation, there were a few times when I

seriously thought about when I fantasized

about just staying in Japan without a

visa, overstaying, and then living my life

as a homeless person. My, my plan was I

was going to start selling knife

sharpeners, and then that would be how I

made my income. I would just buy knife

sharpeners off of Amazon, get them sent to

convenience stores, pick them up at the

convenience store, and then ship them to

customers on eBay. And I would make, you

know, a couple hundred, but not enough to

be able to get my own place. So the plan

was I would just live life without an

actual home and then, you know,

stay at net cafes or karaoke or maybe even

a park. And then now and then, if I was

making enough money, maybe I would splash

out and stay at a capsule hotel. These

were just weird fantasies I had. I never

actually did any of this. My dad was

pretty angry when I told him. I said,

don't get angry, I'm just joking around,

I'm not actually gonna do it. But yeah,

I'm not joking when I say that I've

actually planned out and seriously thought

about becoming a homeless person in Japan.

Thankfully, I never actually acted out on

those plans, and I did go home every time

my tourist stay expired. Here I am 10

years later, still here as a tourist,

whilst all these other foreigners,

they've got visas, work visas, Like those

Canadian YouTubers, you know that Canadian

couple Simon and Martin or

whatever her name is? It's like they just

live anywhere they want to. First they

live in Korea for 10 years and then they

get bored of Korea and they go, oh, we're

bored of Korea now, let's go move to

Japan. They just move to Japan as if it's

so easy, just like, just like that. And

now they're living in Japan for years and

years. How do these people get their

visas? How come I don't get a visa? Now I

don't have a spouse visa, I don't really

know how I can stay in Japan long term. I

just feel frustrated sometimes because I

see all these foreigners and they live in

Japan for years and years, and it just

feels unfair. How do they get visas so

easily and I'm just stuck here as a

tourist? I look way more Japanese than

they do, and I probably speak much better

Japanese than they do as well, and I've

been to Japan way more times than they

have, and I think I have a much better

understanding of the culture as well.

Easy peasy,

easy peasy.

Squeezy. And then just put it back into

the bag.

It's all muddy.

And that, my friends, is how you pack up a

tent. Goodbye, river.

Interesting. Just as I expected,

no one disturbed me. So I hope you enjoyed

this episode of tenting, camping by

the river. Maybe one day I'll actually go

camping for real instead of just

pretending. I wonder why there's a little

concrete— not concrete, but a stone ramp

that goes into the river. It's quite

interesting because there's this metal

mesh that keeps it all in place.

The city of Osaka. Hello.

Goodbye. Oh no, my shoes are getting wet.

Oh no.

You know, I don't actually need this tent

anymore, and there's no one around, so why

don't I just Leave it here.