I stood outside my ex girlfriend s apartment

Hey, so it's the next day. I just woke up,

just had a shower. My hair's nice and wet,

and I'm very excited because we're going

somewhere. We're going somewhere a bit

special today. I'm not sure what's wrong,

but I feel a bit itchy down in my

gentleman's area. It's kind of annoying.

Anyway, I'm ready, ready to go. All

packed. Just need to put on my clothing,

brush my teeth, and we're out of here.

開くだと足元にご注意ください。 This

is so weird. I'm in

Waita.

This is weird.

Looks kind of different.

I feel like I'm gonna vomit. That train

journey was terrible.

I can't believe I'm actually here.

It's been 4 years since I've been here.

It looks so different. All of this wasn't

here 4 years ago. All of this was under

construction, and all of this paving, all

of this pavement area wasn't here 4 years

ago. Looks Really nice. It looks like

they're still building something up there.

Maybe the construction hasn't finished.

Feel a bit emotional actually. This is so

strange. Smells like cigarette smoke.

My room for the next week. Week. Looks

okay, doesn't look too bad.

Look, they even gave me a free phone.

Huh, handy. Seems a bit silly

to offer people a free phone when I'm

pretty sure everyone has a smartphone by

now. I mean, who travels to a hotel

without bringing a smartphone?

Let's see what's in here. Empty fridge,

hair dryer, kettle, cups,

little TV,

and a lovely view of

buildings.

Let's see

what the bathroom looks like. Basic

toilet, bathtub,

mirror. I don't think it's the same

heated mirror like the previous hotel.

Smells okay. Some parts of the room look a

bit scuffy. Look at this.

It just kind of feels like it's an old

hotel, like it was made in the '90s or the

'80s. Looks kind of

outdated. Look at this wallpaper,

marks on it.

So you might be wondering, why, why am

I in Oita? Or maybe you don't care. It

doesn't really matter because I'm gonna

tell you anyway. So I'm in Oita, which is—

which is here on the map. I preloaded a

Google Chrome tab to show you. I was

living here in Osaka, and I came all the

way on the bullet train, transferred to a

different bullet train, nearly threw up on

the second bullet train down to here, and

now I'm in Oita.

So going back to why I'm here, well, 4

years ago, I had a Japanese girlfriend,

and we used to live together here in Oita.

And I lived with her for about 3 months

until we broke up, and then I left Japan.

You might already know about her because I

made a video about her sometime last year.

I'll link it at the top somewhere in case

you haven't seen it or in case you forgot

about her. No, I'm not here to stalk her

or to try and track her down. I'm pretty

sure she doesn't even live here anymore

because I was, I was reading her blog post

from about a year ago, and she mentioned

that she moved out and went back to living

with her parents. The main reason I came

here is for nostalgic reasons, to

reminisce, to walk around my old

neighborhood where I used to live. And 4

years ago, I wasn't doing YouTube, so I

don't have any videos of, of this place

back then. I wish I had a few videos, but

unfortunately I don't. So I'm going to use

this opportunity whilst I can still travel

around Japan and show you around.

It's just so weird to be back here. I had

no idea I would ever come back here again

when I left. Actually, when I left this

place, I thought I'd never come back to

Japan, full stop. And look where we are.

It would be pretty funny if, if I walked

past her on the street. Do you think she

would say anything to me if she recognized

me? I wonder if I would say anything. I'd

be too scared to say anything. No, she

can't be still here. It's been 4 years.

People move on. Do people stay in the same

place for 4 years? That's kind of boring.

So right now I'm at this pier place. I

don't know what it's called. You know,

the place by the sea. I came here with my

ex about 4 years ago. 2nd of October

actually, because I have, I have loads of

photos on Facebook that I took here and it

says the 2nd of October, so I know when I

came. Today is about the 23rd of October,

I think. And I took photos here. I took

photos of this rope and I took photos of

that building over there. I took photos of

these orange ring things.

It's raining and I'm getting soaked.

Yeah, I took lots of photos of these.

I had a new camera back then. I bought

this E-PL Olympus 5 E-PL thing, and I

was having fun taking photos with it, and

my ex wasn't really interested. She was

just like moping around. She was really

not interested in photos or or taking

photos, and every time I pointed the

camera in her direction, she would quickly

get out the way. She really didn't like it

when I took photos of her. It was like I

was pointing a gun at her. She would look

really grumpy if I even pointed it vaguely

in her direction. This is the red gate

thing I was talking about earlier. We

walked around here and I took some photos

of it, and then we walked down this bit

There were lots of pigeons. There's still

a few pigeons actually over there. I

wonder if they're the same pigeons from 4

years ago. I don't think so. I don't know

how long pigeons live. Standing under a

tree right now, but I'm still getting wet.

I don't know what to do. I really wanted

to come here, but it's pouring down. I

don't have an umbrella. I want to see if I

can remember how to get to her apartment

without looking at Google Maps. It's been

4 years, maybe I forgot.

We're on the right track. I remember this

castle. Must have walked past this castle

thing dozens of times.

So if my memory serves me correctly,

go straight forward and it should be on

the 3rd left. Oh, I remember this tree.

It's really low, you have to watch your

head. This feels so weird. I can't believe

I'm here. It's like I've traveled back in

time 4 years, but I'm

a completely different person now compared

to 4 years ago. I've grown so much as a

person, I think.

Oh, I remember this park. We came here a

few times to have lunch, and that's

the restaurant we ate at when she kicked

me out for the first time in And then I

came back, we went for dinner, it was

nice. Pretty sure it's here.

Turn left and then walk down here a bit

and it should be on my left. I'm so

nervous. This is so weird.

I can't believe I'm doing this.

Oh shit, I can see it! You see that blue

vending machine? That's the building.

It's right there, right past this big one.

Oh fuck, someone's coming out. She's going

the other way. She just went inside.

This is the building. I used to live here.

Here it is. I used to live

here. This is weird. You see

that window? There should be a bed right

behind it, and that's where we used to

sleep.

If someone sees me, I look really

suspicious. And you have to go up these

stairs to get up there. I'm not gonna go

in. I'm too scared. This is

really, really, um, my heart's beating

very fast. Let's walk forwards.

I don't know why I'm so scared.

I just feel like I'm doing something

weird. Okay, so if I keep going forwards

and I turn left, there should be a

supermarket. And this is the supermarket

we used to go to every evening.

There it is, the supermarket.

Let's go inside.

I don't really remember the supermarket.

I remember it was small, and she always

used to put her hands around my hips and

squeeze my bum whilst we did shopping. It

was kind of embarrassing. It's not really

interesting, it's just the typical

Japanese supermarket. Let's go, my

battery's nearly dead. It'd be funny if

she was working here. Okay, next stop,

the river. If we go straight forwards,

there should be a big river, and I used to

come here a lot during the day while she

was at work because I had absolutely

nothing to do. I wasn't doing anything 4

years ago. I wasn't doing YouTube. I had

nothing going on online to earn money.

I was just sitting around in her apartment

watching YouTube. I'd go for walks,

usually down to this river, and just wait

for her to come home.

And this is the river. I used to come here

by myself a lot during the afternoon,

just walk up and down.

It's very nice here.

I used to do exercise. I used to use these

things to exercise. I used to do pull-ups.

If you don't know the story, well,

basically we nearly got married, and the

reason why we didn't get married was

because I decided to break up with her.

I decided to break up with her because she

was just so emotional. She would cry and

get upset over the tiniest things, and it

was just driving me crazy. And I had to

decide, do I really want to marry this

woman? And I decided that no, I didn't.

And I packed my things and

I said goodbye, and I didn't reply to

any of her messages. She probably hates

me. Sometimes I do kind of regret breaking

up with her because maybe the reason why I

broke up with her wasn't a very good

reason. I feel like I just ran away

from whatever problems I had back then,

and I ran away from her kind of like I ran

away from my wife. I do a lot of running

away. I think it was a good decision

though, because if we did get married, I

think it would have been very difficult.

I think she thought because I was a

foreigner, I could get some kind of good

teaching job and I'd be able to earn lots

of money. But the reality is I would

have had to get some kind of rubbish job

in a shop. And our lives would have been

pretty shit, to be honest.

It just got dark really quickly. This is

what it looks like when it gets darker.

It's quite pretty. I'm getting bitten

by insects. I'm back

at the hotel room now, and I kind of

regret booking so many nights here. I

should have just booked one night. I could

have seen everything this evening and then

slept one night and then left tomorrow.

Why did I book until Friday? What am I

supposed to do here until Friday? This

place is, is so dead. It's like

a dead town. Look outside, there's like no

life. There's a few people riding bikes up

and down, some taxis. It's just so dead

compared to Osaka.

You know, you go into Osaka, into Namba,

there's all these tourists around,

there's nightlife, there's like a vibrant

energetic feeling. Everyone's having fun

eating out. Here it's just like it turns

10 PM and then everyone's gone.

I'm just thinking back 4 years ago. How

the hell did I live here for 3 months

without having anything to do? The sex

must have been really good back then if I

didn't go insane from boredom. Now that I

think about it, I can't even believe that

4 years ago I just randomly flew out here

to meet some random woman that I barely

knew, and then I nearly married her.

Jesus Christ, what was I thinking?

It sounds like an air raid siren.