[2023-12-21] BIG Announcement! [AeO1zUHw5KI]

Hello, welcome back to a new video. So I

have some very big and exciting

announcements to make in today's video.

This might come as a surprise to you, but

I'm actually going to leave Thailand kind

of soon, in a few weeks actually. Well,

that's if you consider 8 weeks to be a few

weeks. But anyway, I bought my plane

tickets today to go to Japan in March,

and I'll be in Japan from March until

June. Now you might be surprised thinking,

I thought you're gonna be in Thailand

until May because you got a 1-year student

visa. And that was my original plan. My

Plan A was to stay in Thailand until May

and then go back to the UK for my sister's

wedding. But then all of a sudden my

girlfriend tells me she has this idea to

go to America in March to try and get a

job to make money, which was completely

unexpected. I've had to completely change

my plans. So that left me with a few

options. Either I stay in Thailand until

May like I originally thought by myself,

which I think would be kind of boring, or

I go back to the UK in March and then just

sit around waiting until June for my

sister's wedding, which which would also

be kind of boring, or option number 3, I

go to Japan. And I think option number 3

suits me best. And right now is actually a

pretty good time to go to Japan. I think

it's a really good time to go to Japan now

or soon because the Japanese yen is

extremely weak. So basically what that

means is my money is worth 40% more now

in yen than it was back when I was married

in Japan. So it's extremely affordable to

go to Japan right now and buy stuff, buy

food, book hotels, that kind of stuff,

because the yen is so weak. So I really

want to go there before the yen

strengthens, which I don't know when it's

going to happen. It might not happen, it

might happen before I go, who knows.

Also, I think the climate and the weather

and the season right now— well, not right

now, but in March— is going to be really

good because it's not too cold, it's not

too hot. It's like that sweet spot in

between winter and the really hot and

humid sticky summer of Japan, which I

really don't like. Also, Japan is really

close to me right now geographically.

It's the closest I've ever been to Japan

outside of Japan. It's only a 5-hour

flight away, so I'd much rather just take

a flight to Japan, 5-hour flight, and then

back home to the UK, rather than a 10-hour

flight to the UK, then a 12-hour flight to

Japan. Okay, so here's the plan. I'm going

to fly to Fukuoka Airport in March,

and then I'm gonna buy a bicycle, and then

I'm gonna ride my bicycle all the way to

Osaka. And then eventually in June,

I'll take a flight out of Osaka Airport

back home to the UK. Now you might be

thinking you're insane thinking you could

buy— ride a bike all the way to Osaka,

but I'm gonna cheat and I'm gonna buy an

electric bicycle. So Osaka is about 700

kilometers away from Fukuoka, and the

battery life of an electric bicycle is

about— it usually has about 70 kilometer

range. Now that's only on the battery.

I'll be able to do some range without the

battery because I don't need the battery

the whole way there. I really only need

the battery going uphill or for some

flats, but for mostly flats and downhill,

I won't be using the batteries. So if you

take into consideration I can do about 60

kilometers without battery plus the 70

kilometers of the battery, I reckon I can

average around 100 to 150 kilometers in a

single charge in about 5 or 6 hours. So it

should only take about 6 or 7 days to

reach Osaka. What I'll do is I plan to

cycle for about 5 to 6 hours every day,

cover around 100 to 120 kilometers, and

then as the bicycle battery dies, I book

myself into a hotel and then just

livestream in the hotel and rest up,

charge the battery, go to sleep, wake up

the next day, battery should be fully

charged, and then I check out in the

morning, 10 AM, 11 AM in the morning, and

then do another 5 hours bike ride onto the

next city aiming towards Osaka. So that is

my plan. I know you guys don't really care

about cycling or long-distance kind of

activities or exploring kind of content,

but I find it really interesting. I really

like cycling. I did a lot of UK cycling

with the e-bike my mum bought me, and I

want to do something that I find

interesting, that I'll find fun, and I'm

hoping some of you people would also find

it enjoyable to come along on the journey.

Now, my girlfriend did actually ask me if

I would like to come to America with her,

and I said no. If you've been watching me,

you should know that I'm very

anti-America. I have nothing against

Americans, and actually the nicest and

friendliest people I've ever met along my

journeys and travels have usually mostly

been Americans. But I just wouldn't really

be interested in going to America the

country— well, not the country, I mean,

you know, the USA as the country, because

I think America looks kind of dangerous as

a country. I've never been there, so all I

know about it is what I've seen on

Twitter, what I've seen on Netflix from US

drama shows, what I've seen on the news,

and what I've heard from other YouTubers

talking about scary stories they've had,

such as crazy homeless people coming up to

them, scary immigration controls at the

airport, stories like getting pulled over

and questioned in a detainment center.

Also, America is insanely expensive. I

think it's one of the most expensive out

of all of the Western countries. And as

someone who only makes about $1,000 a

month on a good month, I just wouldn't be

able to afford living in America for a few

months, or even just visiting there for a

few weeks would probably bankrupt me. I'm

sure there's cheap and affordable places

in America, but I'm guessing they're

dangerous and kind of scary and rough.

And I'm sure there's safe and nice places

in America, But then I'm guessing they're

insanely expensive. Also, I just don't

really care about America or feel any kind

of interest in American culture or

architecture or the scenery. As someone

who's from Europe, from the UK, I don't

really find the USA appealing or

interesting because the USA is basically

just Europe 2.0. It was colonized and

settled by Europeans. It was made in the

style of Europe. So it doesn't really

appeal to me in the same way that Asia or

Japan appeals to me. Asia is much more

interesting because Everything is

different. Plus, it's really cheap in

Asia, especially Japan. People keep saying

Japan is expensive when it's really not.

I don't know how they keep saying or

thinking that Japan is really expensive.

I actually get really annoyed and

triggered when people tell me I should go

to America, especially when Asian people

keep trying to persuade me into visiting

America when I have no interest in America

or the USA. It reminds me of this time

this Japanese girl came to my house back

in 2006 or '07 for homestay. And she

was really into America. She'd been to New

York many times, stayed in America for

years, and had a thick American accent.

And you can just tell she loves America

and she thinks she's so cool because she

speaks like an American. And she said to

me, Daniel, why do you only care about

going to Japan? There's other countries in

the world, you know, like America and

Europe. And I felt so annoyed because I

have no interest in Europe or America,

and I have a lot of interest in Japan. So

obviously I would like to go to Japan

instead of going to America. I would never

want to go to America, even if you paid me

to go and said, you can have my free

penthouse suite in New York City,

everything's paid for. I still wouldn't

want to go because it's a waste of time,

it's a waste of money. I'm not interested

in the place. It looks dangerous and scary

and it's boring. So no offense to

Americans, but I have a very negative

outlook on America. But not just America,

Western countries in general. Australia,

Canada, Europe, Scandinavia. I'm not

interested in any of those places. So

unfortunately, I had to say no, I won't be

joining my girlfriend in America and I

won't ever be visiting America because I

just don't want to go to America. I have

very limited resources, very limited money

and funds and also time, and I'd rather

use those limited resources and funds

going somewhere that I actually want to

go, which would be Japan. So yeah, we're

only going to be here for another few

months and we have to sort out the

apartment. We have to get everything moved

out and ready to hand back to the

landlord. I've got a few big things that I

don't really know what to do. I've got

this big 27-inch monitor that you can see,

and I've also got this fish tank that I

don't really know what to do with. The

fish tank, my girlfriend said we can give

it to her sister, but how are we going to

take it there? It's about 10 gallons. 10

gallons weighs about 38 kilograms.

There's no way I can lift that. So I'm

thinking we drain the water down to around

there and then transport it using the car,

but then it's going to be sloshing around

in the car. There's about 30 cherry

shrimp, which will be very hard to catch

one by one, and there's about 8 fish.

Because I was thinking we could catch all

of the things in it, put it into a bottle,

and then put water into the bottle and

then move it that way, and then completely

drain the tank so it's lighter to move.

But yeah, it's going to be a pain in the

backside to get rid of the fish tank. I'm

starting to think maybe it's not such a

good idea to get a fish tank unless you're

actually going to live in a place for a

very long time permanently because getting

rid of it is such a hassle. But I just

really like having fish tanks. They're so

fun to watch and see how it develops. It

has been kind of a shock to be thinking

I'm gonna be here until May and then

suddenly, oh, I gotta leave in March. It

was initially a shock, but now I feel kind

of excited to have a new adventure to look

forward to in Japan instead of— I mean,

originally I was going to go to Japan next

year, maybe September or July after my

sister's wedding. But I guess I don't have

to wait as long now, so that's kind of

good news, I guess. Honestly, it feels a

bit annoying and a bit like a waste to

spend all that money to get the 11-month

visa and go to school every day for nearly

4 months, which was really hard work. I

really hated having to go to school. It

was so annoying having to wake up really

early in the morning and then get onto a

really crammed, packed train and then

spend like an hour on the train to go to

school every day to get the visa. And then

I'm only gonna use, what, 9 months out of

the 11-month visa? I'm not really getting

my entire value for money here. Ideally,

I would have liked to utilize the entire

visa before leaving, but I guess you could

say if all I'm going to do is sit here in

this apartment until the very last day,

then it's not really a waste of 2 months

if I'm just not really gonna going to be

doing anything very interesting anyway for

those 2 months. And when it comes to

filming the content for my cycle trip in

Japan, I'm thinking of trying to

livestream the cycle trip on the second

channel. I think I'll stream it on the

second channel because I don't really feel

very confident that I'll be able to stream

at all in the countryside. I feel like the

connection, the internet connection, is

not going to be super strong because of

all the mountains and the tunnels going

through the mountains. And the internet is

just not going to be good enough for a

good livestream. But I'm gonna try anyway,

see how it goes. But I don't really have

high hopes I'll be able to livestream most

of the bike trip. Instead, I'll just be

vlogging it and then streaming when I'm in

the hotel. As for the relationship,

obviously I'm hoping it's not going to

end, and then we'll have to be in like a

long-distance relationship, I guess. And

then she could come and visit me in the UK

or maybe in Japan if she comes whilst I'm

still there, and then maybe we could plan

to meet up again in Thailand when I'm able

to come back to Thailand again for a few

months. And I guess that's how it's going

to be for a while. I think next year could

be kind of interesting. I can't really

predict exactly where I'm going to end up,

but I think I'll be kind of all over the

place— in Japan, the UK, then maybe I

don't know where else. I guess we'll have

to wait and see what happens. You might be

wondering, how am I going to pay for all

this? Because it is going to be quite

expensive. Number one, I've to pay £7,300

in tax by the end of this month. And then

I've got to pay £600 for flight tickets,

hundreds of pounds for hotels over the

course of my cycle trip. Then I've also

got to buy the bicycle, which could cost

about $1,000 to get a decent electric

bike. And I've also got to pay my mum £500

a month. So how am I going to afford all

of this whilst my channel doesn't look

very great anymore? I had to sell quite a

lot of stocks. I sold maybe £4,000 worth

of stocks and I've got another £3,000 in

my bank. I've got some YouTube money

coming, so that's about £8,000. Maybe I

can free up another couple thousand and

I'm hoping the cycle streams and the Japan

streams are going to rake in another

couple thousand. So hopefully that will

break even on all of the tax and bike and

hotel and food costs, but it's going to be

kind of rough. When I get back to the UK,

I really need to just stop buying stuff

and hunker down for the next half year and

then just try and save up some money to

recover my financial losses. And I also

think the tax people owe me a couple

thousand pounds because they incorrectly

charged me tax for 2019 when I proved to

them that I was living in Japan and I

wasn't tax resident in the UK. So

hopefully they give me back my money and

that'll help out a lot too. So although I

think next year is going to be very

financially tough, I don't think it's the

end of the world. I've had a lot of

experience scraping by with very minimal

amounts of money from the years 2010 until

2017. I basically was broke and had no

money, but I was still able to go on

interesting trips to Japan. It was only

really 2018, '19, and '20, and 2021

and 2022. Okay, so that's quite a lot of

years, but it was only like 5 years when

my channel was doing really well, when I

had easy access to a lot of money. Now

those days are kind of over. I need to get

back into trying to be wise and clever and

back into how, how do I get by with

minimal amounts of money? I need to kind

of like get back into that mentality of

being broke again, which is not fun. But

anyway, those are my plans for next year.

I hope they sound intriguing at least.

And I guess I'll see you again tomorrow,

probably.