The surprise cyclists,
we did a story on
him a little while ago
when he got arrested.
His whole shtick
was, he would ride his
bicycle and swerve into
traffic and then swerve
out of traffic, hopefully
not getting hit, but
he was causing a lot of
difficulty, stress, danger for drivers.
He was arrested for his reckless driving.
He’s in court now.
He claims that it was never
his intent to block traffic.
So I find that confusing
because there’s
video of him, multiple
videos of him swerving
into oncoming traffic and swerving
out of the way the last minute.
So I guess if you were
going by the absolute
letter of what he’s
saying, if you’re going
by the definitive words that came out
of his mouth, he wasn’t blocking traffic.
He was trying to swerve
into traffic and then
swerve out of traffic
at the last minute.
That’s not blocking traffic.
So maybe in this very technical
sense, he’s telling the truth.
He is recklessly driving.
He’s maybe obstructing
the flow of traffic
because the drivers
have to be more careful.
They’re hitting their brakes.
They’re doing dangerous maneuvers
in the hopes of not hitting the cyclist.
This started back in
2019 and he was wearing
like black hat and
sunglasses and a mask.
So it was very hard to identify him.
There are multiple
videos that went online
of this guy just driving, riding his bicycle
sort of insanely in and out of traffic.
He was caught in April
2024, now he’s on trial.
When asked if the charges
were accurate, I think
this might be his whole
defense is technicalities.
It says I was going 19 kilometers
an hour, but I wasn’t going that fast.
I’m wondering if his bike had a speedometer
because if you were going to be technical
with other people, like the technicality
is that they’re saying I went 19 kilometers
an hour and I’m saying
I didn’t go that fast.
Is there any way for
me to measure for me to
know that I was going less
than 19 kilometers an hour?
And when he says I wasn’t
going that fast, does he mean 18.5?
Does he mean 17?
Because again, he
seems to be working on
technicalities, not
actually, you know, was I
following the rules, the
road, was I riding my bike
in an appropriate manner,
was I not being dangerous?
He then said I wasn’t driving
in a way that would harm others.
And again, I think this
might be technically true.
He was riding in a
way that if he collided
with a van or a car or a truck or
something, he would be the injured party.
The person in the car would not be harmed.
He would be slammed into a two ton car.
So you can see like in a
way, he is telling the truth.
I was not driving away that
would harm other people.
I was driving away
that would harm me if
there was an accident and I
was causing danger in that again.
These drivers, the people on the road were
having to do their best to avoid me having
to drive in a more erratic fashion themselves,
it may be endangering other people.
So there might be like a butterfly
effect, like he causes a minivan to swerve.
It’s rose into a car that
swerves into another
thing and then hits some
people or causes a crash.
And that injures people and then other
cars are coming too fast and they hit them.
A pile up, let’s say,
that is his fault when
if again, if you’re going to be very
technical, he didn’t cause that accident.
He caused the initial
thing that caused something
that happened that caused a
domino effect down the road.
He’s primarily a danger to himself and
quite obviously not a very good lawyer.
A 26 year old was arrested for
making his car look like a police car.
This story came up before.
He had his car
painted in the black and
white police colors and he
had like an emblem put on it.
The police here have
very distinctive looking cars.
But that wasn’t enough.
He’s already gotten in trouble for that.
This is actually like the second
charge in this whole story.
Having the car look like a
police car wasn’t enough.
He needed more, he
had more of that sort of
visceral realism that
he was trying to live.
So he had someone
at a red light to the car.
So he, now red lights
in Japan, I’m pretty sure
that’s probably true
in most kind of reasons.
Red flashing lights on your
vehicle are reserved for like
emergency vehicles, police
and ambulance and whatnot.
Some of his other chargers
were using a fake police ID.
So he had like a badge
and an ID that said
he was part of the U.S.A.C.,
that said he was part of the U.
S.A.C.A. Police Department.
He has unauthorized use of official marks.
So again, he put these
official markings on his car
to make his car look
like it was a police vehicle.
What was he doing, though?
And that’s actually was again
sort of the interesting part.
He was patrolling the area.
So not necessarily always the same place.
He would go around in different
places and he would do patrols.
He pulled people over and
he took their information.
And he would like stop and talk
to people and take their information.
So he was performing
police duties in a way,
but in a completely
unofficial capacity.
He said, “I wanted
to experience how it’s
like to drive with the
emergency lights on.
” There’s a secondary
issue there, though.
So like I am a foreign
person living in Japan
and there’s a lot of
stories that go around
about foreign people getting stopped by the
police and they check your identification.
And this is perfectly legal in Japan.
If I’m a foreign person,
I’m walking around in
Japan, I’m supposed to
have my residence card
with me to say my visa status so
that you know I’m not an illegal alien.
So them stopping and
saying, “We’d like to
look at your identification,
perfectly legal, I cannot deny it.
” But what if I’m in a situation
where I don’t think you’re a real cop?
And then he pulls out
his badge and I’m like,
“Well yeah, but I
know I’ve seen a story
where someone has faked
that badge and the identification.
” So I still don’t
think you’re a real cop.
What point do we get
to where we actually have
to believe that cops are cops
and we believe in their authority?
Because if this guy
stops me and asks for
my ID, it’s perfectly with my rights to
say, “No, because he’s not a real cop.
” And how do I know
he’s not a real cop?
He has the identification.
He has the badge.
He has a car that looks like a cop car.
What do I do in that situation?
I don’t have an
answer and it would be
interesting to see if
anyone does have an answer.
But at what point,
when you’re suspicious
that a police officer
is not a police officer,
are you within your rights to
start denying their requests?
But if this guy rolls up
in his patrol car, painted
like a patrol car, then he
gets out of his patrol car.
I’m assuming he had a
police uniform of some sort.
And then flashes a badge that means
as I want to see your identification.
But there’s something just
like off about him and I go,
“No, if it’s a real cop,
I’m going to get arrested.”
So you kind of have to submit and this guy,
this is the abuse of power aspect of it.
But how much trouble should he get into?
Because we know he’s
stopped multiple people.
We know he’s taken the personal
information of multiple people.
We know he’s like interfered
with people’s day-to-day lives.
That seems significant in something
he should be significantly punished for.
But he also hasn’t hurt anybody.
That’s the bit I’m most confused by.
This would be interesting
to get a lawyer or a judge
to weigh in on what would
be an appropriate punishment.
No one was personally hurt.
He don’t know if he abused
the personal information.
But we know he did interfere with
sort of the ongoing of everyone’s lives.
And he diminished the authority
of the police department overall.
Because I, when I meet a police
officer, may be more suspicious.
That is a real police officer.
And then if I actually
get arrested because
I think this guy’s not real
cop, what happens then?
Am I in the wrong for
denying someone who I
think is not a police
officer in my information?
Hello.
Hello.
Hello.
The quiz today, we
have kind of a creepy
dude, which is a very common
theme in Japanese news.
This young man is 25 years old.
He’s out in the street and
decides he wants to hit on girls.
And so he introduces
himself by asking for
directions, which is
not particularly creepy.
But then which of the
following do you think he did?
So this is where you get to
ask me questions and stuff.
We have three choices, A, he asks for
directions to a love hotel specifically.
B, he says, “Hey, I think you
have burp poop in your hair.
” Or C, “Can I take
pictures of your feet?
” You can ask me some questions.
Yeah, this is a JPEG.
You can ask me some questions.
One is correct, one is true,
and the other two I’ve made up.
So I have to fill in the blanks myself.
This is like an improv exercise.
Where is this?
This was in Tokyo.
He was basically trying
to find ways to talk
to girls to get more
involved with women.
He clearly does not have
what we would call a game.
And he’s very awkward.
So he would go up
and say, “I actually have
to admit, when I came
to Japan, I would talk
to girls by asking for
directions, but if they
didn’t see me interested,
I would just leave.
” I think that’s why I
stopped being creepy.
But he had to take it to the next
step and he had to be like, “Hey.
” This is like, what do
they call it here, nampa?
Nampa is the picking people up.
But the nampa guys,
there’s kind of two versions.
There’s like just regular
nampa, which would
be normal people
just hitting on people.
Then there’s the nampa where it’s a guy who
would stand in the station, and they always
have these like terrible suits
on, like they’re kind of ill-fitting.
And then they talk to every single girl
that walks by, and they’re like, “Almost.
” It’s basically a step
below harassment.
They’re walking with their face in the
girl’s face, and she’s usually trying to look
away from them, and then he’s just like
talking at her, and then she runs away.
Is he doing either of
those versions of nampa?
This guy, I would say
he’s hit a middle ground,
because he’s asking for directions,
which I don’t think is too bad.
You can tell if the girl
doesn’t want to give
you directions and just
walks away, he just let her go.
This is where he
made his mistake, is he
did not want to let them go if they
were not interested in speaking to him?
He’d be like, “Hey, where’s this place?
Oh, I have a secondary follow-up thing
in the hopes of engaging with her further.
” Okay.
Then maybe it could be B.
Oh, you want to make them?
Ah, so what do you think happens next?
So he says, “Hey, you
have bird poop in your hair.
This is speculation now, so we
have no idea what he actually did.”
So if that did occur,
maybe she would freak out
and be like, “Oh, where
do you have a tissue?
” Oh.
And then she would
be like, “I don’t want to.
” But if you come into
this convenience store
with me or this little,
I don’t know, bassoo
plays, I can get you
a tissue and it kind of.
He could be the hero.
He could be the hero.
Yes, he could be the hero and save the day.
That’s actually pretty good strategy.
I’m not going to do it, but
yeah, so that makes sense.
What do you think about
the aggressive tactic of?
Can you give me directions to a love hotel?
I guess it would depend,
right, because if he
approaches someone
who is very naive, maybe
they would genuinely
think he needs directions.
And then he’s like,
“Can you walk him?
” Can you walk him?
Not so man-new.
Ah, yeah.
Can you walk me there?
Yeah.
No, I mean, this is it.
A guy working at that level of social
awareness, he’s going to think that’s a really
smooth move and not
realize, like, dude, that is gross.
Yeah, he’s tipping his fedora.
I wonder what the
Japanese version of that is.
What?
What?
Well, so we have the neck beard
fedora wearing guy in North America.
I don’t know what the
Japanese version of that is.
It must just be like the otaku guy.
Maybe.
They’re different.
So it just means
that you have, like, an
obsessive interest
in, like, any field, right?
Yeah.
Otaku just means, like, super fan.
So, like, I could be an otaku game
otaku, because I play a lot of video games.
I could be a judo otaku,
because I love judo
so much, but I don’t
think I crossed the
line into being creepy or
off-putting, which they tend to.
In Japan.
Otaku, like, generally looked
at as maybe a little weird.
Yeah.
Because their, their
obsession goes to another level.
And then they’re also usually obsessed
with, like, the trains or the idle groups or
anime, and they have
low social awareness,
I think would be a pretty
standard aspect of the definition.
Okay.
So maybe it is the neck beard equivalent.
Yeah.
I think the problem with neck
beards is they think they’re smooth.
Like it’s that lack of
self-awareness, like
tipping your fedora
and going, “Melady is not
cool,” and they don’t
realize that’s not cool.
So I used to go to a
lot of anime conventions
when I lived in North
America, and I would say
most people acted,
like, relatively socially
aware, but there were
people who genuinely
thought they were
smooth, or they were, like,
kind of being the hero,
like, a white knight.
And that’s how they acted.
They would, and they would also
speak what they were doing out loud.
They would, like, narrate themselves.
Like, like, I’m coming
up to you now, or was
that, like, because
I’ve seen that in chats.
I’ve never done it, but I’ve
seen in chats where he’s
like, and then I, you know,
bite my lip, like role playing.
Yeah, it’s kind of, like, very
similar to, like, role playing in a chat.
Okay.
That seems very off-putting to me.
Yeah, but, again,
like, these, a lot of
people are not socially aware,
because they’re really chronically online.
Yeah, that’s, that this
is the feedback loop
of the internet
that’s actually going to
ruin a lot of society, is because
they meet other guys who
think that’s cool as well, and
then they get, like, reinforced.
Like, yeah, it is cool.
I do know.
It’s an echo chamber.
Yeah.
Okay.
Let’s choose one.
So, A, ask for
directions, and then get
directions to a love hotel,
B. Oh, you have some
bird poop in your hair, or C,
can I take pictures of your feet?
Which do you think it is?
I think after we spoke,
it could be A, because
it’s pretty plausible for someone
to be, like, where’s the love hotel?
Can you bring me there?
But B made sense to
me because that’s, like,
plausible story in my
brain, but, you know,
not everybody who’s socially aware
could, could probably think of that story.
Yeah.
So, like, oh, this is a good idea.
I’m going to do this.
Maybe C is too straight forward.
C is pretty aggressive.
Yeah.
You have to be pretty
confident in yourself.
I’m going to say A.
Okay.
It was B.
It was B.
Yeah.
So, what he would do
is he’d stomp the woman
and ask for directions,
and then while talking,
he would squirt some
glue into her hair,
and then tell her that it
may be a bird poop daughter.
They never, in the
stories, I tried to find more
stories, but they only
give so many details.
They never said how he
thought that would be successful.
And then he said to
have done it about 10
times, because he’s
squirting stuff into their
hair that’s sticky and
they would have to, like,
literally probably cut
their hair to get it out.
That’s now assault.
So he has 10 assault
charges pressed against him.
Oh, my God.
I know.
It is so insane.
And I don’t actually
see how that works, like,
hey, you’re, I didn’t
understand it until
you actually said what
you said, which was, then
he could be like, oh, let
me get you some tissues.
Let me help you clean up or something.
But it sounds like that
still wasn’t successful.
You did the girls, like, were they aware
that he was putting glue in their hair?
No.
It seems like–
It seems like he would be, like, maybe
check on my phone or show me something.
And then when they’re
looking at that with
his other hand, he
had, like, a squirt thing.
And he would squirt some stuff and he’d go,
oh, my God, look, you got some bird poop.
I just don’t see that as an opener.
That’s a pretty, that’s a
pretty desperate move.
It is.
It is.
This is someone who
spent way too much time
thinking about the plan and not
thinking about would this plan work.
No execution.
He’s just like, this is
definitely going to work.
So you want kids to be interested
in sort of the world around them.
You want your kids in your class to
get experience with all kinds of things.
So one of the things
that’s good for students
to know is how the
world works, politics.
So let’s take the kids
out to, like, a session
where politicians are
discussing the needs
of the people and the
issues of the day and
trying to make policy
decisions that are going
to impact you, perhaps
for the rest of your life.
Well, they did that.
They took them on a field trip
and they got to see a session.
I mean, there’s nothing
more exciting than
watching 73 year old
politicians in political discussion.
The only thing maybe
more fun than that is
catching a 73 year old
politician in a session
supposedly doing his job
playing a video game on his phone.
So none of the kids
said anything, but what
happened is when you
go back from your field
trip, you have to make
like an activity out of it.
The school has to make you do something.
So you do something
that something you do is
your right to report
and they wrote a report
and multiple children
wrote about how they saw
this politician in a session
playing a video game on his phone.
So then that of course the
teachers were like, that’s not cool.
That’s not giving the
students the impression
they should be getting from someone who’s
supposed to be like a political leader.
So they sent a
message back and they’re
like, hey, it seems like
this guy was playing
games on his phone when
he should have been doing his
job and it’s given a really
bad impression of the kids.
And then it has to go on television
and apologize, which is awesome.
And he said, he apologized
for giving children
bad memories of their field trip, which I
sort of disagree with because I think for
like an eight year old
getting a 73 year old
politician to go on TV
and apologize to you
would actually be one
of the best days ever.
This story took over my
news feed for a couple of days.
But teen kids were taken to
hospital after eating super spicy chips.
So some kid got a bag of these supers.
I remember that the
one chip challenge it
was like this big Dorito
looking thing and it
was black and it was
just covered in all kinds
of like spicy stuff
and you would eat it.
And they would
actually said like people
were having like heart
palpitations and stuff it was so hot.
It was really causing people
actual physical damage.
Similar chips still exist.
I actually think that one’s been
taken off the market because it
has caused problems multiple
times and they got sued within it.
I believe it actually had a
waiver that maybe you had
to sign but of course no
one’s forcing you to sign it.
So maybe you didn’t sign it.
But that would leave the
company open to getting sued.
So they’re saying like, you
know, kids shouldn’t eat this.
Well, some kid got his hands on
a bag of very, very spicy chips.
He gave them to 30
people, 13 girls and one boy.
I was wondering if he was giving them.
So he gave them to 30 people.
I think maybe just more
the boys didn’t admit
it because that’s kind
of like a boy thing to do.
13 girls and one boy
felt nausea, had stomach
aches, a certainly mouth pain
and they were taken to hospital.
So 14 kids out of 30 tried this chip
and were taken to hospital as a result.
It is labeled as 18 plus curry chips.
So 18 plus they’re saying
you have to meet a doll you
have to be over 18 years
old to buy and eat this chip.
But of course, everyone thinks that’s just
a marketing ploy that’s not enforceable.
You go to 7, 11 or whatever.
You get the 18 plus curry chip.
You take it to the counter, the person
flying the counter, they don’t look at it.
They’re not looking at it.
It doesn’t say 18 plus.
They flip it over, get the
barcode, scan it and off you go.
If it was something like alcohol or something,
there’s actually a button you have to
push on the register
to say that you are
actually an adult and you can buy
cigarettes and you can buy alcohol.
Chips don’t fall under
that same category yet.
This being Japan and
this many kids going to
hospital because of this, I
actually could see that happening.
On the chip maker’s
website, it says for bids,
the chip maker forbids
anyone under 18 years
old from eating them because you know every
time I buy a bag of chips, I then go to
the chip maker website to see if it’s
acceptable for me to eat those chips.
That’s just a really normal
thing that happens in the world.
So the spiciness
factor of this is this
contained jolokia which
is 200 times hotter than
Tabasco sauce and these
are Japanese kids and
there’s a very good
chance that a lot of these
Japanese kids have
never actually eaten any
spicy food, Japanese food
is not particularly spicy.
So Tabasco sauce is
already very hot, Shiracha
is already very hot
for Japanese people.
They have Japanese
versions which are toned down
virgins, it was very
Freudian all of a sudden,
toned down virgins of these hot sauces
that you can put on and they’re still good.
But I actually don’t
like things to be
excessively spicy myself but
I do enjoy slightly spicy food.
I don’t think the spice factor should
overwhelm the actual flavor of the food.
When you do that,
you’re actually there’s no
point in eating the food anymore,
you might as well just ingest the spice.
So a chip like this
that is so hot you don’t
taste any chip or
anything other than the
spice, I’m thinking it
would be more efficient
to just put the spice
directly in your mouth
and then like talk about
how much of a man you
are, but kids do gotta
be careful when the chip,
the chip company did
say like this is not for
kids, there’s tons of
warnings on the bag,
this is spicy stuff, they
did it to themselves,
I don’t have a lot of
sympathy for them.
So we have a shoe thief, we haven’t done a
lot of these people who steal tons and tons
of stuff lately and
it’s because there’s
nothing to be said that
I haven’t said before.
It’s not like I’m against
these stories or I’m
going to stop these
stories but the reality
is I say it so many
times, I get bored of it,
but this was again a significant
number and this guy had a whole thing.
This man was accused
of stealing 29 pairs of
indoor shoes from an
elementary school, so
it’s Japan, so you can’t walk around in
the building with your outside shoes on.
So kids, when they
go to school, they have
their outside shoes,
they come in, they change
into their inside shoes and then they
walk around the building, they go to class.
I would think this would
be really normal for
gyms, like you have outside shoes and then
you change them into your gym shoes that
are clean and you go around
your gym wearing your gym shoes.
You don’t want to
bring the outside stuff
inside and vice versa,
you take your outside
shoes off when you’re
about to leave, you
put on your outside
shoes and then you leave.
So this was not a weird thing
that there are inside shoes.
They’re really hefty
slippers just because kids,
they’re going to wear
through them, they’re
going to run around,
they’re going to be psychotic.
He was caught stealing 29
pairs of these kids indoor shoes.
They, of course, then
searched his residence
and they found 4,000
pairs of shoes in his house.
They were like, what are
you doing with these shoes?
This is always the
bit that I’m always like,
mmm, because creepy
dudes, stealing, creepy
stuff, doing creepy, I assume
they’re doing creepy things with them.
I mean, sometimes good, they don’t say what
they’re doing, but at the same time it’s
like, why do you kind of want to
know what they’re doing with them?
Just so that I can have like, is
this dirty thing, is it a pervy thing?
This guy sold between 4 to 5,000
pairs as used goods on the internet.
So he actually seems like
he wasn’t doing creepy stuff.
He was stealing shoes
from the school, going
home, putting them on
Metcote or some other
like Yahoo auctions
or something and selling
them as secondhand
goods like, oh, my children
have worn out their shoes.
They don’t need them anymore.
They’re still a good pair.
I’ll sell them to you.
And that’s a way he was making money.
So this guy may not be pervy.
My concern is that he
was selling to pervy people.
Like a website like MacKara, we’re
probably not buying it for pervy purposes.
They were like, oh, a cheap pair of shoes.
My kid needs new shoes.
Let’s buy those shoes.
He denies the allegation of theft.
So we’ve discovered 4,000
pairs of shoes in your apartment.
You’ve been selling those shoes online.
We caught you stealing 29 pairs of
shoes, probably to replenish your stock.
Did you, do you want to
admit to stealing those shoes?
He’s like, no, never stole anything.
Now I have a lot of
respect for that as a
criminal because the Nile means
the police have to do their job.
And there could be a mistake made on
the way and you might get away with this.
It would be in his
best interest to slough
stealing shoes
because now he has that
accusation in the past
and that doesn’t go away.
If he gets off and
I’m hoping he doesn’t,
it would be in his
best interest to shift to
some other thing to
steal or try another form
of crime, which is always
one of the mistakes
that criminals make
is they always go back
and do the thing they
know, which is the thing
they’ve been caught for
was the police then find
it more easy to catch
you for in the future.
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