- Okay, so this is literally so stressful.
- Everything has plastic.
- And the anticipation is killing me.
- Hey, my name's Emi.
I live in Tokyo, Japan.
- Hey, I'm Mei.
I live in Hollywood, California.
And for the next 72 hours,
I'm gonna do my absolute best to be zero waste.
- Japan loves plastic.
One of the main hurdles is trying to avoid plastic
because it is literally everywhere.
- I think doing this is gonna be a big eyeopener for me.
- I'm gonna try my best for sure.
- I really don't know.
I'm nervous for the next three days.
(upbeat music)
- Okay, so day one,
I was like, Oh my God,
I'm gonna go get breakfast,
have my daily routine of eating my oatmeal.
I can't be using this packets.
I live like right on the street from this restaurant
that actually has these like grab and go breakfast things
that come in a glass container
and then bring it back.
I feel like this whole entire three days
is gonna be a lot of realizing that like taking
the easy way out it's still not always the best.
- Welcome to my bathroom.
I'm joking, this is the hotel bathroom.
Pretty much all of Japan has stopped using hand dryers.
This is my first piece of trash.
I was so excited about the zero waste breakfast.
And then I open it and I realize
there's a plastic container for granola.
So I guess we have gotten our first thing of waste.
- So I got lunch before leaving Osaka
but there was plastic wrapped around the napkins
and the kushiage.
It came with wooden skewers.
So yeah, I had to take that back home.
- Something that I do not think about at all
until this exact moment right now, I just sneezed.
And I went to grab a tissue
and I can't use one.
Like that is garbage.
TMI but I did have to wash my hands down there (laughs)
- I just got back from the supermarket.
They do use so much plastic.
This, this is the problem.
Like why does one carrot need to be individually wrapped
in plastic?
This one bell pepper.
Now broccoli, they did have it just like this,
but you need to put it in a plastic bag.
It's like essentially the same thing.
You just need to get a gold sticker.
Everything has plastic.
- I'm trying to hit the grocery store
the least amount of times possible.
My roommates and I have kinda have been doing this thing
where we all go at the same time.
I'm going grocery shopping tomorrow.
That means today,
I have to figure out how to eat without having any waste.
I have this idea, there's a really
kind of fancy grocery store.
But last time I was there,
I actually saw they had these glass containers.
I hope it's not too expensive.
And then you can give it to them
and they'll fill it up with food from the hot bar
and you can take it home and reuse it.
- I made dinner with the groceries
that I got from the supermarket.
I am not the type of person that eats the leaves
from a broccoli.
So I kinda snip those off.
I usually peel the carrot skins,
but I just decided to try it unappealed.
So overall, I think I did okay.
It's mostly vegetable peels.
So I found this which I thought would be a much better idea
than buying two liters of green tea every single time.
And we'll make some green tea.
There's already little particles.
- All right, so after calling him like literally
five different restaurants,
everybody said that they can't use reusable
containers right now.
It is back to using this and back to the same grocery store
that I was just at.
But it's better than like wasting the bag and the container
and the utensils or whatever, environment.
Tantara.
Well.
- So I subconsciously pulled out this face mask to relax,
but then it's trash now.
How do I preserve this?
Like, I'm not okay with this.
That's terrifying.
(upbeat music)
- And this isn't a fit,
I don't know what it is.
Are the Starbucks baristas like it.
Okay, we're literally next in line
and the anticipation is killing me.
Are you guys able to use a reusable cups right now?
So that was a bust.
How is it feel?
- I love the environment,
I just, I need caffeine.
- I'm gonna roast my chickpeas on this.
It'll eventually become trash
but at least I'll be able to use the paper again
for different meals.
For lunch I had a chickpea salad sandwich
and I ended up with a couple of vegetable scraps
and the plastic around the bell pepper.
- All right, so we're getting ready to go grocery shopping
for just like our everyday stuff.
And then also for this picnic that we're gonna try
and makes zero waste.
We have like little reusable bags for our produce.
And then we're also bringing our own paper bags
that we have saved from like previous grocery shopping.
We're doing okay.
(classic music)
- Like, come on.
I didn't even ask for this.
I'm gonna fill this water bottle with the green tea
that I made so that I don't have to keep buying
these whenever I get thirsty.
Yes.
(classic music)
- [Mei] Normally this is what we would, get but not today.
- Not today.
- [Mei] Not the easy way out today, ladies.
No hot food.
But I decided to do is I just got a sandwich.
They wrap it in paper.
So at least it's recyclable.
So I guess it's like lesser evil.
It's on her paper,
sad. Everything wasn't plastic.
Like every single thing we couldn't even buy like chips
or crackers or anything.
No chips for me.
Okay, so these are the bags that we brought
so we are gonna be using.
And I think we're just gonna put everything in the car,
bring it out to my car and then bag it there.
Since you're not allowed to bring reusable bags
in the store right now.
- I may not have thought this through.
But in the moment, did me dirty.
Like, what am I supposed to do with this?
So we're gonna go down there,
set up and have a fun time.
Literally every single thing had stickers on it.
So we have to keep that,
but we didn't get pre-cut fruit
sacrifice a little bit.
Okay, so literally wrapped in one piece of paper.
Wrapped in another piece of paper, we got plastic.
(roommate laughs)
We have also two pieces of paper, but you know what?
It's a nice day out if we're not gonna be mad.
- All right, so I'm about to make dinner
and I'm shamefully admitting
the amount of plastic that comes with it.
Plastic, plastic, plastic, plastic in styrofoam.
I don't know, man.
So for dinner, I made a simple Japanese meal with gummol,
its kind of tofu I guess.
Eggplant and steamed salmon.
Usually you would wrap it in aluminum foil
but I'm reusing the cooking paper
that I used for the chickpeas earlier.
(upbeat music)
- [Mei] Sounds great, It's not that fragile, I feel.
- [Roommate] No. Oh my God, hold on we got one more.
- [Mei] Oh, great.
It's only been two days.
Like it really shouldn't be that hard.
I feel like. Also I decided
I'm not gonna go out or anything for dinner.
I think my roommate gonna cook something
and I'll probably just eat leftovers from that.
And it's the best I can do right now.
- I have all this waste.
Maybe I can make some green dye out of this.
Like if I'm gonna throw it out anyways,
I might as well make the most of it.
Ewe.
(laughs)
And I'm gonna try and dye this white rag.
My expectations are extremely low.
(upbeat music)
- This is the day.
My confidence is up.
We are going to the farmer's market.
We're gonna get fresh produce.
No plastic.
And my reusable bag.
- I buy the packs of spaghetti that already have this tape.
So I guess this is trash.
I'd made this vegetarian pasta dish
and it really didn't make as much trash
as I thought it would.
So this has been sitting in this dye for about 20 hours now.
Like it has some earthy tones.
So after washing it a couple of times,
it's pretty cute.
- I've been in this farmer's market before
and I know that they have so many things.
Not any packaging , no stickers, no nothing.
(upbeat music)
I mean, we got supply good.
Thank you.
A lot of sun and a lot of sweat later.
I have enough food to last me for a day
and I'm actually so excited.
I have a really fun recipe in mind.
I got everything that I needed
and honestly I feel like it was cheaper
than going to the grocery store.
- Once again I'm showing off the amount of plastic
that I'll be throwing away at the end of the day.
I don't.
I'm sorry.
I would peel the skin off,
but I'm not gonna do that today.
I think I'll just cut like a tiny sliver.
But other than that, I'll be using the whole thing.
- I got a spaghetti squash.
I got a bunch of tomatoes
to make like a fresh homemade sauce.
Like, It's gonna be so good.
I want her
so bad.
I'm in my kitchen and I'm about to cook dinner.
So I'm making spaghetti squash and then making a homemade
sauce with the tomatoes, onion, shallots that I got.
I'm really (beep) excited.
Cause I'm really hungry.
So Chef Mei is here and we're gonna cook.
I feel I should not be trusted with a knife this big but.
(classic music)
I'm the strongest person alive so Thank you.
(classic music)
This looks interesting.
Instead of making a real sauce,
we're gonna make more like a fresh tomato sauce
if you will.
It can taste bad but I don't think it's gonna be like
quite the spaghetti sauce that I was hoping for, yikes.
But also we're working with what we have.
Like foster shaped.
It does look like spa...
Holy (beep)
This is definitely the most successful meal this far.
(classic music)
- When I get out of the shower,
I like ice cream,
but I'm trying not to getting trash.
So I'm eating an orange instead.
It taking me the idea of using the orange pills
and making those sort of sugar coated orange peel things
that you see in gift shops and stuff.
Yeey. Oh my God, oh my God.
Am so proud.
All the possibilities.
- So I just woke and which means 72 hours
of no waste are over.
- I feel terrible because I did such a bad job.
I did try.
I really did.
Japan loves plastic.
There are things that I can do better.
Like, you know,
not buying plastic bottles.
Just like bringing my own water bottle everywhere.
- Didn't get zero waste.
But I did honestly get pretty close.
Like I have a whole new perspective on like my own behavior
that I didn't have before.
So taking a step back,
really looking at what you're doing,
what you can change and how you can be better.
Even if it's in small ways is so important.
- I'll do better.
I did have fun making these and this.
So not a total bummer.
(upbeat music)