Lots of people coming and going especially at a popular tourist spot like Sky Tree

As it's bound to happen you get hungry and want a bite to eat

Then you notice a situation like this

some perfectly respectable bags occupying the table that you'd like to sit at

As you hunt around for a free spot you start to notice a trend an umbrella hanging out all by itself unattended baby strollers

Lonely handbags a stray jacket an abandoned bag this forgotten suitcase and camera

What's to stop hungry shoppers like this from snatching up a coveted spot?

Anything literally anything left on the chair or table?

So I decided to take my daughter and a GoPro to the mall to see what would happen if I left our belongings to save

a seat

What did we leave a purse a smartphone and a bag full of newly bought goods

After noticing that cameras were all over the place I decided that the best disguise for a secret camera

recording was to do it in plain sight so I staged the table with all sorts of camera gear

Okay. So it's not exactly a super-secret spy camera setup, but I think you'll get the point

I love while recording someone decide to leave their belongings to save their table my daughter Aiko's biggest opposition to this whole experiment is

That we'd be occupying extra seats that others could use

She didn't seem to have much concern that her belongings might actually get stolen and I concur we were being quite rude

So I apologize to anyone looking for a table during that time

We recorded a whole hour before I decided to call the whole thing off

Because the most likely scenario was that the cleaning staff would notice our unattended goods and put it in the lost and found

So Aiko and I packed up her belongings and headed to Starbucks because it's not like we hadn't sat around enough

While there the trend of seats being saved by valuables continued shopping bags backpacks

purses fanny packs even making a comeback

I see I also noticed that there are many people working on their laptops thus began experiment number two

What would happen if I left my macbook pro to save my spot?

I'll save you the suspense

absolutely nothing

25 minutes into this grueling experiment we called it quits

Who knew sitting in front of a sunny window would get so hot this spy thing can be quite tough?

Moral of the story if you're a thief looking for some easy pickings. Japan's the place to be or is it?

Apparently the Japanese police have more patience than Aiko or I in an effort to net themselves a thief

They left the case of beer in the seat of an unlocked car

After a week a whole week of carefully staking out the spot

They finally caught themselves a criminal

My only major issue in Japan with leaving my belongings behind is that I forget to retrieve them

There was that time when I left my backpack on the train

Then the other time where I did it again in both cases the train staff had my goods found within an hour

I must say though that there was this one time where I went to ride my bike and discovered it was missing

I thought to myself that I was finally getting my come-up-pance for leaving my stuff laying around as

it happens it turns out I left my bike parked and

Unlocked in front of the kids school and had forgotten to ride it back home

I know this because as I was telling the story of my lost bike to my wife

Aiko chimed in to say that she had seen it in front of her school over the past couple of days

She said the bike even had a notice on it to move it within a day

Or it would be impounded. Did Aiko think to tell her father this before? No.

So I went to the bike jail and sure enough my bike was there that lapse in attentiveness cost me 3,000 yen. So far,

that's the only price i've ever paid for leaving my valuables around that end the train tickets

I had to buy to go and retrieve my backpack twice from the train stations Lost and Found Depot

The lesson here folks is that by all means leave your valuables to save your spot in Japan. In fact,

I think the more valuable the better. That's why I always leave my kids to save mine

Thanks for watching. See you next time. Bye! How do you save your spot where you're from?