Paolo (Paolo fromTOKYO)

Paolo de Guzman is a popular YouTuber.

He has more than 3.3 million subscribers on his YouTube channel, ‘Paolo fromTOKYO.’

Introduction-

Paolo de Guzman was born on 17 September 1983 in Quezon city in the Philippines to Filipino parents.

At 3, he moved to San Francisco, United States and later moved to Redmond in Washington State and grew up here.

Paolo’s nationality is American, and ethnicity is Filipino American.

Born	Paolo de Guzman; 17 September 1983, Quezon city, Philippines to Filipino parents
Ethnicity	Filipino American
Nationality	American
Education	Bachelor of Science (BS), Computer Science and Business
Occupation	YouTuber
Website	www.tokyozebra.com
YouTube channels	‘Paolo fromTOKYO,’ and ‘Paolo fromTOKYO en Español’
Years active on YouTube	2016-present
Genre	Japan, travel
Subscribers	3.38M on ‘Paolo fromTOKYO’
Partner	Maiko (married 2019)
Residence	Ebisu Nishi, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo

Love for Japan-

Paolo joined Pepperdine University in Malibu, California to study for a Bachelor of Science (BS) in Computer Science and Business.

While studying here, he got a chance to study a semester in Florence, Italy and thanks to this, he was bitten by the travel bug.

During that time, Paolo was fascinated by Japan’s technology and culture, so, in his third year at Pepperdine University, he applied for a student exchange program in Japan.

Japan above all-

Thankfully, Paolo got accepted into the student exchange program.

But a couple of months prior to his journey to Japan, he was offered an internship by a software company in Santa Monica, California.

For a while, Paolo thought of accepting that offer and making a career and then travelling to Japan at a later period of time.

But he realised that travelling at a younger age would be more fun and so, he rejected the job offer and packed his bags to travel to Japan.

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Life in Japan-

Paolo arrived in Japan with a savings of $3000 and the moment he arrived in Japan; he was blown away by this country.

Here, he got admitted into Sophia University in Tokyo.

In his first year in Japan, Paolo lived in a homestay which he felt was very convenient.

While he was studying in the university, he secured a part-time English teaching job and he started earning $30 per hour for teaching English to the kids of his family friends.

Then, Paolo obtained another English teaching job and was earning $300 by working a few hours per week.

Learning Japanese-

Paolo learnt a few Japanese words before arriving in Japan but he learnt much of the language by interacting with people in the university and homestay.

Initially, he arrived in Japan on a one-year student visa but as he was impressed by the country, he decided to settle here.

Career-

Paolo searched for job opportunities in magazines and attended a couple of job interviews.

He attended an interview for the job of an account manager for a magazine but couldn’t crack it.

Luckily, Paolo cracked the second interview and in June 2003 secured the job of an Associate engineer at Systemsgo and during that time, he was still studying in the university.

This was not the first job of his life as in his high school he worked for Safeway bagging groceries.

After securing a job at Systemsgo, Paolo quit his English teaching job.

After his first year of university, he was hired full-time at Systemsgo and got sponsored his working visa in Japan and he worked for Systemsgo until September 2010.

At the time of resigning, Paolo was working as an IT Project Manager and was working long hours.

Then, in October 2010, he joined TORA and worked here as an IT Project Manager until August 2014.

A life-changing mishap-

Paolo picked up snowboarding and soon developed a passion for it.

But unfortunately, he met with a devastating snowboarding accident.

While recovering in hospital, Paolo realised the value of life and released that life is unpredictable.

Prior to the accident, he was working long hours at his job and so, he decided to quit his job and start something on his own.

So, Paolo quit his job in August 2014.

Starting eikaiwaNOW-

With the savings of his job, Paolo started eikaiwaNOW in September 2014.

eikaiwaNOW was a GPS-based matching app and it used to help connect English teachers with students.

Eikaiwa in Japanese means English conversation and the word eikaiwaNOW means real-time English conversation.

Paolo’s experiences as an English tutor in Japan greatly helped him in starting this app.

He also hired a small team in Tokyo and started funding his app all by himself.

As Paolo needed more capital for marketing of eikaiwaNOW, from December 2014, he started working as a Senior IT Consultant at Akegata Solutions in Tokyo.

He started using his salary to pay the developers of eikaiwaNOW.

While working as a consultant, Paolo met his future wife, Maiko and he hired her as a full-time marketer for eikaiwaNOW, prior to this she worked as a Visual Merchandiser in the fashion industry.

Maiko is Japanese and she lived for a few years in the United States.

Starting his YouTube channel-

Paolo decided to start his YouTube channel after having a discussion with Maiko.

Thanks to being inspired by Casey Neistat, on 23 October 2016, he started his YouTube channel, ‘Paolo fromTOKYO.’

On 23 October 2016, he published the first video of his channel, ‘Riding my Leiftech in Tokyo Japan (Unaffiliated Customer Review)‘.

Initially, Paolo used to shoot videos with his iPhone but later he upgraded to a Canon EOS R camera.

Becoming a full-time YouTuber-

In 2019, his YouTube channel grew substantially and thanks to this, Paolo became a full-time YouTuber.

He quit his consulting job and as his eikaiwaNOW business wasn’t performing as expected even after investing much money, he closed it in April 2019 to fully focus on his YouTube channel.

As of January 2024, he has 3.38M subscribers on ‘Paolo fromTOKYO’ YouTube channel, 154K followers on Instagram and 835K followers on ‘Paolo from Tokyo’ Facebook page.

He earns from a variety of sources like advertisements, ‘Super Thanks’ and Membership on his YouTube channel, sponsorships, affiliate marketing, selling merchandise and he also accepts donations on Patreon.

Paolo primarily makes videos about Japan, but he also made videos about Vietnam, Philippines and Thailand.

Maiko helps him out with his YouTube channel as a camerawoman.

Other channels-

Maiko is also a YouTuber and has a YouTube channel by the name MAIKO de Guzman.

Both Paolo and Maiko run a YouTube channel by the name Tokyo Zebra.

On 2 December 2022, he started a YouTube channel ‘Paolo fromTOKYO en Español.’

Paolo also has a website.

Personal life-

Paolo and Maiko got married on 11 January 2019.

They have a son, Taiga Wolverine de Guzman.

So, how are you inspired by the success story of Paolo de Guzman?

Share with me in the comment section below.

Featured image credit- Paolo de Guzman/Wikimedia Commons