My trip to the other side of the world

THE TRIP

AUG 06, 2016 MATHIEU DUBOIS BLOG

OK so here I am in Beijing international airport waiting to get on the last plane of my trip. Lets do a quick recap of my initial trip to China thus far. I started in Sherbrooke (Québec ,Canada) then I drove to Kingsley falls to meet with my parents who offered me a ride to Pierre elliot Trudeau airport in montreal (my mom didn’t really gave me a choice haha). So I get to Toronto and I find my gate, wait to board and I’m on my way to , excuse my french, mothafuckin China!! Do you know how long 14 hours really is? Well if you ever take a plane for that long and that the airline company tells you that you can’t use any electronic devices during the flight, you will get an idea. I was to tired to read without losing focus yet to excited by where I was going to sleep. Ok enough complaining, I fly for Guangzhou in an hour and then a new life full of martial arts adventures awaits me !

(1H30 LATER)

It’s my first big trip and I just realized my first big mistake. I didn’t make sure of the when and where of my pickup location. My contact knows that I was landing at 12h45 but that’s the only thing keeping me sane. I have no address, no phone number and Facebook doesn’t work because of the great firewall of China. Worst case scenario is a night at the airport so it ain’t the end of the world. I keep saying to myself, it’s OK to make mistakes as long as you don’t do the same one twice.

A new hope (30 minutes later)

I must have done something great in a past life or something. Just as I was starting to feel like I was sleeping the night at the airport, messenger decided to work for half a sec. During that very short connexion my messages all came in at once and one of those contained my contact Chinese cellphone number. My problem was almost solved. I tried to find a public phone but I quickly remembered that we are not living in 2012 anymore lol. No public phone in the one place it might still be useful so I borrowed a cellphone from a skinny Chinese dude who happened to seemed to understand that my phone wasn’t working. My only credit In that problem resolution was to stay calm to stay focus on the possible Solutions. Like Chris Hauenter ( one of the 12 first american bjj black belts) said, win ,lose ,or draw you will always have a better outcome if you stay calm
#BJJKNOWLEDGE

The language barrier strikes back
I need to learn basic Chinese ASAP. I almost kicked myself out of the waiting room because the security guard thought that I was waiting to get to my next flight and there was no more flight. That’s what I think happened but at first I thought the waiting room was closing. That got my heart pumping a little bit. I just managed to get my contact to pick me up after a little misunderstanding and someone wanted me to move from the spot I said I was going to be. I could always call him back but that implied borrowing a phone without speaking any Chinese.
I have a feeling that I’m gonna be in those kind of situations a lot in the next few weeks. It’s gonna be tough but nothing easy is worth doing anyway.

Return of the contact (1h00 later)

My contact is finally at the airport and I’m off to Foshan. Lets get some sleep because now than the planning and travelling part are over, the vacations are over. I like quoting overachieving people (keeps me motivated) so as Jocko wilink would say : Let’s get after It!!

P.s: this is the first entry of my first blog so i'm looking forward to your comments/feedback