Archive for category: Blogs

Greetings From Berlin Germany! (5-10 July 2017)

After a fun and eventful time in Hamburg it was time for my last stop in Germany, a city on my list of top cites I’d like to visit, Berlin! The train ride in was pretty quick and easy as was finding the gym, Hilti BJJ as Frank, who I had been talking to about visiting and training, gave me directions to find my way. I’ll speak more on my time there later but now I’d like to cover a different adventure that was going on at this time. The adventures of the care package my Mom sent me.

So back in May I was supposed to have a friend meet up with me in Morocco, those plans fell through at the very last minute, but not before already setting up having my Mom send a package to them to bring over to me. Once the package then made it’s way back to my parents place it was a while before figuring out when, or where, she could finally send it to me. Since I had my stops in Germany set up well in advance I figured I would have her send it to me when I was visiting Hilti BJJ so that there would be enough time to send the parcel from Canada. It was all planned out and set, I would be finally getting a parcel, that had some important items, I’d been waiting months to get. Of course there was problems as nothing ever works out perfectly and I wouldn’t be writing about it if it did.

As it ends up the parcel was held for an extra day or two in customs, and then there was a government holiday, so by the time it was released and dropped off to the gym I was already gone. Missed me by one day. In fact as I was flying to my next stop Frank sent me a photo of the parcel now in his possession to which I could only laugh and reply “go figure”. I would have to wait a bit longer to pick up this package now but at least it was in Europe. I would be going back to Germany in about 6 weeks for the BJJ Globetrotters Fall Camp and having just been there I now had some new friends to help me out. After some messaging back and forth I had Ruadhan’s (the Globetrotter I met and who helped me set up my visit to Heidelberg) mailing address sent to Frank so he could send the parcel along and Ruadhan would have it ready for me once I got in for the camp. This time the plan actually worked and I finally received the care package, a package that was originally sent to me in May, and that traveled through Canada and USA probably most of Europe, that I finally got at the end of August. The care package probably almost did as much traveling as I did before getting to me.

So at this point there was a lot of waiting and back and forth with my Mom to figure if and when the parcel was showing up. I started and ended everyday off with checking out the online tracking and asking the guys at the security office if any parcel had been delivered. It didn’t interfere with my visiting too much but it did weigh on my mind most the time as I traveled around the city seeing the many sights. 

Seeing The Historical Sights of Berlin

There’s lots to see in Berlin, the whole city is full of historical sights from WWII, some that are memorials and others that are old buildings now modified for modern use or kept as museum now, as well as newer buildings like the TV Tower, or Fernsehturm, or the Mall of Berlin. I took photos of as much as I could but clearly needed another week or more to really explore this city.

Parts of the Berlin Wall has been turned into an art gallery, called the East Side Gallery sections of the wall are graffiti’d and periodically they re-paint them all white and have local artist do all new murals again. 

There’s also still parts of the wall kept to see and read about the history of the Nazi era around a museum called the Topography of Terror.

Checkpoint Charlie, the (in)famous security point between West Berlin and the Soviet occupied East Berlin. It’s now a famous tourist sight complete with people dressed up as guards to take pictures with and all sorts of souvenir shops and ‘checkpoint’ theme restaurants, such as ‘Checkpoint Curry’.

I have more photos of my travels an adventures over on my Flickr account, head over there if you want to see more and maybe show some love by liking or commenting on few of them, thanks!

Hilti BJJ & Frank

When I was first looking at places to train at in Germany Hilti BJJ Berlin and Frank Burczynski’s name came up to the top, along with Ana and Nexus Fighter Academy, who I had just visited in Hamburg. I contacted him through e-mail and he responded back pretty quickly letting me know I was welcome to stay at his gym and train with the club. Frank is a well known and respected black belt in the Germany BJJ scene and I would have loved to do an interview with him but he was busy with a million things and actually was off at a tournament coaching his team and refereeing for most the time I spent at Hilti BJJ. Frank also had a seminar set up before the weekend with Nicolas Gregoriades of Jiu-Jitsu Brotherhood, which I covered in my ‘Camps & Seminars’ article.

Hilti BJJ is part of IMAG JKD Berlin, sharing a big space with two different mat areas and a big kickboxing area with pads and heavy bags and mirrors and thick crash mats off in the corner for throws. There’s also big change rooms, where I stored my bags, with showers. With the exception of a kitchen I had everything I needed, I slept on a crash mat in a dark corner of the gym and it was probably one of the most comfortable sleeps I had in Europe. More gyms should get crash mats.   

The club was full of different people and skill levels, everyone was generally friendly and I got along with everyone during my stay there. I had some great rolls and everyone was really helpful telling which clubs are good to check out on what nights or where’s good to eat around the gym. I didn’t get to train with everyone too much, I strained my groin after the seminar with Nic Gregoriades so I wasn’t able to train there or the other clubs I was looking to visit like BJJ Akademie, Ringside Gym, or Ralf Warneking Jiu-Jitsu, who I had been talking to about visiting for a while. I was bummed out for not being able to train much while at such a great city for training but it did give me  chance to get out and see much of the sights there. I will say this, from what I saw of the Berling Jiu-Jitsu scene it is amazing, friendly and definitely worth checking out. Thank you Frank for everything, I hope we cross paths again in the future and get to spend more than a few classes hanging out!

This was my last stop in Germany and with that the end of my 3 months I was allowed to stay in the European Zone. If you don’t know most non-European countries are only allowed 90 days out of 180 in the European Zone, or Schengen Area. I had come to the end of that time and I didn’t want to risk going over and being kicked out if caught while crossing a border down the line. I have yet to return to Europe as I’ve headed East toward South East Asia, I’m looking to return early next year (2018).

The first stop heading East after Germany was one of the first spots I planned out before leaving Canada, and I had been waiting excitedly for this, St. Petersburg Russia: Home of Sambo!

Until next time,

see you on the mats!

OSSS!!

WAYS TO SUPPORT PANDA’S ODYSSEY!

Sign up to the Panda’s Odyssey Patreon Account.

Buy Panda’s Odyssey Patches at The Gi Hive.

Buy a shirt at Panda’s Jiu-Jitsu Store.

Follow me and other traveling Jiu-Jitsueros at the BJJ Globetrotters blog section.

Subscribe to my YouTube Channel.

Check out my full photo albums for each article at my Flickr account.

Add me and follow along on most social media @pandasodyssey

The idea of spending a whole month in Rio was both thrilling and frightening. Marcus and I were both looking forward to the amazing BJJ training opportunities and also I couldn’t wait to start practicing with one of the pioneers of Ashtanga Yoga in Brazil, Dany Sa. However, Brazilian and non-Brazilian friends alike had abundantly warned us about safety in Rio so, by the time we set foot in the cidade maravilhosa I had honestly resigned myself to the idea of being robbed (to say the least) at some point! But the truth is, if you take the usual precautions (don’t wander at night in unsafe areas, don’t flash your phone around, don’t visit a favela just for the sake of tourism) you’ll do just fine in Rio.

We rented a one bedroom flat in Copacabana on Airbnb and got a pretty good rate for a month’s stay. It was safe and central and we could easily cycle to/from the various gyms using the orange city bikes (Rio Bike) – you can register and download the app here (https://bikerio.tembici.com.br). However looking back we probably should have stayed in Ipanema/Leblon, as the neighbourhood is nicer, you get more choices for cafes and quieter beaches. We almost rented a flat high up in one of the favela’s (there are some super stylish, very cheap ones on Airbnb) but decided against it just in case. It was fortunate that we did because while we were in Rio there were some dramatic episodes involving the police and military presence in some of the favelas which would have been pretty tense.

We decided to use the first week to try out different gyms around our area. First on the list was Fightzone in Ipanema; we got there for the 10:30am class (50 reals for a day pass) and Ricardo Vieira invited us to join the open mat that day (Wednesday morning is open mat). The class started with a light warm up and then went straight into sparring, which was intense. The coach will generally pair you up for rolls so don’t worry if you are shy, and most of the students are able to speak a bit of English as they have probably travelled the world to compete.

The next day we decided to try Nova Uniao in Flamengo (first trial class is free). We were looking for a place where we could train gi and no-gi, but we found that Rio has surprisingly limited options as the vast majority of academies focus more on the gi game. Nova Uniao has one of the best MMA teams around, and came recommended from several friends of ours so we decided to give it a try. The no-gi classes are led by Ronys Torres, a professional MMA fighter and Jiu Jitsu black belt with a killer record (never been submitted in a pro fight). The team there is very welcoming even though most didn’t seem to speak much English, but they take their training very seriously as many of them are professional fighters (you’ll often be sharing the mat with UFC and Bellator fighters). Classes are generally one hour (but sometimes go for longer), and the focus is generally always sparring, with maybe one or two techniques at the start. Rolling is always intense, and the mats get super slippery at the end of the class because everyone is absolutely dripping in sweat.

Nova Uniao is located inside a gym called Upper Flamengo, conveniently right next to the Flamengo metro station – membership is affordable at 300 reals a month or 200 for a fortnight, and includes use of the pool and gym areas.

Next, we stopped by Felipe Costa‘s gym (called Brazilian Black Belt) located on a Main Street in Ipanema. Despite being 2-times world champion and one of the best rooster-weight of all times, Felipe has a reputation as being one of the nicest guys in the sport and absolutely lived up to that expectation. He speaks perfect English and his teaching is incredibly clear and detailed – and very effective for lighter fighters such as Marcus and myself. We paid 60 reals for a day pass and went to both the morning class which was relatively quiet and had a big focus on technical detail (Felipe was working on a very interesting leg drag variation that day) and returned for the evening class which was busier and had more sparring. If you are a lighter fighter in terms of weight or size, Felipe also has specific sparring sessions for lighter guys, unfortunately we weren’t able to make it to one but we loved the idea!

Finally we decided to check Murilo Bustamante’s Brazilian Top Team academy in Leblon. It was a bit out of the way for us and unfortunately, on the day we visited there weren’t many people on the mat and Murilo wasn’t teaching (he focuses more on the MMA team) but we worked on some nice drills from closed guard with the lead Jiu Jitsu instructor.

Also during that first week in Rio, Marcus dislocated his knee that evening during sparring (a recurring injury of his since he started Jiu Jitsu). Luckily it wasn’t too bad and he was back on the mats in a couple days, but he had to be very mindful and wary of his knee when rolling for the rest of the month.

There were many other gyms in Rio that we would have loved to try, but after being on the road so long, we were looking forward to regular training everyday with familiar faces rather than always visiting new gyms. So after trying out a few we decided that Fightzone would be our home gym for the rest of the month – we liked the environment and their classes fit well my yoga schedule too.

Fightzone also happens to have a great location only a couple blocks away from the beach ? and around the corner from a cafe called Apetite which has good coffee and pastries. Marcus also signed up to Nova Uniao so he could join their no-gi submission grappling sessions, as the one downside is that Fightzone did not have a regular no-gi class. I would have also loved to but I had my yoga classes and you know, an empty wallet.

Fightzone offers several classes a day (10.30am and 8pm every day, 4.30pm Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Saturday morning is open mat at 11am). Ricardo teaches most of them, and he often goes out of his way to accommodate visitors, teaching classes in Portuguese but then explaining in English afterwards as well (something we really appreciated!). There’s also ladies class on Tuesday and a Thursday evening at 9.30pm, led by Gabriela Fechter, an incredibly talented and dedicated world champion brown belt with a slick guard game (also speaks fantastic English).

For the month we were there, Ricardo focused heavily on passing half guard. His teaching style was often very conceptual, rather than only showing structured techniques, he would spend a lot of time to ensure his students fully understand the possibilities of the position and pressure. The only downside was that our limited Portuguese skills meant that we couldn’t get the most out of this as we would have liked.

Sparring at Fightzone is challenging as you’ll find a lots of higher belts and serious competitors on the mat such as Gabriela and the the Gomes brothers; as well as several black belts. However the atmosphere is very welcoming and chilled, so if you’re tired no one will judge you for skipping a round (like me!).

Rio’s lifestyle was good: we’d go train in the morning and hit the beach straight after – The cold sea was great for recovery after training. In the afternoon we’d either go back to training or we’d drag ourselves to go explore the various attractions around the city even if we were exhausted. And there are many of them: Sugarloaf mountain, Christ the Redeemer and Escadaria Selaron are totally worth an early morning or late afternoon visit.

In my opinion, Barra de Tijuca has the most beautiful beaches and clear sea though I’d recommend going during the week as it gets crowded on the weekend (like all of Rio’s beaches!). If you are heading toward Barra’s beach is probably worth going to Pedro do Telegrafo too, since it’s in that direction, although it can be a bit of a mission getting there.

Santa Teresa, a hilltop district with a charming village vibe, is a nice choice for lunch and views but can get pretty dodgy in the evening. We also had time to visit some of Rio’s museums and galleries and really liked the Museum of Tomorrow and Instituto Moreira Salles (there’s a very good coffee shop in the IMS with great croissants – definitely worth a stop).

We also spent time paddle boarding, did a free walking tour around Copacabana and watched lots of live music and went to see some of the Nova Uniao team fight at the Shooto Brasil event.

We absolutely loved our time in Rio: its natural beauty, its people, the lifestyle, and for Marcus especially, eating acai – Every. Single. Day. But we still had more of the country to explore, so with some reluctance we left to continue up north to Bahia and Ceara. Till next time, Cidade Maravilhosa – we will be back! ❤️

Alessia and Marcus

@aleyogabjj

@marcust.bjj

We headed north from Colorado to try and see Yellowstone National Park before it closed for the season. We had around 4 days until it was scheduled to shut so we jumped in the car and headed to Jackson Hole. Unfortunately, the night before we had grabbed a pizza after trick or treating and I was feeling a little off. This made the 8hr drive a struggle as I was unable to keep down anything including water, we had to make a number of stops so I could “empty my system”. I still ended up driving the whole way, as Dee wasn’t listed as a driver and didn’t feel confident driving in the winding, windy and icy conditions through Wyoming.

White wonderland

When we finally arrived, I was so exhausted! We managed to stop and pick up some medication to stop the vomiting and some hydrolyte which I could only just sip to avoid it coming back up. Dee was also starting to feel sick, so we decided to have an early night. When we awoke the next morning, there was around 6 to 8 inches of snow everywhere, this had unfortunately caused the closure of the Yellowstone park roads. We weren’t too upset though as we weren’t yet completely over the illness from the day before. Dee and I spent most of the day laying back in the hotel room while Lilly and Kobe played just outside the room building and having snowball fights.

Kobe and Lilly’s snowman

The following day we left Jackson Hole to head around the side of the park to West Yellowstone. We thought we would have a better chance on getting into the park as the roads were still open on that side. During our drive around, it continued to snow and when we arrived the park entrance was also closed on this side as well. We had booked two days here, so we headed off to the Bear and Wolf Discovery centre as it was the only thing that was still open. We wandered around checking out the enclosures, all the time the snow continued to fall. They have some great displays there and even though it was cold we enjoyed checking out the Bears, Wolves and other animals. The next morning, we woke to even more snow which ended our hopes of getting into the park. We decided to take a drive up the edge of the park where a small section of the highway crossed into it. It was a nice drive through that section and nice and slow due to all the snow and ice one the roads. We did manage to see a coyote running across an open section of the park. We took a walk around town in a bit of a snow storm but as the park season was coming to an end a lot of the business and attractions were closed.

Quake Lake

it was cold!!

Bear and Wolf Discovery center

We had planned on visiting a few small academies that were in some of the towns further north, unfortunately the weather forecast was more severe snowstorms for the next few days. We made a last-minute decision to head towards Seattle and try to get there before the severe weather on the forecast really set in. We headed off in the morning along completely whited out landscapes and snow-covered roads. We drove the rest of the day through Montana in snow, ice and rain. There were definitely some white-knuckle moments during the drive as Dee and I were constantly amazed at how fast and the risks some drivers took, but I suppose they are familiar with these types of conditions.

Yellowstone

Driving conditions were a bit sketchy at times

We stayed the night in Spokane where it was also snowing when we arrived, thankfully the next morning the weather had warmed up a bit and melted a lot of the snow on the road. We drove through to Washington State stopping at a few of the natural attractions. We visited the Petrified Forest which wasn’t really a forest at all, but a heap of fossilised sections of trees. It was very interesting and other than the museum being closed it was a great stop to break up the trip. Washington State is quite beautiful and a very scenic drive with an always changing landscape.

Petrified forest…… basicly trees that turned into rocks

Columbia river

Snoqualmie Falls

Next stop Seattle

-Woody

jitzwithwoodys.com/blog     Youtube   Facebook   Instagram-Woody Instagram-Dee      BJJ Globetrotters

Hello all my Panda-maniacs!

Yes, if you follow me and are a fan of my blog, my videos or you just like me you are a Panda-maniac. Be proud of this nickname as I’m proud of all of you, you have all helped me along this way. Even if all you did was quickly check out my latest post, read a few lines and look at the photos and then pass on to the next thing in your life. Just seeing the view counts on my blog posts give me inspiration to keep writing. All the small comments on my social media accounts, the messages send to me saying ‘good job!’ or asking me where I am or how I’m doing, all those seemingly inconsequential interactions keep me going, pick me up on a bad day and drive me to continue the Odyssey. I have a new article ready to publish but first I figured I would fast forward to more recent days when I made some rather significant milestones. So before I pick back up about my adventures in Germany, where I last left off, I first want to tell you about hitting my 100th club and making it to one full year of traveling and training around the world.

100th Jiu-Jitsu Club!!

I originally had set for my 100th club to be in Bangkok. I was in Koh Tao, Thailand at the 10th Planet club at Monsoon Gym and they were club number 99, but then I got a bug bite. I went hiking up the island’s one mountain to get some awesome photos of the sun setting from View Point, the ultimate lookout point on top of the mountain. Then next day I felt an itch and at first figured it was a pimple on my leg from all the sweating I was doing while there, and man I was doing a lot of sweating, but soon realized it was in fact a bite that was now infected. I was off to Bangkok the next day and the first thing I did was go to a pharmacy and get some ointment and antibiotic pills to sort it out but the damage was already done. I had a staph infection. There would be no training in Bangkok, but I could take the time to get better and ready for my San Diego trip with the Free Rollers group from Australia. At this point my thought was that I was going to make my 100th gym the first class with the Free Roller guys at University of Jiu-Jitsu. I was excited for it, not just to meet the guys and train at Uni JJ but also to make our first class together some a big milestone. But then I checked my flight itinerary update.

I had a series of connections going from Bangkok to San Diego and one of them was stopping off in San Francisco. At first I was scheduled to get in at midnight and not fly out until noon the next day, then that changed to flying to San Diego on the first morning flight then changed again to make the last flight out the night I got in. I lost track of which itinerary was the newest one so I messaged the flight centre to figure it out. As it happens I was on that last flight of the night, meaning I would be getting into San Diego around 1am and would then have to wait until the guys showed up in the afternoon, giving me the full day to figure out what to do. I ended up making plans with a fellow Globetrotter I met at the Fall Camp in Germany, Trevon. The plan was I would meet up with Trevon in the morning and make the morning class at his gym, making that my 100th club now. We kept in contact and Trevon had everything planned out for me. But then there was a delay in my flight.

While I was in Manila waiting for my flight something happened that required a 90 minute delay before we could board. My layover in San Francisco was scheduled to be a short one, 90 minutes to be exact. By the time the plane landed in San Francisco the last flight to San Diego was already boarding, and by the time I got through customs, picked up my carry on that the airline made me check, and made it to the front desk to get my ticket it was too late. It was late, the last flight of the night was already boarded and I was really tired. I wasn’t upset, this was all comical, I was actually joking about this with my friend Luke, who organized the San Diego camp, before ever catching my flights. As I talked to the front desk about re-booking my flight to San Diego and looking for a room for the night I also got onto the internet and checked morning class times for a certain academy in town. The flight attendant asked “Do you want the first flight out or do you want to have a good night’s rest and leave later in the day? We have flights going there hourly.” Quickly checking Google maps to see how long it would be to get from the club to the airport after class to make sure I had more than enough time for the forming plans I then asked “How about around noon time? So I don’t have to rush in the morning” and like that it was set. I would take a short nap at a far too expensive hotel then set out for the morning class for my 100th club, a class with none other than Kurt Osiander.

I would like to mention here that by this time that I had been on antibiotics pills and ointment for 8 or 9 days and the staph infection was no longer an infection now but rather just a small wound of dead skin, a deep one that would take a while to fully heal but also no longer a contagious zombie disease that would prevent me from training.

So I get into the hotel, order some awesome pizza, pass out on a pizza coma and wake up 4 hrs later to take off into San Francisco for the morning class. I make to the Ralph Gracie Academy a bit early to find the lights out and a car parked out front with someone waiting in the car. I walked up to the gym door to look inside and I saw someone behind the desk, figuring they were just getting the club ready I waited for the club to open. The person behind the desk saw me so I waved, they in then turned on the lights to see me better. Who do I see but Kurt Osiander himself standing in his underwear brushing his teeth looking at me like ‘what the fuck do you want?’ before opening the door and letting me and the person inside.

‘Either you two are really early or I’m really slow this morning’

‘No sir, we’re early, sorry for interrupting you’

After a brief conversation of me telling him I was dropping by on my layover and us talking about the last time I saw him, which was at the Black Belts for Butterflies fundraising seminar in Seattle at Professor James Foster’s gym, he showed me the change room and let me dress and stretch out while he got ready himself. The gym is a big square space with an open mat area on one side and a gym area on the other, It’s a nice big gym that I was happy to finally visit and have as my 100th gym.

As I slowly stretched out and got ready for class more and more people showed up and we ended up had a full class of 20 or more. The other person who showed up early as I did was a seasoned blue belt and Kurt had him lead the warm up. They must do this same warm up all the time as everyone seemed to know exactly what he was going to call and were a step ahead of me for switching to each new movement. It was good thorough warm up, and with the jet-lag from being in airports for almost 2 days I was drained before class even started, but I got my wind back quick enough. We worked a sweep from open guard, working shin on shin guard to side control to a choke. Little things got changed or added as we worked it out, Kurt was great at describing exactly how to move yourself and the opponent to make everything work. Counting the seminar this is twice now I’ve trained with Kurt and although he has an entertaining rock star persona, Kurt is always dropping some great knowledge on the mats and if you get all caught up in his hair and swearing instead of listening you’ll miss it.

After class, as some were still rolling and others drilling I talked more with Kurt and told him of the Odyssey and him being the 100th club since beginning the journey. He thought the whole thing was cool and asked where I’d been, usually adding ‘I’m going there later this year’ or ‘I want to go there next year’ it seems Kurt’s always working on new seminars and traveling. As I was talking to Kurt and some of his students about traveling and training Kurt mentioned that there was another class in an hour that I could stay for. I had to look at the times for making back to the airport for my flight and as much as I’d like to stay and have another class with Kurt Osiander that would be cutting it way too close to make my flight. I will say though it was awesome making it out and meeting the great group at Ralph Gracie’s in San Francisco, thank you Kurt!

One Year of Traveling the World!

Earlier this week I hit the one year mark of traveling and training around the world. I was in Melbourne, training at a bunch of gyms that were all places I was referred to by other Globetrotters, making new friends and generally just loving life. I didn’t do anything big for that day, like jump in a shark tank or train a bunch, I was actually pretty tired from all the training lately so I had a quiet night and went to the movies. The days leading up to the milestone I was thinking of it a lot, typing out a master list of countries, cities and clubs, talking about it to the people I was staying and training with in Geelong, before Melbourne. Just letting it sit in that I’ve been traveling and training around the world for one full year.

Here are the numbers I have for traveling for one year:

22 countries

72 cities

112 clubs

and countless friends made along the way.

There are so many people I owe to the Odyssey being able to work, too many to name individually, but know that if you are reading this you are one of them. One person I must give a big shout out is Christian Graugart, the head guy how created BJJ Globetrotters after his own traveling around the world and training. Without Christian putting together the community as he traveled and using social media to bring us all together I would never have found most of the places I’ve trained at and most likely never have met any of the people who have hosted me on this journey. Thank you so much Christian for creating BJJ Globetrotters and thank you to the BJJ Globetrotter community for all the help you’ve given me and wonderful hospitality you’ve shown me.

I have plans to travel for another 6 months, if I can mange the finances to cover it, before heading back to Canada and going back to the ‘normal life’. It will be hard to re-adjust I’m sure but once I’m settled I’ll be sure to have my door open and repaying all the good karma I’ve had sent my way.

Until next time,

see you on the mats!

OSSS!!

WAYS TO SUPPORT PANDA’S ODYSSEY!

Sign up to the Panda’s Odyssey Patreon Account.

Buy Panda’s Odyssey Patches at The Gi Hive.

Buy a shirt at Panda’s Jiu-Jitsu Store.

Follow me and other traveling Jiu-Jitsueros at the BJJ Globetrotters blog section.

Subscribe to my YouTube Channel.

Check out my full photo albums for each article at my Flickr account.

Add me and follow along on most social media @pandasodyssey

Most of my life, I’ve been fascinated by social mechanisms that restrict people’s freedom in a society or community. Cults, religions, traditions, the East German republic after World War 2, North Korea, the European colonisation of most of the world and so on. I’ve always strived for the opposite for myself; to design my life in a way where I can do what ever I want, go where ever I want and say what ever I want. I’m sure a therapist could dig something up in my subconsciousness that has triggered it, I don’t know.

So when I found Jiu Jitsu, it came very natural to me to dislike all the politics and cult like mechanisms you’ll find in the sport. I pretty much managed to steer clear of most it myself in my career, but throughout the years, I’ve heard and experienced my fair share of bullshit. Students who are told they are not allowed to train with whom they want. People who has gone traveling and gotten a friendly reminder from their instructor that they can only visit academies on their trip within their affiliation. Bad mouthing of former students and friends, who has chosen to change academy, sometimes even online in public. Being encouraged to keep a distance towards those not training with you. Push an “us vs. them” mindset, even to the children of which the people are role models for. The list goes on, and I am sure a lot people in the sport have run into similar experiences at some point.

[People listen when you have a black belt. And a sword.]

I believe that most—if not all— politics in Jiu Jitsu derives from one thing; the business of affiliation.

Above all, humans desire a feeling of being important to you – more than they desire your wealth or health. Most of what we say, wear and do in front of any audience, is a matter of displaying value in order to be accepted and recognised in society and to determine our place in it.

Entering the modern Jiu Jitsu community and climbing the belt hierarchy is a great way to achieve recognition within a large group of adult peers, and the typical affiliation business model is build on exactly this mechanism.

Let’s be honest for a moment. If there were no belts, there would probably be very little team and affiliation business. Just look at MMA. It’s a very similar sport, but since there is no validation of skill other than competition merits, the hierarchical rank system does not exist in the same way, thus there is no foundation for running a business based on letting people climb it. But the belt system in BJJ creates—or rather is—a hierarchy that allows affiliations to exist.

[Breaking the traditions of the belt hierarchy]

Being affiliated with someone is basically about validating yourself through others. Preferably through a name/brand that is already recognised in the community. You stick their logo on your gi and website, and instantly feel a little cooler, even though your own skills or results didn’t change. The other way around, an affiliation is also validated by it’s members, as they acquire recognition through the competition or hierarchical results created by them. Both sides are providing each other with value and recognition, but the one side who is higher in the hierarchy has a huge business upside and interest in the relationship. This could be in form of affiliation fee, recurring seminars, merchandise sale etc. You may ask yourself; would you be signing up for an affiliation with all these requirements if it did not offer belt promotions?

Back in the days, not too many years ago, in order to learn Jiu Jitsu, you pretty much had to find some guy with the “secret weapon” and get the knowledge from him. There was no way to figure it out yourself. But times have changed and Jiu Jitsu instruction is more accessible than ever. The option to lock people into a closed group in order to sell them technical knowledge is no longer anywhere near as valid as it used to be. The only primary product left to sell for an affiliation, is the public recognition through belt promotions.

[The difficulties of determining hierarchy when belts are off]

I’m not saying that belts or affiliations are neither good nor bad. Pretty much all businesses and brands are built on exploiting human anxieties in one way or another. Being part of a strongly hierarchical community in order to work your way towards recognition is not necessarily a bad thing. For many people it is just right and they thrive in it. We are programmed for this; it speaks to our primal need of being held and told everything is alright. It also allows us to ignore our immense insignificance as individuals and species in the scope of the universe and time. There is a lot of value in and good elements of having a traditional belt system. BJJ is probably the only martial arts that still upholds some integrity in it and the actual acquired skills are very real. The key here is to be honest with ourselves and each others and see this illusion of belts for what it is. First then can we have a healthy relationship with it.

[True happiness through illusion]

But belts can make grown men act very weird and the problem—in my opinion—arise when this turns into politics, telling adults what they can and can not do. Splitting friendships. Spreading bad vibes. Creating unhealthy rivalries. People not being themselves. Sucking up to or looking down on others based on their belt level. Limiting people in social interactions with potential new friends. Making people greedy. So I do believe the time is right and that there is room for an alternative approach. An affiliation based first and foremost on training and healthy, equal friendships. With a respect for the belt tradition but also a mature approach to it. With belt promotions being a natural effect of having a strong community interested in helping each other instead of an effect of having a business relationship.

[Black belt in Jiu Jitsu, black belt in life (as they say)]

There is no “us vs. them”, it’s an illusion, a stone age mechanism, hardwired into our brains to keep us safe by staying with and fighting for our own desert tribe. Anything else would’ve meant certain death 2.5 million years ago. At the end of the day, we’re all just adults, who like to grapple and no other adult should tell us, who we can and can not play with.

Tribalism is our nature. Humans seek the comfort of being part of something, and it feels so incredibly good when we are. This is no different than sports team fan clubs or religion. Or BJJ Globetrotters for that sake. But this tribalism, when let loose, can quickly lead to unhealthy things.

BJJ Globetrotters is a humble attempt at creating small a counter balance to this.

From Texas we moved further north into Middle America, as we had plans on stopping in Oklahoma to train at Rafael Lovato Jr’s Academy. As we headed up the highway we took a little detour to the Toy and Action Figure Museum…… for the kids of course ?. This place was amazing! It had so many action figures, many from my childhood. We spend well over an hour walking around and trying to pick out all the toys we had owned and played with. Kobe seemed to know more about most of them than me, as he often plays with my old toys when visiting Nana and Pokka’s place. After that stop we continued into Oklahoma City, we were quite surprised how clean and nice of a place it seemed. Our Airbnb was located north west of the city in a nice shopping area which was great as we had to purchase some cold weather gear as the seasons were definitely changing.

First place on the list to visit was the Cowboy Museum, this place was fantastic, we were so glad we visited it. It had so many great exhibits, unfortunately you were unable to photograph and video a lot of them. The art area was probably one of our favourites with the carved leather saddles and amazing paintings. The Cowboy movie section would have definitely been a hit with my old man, walking around it I swear he would have watched every single one of those movies as he is a huge “yippie” fan. We spent a few hours there and left all in agreeance that this was probably the best museum we had been to yet, mainly because it was so different from all the others we had been to…. And we have been to a lot on this trip.

Buffalo Bill

Riding Logs?

Almost left them there!

The next day (Monday) we headed to Rafael Lovato Jr’s Academy, unfortunately the 11am class wasn’t on and Rafael JR was out of town prepping from an upcoming MMA fight, but we met Dallas one of Rafael’s brown belts. He gave us a heap of things to checkout and do while in town. So, we headed off exploring more and would return later that evening for class. We decided to head into the city and check Bricktown an old section of the town with, you guessed it, with brick buildings and roads. We also checked out the Children’s Garden where they had a pretty cool pumpkin display.

Brick town

We retuned for class which was ran by Shiloh Roberts, one of the friendliest and happiest guys we have met on this trip. He started the class with probably one of the coolest yoga warm ups that had me downward dogging like a bloody pro! He followed it up with a solid class on passing concepts that had plenty of pressure and movement that you would expect from Rafael Jr’s school, we had a fun time and some great rolls.

Shiloh’s class

Us and Shiloh…. Super nice guy!

The next day we had the best pizza yet on this trip from a small place downtown called Empire Pizza (one of Dallas’s recommendations) if you head to Oklahoma make sure you check it out. We headed to Will Rogers gardens where I saved a poor little turtle from certain doom after he fell on his back on the road and couldn’t get up, a bit like when I have Dee in side control ?. We also took a drive around Lake Hefner which was damn cold and windy. We headed back to Rafael JR’s for the kid’s classes, Kobe and Lilly enjoyed the classes. We didn’t get to see too much of their classes as the parents sit in another room out the front and watch through the window or on a TV that it connected to a camera. Its not a bad idea as it stops the kids getting distracted and coached from their parents.

Best Pizza

Our little mate

Lake Hefner

Kobe in class

Lilly and her class at Rafael Jr’s

Dee and I then took part in Dallas Niles’s NoGi class, it was a blast I learnt a sneaky little 50/50 position ankle lock that I will be using from now on! Everyone was super cool to roll with and found myself laughing when we would end up entangled in some weird 50/50, inverted, bear trap leg lock position that neither of us could submit from. Even though Rafael JR wasn’t there we had a blast with guys! And they were so welcoming…. I don’t think they would get a whole lot of visitors as Oklahoma isn’t really a huge tourist draw… We loved it though.

getting murdered by Dallas

From Oklahoma we headed further north into Kansas, we ended up staying in Wichita. As we were only staying one night we didn’t train, instead we headed out and checked out the place. We headed over to the Great Plains Nature Centre and checked out the exhibits then took a nice walk around Chisholm Creek Park. We then Headed to check out the “Keeper of the Plains” a giant steel Native American that stands in in the centre of Wichita along the Arkansas river.

Great Plains Center

The Keeper of the Plains

We had enjoyed our run up the centre of the USA, seeing all the cotton, corn and plains. It really felt as though we had finally seen the real America that we had imagined after seeing so many movies as kids. From here we were off to the mountainous terrain of Colorado.

-Woody

jitzwithwoodys.com/blog     Youtube   Facebook   Instagram-Woody Instagram-Dee      BJJ Globetrotters

The drive from Orlando to New Orleans would take us through 4 states in 9 hrs – Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. Our stay in New Orleans was brief, 2 nights in fact, so we unpacked our bags to the Airbnb and headed to the French Quarter for dinner and some sightseeing.

Trip Advisor had great reviews for a restaurant called Gumbo Pot but upon our arrival we discovered it was closed. So, we decided to go for a stroll to see if there was somewhere else close by.

As we walked up Saint Peters St pass Jackson Square where we passed many buskers, some of whom were doing magic shows and others whom were reading palms and telling fortunes

Thankfully we came across the Gumbo Shop- a beautiful quaint restaurant, that was very busy – which we took as a good sign.

Post meal destruction

We took one look at the menu and were happy to see the “Complete Creole Dinner” option, allowing us to try a variety for meals without having to spend big dollars on multiple “entrée’s”. Much to our surprise Lilly and Kobe loved the Gumbo and Jambalaya as much as Adam and I did, so much that I will attempt to cook a Gumbo once we are home again.

New Orleans is more commonly known as a city to visit if you want to party, but all of this is really contained in one Street – Bourbon Street.  This makes sightseeing easy, knowing where not to go if you’re not up to partying.

As we walked around the French quarter the next day I loved admiring the buildings with their gorgeous shutters and balconies and the kids enjoyed looking at all the Halloween decorations in the doorways. We loved walking through the streets looking through the art stores and gorgeous boutique stores listening to the Jazz bands that were playing in the streets.

Walking around New Orleans

New Orleans is also famous for Beignet,  a doughnut covered in powdered sugar, but rather than wait in a rather long que at the very famous Café du Monde, our Lonely Planet Guide book had informed us the Beignet Café just around the corner and it would have no line at all and plenty of seating. We were delighted to try out this delicious treat with a nice coffee in a quiet café with fast service.

mmmmm…. Doughnuts

As we walked around we found ourselves at the dock of the Paddle steamers Natchez & Queen Creole and decided to take a lunchtime cruise on the Queen Creole along the Mississippi River. The cruise was very informative of the origins of New Orleans and the Battle of New Orleans in 1815 which a stop off at the site of the battle. Much to our delight lunch would be more Gumbo.

Paddle steamer

I would love to come back to New Orleans again – there is so much history and character that I think you could spend days just discovering it.

After our stay at in New Orleans we were headed to Dallas Texas, but rather than the interstate we drove along the Mississippi River till Baton Rogue on our way to Natchez. To break up the hours of sitting in the car we are always looking for things to see and do along the way. We found a hike to a waterfall in the Clark Creek Natural Area in Woodville. This was a beautiful hike with lots of steep climbs and stairs. We hiked for 2.25km and we came across a little creek, Kobe declared his despair of “walking this far, for this!”

big canon!

We made it to Natchez in time to watch a gorgeous sunset at our Hotel which is alongside the Mississippi River. After a nice southern breakfast of biscuits and gravy at the hotel we were headed to Shreveport via Alexandria, as we had discovered that in Alexandria was a petting zoo that we knew Lilly & Kobe would love.

Sunset over the Mississippi

We had told Lilly and Kobe that we would be stopping soon, but with the hike still very fresh in Kobe’s mind he was very concerned that we had found another hiking trail and was not excited, that was until he seen the sign for “Gone Wild Safari”.

Well trained

feeding the animals

Once in the park, we brought some feed for the animals and stepped aboard the repurposed school bus to head out on our tour. A guide drives you around the park and tells you about the animals they have there. And stops frequently for you to feed the animals from the bus. On the first stop a very friendly camel stuck its head in the bus window scaring Kobe, Lilly lost her feeding cup to a very zealous antelope wanting more than she was offering. Kobe loved that the long-horned bulls would come up the window open their mouths and put their tongue to the side, so you could just poor the feed into their mouths. As we drove around we got to see Bison, Kangaroos, a Zorse (a mix between a Zebra and a Horse), Ostrich, Llamas, pigs, Deer and Giraffe and many more. Kobe and Lilly loved seeing the Prairie Dogs and may have even tried to sneak up on them to try and catch one, but those two aren’t very stealthily a trait they must get from Adam?.  I think Kobe was definitely happy with this stop, we continued up to Shreveport where we would rest before heading to Dallas the next day for some Jiu Jitsu.

-Dee

jitzwithwoodys.com/blog     Youtube   Facebook   Instagram-Woody Instagram-Dee      BJJ Globetrotters

Leaving Miami, we headed up the centre of Florida to Orlando, we opted to take the smaller back roads up around Lake Okeechobee to see more of the Florida countryside. We had only planned to visit Orlando for about 4 days to visit some friends and get a little bit of training in.

Upon arriving in the afternoon, we dropped our gear of at our Airbnb and headed to Disney Springs to meet up with the Elam family. They had just moved back to the USA from living in Australia for a number of years most recently in Newman where their children had trained Jiu-Jitsu with us. It was great to see familiar faces and the kids were so happy to see each other, telling stories and running around the different shops.

Checking out Disney Springs

Sitting on Captain America

The next day we headed to Gatorland, a park filled with Alligators and other wildlife. We ended up spending a full day here as it was so much fun, you can get a bag full of hotdogs that you can feed to the Alligators. We all tried our hands at Alligator wrestling which was a lot easier that some of the rolls I’ve had on this trip, they pretty much just lay there and let you sit on them.

Kobe Gator Wrestling

Lilly Gator Wrestling

The following day we decided to get some training in, we headed to Orlando Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. This is where 9x World champion Bruno Malfacine trains and teaches. We all took classes and had an absolute blast, both Dee and I felt though we had learnt so much in just one class. Bruno has a very simple strategic way of teaching complex concepts. We were also both lucky enough to roll with Bruno, that in itself was an experience, we rolled for 10min and I think I only saw him twice. The rest of the time I just saw flashes of his Gi as he moved around me. That night we went home and decided we needed to extend our time here and we also wanted to catch up more with the Elam Family.

Rolling with Bruno

We spent the rest of the week training with the Alliance team at Orlando Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Both Lilly and Kobe loved it there, they were always playing around with Bruno and the guys. It was also great to see someone of Bruno’s calibre spending time teaching the kids classes. Jonathan Satava was also visiting from Marcelo’s in New York. Bruno had Jonathan teach one of the NoGi classes and he taught some north south choke gold! Some great details that I will be defiantly taking away from his class and adding into my game.

Lilly and Kobe with Bruno

Awesome class

Me and Jonathan Satava

Saturday had come around and after training we were contemplating what to do on Sunday. At around midnight we made the decision that we would go to Universal world. We had already done Disney and as we only had a day Universal seemed the better option. The kids were already asleep so we set the alarms to wake us up in 5 hours. Now waking them in the morning felt like Christmas they had no idea beforehand that we were going to go, they were absolutely ecstatic.

Jaws!

We ended up spending 12hrs there between the two parks, we all had a great time walking around and riding all the rides. We managed to avoid all the big roller coasters as Lilly and Kobe were not that excited about them, pretty sure they were still having flashbacks from the Guardians of the Galaxy ride in Disney California. Overall we were very impressed with the parks. Kobe absolutely loved Jurassic park and Lilly the Harry Potter rides and areas. At about 4pm the Florida weather kicked in and the rain started bucketing down, this unfortunately closed a few of the rides but we continued to walk around and ride what we could. At the end of the day we were very wet and exhausted! we had walked a little over 20km, seen and done so much. It was a great day and the kids won’t stop talking about it.

Jurassic Park

Transformers

As Monday rolled in we headed back to training, Lilly had also been doing the kids striking classes while we were there. Lilly can’t seem to get enough of training, I swear she would roll all day if we would let her. Kobe is also super keen to train all the time but when his class is over he is happy just to kick back and play on the side of the mat. The team at Orlando BJJ was great we had some of the best training there so far on the trip and were welcomed where we felt part of the team. After our last session at Orlando BJJ we headed off to Wekiwa Springs a natural spring one of the guys at the club had recommended. It was so good after training as the water was freezing as it bubbled out of the large crack in the spring.

Cool Kids class

Us with Bruno

From the spring we headed over to the Elam’s for dinner, the kids had a great time fishing in the pond that was straight out their backdoor. After a great dinner they introduced us to the messy art of pumpkin carving. Kobe lost interest in the first 5 minutes so I  ended up finishing it for him, Lilly had a great time doing it.  We worked out Dee was the best person and scraping out the insides of the pumpkin……It was probably more the fact that no one else wanted to do it so we just kept praising her so we didn’t have to hahaha.

Messy Pumpkin carving

End result!

Orlando was super cool, one of the perks of having an open itinerary for this trip is that we could extend our stay there and not miss these opportunities.

-Woody

jitzwithwoodys.com/blog     Youtube   Facebook   Instagram-Woody Instagram-Dee      BJJ Globetrotters