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I get requests every week from people who hope we’ll set up a camp some place in the world they like (or live). But USA Camp is really the season for me where I’m answering the same question on an almost daily basis:

“So, when are you doing a camp on the West Coast?”

I understand the thought process of this. There are places in the world that have no BJJ Globetrotters camps but that doesn’t mean there’ll ever be one. In reality, the approach I have to eventually making a camp happen somewhere, is probably different from what you’d expect.

First, I don’t sit and look at a world map on my wall and try to figure out what areas there could be a market for setting up a camp. The way I approach the camps is that I make them for myself, first and foremost. Every single camp is basically just me trying to design the most amazing, dream holiday I can possible imagine for myself and then invite a few hundred friends along to join. Even if no one signed up for a camp, I would still go and probably have a great time on my own. Ok, I’d need one volunteer for the Jiu Jitsu training part of it at least, but you get the point!

I believe that for the camps to really work, I must be 100% passionate about going there myself. Every. Single. Time. For me to sit down and think “ok, what would be the absolutely most amazing trip I can think about for myself here”, I must have a genuine interest in taking part of it.

This is why I have no plans of franchising or outsourcing the camps. I will never do camps every week around the world where I send someone else to run it and just put my BJJ Globetrotters stamp on them. If I’m not a genuine part of the social- and training aspect of a camp, it would not a BJJ Globetrotters camp anymore. It would just be a business. Fair enough, maybe one day, I’ll have enough stripes on my black belt to become old and greedy and just do it for the money, but who knows.

Back to people asking me about doing camps in certain places. There are a lot of factors that play in:

• First and foremost, when I consider it, I must feel excitement. I must get a bit of butterflies in my stomach by the thought of going. I don’t care about how many potential participants we could sell tickets to, how much other people wanna go there or how unexplored the market is for a camp there. I must personally want to do it. Considering that a new camp usually takes 6-10 months of hard work to set up from scratch and I’ve been traveling a bit in my life, I’m getting increasingly more difficult to excite with potential new locations. This is a (beyond luxury) problem I’m struggling with a bit.
• Finding enough matspace for a hundred or more people is extremely difficult. If they’re not there in the first place, I’m already moving on to the next camp idea on the list. It’s most often just way too much work to even try and begin to look for mats of the right quality and quantity – not to mention reliable transportation, insurance, set up and so on.
• There are physical and calendar limits to how many camps I can squeeze into a year and into my life. The puzzle of booking 10 camps this year has been incredibly complex already and often I have to skip great camp ideas because I simply have enough on my plate. It also seems to be the exact amount of camps I can barely do without completely burning out.
• I try to make each camp different. I like the contrast of traveling and I’m sure that if I did 10 surf themed camps a year, I would end up finding it tremendously boring. A new camp must be something that isn’t already on the schedule or I don’t bother doing it. Did anyone say Antarctica?
• I want the camp to be part training and part adventure. Adventure defined by a travel experience that would be very difficult to do on your own. If traveling is easy, it’s usually not memorable for me. It must be a place that’s somewhat challenging to get to. This is why I’ll never do camps in any mainstream travel destinations that you’ll likely visit anyway some day. New York, San Diego, Rio de Janeiro, Ibiza, Amsterdam, Cancun. Any resorts with a buffet and evening entertainment shows. Not happening.
• It has to beat all the other camp ideas that fit the schedule for the season. My checklist for running a camp currently has a whopping 800+ items and there are way more tiny things that has to work than you can probably imagine. Logistics of transportation, accommodation, distances, food delivery, cleaning, shipping etc. is complicated and if any one of these things look like they’re too much work, the camp will be bumped down the list. When I have 50 or more great camp ideas for one season, I’m only gonna invest my time and money in the absolute best ones only.

And as for the #1 question in my inbox: Why don’t I do a camp on the west coast of the United States? No one has pointed my attention to any potential camp ideas that fulfill all points above. I’m already going to the U.S. once a year for our camp out in the forest and I’m getting my annual quota of Walmart and beef jerky covered for now. But who knows, maybe I’ll randomly find a place there on day and go for it. Nine out of ten camps have happened because someone at a camp has come up to me and told me about a place they know of, which I always think is interesting to listen to.

Setting up a camp is complicated. It has to be perfect and it has to fit my personal schedule and willingness to risk my money if it fails. With that said, I really love the process of spending months and months grinding through hundreds of logistical details, emails and phone calls for each potential location and finally end up with a full year’s schedule of perfectly planned, exciting adventures for myself and everyone else who decides to join. It’s a lot of work but I do enjoy every minute of it. I often say I’m like the Miyao brothers of Jiu Jitsu camps; I’m on the mats with this more hours than anyone else in the world. I don’t take steroids though (or should I say I’VE NEVER FAILED A TEST). But apart from that, we’re pretty much identical. Ok, I don’t have a twin.

Therefore, if you’re ever at a camp, remember you’re pretty much just crashing my holiday, so if I leave a towel on that beach chair in the morning, that means I have reserved it for the day. Thank you.

I really don’t know where to start this blog, so many things come to mind, but here it goes. The week I spent in the USA Maine camp has been one of the most eventful weeks of my travels. After being able to relax for the two weeks between camps, my body felt much better and it was ready for the mats. I however realized on the first day attending the classes that my head still had a loads of unprocessed information and techniques. I tried to pay attention but I caught myself drifting away thinking about similar techniques that I’ve seen or other unrelated topics. With that in mind I decided to only take 1 or 2 classes per day but focus on the open mats, trying to roll with as many different people as I could. The week went on and I started to see that my Frankenstein techniques were falling together. Having my body in good condition I was able to perform better then in the St. Barths camp and my movement and skills started to get smoother and more goal oriented.

Photo credit: Tom Dowdall

I finally felt how this trip had pushed my BJJ further down the road. Saturday rolled around and my class was scheduled at 3 pm. A certain familiar stress feeling started to creep up at me. It was the same kind of stress that I used to feel when I was competing in my earlier days. I had coached before at my local Judo club, I had even stepped in a few times to coach at my old MMA gym. This however was different. I was in a group of world class coaches with years of experience. To be honest the thought often crossed my mind that I did not belong. Like I’ve said before, I strive at pushing myself past my comfort zone and forcing myself to grow. That experience did certainly push my limits but I’m happy I did. The class went on with only a few minor hiccups on my part, but overall I’m happy with how it went and I know it will get better and easier with experience. That being said to all the people who attended my class and those who came to me after it with kind words, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving me your time and showing what I have to offer interest.

Photo credit: Rich Sab 

While still recovering from my adrenaline dump we went for the last open mat and lined up for the last photo shoot. Christian stepped up and had a small speech about a very persistent white belt named Evan Law. He had trained for 7 years and still had his white belt. Christian brought out a blue belt and told him to step up. I am truly happy for him, he deserved that and even more. From what I heard it was long overdue. Then it happened. Christian started another speech about an person who sounded familiar. When he mention that this person lived in the middle of the “freaking” Atlantic I realized he was talking about me. I had to focus all my strength to hold myself together and keep my composure. According to witnesses my face became bright red as a stoplight. He grabbed an purple belt and told me to step up. He slapped me with it and that was it, I was officially an purple belt. While trying to process all that happened I see Nelson running towards me, thinking he was about to give me a hug I raised my hands. He grabs my hands and throws me head over toes. I was too happy to care, I think he just wanted to get payback after I threw him at my class.

 

Photo Credit: Shawna Rodgers

With all that behind me, I can’t imagine spending the last days of my trip with better people. Everyone I met, new and old friends, you are what made this week great. Being able to share it with you guys was my best reward. So to all the people from the camp, I’ll see you down the road.

Photo credit: Shawna Rodgers

 

Photo credit: Shawna Rodgers

 

 

Greetings From Paris France!

I had a quiet morning train to the airport and flight over to Paris. Getting to the hostel was a different matter. I had no problem using the trains in Paris and no problem navigating around the streets, but first I had to get a ticket for the trains before anything. At the train station there was a line up to get a one way ticket from a machine. There were 2 machines and just before I got to the use either one they both seemed to break, only one of them would even take change. I had credit cards and Euro notes but no change, so I switched lines for the customer service desk. After getting to the front of the line and asking for the week pass now, since I spotted that they had one, I was told I would have to now go get a photo, attach it to the pass, and sign the back. The photo booth was on the other side of the station and had a line up of other tourists doing the same thing. I stood back and I read the side of the booth for instructions and watched everyone trying to figure out how to use the photo booth and pick the right option for the proper picture. Once I got into the booth it was easy enough to figure out to pick out the right option. The thing is you get a sheet of small pictures and you need to cut one out for the train pass. Luckily I came prepared and had a pair of scissors, and a pen to sign the back too.

There was a girl from Canada in front of me who wasn’t prepared for this, she had to ask for change to break the Euro notes she had, and borrowed both my scissors and pen and even needed me to help her figure out how to get the right picture option. I figured she was totally lost and had no clue or anything planned for her visit but after talking to her she seemed to have a whole trip planned out, at least for the bigger picture. She was visiting a few places across Europe and had all her places booked and plane tickets bought and a list of the sights she wanted to see, she just didn’t think of the small details like city transit. I hope her trip went better than getting her train pass went, but learning the train system may have caused her some problems. By now I’ve found I can figure out pretty much any transit system pretty easily. After visiting so many cities and finding my way around, especially after my week in Tokyo a few years ago and more recently London, transit maps are easy enough to read, even if they’re not in English. The Paris trains take a few minutes to figure out but it was easy enough to my hostel and settle in.

As soon as I settled into the hostel I had a few things to pick up, like a new hair trimmer, my old one died in London (I blame the adapter) and more importantly, a pair of shorts. I had been wearing a pair of pants all this time and that was ok when traveling through Canada during the winter and not a big deal when traveling through the UK in the spring but now I was getting into warmer places and a warmer season. It’s only going to get warmer as I travel on, so I was going to need shorts. I have brought with me my no gi training shorts but they don’t have pockets and I need my pockets! With a run to downtown and an adventure looking for a hair trimmer I was good to focus my time on sight seeing, making friends and of course training.

Making Friends and Seeing Sights

Seeing the sights, or some of them anyways, was definitely on the list, after all how could I pass up the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe or Versailles? In total it was 2 full days of walking around to see the sights in Paris that I did see and I have many, many photos of them. I’ve picked some of the best ones and posted them here, for the full photo stream you’ll have to head over to my Flickr account to see them all. 

I went by the Louvre as well, but I didn’t go inside, I was just too tired from the past two days of sight seeing. Next time I go back I will definitely spend a day going through the museum. For now here’s some photos of the beautiful outside of the Louvre and the surrounding area like the gardens.

I also made some friends while hanging out at the hostel, one was a fellow Canadian who after talking we realized we both grew up in some of the same ares and really should have crossed paths as some point before. He was making his way to the UK having come from Italy, almost the exact opposite direction of me. Another was a woman who was staying in my room who was in Paris for a marathon on the weekend, she travels around the world doing marathons at least once a year outside of Peru. We would talk about traveling, places we’ve each been to and places we each still wanted to go see, just about every evening and even went out to explore the neighborhood one evening and found a cool looking giant metal orb, the Geo-Sphere, and there was a submarine on display beside it too. There were others I met in passing, another Canadian who had gone to Versailles in the same group as me who was from Edmonton, some guys from Brazil there on business. It was pretty cool hanging out at the hostel and meeting people in the evening, it’s been something reliable to look forward to when checking into the hostel, meeting people with cool stories.  

Meeting Arthur and Paul

When I planned out my visit to Paris I had been talking to Arthur from the start, getting all sort of tips from him. Arthur is actually in Christian’s Book, The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Globetrotter, as one of the first guys Christian meets up with, so he’s been helping fellow Globetrotters visit Paris for some time. Paul is from the UK and just so happens he and I were visiting Paris at the same time, as well as Barcelona afterwards. This gave us the opportunity for all three to meet and hang out together and train at Arthur’s gym. We first all met at a cafe one evening. It was in the same neighborhood as Arthur’s and the gym, and also the hostel I was staying at. After a quick coffee and introductions Arthur showed us around the area, there was a cool park that had a man made pond and island hill with a lookout point out and memorial on top. There was a cave area where they used to cut stone from, which is what this whole area was carved out for, a stone quarry. It was cool to see and I would have totally missed it had Arthur not brought us out to the place.

The next times I returned was Paul and Arthur and it was for class, we actually hit up 2 classes that day, both the noon time and evening class. By the end of the day we were tired and sore but it felt good nonetheless. The classes were with great people, Arthur’s club has some really nice teammates, they all welcomed us to their mats and were friendly and helpful. Those who killed us in the mats were also killing their own teammates so it wasn’t like they just wanted to take it to the new guys, seriously though the range of styles was so wide each roll was so different I felt the fact most of them have other styles they train in or came from really showed. It was a great time training with everyone, thanks again Arthur for helping me out with my Paris visit and bringing me to your gym!We hung out a few times while we all were in town. Grabbing drinks and burgers at bar in my hostel after class and talking Jiu-Jitsu until midnight one night. Relaxing another night at Arthur’s talking away about our own travel and training experiences while his tiny puppy constantly attacked my toes, having a hatred for my socks for some reason. It quickly became like we were long time friends, meeting up and hanging out was very natural from the start. When you have a lot of common interests like traveling and training Jiu-Jitsu it’s pretty easy to build on it and become good friends quickly. As the usual theme of this journey goes I wish we had more time to hang out, in fact I was having such a blast I didn’t think of setting up a video of the three of us until afterwards. I having some our conversations of the different ways and reasons we started BJJ or thoughts of different game styles and experiences traveling would have been a great interview. Ah well, there’s always next time I guess.

Training at RNK Paris

Arthur Trains, and teaches some classes, at RNK Paris which has two different locations but for my time in Paris I just trained at the one near Arthur’s place and my hostel. I had originally hoped to also look up the French boxing art of Savate but the schedule never worked out with my sight seeing hang out with the guys. RNK Paris from what I can tell is part of a bigger community of different martial arts styles under the same roof. From the pictures on the walls I could see there were also Aikido and Judo classes at the the location I was training at and at one point as BJJ class was ending a Jeek Kune Do class was starting. The first time I made it out Arthur was busy and Paul was just getting into Paris so I was on my own to meet the club. It was an open mat and I think it went on for 3 hours, with people slowly filing in as time went one, but I didn’t stay the entire time. The black belt who open the gym, Prof. Akio Long, is a very chill guy and welcomed me in and introduced me to everyone. As the class went on I was a feeling aches and pains all over from traveling so much and he would always stop and make sure I was ok and didn’t need any help. I rolled with him at one point and was utterly lost as he wrapped me up over and over again. As Arthur pointed out he has a very different style and tends to destroy everyone there, I which I had more time with him to figure out how he moves and sets up the things he was doing, it was such an intriguing style he had.

Game of Rolls 

While we were hanging out Paul pulled out a deck of cards to show us, it wasn’t some magic set that he was going to do tricks with or a deck of Playboy cards with naked girls, no it was a BJJ deck of cards that while being designed into a very cool looking traditional deck of cards it’s also a Jiu-Jitsu game called Game of Rolls. The idea is you have timed matches, the 2 opponents draw 3 cards each, keeping them to themselves, or only showing a judge if there happens to be one. each card is designed to either be a position card (mount, side control, honey hole etc.) or a trick card (blindfolded, hand armed, hand tied etc.) the idea is if you have a trick card you show it to your opponent and they have to play with that handicap on them, while the position cards to keep to yourself and look to get a submission within the match time from one of the positions you drew. The whole thing is a very creative way to get fun competition matches going on within the club. I think having a full tournament in this style would be a lot of fun to not only part take in but also watch as a spectator, and with the game designed as a deck of cards it’s always good to have one on hand to play card with as well. Paul gave Arthur and myself each a pack and I’ve had it in my bag this entire time, pulling it out once a while while traveling. One day I will bring it along to a class and see if anyone is interested in playing during open mat. I hope this game catches on! Here’s a video on how to play.

Until next time,

see you on the mats!

OSSS!!

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Something that’s taken a lot of getting used to on this journey of mine is the shear freedom of it all. I woke up in my Jeep after staying the night in a shady truck stop somewhere in South Carolina. I followed my typical morning routine of getting dressed, making my truck stop breakfasts (usually a PB & Nutella Sandwich), topping off my gas tank, and hitting the road. I’d planned a nice day of bouldering in Chattanooga, Tennessee. However, on my stretch to ‘Nooga, I made the last-minute decision to skip it entirely and shoot straight to Nashville: the land of Country. I’ve always been a country buff, so blasting Zac Brown Band as I maneuvered my way through the Appalachian Smoky Mountains was a blast. I couldn’t help but stare in wonder at the jagged beaks of the mountains as I tore across the valley; I studied geology in college, so mountains have always intrigued me. I began to think of how geology is a lot like jiu jitsu. In the word’s of Morgan Freeman,

“Geology is the study of pressure and time. That’s all it takes, really: Pressure. And Time.”

When people as me about jiu jitsu, the word “Pressure” is the first thing that comes to mind. When I think of the difference between a white belt and a black belt: pressure. When a new student asks me what they should focus on to get better, I tell them to focus on their top pressure and to keep coming back. It takes time. So in a way, JIU JITSU is also the study of pressure and time. As we spend more time on our journey, we learn how to apply pressure more effectively and more efficiently. 

I spent the night in Nashville taking in the sights and seeing some live music. My first stop in Nashville was something I’d completely forgot about until I drove past it: the Parthenon. I’ve never been to Greece, but greek mythology has always been an interest of mine (shout out to the Myths and Legends podcast for keeping my mind busy while driving!), so this scale model of the Parthenon offered some AMAZING scenery. The opportunity to string up my hammock and work on these blog posts at the base of the Parthenon was unforgettable.

 

 

After my night in Nashville, I crashed in a Walmart Parking Lot halfway between Nashville and Memphis. I rolled into Memphis around 12:45; just in time to catch open mat at Midtown Grappling Academy, a Marcelo Garcia affiliate smack dab in the middle of Memphis, the city of blues and Rock ’n’ Roll! I walked into the school, which is settled away in the more industrial area of the city. Open I-beams towered over us on the ceiling, and the mat space went on for miles. They share the space with an aerial acrobatics club; they were holding practice for a performance that night during the open mat, which was cool to watch while resting!

 

 

I first rolled with the instructor, Alexandre Meadows. Alexandre, a black belt under Marcelo, held little back on me. The roll was fast-paced, high intensity, and VERY entertaining. Much of the gym was training for an in-house tournament taking place the following weekend, so I was expecting a scramble-filled rolling session regardless. I then rolled with one of Alex’s brown belts, also named Mike. We exchanged single-leg-X to X-guard sequences for the duration of our six minutes. I was surprised to find that Mike was the only person I rolled with that day who used SLX and X-Guard. Being a Marcelo school, I’d expected to get my ass handed to me, to say the least. That wasn’t the case. Most of the white belts and blue belts I rolled with were very wrestling-heavy, a theme I’d been observing more and more as I journeyed through the midwest. In discussing this with them after open mat, they all mentioned that wrestling was a big part of the culture in the area; most guys either wrestled or played football to some extent between high school and college. 

 

 

 

Overall, my experience at Midtown Grappling Academy was one I enjoyed. I just realized while writing this post that they share their MGA namesake with MGA in Manhattan. Funny. This was a crew of guys and girls who just wanted to train. They were very compelled to roll with me, the outsider, and were very impressed with my transitions.

I left the gym to find a place to shower, and ultimately ended up driving to the nearest Planet Fitness and signed up for their Black Card membership. This membership basically guaranteed me a shower for the remainder of my trip, giving me access to every Planet Fitness nationwide (and all for just 35 dollars!). I showered, got changed, and went exploring! After visiting the Bass Pro Shops Pyramid on the shore of the Mississippi, apparently the 10th largest pyramid in the world, I found a park on the river to make dinner! My diet has been consisting of more Ben’s Instant Rice packets (sodium galore) and Beans than I’d care to admit. I enjoyed my dinner, FaceTimed with my parents briefly, and took in the scenery. Again, after countless times at this point, the thought popped into my head:

“You’re doing this. Be Proud.”

Until this point, I had been, admittedly, struggling with the trip. The loneliness on the road began to take over. In fact, the only thing that could make this trip better is to have a best friend with me. Talking with my parents helped substantially; I’m finding that, although your leaves and branches are flowing in the wind while on the road, having roots and a support system back home are incredibly important. 

 

 

I was given a task by my father, a lifelong blues fan and someone whose influence my own music for much of my life, before we parted: “Go see some real Memphis blues.” Gregg Allman, a pioneer in the Southern Rock genre who had a profound influence on my father’s music, had passed that day. Call it poetic that I was in Memphis at the time. “You got it, Pop.” I promised. 

I made my way to historic Beale Street. I was shocked to see thousands of people crammed into this small midwestern street. I’ve never been bad in crowds, but the security clearance and ID check that was needed to get into the street instilled a small bit of claustrophobia. I explored the crowded streets, passing country bar after country bar. I stopped and listened to blues renditions of “Stacy’s Mom” and “Cold Hearted”. I grabbed a beer and just took it all in. Memories.

 

 

After an hour, I made my way back to my car. I started Karen up, and blasted Marc Cohn’s “Walking in Memphis” as I began my journey out of the city. As I approached the I40 on ramp to go over the Hernando de Soto bridge, the winds started picking up. As light hail pattered on my windshield, the thought of a tornado never crossed my mind. Roughly half way across the bridge, the winds began tearing at my Jeep. Hazard lights were the only thing that crossed my vision as the wind and rain roared. Suddenly, my rock climbing crash pad, which was strapped to my roof, came loose. Had I not tied a loose strap to the roof rack, it would’ve blown 150ft to the Mississippi below. I rolled my window down, grabbed at a strap, and held on. After closing the strap in my window to nullify the deluge that was pouring into my car, I sat an prayed. As the 75mph winds tore across the bridge, I honestly thought, “Whelp. This is it.” 

I’ve never felt so close to death. I’ll admit it, some tears were shed in the heat of the moment. Traffic had stopped dead. I could imagine my car being lifted and thrown from the bridge. Now, rationally I knew that was incredibly unlikely. But when you’re anxious and stuck on a bridge in a tornado, your mind goes crazy places. As the wind subsided, people started emerging from their vehicles. A couple in the car next to me had gotten a friend to drive up the opposite side of the bridge to pick them up. They abandoned their Toyota on the bridge. I made friends with a family on the other side of my car; they’d been traveling back to Arkansas after spending the day in Memphis. They were unfazed, and I mentioned I’d been traveling form New York and had never experienced a tornado. We laughed, and the situation had deescalated…

…But we were still not moving. With rain still coming down, and gusts occasional, I walked a few dozen yards, weaving my way between the stopped cars, moving towards the emergency lights ahead. I found that a tractor trailer had been tipped on it’s side by the winds, blocking all three lanes. The panic began to set: being stuck on a bridge is bad enough as is. Being stuck on a bridge as severe weather systems move through an area is MUCH worse. After nodding off in my car for a power nap, I threw on some music and waited. And waited. And Waited. After three tumultuous hours, traffic began moving again. I passed by the truck and hoped the driver was okay. 

It was 2am at this point, and I’d decided to get off the roads for the night. I took the nearest exit and parked at a truck stop. I called my girlfriend, who was freaking out that I’d been on the bridge, calmed the both of us down, told her I loved her, and hung up. I made a Facebook post, updating everyone that I was alive and well. I’d had a running SnapChat story of the ordeal, and felt the need to update everyone. I texted my parents that I loved them, and laid in my Jeep. As I fell asleep to the rain hitting my roof, I reflected.

Life is precious. Life is good and beautiful and all around amazing. Take risks. Go live your dreams. Thanks for reading everyone! I’ll have my next post about my trip to Dallas, TX up soon!

Hello hello everyone!

I would like to first of all thank Christian and the Globetrotters team for sponsoring us on our travels. We are absolutely honored to be able to represent BJJ Globetrotters on our way around the world and look forward to meeting all the amazing people along the way.

Before I get into the meat of the blog, i’ll give a quick background as to who we are.

Katherine and I both grew up on dairy farms in the small rural town of Ruawai, New Zealand.

Katherine is a full time Early Childhood Teacher and I work in the agricultural sector. We spend most of our time fishing, diving and as of 2 years ago, BJJ!!

This is a 15kg kingfish caught off the Northland coast and it made some great smoked fish.

We started training BJJ around 2 years ago out of Fightshop in Palmerston North, NZ. I remember my first week of rolling being both incredibly exciting and terrifying. Learning to do my first collar choke was a surreal experience. It took some getting used to let someone I had only just met put on a choke and trust that they will respect the tap.

After around a year of training we decided to enter our first competition. This was the 2016 Wellington Gi Regionals. I managed to not get subbed but lost to points and Katherine managed to come home with a silver medal!

We now train out of myBJJ Whangarei under Professor James Cherrie.

When we decided to take a break from normal life and go see some of the world, I was worried that we would have to put BJJ on hold. Luckily for me we had a BJJ Globetrotter Anthony Panaioli training at the gym who gave me the whole insight as to what Globetrotters is all about. A quick google search later and all my worries had disappeared!!

Our travel so far!

After a few weeks of fishing, diving, BBQs and rolling we flew out of NZ late April on a one way ticket to London. We spent the first week getting over the jet lag of the worlds longest flight (Auckland to Doha – 17hours 40mins). It wasn’t as bad as we thought it would be, Qatar airways were fantastic.

We chilled out at a family members house in Worcester, checking out the local pubs and planning a 2 week trip around the UK.

After a few days in Liverpool, we were off to Scotland. Here we decided to hire a car and spent a few days driving around on a castle hunt, where we found them everywhere. Now, being a fan of Braveheart, we had to visit the William Wallace memorial.

Behind me here is where the battle of Stirling happened.

We spent the next few days hanging out in Edinburgh, where I found a few great whisky pubs! This place has to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world (thus far….) and the people of Scotland were amazing.

Now back to London, on an over night bus :(.

London is a great city for a tourist. It is well set up, there are a ton of sights to see and museums to visit, and the tube system is fantastic! The one thing I didn’t like were the 5 pound pints!

Where to next? A small village in the south of Spain called Jimena De La Frontera via Malaga. We stayed with the same family members as we did in Worcester and were lucky enough to be invited to stay a week or so. We flew into first and decided to stay a few nights in Malaga in a hostel right on the beach. This was a great change from the UK climate, where the temperature stayed in the high 20.C. We stayed here for a few nights, checked out the local markets, took a swim right outside the hostel (not quite confident to strip off like the locals haha), and got introduced to dirt cheap food and beers, before heading down to Jimena.

Now that we were out of the rat race on London I had a look around for a local gym. However, before I could get my Gi on and hit the mats, I was hit with a terrible case of the man flu, or as they call it in Spain, El Man Flu. This had me bed ridden for two days and off the mats.

The next week or so were spent in Jimena, with a few day trips to see some sights, even on to Gibraltar. This small village in the south of Spain was a great little retreat, and after a day or two of 1 Euro tapas and cervezas, I was back to full strength! Now being a small village, there were no BJJ facilities to be found, but using a little ingenuity we managed to have a roll around on the front porch. Due to the tiles it was more of a very slow flow roll, but we managed a few sweeps and subs, and it was just enough to scratch our itch!

From here we took a long train ride to Barcelona and checked in few a couple of nights. Fantastic city, although the tapas and cervezas doubled in price haha.

Now I was determined to find a gym, and I managed to find Atos Barcelona were I was greeted by the very friendly Gustavo Galvao. Now I don’t speak much Spanish, and they didn’t speak much English, but that didn’t matter. As Gustavo was teaching an arm bar on someone in the turtle, I was easily able to follow along and ask questions. Then it hit me, we shared the language of Jiu Jitsu. It might sound funny but i’m sure a lot of you understand exactly what I mean.

It was fantastic to be able to attend a class at a world renowned gym and roll with some absolute savages! My new BJJ Globetrotters Gi was amazing to roll in. Very light which was great in the Spanish heat, however, it is a little tight around the waist haha, might need to cut down on the beers!

Now, we are traveling on a shoe string, trying to keep costs down and go where prices are low. We were hoping to head up to Amsterdam via Paris, but instead we flew to Warsaw. This was due to a few reasons. Firstly, western Europe is expensive if you don’t book ahead, which we didn’t. Secondly, eastern Europe is cheap and you don’t really need to book ahead to far. And thirdly, Poland is a cool place that I have always wanted to visit.

I am writing this, my first ever blog about anything, in a hostel in Krakow. I’m jamming to some Foos and sipping a Polish beer I found for around half a Euro. Tomorrow we are off to Auschwitz to get a history injection no amount of time in school could ever give you. Might need to get something stronger to drink tomorrow night. Or roll. I think I might roll. There are a few gyms in Krakow so hopefully they wont mind a couple of Globetrotters gate crashing a class tomorrow afternoon!

Anyway, that’s enough from me. We don’t have a very detailed plan for the rest of our trip, who knows where we will end up! All we know is we want to see a lot of the world, meet some cool people and roll at a wide variety of gyms!

Cheers,

Jamie and Kathey :)

After training at Roots Athletics in Philly on Tuesday, I made a B-Line to my next destination: Washington D.C.. I hadn’t been to the capital since 2005, and was ready to do some sight seeing! I’d slept the night before in my Jeep at Maryland House, a rest stop off I-95S about an hour north of D.C.. After the two training sessions from the day prior, I decided to spend my Wednesday unicycling around the city, visiting monuments and museums along the way. I got some great photos, saw the monuments I cared about, and visited the National Zoo. If you’re ever in Washington D.C., go to the zoo. It was absolutely incredible and, considering it’s free entry, hard to pass up. 

 

My preferred method to getting around cities.

 

At the end of my day in D.C., I started driving south to North Carolina, where I’d planned to train at Chapel Hill Gracie Jiu Jitsu the next morning. It had been years since training at a Royce Gracie affiliate, so I was unsure of what to expect, but I was soon to be pleasantly surprised. On my way out of Washington, I may or may not have nearly lost my gi pants. Pro tip: if you put something on top of your car, make sure you grab it before driving away… otherwise, it’ll fly off your car at 50 mph and necessitate you stopping in rush hour traffic on a bridge.

 

The only photo I got at Chapel Hill: I was too busy training to grab more!

 

After spending a rainy night in my car in a Walmart parking lot just 10 minutes from the gym, I arrived at a clean, southern strip mall. All I could see was a sign that said, “Gracie Jiu Jitsu”, and assumed that’s where I was going! I walked in the doors to quite a sight: to my left and straight ahead was a professional looking kickboxing gym setup. To my right? A mixture of green Gracie mats, roll-out mats, and other miscellaneous mats. I was excited. I was greeted by Tim Hufford, an ex-military, Royce Gracie purple belt who is one of the main instructors at Chapel Hill Gracie Jiu Jitsu. He apologized for the appearance of the mats; turns out they’d finished an expansion of the gym not three weeks earlier, and were still waiting on the new mats to arrive! He pointed me towards the locker room, and I went and got suited up!

Class at CHGJJ was pretty informal. No bowing in, no formal warm ups, just diving into jiu jitsu. There was something to be said about this “no frills” approach to the class. I spoke to Tim and Dwayne, their 350 lb., 6’7” blue belt, about this after class. Tim said, “This is advanced class. These guys aren’t here for politics, gym drama, etc. They’re here for jiu jitsu, and they’re here to train.” I loved it. I partnered up with another blue belt, Steve, and we drilled the armbar sequence we were working that day. The class consisted of eleven people; three white belts, three blue belts, three purple belts, and two brown belts. Tim showed us some armbar finishes; one when you break the grip towards the hip, and one when you break it towards the head. He went over a few different grip break options, as well as the importance of wrist locks in relation to attacking an arm bar.

“An armbar is just a wrist lock I didn’t finish.”, he said.

The one detail that stood out for me was with a particular grip break. It involved taking your hand that’s close to their hip, looping it under the arm you’re attacking, posting with the other hand, pressuring in, and sliding your hips under their shoulder blade to turn them away. It’s a detail I’d seen dozens of times in the past four years, but it finally clicked. 

After class cleared out, I hung around with Tim and one of the blue belts, Dwayne. Dwayne is one of those guys you find at every gym: the BIG guy. At 6’7”, weighing 350 lbs, Dways was by FAR the biggest guy I’ve ever rolled with. I tried everything in my toolbox, but I couldn’t move him. We chatted about jiu jitsu, competition, my trip, and everything in between. They were incredibly kind fellas, and I’m glad I got to train with them!

After a quick shower, I hopped in the Jeep to drive to my next destination: Charlotte, North Carolina! Driving through the tailwinds of the Appalachians was beautiful, and a drive everyone should do given the chance! I was en route to train at an Atos affiliate in Charlotte; Fernando Loor Vera Jiu Jitsu.

 

A little panoramic action from ATOS Charlotte: Simple, but that’s all we needed.

 

Fernando’s gym is located inside a massive fitness facility on South Tyron Street in Charleston. Class was taught by Fernando Loor Vera himself, an IBJJF Certified Referee and Black Belt under Gilbert Burns. 

When I first stepped on the mat for the 7:15pm NoGi class, I was excited to finally don my nogi attire for the first time on my trip. I’m typically more interested in gi jiu jitsu, but I do train NoGi on occasion to both keep my skills up without the gi and get in a good workout; the faster pace guarantees some fun, scrambly rounds.

I was greeted by one of FLV’s blue belts, a guy named Mike. He asked about my trip, my sponsorship with BJJGlobetrotters, my plans, etc. He was very genuine in his questions, and even hooked me up with a few packages of some finger tape that his company produces: TapTape! Apparently, TapTape is sold on Amazon and is the #1 rated tape they sell… for rock climbing, interestingly enough. It’s the best finger tape I’ve used: it’s not quite as sticky as MonkeyTape, but is even more durable. The tape comes in 15 yard rolls and are cut to 1/3 inch; the PERFECT size for taping your fingers. They don’t have a website up just yet, but I’ll be happy to send his contact information to anyone interested. Just comment below!

 

This very generous gift is amazing. AWESOME job, Mike. Your product is second to none.

 

Class started with something I’m not used to: a yoga warm-up. This was extraordinarily pleasant, and is something I’d take back to my home gyms. This was followed by some dynamic warmups with calisthenics. The humidity tore through my northern blood, and I was drenched by the time I finished warm ups.

For drilling, I paired up with one of their blue belts: Johnny. We drilled the knee cut pass followed by spinning to the back. Drilling was very structured: you do twenty, I do twenty. I really liked the structured nature of the class, and it definitely added to the experience! 

Technique-wise, Fernando showed us some key details in using Reverse De la Riva to defend the knee cut pass. He went over Kiss of the Dragon details (which I desperately needed) and a calf crush/back take from RDLR. After about 50 minutes of drilling, it was time to roll! There were nine people in class including myself and Fernando, and I rolled with everyone. Something I noticed about the southern grapplers I’ve encountered is the perpetuity towards scrambles. I’m very position oriented: I get to a spot, maintain position, then move on to the next. I’ve noticed with the southern grapplers that there’s a big focus on scrambling; moving faster than your opponent can defend. It was a breath of fresh air, and I had a blast! I caught a roll with Fernando, and promptly got smashed. He gave me some tips after the roll about using my feet to post on their hips when using my open guard: I’d heard this before, but hearing it from him really drove the point home.

Class ended with a yoga cooldown and a pyramid set of calisthenics very similar to what I encountered at Roots in Philly. My chest burned, my hips cramped, and my body wanted to give out, but I kept going. Fernando said,

 

“This is when diamonds are created. Diamonds don’t happen when you’re comfortable: they happen under pressure!”

 

Class ended, and everyone swiftly left the mats. I was invited by Fernando to join the crew at a nearby biker bar, Mac’s Speed Shop, for their weekly Thursday post-training outing. I’d intended on getting on the road to Nashville, but gladly took them up on their offer. I’m incredibly glad I did: the food was amazing, the guys were awesome, and the conversation was non-stop. We talked about jiu jitsu, Mike’s tape business, my hobbies outside jiu jitsu (I showed them some card tricks: Fernando called me a witch. Fun times!), and had extensive conversations about how jiu jitsu is evolving. 

 

Many thanks for letting me train, fellas. Looking forward to crossing paths again: Oss!

 

Although I’m barely a week into my trip, I’m already making memories that will last a lifetime. I left Mac’s feeling amazing about the journey ahead. I drove about an hour before crashing at a truck stop near Sieverville, South Carolina. The next day was planned to be filled with climbing in Chattanooga, but plans change. More on that in my next post! Until then: Happy Memorial Day everyone! Go train!

Greetings From London…Again!

I’m back in London! This time around I stayed with a BJJ Globetrotter rather than a hostel, although I did stay at a hostel the first few nights, but more on that later. It was an uneventful train down to London, I checked into the hostel then I was off to my first gym to visit, and to film the interview for this article with an idol of mine. But before we get into that let’s cover the sights I saw and friends I made.

Seeing More of The Sights

This time around I made a list of places in London I wanted to make sure I saw, before it was easy  hitting the big landmarks like Buckingham Palace and the London Tower and Big Ben. But there are many other places worth seeing, I could probably spend another month in London and still not see everything, certainly not train at all the gyms. Anyways, it was a nice day out and I decided to set out and see a few sights and trek around the city. Camden Market, which I had heard so much about, was first on the list. I could see gentrification had made the place a trendy tourist spot but there was still a lot of the old flavour to it and still a lot of fun to walk around.

Next up was Abbey Road, the iconic crossing in front of the Abbey Road Studios made famous by the Beatles and their album cover crossing the road. It’s a really busy intersection full of Beatles fans constantly almost getting hit by cars while trying to reenact the album cover. There’s also the wall in front the studio which is absolutely covered in fans signing it. Of course I put my own “Panda was here”

I also Stopped by Baker Street to have a look at the Sherlock Holmes Museum, It’s actually at his address, 221B Baker Street, and although I didn’t go up to the apartment itself I did wander around the ground floor souvenir shop which was full of things Sherlock Holmes, like replica pipes and hats and puzzles and books and more. There’s a ‘Bobby’ keeping order at the door to Sherlock Holmes’ apartment that everyone takes a photo with and statue of Sherlock Holmes just down the street from his home. I wonder how many people who go there a day thinking he actually existed?

Meeting Up With Old Friends, And Making New Ones!

During my time in London I was able to meet up with old friends from back when I lived in Toronto, Tanya and James. I met them back when I was working at the bars and doing my clothing design thing, they actually modeled for me. Apparently it’s through modeling for me that they met and eventually got together. James and Tanya now live in London and it was Tanya’s birthday the weekend I was visiting, it was perfect timing for us to meet up, especially since it was 6 years since I had seen them last. It was awesome to meet up with old friends, reminisce about the old days in Toronto and show me around some great markets. Great seeing you guys, until next time Tanya and James!

While hanging out and shopping in the markets someone recognized me from the night before’s visit to a BJJ club. I was wearing one of my Jiu-Jitsu shirts, as usual, and first I heard “Hey! You do Jiu-Jitsu?” then as I turned to look at them “I know you! You were at Meerkatsu’s!” I was a bit taken back, I was not expecting anyone to recognize me in a busy market that is in no way related to Jiu-Jitsu. I’m not really expecting anyone to recognize me when I show up to BJJ gyms, I’m only a blue belt nobody after all. The night before I had indeed visited Meerkatsu and we took a photo together that he instantly posted, which is how she recognized me. So we talked a bit, as it happens Nina trains at a gym I was already planning to visit, Urban Kings, where my host also trains. We exchanged social media accounts (I guess that’s the new ‘let’s exchange numbers’ now a days) and agreed it would cool to meet up later in the week. One day Nina showed me around town to some places I wouldn’t have found or thought of going to like the Piccadilly Circus and Soho District and also to the morbidly, interestingly weird Hunterian Museum. It was also cool to talk her about Jiu-Jitsu and bring me out to the gym when I my host got held up at work. Thanks again Nina for showing me around, was so great to meet you and we’ll definitely keep in touch!

I stayed the first few nights at a hostel, one I did not enjoy but there’s no sense complaining about it and dwelling on bad hosts. I had stayed there because my BJJ host Jorge had his brother in town at the same time. I met up with Jorge at his place to drop off my bags just as his brother was getting ready to leave, it was a lot of fun meeting both of them and talking about traveling. Between Jorge and his brother they have traveled a good deal of Europe and had some great tips for traveling around. Jorge lives in a really nice apartment down town (I call it down town, I really don’t know where down town is in London since each district has so much going on), so I got to walk around to a lot of places rather than always take the metro, which can be pretty expensive if you travel a lot. Jorge and I hung out and he brought me out to some places to eat, it’s always fun to go eat with someone from the area, they know where’s good to eat and show you places you otherwise would have probably missed. We all get our favourite places to eat, and I love being brought out to them when visiting people. Jorge and I had some great conversations about Jiu-Jitsu, or martial arts in general, and how it helps with everyday life. As mentioned earlier Jorge got held up at work when I visited his gym, but he still needed the outlet so went to go lift weights or hit up the kickboxing class. He would go to the morning class for kickboxing or go workout before work if he was going to miss the evening. I admire his discipline to get that training in, as a lot of people don’t have that initiative, myself included. Training is very much a part of Jorge’s life, as it is mine too, and we agreed that having the outlet to release stress, clear the mind, get that physical exertion and let go of the negativity and recharge on the positive vibes of the gym is something everyone should have. I bet there would be a lot less stress in the world if everyone trained. Thanks so much for taking care of me Jorge, I loved our conversations, but next time we’ll have to train together!

Borehamwood BJJ

The first gym I visited this stay was during the evening of getting into London. I found the hostel, dropped off my bags and left for Borehamwood BJJ, which is in Borehamwood which is a small town in the northern outskirts of London. This is not a gym on my list and I never knew it existed until a week or so before coming back to London. I was sitting at the table talking with Giles in Glasgow during my stay with him and I saw something that reminded me of Meerkatsu, an ad or a post by him or someone wearing his gear, I forget which. “Hey, I wonder where he is I bet I’m passing by his place soon” I said and looked him up, as it happens Meerkatsu is situated in London. I sent a message on Facebook telling him about my journey and asking if he’d be up to meet and do an interview, completely on a whim. He got back to me with in 10 minutes, agreeing to do the interview, inviting me out to his club and asking me more about my journey being fascinated about it, I was floored! I’m a big fan of Meerkatsu, I love his artwork, it hits me on so many levels (don’t worry I won’t fanboy about it here) so I was really excited for this. I made it out to the small community center and found Meerkatsu’s, Prof. Seymour Yang’s, gym. Prof. Seymour sets up in a small space that is shared with a dance group, so each class he puts out the rolls of tatami and tapes them up. I showed up as he was setting up and there were a few students stretching. He quickly came over to welcome me to his club, I thought it was funny he was so happy to have me visit when I was so happy to able to meet the guy behind Meerkatsu.

It was a fun class, a lot of the students were younger and eager to learn and happy to have a visitor from Canada in class. After going through some fun techniques it was time to roll and I had a turn with most the students. Some had experience in other styles like Wrestling or Judo but they were still working on their Jiu-Jitsu game, so I was able to capitalize on their holes and help them out with some pointers afterwards. I also got to roll with Prof. Seymour, both in gi and no gi and we rolled for a while after class. I’m bigger and heavier but he’s a black belt, we both rolled light respecting each other, and it was a lot of fun testing my game on his and trying to find a hole in his. Seymour Yang is the nicest guy, he made me feel so welcome at his club and was genuinely interested in talking to me and we had a fun time doing the interview together. Thank you Sir, I look forward to us meeting again!

Urban Kings

The next place I went to was Urban Kings Gym which is were Jorge trains and also where I new friend Nina trains. The initial plan was to meet up with Nina before class and meet Jorge at the gym, but Jorge got held up at work so I was a good thing I made plans to meet up with Nina so I had someone to bring me to the gym and introduce me to everyone. The gym is down a side street in a court of stores and restaurants, it was much better being brought to it than me trying to find it on my own. It had the usual free weights and machines that gyms have, with a section for kickboxing and in the back room was the BJJ mats. There were a lot of guys on the mats, all of them that I met were very friendly too. The class itself dealt with a series of moves that weren’t great to for me, it all started from a De La Riva lasso, which I had a lot of problems getting into, and then sweeping or moving from there. I’m sure if i worked at it enough I could find a way for it to work for my body shape, the coach gave me some great tips to help me out but it was tough going. As the class went on I was starting to not feel too good by the end so I sat out of rolling. I sat on the side of mats and watched everyone roll and chatted with some of the students. It sucked not being to roll with the guys, but I didn’t want to risk throwing up on the mats, or worse. Despite everything it was a good time training with Urban Kings, thanks for everything guys!

Roger Gracie HQ

One gym I had to go to was the Roger Gracie Academy HQ. I had held it off until now, opting to check out the other gyms before heading to the big one everyone talks about. I sent an e-mail hoping to meeting Roger and maybe even do a video for the blog, but I got no response. I just chalked it him being busy. I set out to the gym hoping that Roger would still be at the gym so I could at least get a photo with him. I found the gym easy enough and showed up early to sign a waiver and get ready for class, but I was out of luck for the photo, Roger was not in that evening.

The class was pretty full and I met some cool people, the few I had been talking to online weren’t around but there was Joe, who I had just met on Facebook through a mutual friends of Chris Crossan having just visited Stockton. We had a cool chat about the club and my journey so far and experiences with Catch Wrestling before class. During class I was teamed up with a big tall purple belt, I forget his name but he took to me and we trained the whole evening with him giving me pointers for my game. The instructor, Prof. Negromonte, spent the time going over positional questions, troubleshooting people’s problems with their game. There wasn’t any rolling that night but a lot of the class was live training so it was a good workout and a lot of time spent working on my game. As the class went on I recognized a familiar face in the back, a black belt sitting and watching and helping the white belts. It was A.J. Agazarm. I was shocked he was there, him being a Gracie Barra guy I would have figured he was be at a GB club unless he was there training with Roger Gracie, maybe he did I as did and just showed up hoping Roger would be there. Part of the warm up included going for a take down from a slap, a kind of self defence move, and given that A.J. had just been involved in an incident where he was slapped by his opponent there were a lot of glances his way and some snickers. My training partner and I quietly made the joke of A.J. being there was why we were going over this technique. Although he gets a bad reputation A.J. was actually really nice the short time I talked to him after class and during class he did spend a lot of time helping out the lower belts.

Despite Roger Gracie himself not being around it was a great visit to the much talked about club, hopefully next time I get better luck and am able to meet him, or maybe even do an interview, one can only hope!

Meerkatsu!

I was really excited to do this interview. I have been a fan of Meerkatsu since I first saw his rashguards online. I’ve bought some as well a shirt and gi designed by him since then. Like I said earlier I sent the message on a whim and was surprised to get such a happy and warm reply so quickly. Seymour Yang and I talked for quite bit to figure out when would be good to do the interview too, showing me how much he actually cares about meeting people. We had a great conversation, both in the interview and at the gym after class as we put away the mats. I’m sure Seymour and I could go on for another half hour or more talking about Jiu-Jitsu. It was an honour to talk to Seymour about how Meerkatsu came around, his Jiu-Jitsu and martial arts background and how he balances out his family, the company and running his BJJ club. I hope you find it just as interesting as I did, sorry for the reverb audio.

To watch the video head over to the Panda’s Odyssey YouTube Channel to check out it, and past interviews too. While there please show some love and like, share, comment and subscribe to the channel, thanks!    

After such a fun stop in London my time in the UK was over. I made so many friends, saw so much and realized how much more there is to see. Thanks for all the great experiences guys! Now it’s time to head off to see the rest of Europe, starting with Paris France!

Until next time,

see you on the mats!

OSSS!!

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Just over two months ago I had started my journey in the El Salvador Globetrotters camp and now I was finally at my second camp in the Caribbean. I had travelled through Central America, hitting as many gyms as I could for two months, meeting people through Jiu Jitsu and others just on the road, people who would make an impact on the rest of my life. I can’t believe how lucky I am to be able to have this life and how glad I am to have made the decision to go for it.

It was the first open mat of the Caribbean Camp, I had already done a few rolls with my fellow Globetrotters. I sat at the edge of the mats looking at all the people rolling together, laughing and enjoying. Gradually I felt the goosebumps rising from within and I had to try my hardest to hold back tears of joy. I thought to myself of all the places I’ve been to, this is where I belong. People coming from all over the world with one common interest, putting aside nationality, believes, politics and everything else, on the mats that doesn’t matter. We are all the same.

The following week was one of the most intense and best weeks of my life. We would wake up in the morning for surfing, head for Jiu Jitsu class and end the day with a few beers together. To survive that I had to strategically take naps during group beach trips after lunch. Such a hard life. Then Friday rolled around, there was a boat trip scheduled for the whole day. In my childhood I grew up around boats and have always enjoyed myself a boat ride, but this day took it to a whole new level. We sailed out to this remote beach where we set down anchor. We spend the day swimming in the sea, tanning on top of the boats, cheering to a good week and trying our best to grab the best profile picture as possible.

I wish I could mention every single person I met in the camp in this post but there where just to many people I got to know over the course of the week. I do however have to mention my fellow instructors. Every single class that I attended was interesting. In just that one week I was able to add so many techniques to my game. After all this travelling my game doesn’t even look the same, I’m starting to look like a BJJ Frankenstein put together with techniques from all over the world. These camps are not only a place to make friends for life but also improve and widen your Jiu Jitsu.

Before this week started I thought that maybe I wouldn’t make as many friends as I did in El Salvador, maybe it wouldn’t live up to that camp. However at the end of it I had just as many invitations around the world and I realised that each camp would be different and would bring me different experiences for life.