So, after getting my banana and cheese jaffle and tea the next morning, going on the internet for a bit, and doing my basic shopping its time for me to go meet up with Rich and Claire to head out to Dreamland. They'd decided thyey wanted to go check it out, so we were going to split a cab to get out there. I got to their hotel, saw what was up, and was promptly asked about my burn. No, it doesn't seem to be getting better. Yeah, thats pus. Yeah pretty gross eh? No I don't know if I want to go to a doctor. Yeah the guys at my hotel said I should. Well I don't know maybe I should just clean it more. Well maybe.. Yeah you're probably right. I guess. Where'd you say it was? Just up and around the corner.. Ok..
And off I rode. At this point, it was bad enough that I could feel fluid flowing into my leg/foot when I took it down from being elevated and it was giving me trouble walking still. So off to the Tourist Doctor I went. Just nearby was a clinic where they could call the Doctor in, I got there and got chatted up by a Hairdresser from next door and they called him for me. Swiftly the hairdressing staff, girls and gayboys all, became a bit of a cheering section "Ohh Strong Dave! Strongg! Play rugby!" etc, it was cool, kind of motivating. Anyways the doctor arrived, to my relief looking professional and speaking decent english. In I go.
Once inside, I sit down on the examining table, and tell him whats wrong. I'm made to lie down, and he says he's going to clean it for 250 000 Rupiah. Soon after he tells me its badly infected, and so is my little cut on my knee. He cleans them both, pulling skin off, rubbing betadine on, and some other cream, warning me about how its going to hurt..but it didn't really, the skin pulling was a bit stingy but otherwise it was all sweet. Afterwards he put on some antibiotic drying powder and wrapped it up and proceeded to prescribe me nearly 2 million Rupiah worth of medicine. Antibiotics, Painkillers, Anti-Inflammatorys, the whole kit and kaboodle. I came out of there depressed by his announcement that I couldn't get in the water for at least 3 days, but glad I went...Don't like the idea of a Balinese infection.
So I met back up with Rich and Claire at their hotel, and they called their cab guy. Supposedly he said 100 000 to Dreamland, which was a pretty good price. So he got there, and even though he'd been warned we had 3 surfboards, 3 people, and 3 bags, he turned up with a small car. We tried to tell him it wouldn't fit, but he insisted it would, so off we went to my place to get my board and bag. The boys at the Ayu were looking after them for me, and when I got back they were glad I went to the doctor. But upon seeing my massive 7'6" coffin, the driver got a bit frazzled. I told him we'd said it wouldn't fit, and to get a bigger car..he wanted to rest it on the roof unstrapped. In the end we gave him a couple bucks for his trouble and sent him off. I got us a Van cab for only a couple dollars more, and off we went. I was following the van behind on my motorcycle, and even though I drank a ton of water was still feeling like shit. It was a rough drive out, but once we got there it was worth it. Dreamland is like something out of a movie. Beautiful white sand beach in front of a cliff, thatched huts everywhere, a good surfing wave, and beautiful girls all over. I was in heaven. Until we had to climb down the stairs. Rich had a spot of Bali Belly so Claire and I decided to go down to scout out accomodation. I was limping pretty badly with my leg, and the stairs were brutally uneven and oversized. Not, I admit, much fun at all. After checking out places varying from beautiful and overpriced to small and dingy, we settled on a place called Rambo's Cafe. I saw Kavi out surfing so I knew the crew was there ahead of me, and we went back up to get our bags. This time it was even worse with the stairs. My coffin is heavy as , and so is my backpack, and I was limping, so I struggled quite badly to get to Rambos. Once I got there I was stoked, took my bag up, got a drink, and chilled out. Rich, Claire and I had dinner there, and the food was pretty ridiculous. My beef burger was pretty much a piece of salami, and Rich's cheeseburger was a slice of ham. One. Slice. That was an ominous sign, followed up by the bathroom, which was a proper squat job. Just a hole to do your business in, no seat. These were signs of trouble to come, and proved to be too much for my British companions in the end. I made my way down and found the boys at Eric's, they were stoked, drinking Bintangs and hangin out on the deck, I chilled with the for a bit and went to bed. The next day I woke up and Claire and Rich were leaving, so I said bye to them, shook Rich's hand and off they went. I hope they enjoyed the rest of their trip out Balian, and they're doing good back in England now! Their new house should be unreal. (If you read this Rich, I hope you got that bike you wanted! Don't let the missus stop ya hahah and enjoy your house brother!) Anyways, from then on I was going to be hanging with the South Shlatvian crew, shitty balls and all. Bali Phase 2 has begun.
Bali 6
From here on the last 2 weeks of my time in Bali meld together in a way. More separated by events than dates, they were nonetheless some of the most enjoyable days of my travels. Due to my burn I was kept quite lazy, spending most of my time sititng on the deck down at Eric's, reading, eating and drinking. My foot swelled up, and I ended up having to keep it elevated all the time as well. I was in rough shape, but I was still feeling pretty wrapped with being in Bali, living on the beach. However, these sedentary days with too much food did nothing to help my fitness or get off my traveller's pouch as I'd become apt to call my developing belly. Sitting here today, much later in New Zealand I'm still working at getting rid of it here at Rugby Academy. Hopefully by the time I get home it will be at least mostly gone.. Gotta be ready for beach season! Anyways, back to the deck. Having finished On The Road I needed a new book. One of the guys at Rambo's had a book he gave to me, called Confessions of a Mask. It was by Yukio Mishima, a famous Japanese artist and author who ended his own life in middle age through ritual suicide at the height of a demonstration. Weird guy. Even weirder book. It was a series of highly lucid recollections of his childhood where he deals with his homosexuality, and beyond it some serious perversions. From a young age he fantasizes about killing and eating boys for his sexual desires. It gets weirder and weirder as he deals with deception, of himself and others, regarding his true nature. If I can't work out my body, might as well work out my brain I guess. Freaky though. While reading this I also got to know everyone better, Kruger, Mark, Drew, Casey, and Kavi formed the crew at first, then Sarah and Sam joined us, followed by Kruger's girlfriend Lisa, Kavi's girlfriend Amber, and her 2 friends Carlo and Brin. We made an interesting group, with a Canadian, 3 South Africans, an American/Mauritian, 3 Brits, and an Ozzy. Everyone was pretty cool, even though I argued with Sam alot about stupid stuff.
When Sam and Sarah first arrived we all went into Kuta, the main party town, for a night out on the town. We stayed at hotel Ayu, where they all usually stay when they're in town, a cheap and actually nice spot right on Poppies II in the middle of town, only a couple minutes from the clubs. We started out the night on the balcony in front of the room I shared with Kruger and Mark drinking cheap vodka red bull and mango juice, getting amped up to go out for the night. We spent a good part of the pre-game time chilling with some Norwegians and a Swede hanging out across from our room, singing and generally getting in a good state to go out. Next came Bounty, dancing on stage, generally going crazy, drinking Bintang and having a great time for what seemed like hours but was only minutes, or maybe it was the other way around. I think it varied. After this we headed to Mbargo, a hip-hop/R&B club with pumpin tunes. We pretty much danced the night away there, and I stumbled back to my room fairly late at night, to find Kruger already kipped on his bed. It was a solid night out, and the next morning we headed back out to Dreamland pretty early. It made for a pretty hungover mission on the bike but it was all good.
It wasn't many nights after this that I was sitting on the deck down at Eric's, having a Bintang with Kruger, Drew and Mark and one of the guys from Rambo's walks by and just sort of mutters "ok you leave tomorrow 7 am ok?"
I was taken aback, and just said Ok before I really thought about it, and he walked away silently. I was surprised, not entirely by that they were kicking me out, because I'd recently learned that you are expected to eat at the same place you stay and I hadn't been, but by the fact they gave me so little time. I told the boys, who hadn't really heard what happened, and they pretty much said to a man "What the fuck?!". I sat and finished my Bintang, talked to the guys at the place right next door to where everyone was staying, and went back to tell off the guys at Rambo's. Some words were thrown around along the levels of "your place is a shithole, your toilet is literally a shithole, it stinks and its dirty and you're a dick for giving me such short notice, you never even told me I couldn't eat there, what the fuck fuck you" and he said he'd supposedly told someone to tell me before. Whatever. I moved over to Jimmy's Brother's the next day.
Man, I feel like theres so much more that happened.. I mean there is, this is only early in, but this explanation of it seems somehow soulless? Its like only part of the meaning is there in the words, and theres another part I can't quite explain. Its like the difference in a place upon seeing it for the first time and having become used to it, individual details lose importance and its more of a general feel you notice towards the end, whereas at first its every little thing you focus upon. Its happened so many times in my trip, the fascinated first impression, some vague sense that a place could be really cool, and then that feeling when you've been there for a while, a sense of belonging and being a part of the place. Hanging out at Dreamland I had a really strong feeling of that, even though I was only there a couple weeks. Balian was the same, and Cronulla, and now even New Zealand. Each place in its own way and totally different from all the others, but all the same as well. Every time I came to one of those places I had a good feeling about it, one I didn't quite understand, and each one when I left I feel I'd grown somehow with having become a part of that place, as if it had become a part of me in turn.
When Sam and Sarah first arrived we all went into Kuta, the main party town, for a night out on the town. We stayed at hotel Ayu, where they all usually stay when they're in town, a cheap and actually nice spot right on Poppies II in the middle of town, only a couple minutes from the clubs. We started out the night on the balcony in front of the room I shared with Kruger and Mark drinking cheap vodka red bull and mango juice, getting amped up to go out for the night. We spent a good part of the pre-game time chilling with some Norwegians and a Swede hanging out across from our room, singing and generally getting in a good state to go out. Next came Bounty, dancing on stage, generally going crazy, drinking Bintang and having a great time for what seemed like hours but was only minutes, or maybe it was the other way around. I think it varied. After this we headed to Mbargo, a hip-hop/R&B club with pumpin tunes. We pretty much danced the night away there, and I stumbled back to my room fairly late at night, to find Kruger already kipped on his bed. It was a solid night out, and the next morning we headed back out to Dreamland pretty early. It made for a pretty hungover mission on the bike but it was all good.
It wasn't many nights after this that I was sitting on the deck down at Eric's, having a Bintang with Kruger, Drew and Mark and one of the guys from Rambo's walks by and just sort of mutters "ok you leave tomorrow 7 am ok?"
I was taken aback, and just said Ok before I really thought about it, and he walked away silently. I was surprised, not entirely by that they were kicking me out, because I'd recently learned that you are expected to eat at the same place you stay and I hadn't been, but by the fact they gave me so little time. I told the boys, who hadn't really heard what happened, and they pretty much said to a man "What the fuck?!". I sat and finished my Bintang, talked to the guys at the place right next door to where everyone was staying, and went back to tell off the guys at Rambo's. Some words were thrown around along the levels of "your place is a shithole, your toilet is literally a shithole, it stinks and its dirty and you're a dick for giving me such short notice, you never even told me I couldn't eat there, what the fuck fuck you" and he said he'd supposedly told someone to tell me before. Whatever. I moved over to Jimmy's Brother's the next day.
Man, I feel like theres so much more that happened.. I mean there is, this is only early in, but this explanation of it seems somehow soulless? Its like only part of the meaning is there in the words, and theres another part I can't quite explain. Its like the difference in a place upon seeing it for the first time and having become used to it, individual details lose importance and its more of a general feel you notice towards the end, whereas at first its every little thing you focus upon. Its happened so many times in my trip, the fascinated first impression, some vague sense that a place could be really cool, and then that feeling when you've been there for a while, a sense of belonging and being a part of the place. Hanging out at Dreamland I had a really strong feeling of that, even though I was only there a couple weeks. Balian was the same, and Cronulla, and now even New Zealand. Each place in its own way and totally different from all the others, but all the same as well. Every time I came to one of those places I had a good feeling about it, one I didn't quite understand, and each one when I left I feel I'd grown somehow with having become a part of that place, as if it had become a part of me in turn.
New Zealand 1
For some reason I can't seem to write about my time in Dreamland quite right. Maybe unsurprisingly, accounting to the name, my memories there have something of the texture of a dream, with sharp flashes of moments and a sense of remembering it all, while being totally unable to fully string it together.
New Zealand is alot more solid however, having only been here almost 2 weeks now.
Wow, it doesn't feel that long...
I guess the New Zealand part of the story, the part I don't count as part of my time in Bali, starts in Australia...
After a day and night that were incredibly stressful, I managed to arrive in Sydney at about 7 40 in the morning on June 10th. I was lucky to have made it there even for then, but that was exactly 24 hours later than I should have arrived, and this presented some serious troubles. My ticket for my continuing flight was in a safe, at the Cronulla Beach YHA approximately one half hour's drive away from the Airport. This is a problem because by the time I got through customs, where for the first time in all my travels I seemed to be a person of interest..(must have been the beard), being asked tons of questions at the customs desk, and by 3 separate people inside the airport, before I could even go pick up my bags. Once I got my backpack I threw it on my back and went over to get my coffin. Previous experience in the airport in Indo told me carrying it by hand was not the way to go. 2 Surfboards, some shoes, and a bunch of clothes make for heavy work for a guy with a sprained ankle. So, I got a cart and picked up my coffin, balancing it standing up and getting into the huge customs line. Once I got there I declared the sharks tooth necklaces I'd picked up, got through customs, and headed straight back up to departures. By this time it was nearly 9 am, and my flight left at 11. At the very best I could hope to get back around 10 30 if I got a taxi to the hostel and back, and that would be too late to board, with it stopping at 10. More realistically I would get there around 11 missing it entirely. So, I decided to go to the San Chile airline desk and ask for help. After working my way upstairs, and finding the desk I found myself with a distinct lack of help. A fat woman with a spanish accent simply told me she couldn't and wouldn't do shit all to help me, and pretty much told me to leave her alone. It was crunch time, 9 am now. 1 hour and I'm fucked, no ticket, no flight, no airport transfer in New Zealand, no way to tell the people at Academy I'd miss it, and no idea what to do next. I ran over to the ticketing desk for Qantas where she recommended I ask, and they said they couldn't do anything except maybe sell me a new ticket. I figured I had one card left to play, so I got them to give me a phonebook.
I called the hostel, and on what I figure had to be the very last ring, a familiar voice picked up the phone. Danny! That old cunt. I was pretty stoked to get throguh to him, thats step 1 taken care of. I'm in touch with the ticket, now I just need it to get to me. 5 minutes later I've given him my credit card number and he's going to take some money from it and use it to send my ticket with a cab. Should be there in half hour-40 minutes! Woooo I'm gonna make it! I couldn't believe that I was seriously not going to have to buy a ticket. Thank. God. In the end Mark ended up bringing it instead of a taxi, I told him I'd come back to the hostel for a few days in July(I have 3 days in Sydney between my flight back from Auckland and my flight to Vancouver), and said I'd see him then. Then I rushed straight to check in! After that, customs, where again they scrutinized my passport, which wouldn't scan..thanks washing machine.. but sent me through anyway, and I made it to my plane with time to spare having grabbed a couple pizzas. On the plane, and back to sleep I go.
A few hours later I arrived in Auckland, stoked to be there. It was about 6 at night I think, I'm not sure, and I slowly worked my way through customs, making some jokes with a couple other Canucks I saw on the way, and generally feeling wrapped with myself for making it. Once I got out, I saw a MASSIVE Maori with face tats waiting with a sign with a D on it...I was wondering if this guy was going to be from the Academy. Fuck me he was scary. He wasn't thoguh, it was a normal van driving guy with bandages on his hands or something. We headed out to his van and begun the journey to my homestay place, stopping for Subway on the way. We talked about the Academy and Rugby and New Zealand, and all sorts of crap, and I slept for a while. When we finally got to Rotorua, I smelled and saw the famous hot springs which give the town alot of its tourism and also its distinct sulphurous odor. It wasn't too bad though.
After that it was off to my homestay. I met Steve and his wife and Kasey their son. Jordy the other son was already in bed, but Kase was pretty worked up for me to come. I hung out with them for a while, they're cool as, then headed down to bed. In a big. Nice. Double. Bed. With a Duvet. Mmmmmmmmmm.......
So began about 2 days of sleep.
And then, to Academy....
New Zealand is alot more solid however, having only been here almost 2 weeks now.
Wow, it doesn't feel that long...
I guess the New Zealand part of the story, the part I don't count as part of my time in Bali, starts in Australia...
After a day and night that were incredibly stressful, I managed to arrive in Sydney at about 7 40 in the morning on June 10th. I was lucky to have made it there even for then, but that was exactly 24 hours later than I should have arrived, and this presented some serious troubles. My ticket for my continuing flight was in a safe, at the Cronulla Beach YHA approximately one half hour's drive away from the Airport. This is a problem because by the time I got through customs, where for the first time in all my travels I seemed to be a person of interest..(must have been the beard), being asked tons of questions at the customs desk, and by 3 separate people inside the airport, before I could even go pick up my bags. Once I got my backpack I threw it on my back and went over to get my coffin. Previous experience in the airport in Indo told me carrying it by hand was not the way to go. 2 Surfboards, some shoes, and a bunch of clothes make for heavy work for a guy with a sprained ankle. So, I got a cart and picked up my coffin, balancing it standing up and getting into the huge customs line. Once I got there I declared the sharks tooth necklaces I'd picked up, got through customs, and headed straight back up to departures. By this time it was nearly 9 am, and my flight left at 11. At the very best I could hope to get back around 10 30 if I got a taxi to the hostel and back, and that would be too late to board, with it stopping at 10. More realistically I would get there around 11 missing it entirely. So, I decided to go to the San Chile airline desk and ask for help. After working my way upstairs, and finding the desk I found myself with a distinct lack of help. A fat woman with a spanish accent simply told me she couldn't and wouldn't do shit all to help me, and pretty much told me to leave her alone. It was crunch time, 9 am now. 1 hour and I'm fucked, no ticket, no flight, no airport transfer in New Zealand, no way to tell the people at Academy I'd miss it, and no idea what to do next. I ran over to the ticketing desk for Qantas where she recommended I ask, and they said they couldn't do anything except maybe sell me a new ticket. I figured I had one card left to play, so I got them to give me a phonebook.
I called the hostel, and on what I figure had to be the very last ring, a familiar voice picked up the phone. Danny! That old cunt. I was pretty stoked to get throguh to him, thats step 1 taken care of. I'm in touch with the ticket, now I just need it to get to me. 5 minutes later I've given him my credit card number and he's going to take some money from it and use it to send my ticket with a cab. Should be there in half hour-40 minutes! Woooo I'm gonna make it! I couldn't believe that I was seriously not going to have to buy a ticket. Thank. God. In the end Mark ended up bringing it instead of a taxi, I told him I'd come back to the hostel for a few days in July(I have 3 days in Sydney between my flight back from Auckland and my flight to Vancouver), and said I'd see him then. Then I rushed straight to check in! After that, customs, where again they scrutinized my passport, which wouldn't scan..thanks washing machine.. but sent me through anyway, and I made it to my plane with time to spare having grabbed a couple pizzas. On the plane, and back to sleep I go.
A few hours later I arrived in Auckland, stoked to be there. It was about 6 at night I think, I'm not sure, and I slowly worked my way through customs, making some jokes with a couple other Canucks I saw on the way, and generally feeling wrapped with myself for making it. Once I got out, I saw a MASSIVE Maori with face tats waiting with a sign with a D on it...I was wondering if this guy was going to be from the Academy. Fuck me he was scary. He wasn't thoguh, it was a normal van driving guy with bandages on his hands or something. We headed out to his van and begun the journey to my homestay place, stopping for Subway on the way. We talked about the Academy and Rugby and New Zealand, and all sorts of crap, and I slept for a while. When we finally got to Rotorua, I smelled and saw the famous hot springs which give the town alot of its tourism and also its distinct sulphurous odor. It wasn't too bad though.
After that it was off to my homestay. I met Steve and his wife and Kasey their son. Jordy the other son was already in bed, but Kase was pretty worked up for me to come. I hung out with them for a while, they're cool as, then headed down to bed. In a big. Nice. Double. Bed. With a Duvet. Mmmmmmmmmm.......
So began about 2 days of sleep.
And then, to Academy....
New Zealand 2
First Day:
First Impressions always make a big difference. When I arrived at the Academy I met Willow, Darryl and Ray straight away in the office. I was late because I had to wait for Steve to drive me and he didn't take me there til almost 9. It was alright though because I couldn't do that much anyway my ankle was still pretty fucked. I got some of my kit, a training shirt and a polar fleece, and then went in to meet the boys. I arrived about half way through the morning weights session, and I worked with them through the second part of Back+Bis, got a nice pump on and then headed up to the field for some skills with the other internationals. Greg, Josh, Julian, Rudy, Richard, Mark, Tainer(the only domestic guy that came out) and myself did some skills drills, and right away I learned a new method of passing. I'd been taught the flick pass before, but never the right way. The academy was off to a good start, even if I couldn't run or anything. I did the drills, and generally thoguht I picked up the flick pass pretty quick... not really as well as I thought though, as I showed in testing this week we just had. Oh well, learning learning.
That was pretty fun, then we had breakfast and I found out we had a ping pong table. And then found out I couldn't play ping pong anymore. I've gotten it back a bit now though. Not nearly where I was ...but still. Weetabix, toast, and some tuna(which I didn't realize I stole at the time..Oops, sorry bro!), and talking to some of the boys then came the afternoon. I couldn't do the drills so I worked on passing with some of the other injured guys, then I came back to my homestay for the night and met Jordy the other son. Jordy is a little ripper, cool as, and so is Kasey. I've spent alot of time playin with the boys since I've been here, they're both avowed members of my fan club, really into WWE wrestling, and hilarious. Jordy is a cheeky rough bastard and Kasey is a bit quieter, more organized/on the ball, but still cool as. The little bros eh.
That began a bit of a pattern for the week, lift weights and do core and then skills in the morning, breakfast, chilling and ping pong, then skills and stuff before lunch, then more skills and other drills after lunch. My attendance picked up, and I proceeded to tear each muscle group we worked quite nicely so as to be walking around unable to either straighten or bend my arms all the way, with mad pains in my chest whenever I move too fast, a tight back, and sore abs. It was a good feeling to be back in the gym, but every time after I finished a lift I freaked out at myself about how much strength I'd lost travelling. I have to admit, I loved my time on the road just doing my thing, but man I do wish I'd been able to keep up with my fitness the whole time. Fuck, I was so weak that first week, and so out of shape. Its brutal trying to get back on it after so much time off, and even worse knowing exactly how much strength I lost. I still have a lot of work ahead of me to get back to where I was...but hey I put in alot of work to get there before, I'll manage it.
All the while during the week I was learning stuff, getting stronger, my ankle was getting better, and I was getting to know the boys better. Some of them were pretty impressed with some of my stories, and the Kusabs boys ended up telling me to come up to their house and then head out for the night with the boys. Oh yeah! One thing before then..
I rented a scooter. This time, unlike in Bali where I managed to get a proper motorcycle for myself I ended up on a proper "Faggio" as GTA would say. This thing is a little 50cc piece of garbage, with about as much pick up as Jabba the Hutt. Its been carbed back from its original 50ccs of power to go slower, and its actually so slow its really scary being in normal traffic on it.Turning across roads is a feat of patience and courage and generally driving is an exercise in caution. Constantly dodging people who don't see you or pretend not to because you can't match the flow of traffic, while driving without gloves or a visor in rain and freezing cold makes for a bit of a test every time I go to get somewhere, and a sharp wakeup in the morning before Academy. Generally I arrive with my hands near numb and hurting, pretty wet, and having had one or 2 life or death experiences on the way... But its only 4.50$ for a full tank of gas!! And that lasts almost a week! Always a silver lining.
Anyways, so I headed up to chill with the boys, things get going, beers get flowing, Richie spotted everyone beers and the drinking games begun early and hard. There were a bunch of us up there, the owners of the house Willie Sean and Shannon, as well as myself Richard and I think a couple others. After a couple spots, some beers, etc, we headed over to some of the other boys' house and got even harder on the drinking games. Julian who is a bit of a whipping boy for everyone sucked at drinking games, but there were some really fun ones and we all left the house seriously pissed up and fired up. So began a great night out on the town, drinking vodka and red bulls. Sean and I were going Pulse for Pulse, starting off at the Grumpy Mole and then moving over to Lavabar. At Lavabar Richard started shouting shots and the night goes really blurry for a while. Not good, but fun. I had some Bali belly in the bathroom, much to the displeasure of the lineup, and other than that the night was solid with chilling with the boys trying to mack on girls and having a great, overly drunken time. After we headed out and back to the place, we lost Willy due to him picking up a MILF and Sean was already ahead of us...with company. The rest of us went back and were hanging out in the living room, when out stumbles Sean leading what at first glance I thought was a hippopotamus. Then I shook my head and realized it was too big, it must be an elephant. But it turned out to be the girl he picked up, who was basically the most disgusting piece I've seen in some long days. We had a bit of a fryfight, Richard having bought some 13 cheeseburgers and a massive amount of fries for everyone, and then everyone passed out. The next morning Sean had sent her home and everyone had left, the house was a mess and we were too. After cleaning up we did a mad mission for some stuff and my dvds with Willy's van, ran into him in a Taxi and heard his story...the girl he picked up had 2 kids, who while he had been in bed with her, had jumped in and proceeded to call him Daddy. He was not happy. After this we got my pirated dvds from bali and proceeded to hang out and watch a bunch of movies until night came, and I ended up crashing there again. The next day I went back to the Simpkins residence, played with the bros a bit more, had a mean dinner and got a really good sleep for Academy on monday...testing week had begun.
First Impressions always make a big difference. When I arrived at the Academy I met Willow, Darryl and Ray straight away in the office. I was late because I had to wait for Steve to drive me and he didn't take me there til almost 9. It was alright though because I couldn't do that much anyway my ankle was still pretty fucked. I got some of my kit, a training shirt and a polar fleece, and then went in to meet the boys. I arrived about half way through the morning weights session, and I worked with them through the second part of Back+Bis, got a nice pump on and then headed up to the field for some skills with the other internationals. Greg, Josh, Julian, Rudy, Richard, Mark, Tainer(the only domestic guy that came out) and myself did some skills drills, and right away I learned a new method of passing. I'd been taught the flick pass before, but never the right way. The academy was off to a good start, even if I couldn't run or anything. I did the drills, and generally thoguht I picked up the flick pass pretty quick... not really as well as I thought though, as I showed in testing this week we just had. Oh well, learning learning.
That was pretty fun, then we had breakfast and I found out we had a ping pong table. And then found out I couldn't play ping pong anymore. I've gotten it back a bit now though. Not nearly where I was ...but still. Weetabix, toast, and some tuna(which I didn't realize I stole at the time..Oops, sorry bro!), and talking to some of the boys then came the afternoon. I couldn't do the drills so I worked on passing with some of the other injured guys, then I came back to my homestay for the night and met Jordy the other son. Jordy is a little ripper, cool as, and so is Kasey. I've spent alot of time playin with the boys since I've been here, they're both avowed members of my fan club, really into WWE wrestling, and hilarious. Jordy is a cheeky rough bastard and Kasey is a bit quieter, more organized/on the ball, but still cool as. The little bros eh.
That began a bit of a pattern for the week, lift weights and do core and then skills in the morning, breakfast, chilling and ping pong, then skills and stuff before lunch, then more skills and other drills after lunch. My attendance picked up, and I proceeded to tear each muscle group we worked quite nicely so as to be walking around unable to either straighten or bend my arms all the way, with mad pains in my chest whenever I move too fast, a tight back, and sore abs. It was a good feeling to be back in the gym, but every time after I finished a lift I freaked out at myself about how much strength I'd lost travelling. I have to admit, I loved my time on the road just doing my thing, but man I do wish I'd been able to keep up with my fitness the whole time. Fuck, I was so weak that first week, and so out of shape. Its brutal trying to get back on it after so much time off, and even worse knowing exactly how much strength I lost. I still have a lot of work ahead of me to get back to where I was...but hey I put in alot of work to get there before, I'll manage it.
All the while during the week I was learning stuff, getting stronger, my ankle was getting better, and I was getting to know the boys better. Some of them were pretty impressed with some of my stories, and the Kusabs boys ended up telling me to come up to their house and then head out for the night with the boys. Oh yeah! One thing before then..
I rented a scooter. This time, unlike in Bali where I managed to get a proper motorcycle for myself I ended up on a proper "Faggio" as GTA would say. This thing is a little 50cc piece of garbage, with about as much pick up as Jabba the Hutt. Its been carbed back from its original 50ccs of power to go slower, and its actually so slow its really scary being in normal traffic on it.Turning across roads is a feat of patience and courage and generally driving is an exercise in caution. Constantly dodging people who don't see you or pretend not to because you can't match the flow of traffic, while driving without gloves or a visor in rain and freezing cold makes for a bit of a test every time I go to get somewhere, and a sharp wakeup in the morning before Academy. Generally I arrive with my hands near numb and hurting, pretty wet, and having had one or 2 life or death experiences on the way... But its only 4.50$ for a full tank of gas!! And that lasts almost a week! Always a silver lining.
Anyways, so I headed up to chill with the boys, things get going, beers get flowing, Richie spotted everyone beers and the drinking games begun early and hard. There were a bunch of us up there, the owners of the house Willie Sean and Shannon, as well as myself Richard and I think a couple others. After a couple spots, some beers, etc, we headed over to some of the other boys' house and got even harder on the drinking games. Julian who is a bit of a whipping boy for everyone sucked at drinking games, but there were some really fun ones and we all left the house seriously pissed up and fired up. So began a great night out on the town, drinking vodka and red bulls. Sean and I were going Pulse for Pulse, starting off at the Grumpy Mole and then moving over to Lavabar. At Lavabar Richard started shouting shots and the night goes really blurry for a while. Not good, but fun. I had some Bali belly in the bathroom, much to the displeasure of the lineup, and other than that the night was solid with chilling with the boys trying to mack on girls and having a great, overly drunken time. After we headed out and back to the place, we lost Willy due to him picking up a MILF and Sean was already ahead of us...with company. The rest of us went back and were hanging out in the living room, when out stumbles Sean leading what at first glance I thought was a hippopotamus. Then I shook my head and realized it was too big, it must be an elephant. But it turned out to be the girl he picked up, who was basically the most disgusting piece I've seen in some long days. We had a bit of a fryfight, Richard having bought some 13 cheeseburgers and a massive amount of fries for everyone, and then everyone passed out. The next morning Sean had sent her home and everyone had left, the house was a mess and we were too. After cleaning up we did a mad mission for some stuff and my dvds with Willy's van, ran into him in a Taxi and heard his story...the girl he picked up had 2 kids, who while he had been in bed with her, had jumped in and proceeded to call him Daddy. He was not happy. After this we got my pirated dvds from bali and proceeded to hang out and watch a bunch of movies until night came, and I ended up crashing there again. The next day I went back to the Simpkins residence, played with the bros a bit more, had a mean dinner and got a really good sleep for Academy on monday...testing week had begun.
New Zealand 3
The testing started off with a 1.5k run. My ankle was feeling alot better, and I wasn't sure whether or not I was going to be able to do it. When everyone else ran the warmup lap I abstained, trying to feel out my ankle for jogging. In the end I decided at the last second that I could do it. I limped my way out of the gates, falling way behind everyone else right from the get go. I continued at a slow pace, which as the race went on had to do almost as much with my fitness as my limp, and trotted in through the gates slower than the leader by some 2 minutes 10 seconds, at 7 minutes 40 seconds. I reckon without the limp I could have done under 7..maybe..just. Yikes.
So began a week of generally poor testing results for me. In the gym the first thing we tested was chin ups and..man what was it we did before chin ups! Fuck I can't even remember. I didn't do great at it thoguh. Generally stronger than alot of the other people, around the same as the others at my weight, but still a LONG way from where I was. I only got 8 chinups, although with better form than I needed to, at normal grip with hands facing towards me. Bench I got 100 kilos easy..(thats only 225) but I didn't quite get 110, ended up getting rated at 105 kg. Which is shit. Then on shoulders I got about 35 kgs each hand, which is only about eighty pounds.. Dips I only got 3 with a plate around my waist due to my shoulder going wonky...(but I wouldn't have done more than 5 anyway! fuck.) Kneeled on the stability ball for a minute, couldn't do the sprint testing, didn't do great at passing(better than before I came though..) generally I pretty much learned I needed to train really really hard just to get back to where I was. How good is that! :D... On one good note when we were measuring dimensions for body fat percentage...my arms are still 17"! At least I've still got something...thank god. I don't know what my body fat percentage was yet...but its higher than it used to be thats for sure. 94.3 Kg, or about 208 lbs on the scales...but a shitty 208. Should be 190 probably. 195 maybe... But anyways enough ragging on myself about fitness..
Thursday however was different from the rest of the week. We were kicked out of the normal facilities for the game with Team Canada playing NZ U-21 that was on that night, so we went to a place just down the road. The day started off with a talk from a man named Lippi. Lippi was an ex rugby player who never made it too big with rugby, had alot of troubles in his youth even using heroin and getting into gangs, but in the end managed to get on staff for the All Blacks and travel the world with rugby. He did a great talk which was legitimately inspirational, and left us with one piece of advice which all the boys have been loving and finding hilarious. We're all supposed to look at ourselves in the mirror and go "You're awesome! I love you!" every morning. Its like homework for school. Cheesy I know, but he told it really good and didn't make it seem toooo gay, its a pretty funny thing to do I'm not gonna lie I tried it. But then I'm the man so I obviously love me.. hahaha err
but anyways, that was cool, alot more to the talk than that..it went on about 2 hours. Then we went outside and did some running on the stairs. I found I could sprint up them and go hard on them without hurting my ankle because I pushed off the flat of my foot, so after when everyone was running drills which I couldn't do some of I spent the rest of the training session running sprints on the stairs. I'd actually crashed back up at Kusab's the night before so after getting our tickets to the games we all piled into Willy's van and headed back there. I headed pretty much straght away back home to get ready, got a shower, went online for a bit, and chilled. Around 3 I was starting to wonder if they were coming and I headed their way on the scooter, only to pass them while driving. We met up and then with the scoot in the van headed to the grocery store then their place. We each got a twelve pack of Tui's beer and we finished alot of them before we even got to the game, playing in or out, a sweet drinking game. The game was pretty amazing. Canada won 8-5... it was an even match. Which is sad cause NZ was Under 21..but stilll I was lovvvinggg it. I was so fired up when we won, but it sucked because I didn't have anyone to share it with. Afterwards we headed back up Kusabs, had a little sesh, watched some movies and hit the hay. Thats thursday night. Friday we pretty much did nothing but chill out, make some food, watch movies, rent and play God of War II, have more sesh's and take it easy. I crashed there a 2nd night in a row without planning to, and then this morning Willy's parents came. We cleaned up and chilled out, and somehow the Luge came up. Theres a street luge around here, on a big mountain, and Willy was keen on going. Willy, his dad and I ended up going there this morning at about 11, we did 5 races down the hill and it was intense assss hahah. It was a friggin great time, mad races, I got run off the road by Willy's dad and nearly flipped my luge! It was sweet though, Willy was faster than me...which I'm unhappy about, but it was a close race! After that I just headed back to the homestay, and I've been hanging out here all day, wrestlin with the bros, babysittin em, havin some mad food, and chillin out. They're just here now with a friend of theirs thats sleepin over expecting me to go watch movies or play video games with em, so I figure I'll head over and do that now!
Man its good to be caught up, even if I haven't finished the Bali stuff yet.
So began a week of generally poor testing results for me. In the gym the first thing we tested was chin ups and..man what was it we did before chin ups! Fuck I can't even remember. I didn't do great at it thoguh. Generally stronger than alot of the other people, around the same as the others at my weight, but still a LONG way from where I was. I only got 8 chinups, although with better form than I needed to, at normal grip with hands facing towards me. Bench I got 100 kilos easy..(thats only 225) but I didn't quite get 110, ended up getting rated at 105 kg. Which is shit. Then on shoulders I got about 35 kgs each hand, which is only about eighty pounds.. Dips I only got 3 with a plate around my waist due to my shoulder going wonky...(but I wouldn't have done more than 5 anyway! fuck.) Kneeled on the stability ball for a minute, couldn't do the sprint testing, didn't do great at passing(better than before I came though..) generally I pretty much learned I needed to train really really hard just to get back to where I was. How good is that! :D... On one good note when we were measuring dimensions for body fat percentage...my arms are still 17"! At least I've still got something...thank god. I don't know what my body fat percentage was yet...but its higher than it used to be thats for sure. 94.3 Kg, or about 208 lbs on the scales...but a shitty 208. Should be 190 probably. 195 maybe... But anyways enough ragging on myself about fitness..
Thursday however was different from the rest of the week. We were kicked out of the normal facilities for the game with Team Canada playing NZ U-21 that was on that night, so we went to a place just down the road. The day started off with a talk from a man named Lippi. Lippi was an ex rugby player who never made it too big with rugby, had alot of troubles in his youth even using heroin and getting into gangs, but in the end managed to get on staff for the All Blacks and travel the world with rugby. He did a great talk which was legitimately inspirational, and left us with one piece of advice which all the boys have been loving and finding hilarious. We're all supposed to look at ourselves in the mirror and go "You're awesome! I love you!" every morning. Its like homework for school. Cheesy I know, but he told it really good and didn't make it seem toooo gay, its a pretty funny thing to do I'm not gonna lie I tried it. But then I'm the man so I obviously love me.. hahaha err
but anyways, that was cool, alot more to the talk than that..it went on about 2 hours. Then we went outside and did some running on the stairs. I found I could sprint up them and go hard on them without hurting my ankle because I pushed off the flat of my foot, so after when everyone was running drills which I couldn't do some of I spent the rest of the training session running sprints on the stairs. I'd actually crashed back up at Kusab's the night before so after getting our tickets to the games we all piled into Willy's van and headed back there. I headed pretty much straght away back home to get ready, got a shower, went online for a bit, and chilled. Around 3 I was starting to wonder if they were coming and I headed their way on the scooter, only to pass them while driving. We met up and then with the scoot in the van headed to the grocery store then their place. We each got a twelve pack of Tui's beer and we finished alot of them before we even got to the game, playing in or out, a sweet drinking game. The game was pretty amazing. Canada won 8-5... it was an even match. Which is sad cause NZ was Under 21..but stilll I was lovvvinggg it. I was so fired up when we won, but it sucked because I didn't have anyone to share it with. Afterwards we headed back up Kusabs, had a little sesh, watched some movies and hit the hay. Thats thursday night. Friday we pretty much did nothing but chill out, make some food, watch movies, rent and play God of War II, have more sesh's and take it easy. I crashed there a 2nd night in a row without planning to, and then this morning Willy's parents came. We cleaned up and chilled out, and somehow the Luge came up. Theres a street luge around here, on a big mountain, and Willy was keen on going. Willy, his dad and I ended up going there this morning at about 11, we did 5 races down the hill and it was intense assss hahah. It was a friggin great time, mad races, I got run off the road by Willy's dad and nearly flipped my luge! It was sweet though, Willy was faster than me...which I'm unhappy about, but it was a close race! After that I just headed back to the homestay, and I've been hanging out here all day, wrestlin with the bros, babysittin em, havin some mad food, and chillin out. They're just here now with a friend of theirs thats sleepin over expecting me to go watch movies or play video games with em, so I figure I'll head over and do that now!
Man its good to be caught up, even if I haven't finished the Bali stuff yet.
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