Brian Schoenborn: Hello. Hello. Hey, everybody. Our guests today has been to over 50 countries. He’s dive deep into cultures, getting to know local culture, local cuisine, the people, and their drink is also the host of lost ex-pat, a YouTube channel dedicated to travel. He’s got tens of thousands of followers. We’re here to talk a little bit about that, uh, as well as a little bit about what’s going on with coronavirus.

[00:00:26] Give it up for my friend Bert Diggs.

[00:00:28] My name is Brian Schoenborn. I’m an explorer of people, places, and culture. In my travels, spending over 20 countries across four continents, I’ve had the pleasure of engaging in authentic conversations with amazingly interesting people. These are their stories, on location and unfiltered. Presented by 8B Media, this is Half the City.

[00:00:56] First of all, let’s get that day drink, and then you gotta get a beer in while we’re having this, uh, corona lock down time.

[00:01:04] Bert Diggs: It’s crazy, man. It’s makes sense that everybody’s talking about, it’s the only thing that anybody can talk about. But I think like, you know, it’s nice to get a little bit of a break and kind of talk about other things too.

[00:01:14] Brian Schoenborn: Right. You know, like, so just, you know, so for the listeners at home, you know, I’m, I’m in LA. Uh, Burt’s currently in San Diego, although we met each other, uh, back in Beijing, oddly enough, during our times there. How did we meet? I’m just trying to, I’m just trying to remember that cause I remember it was a pretty funny story.

[00:01:33] Bert Diggs: But, uh, the way we met was we were both sitting. I was sitting behind you on that. I was sitting behind you on the train in Beijing, going to the airport. We were both heading to the airport. Airport express. I was talking to this girl that was sitting next to me a pair of way that like, I was just kind of chatting and rough, you know, hitting on her and they kind of way then Chinese, you were, you were kind of like looking at me like, how’s he doing?

[00:02:00] He’s going, he’s going good. And then after the girl got off the train, we started talking about how we like living in Beijing and how easy it is to make friends and you know, talk to girls. And it’s just. Good experience over there.

[00:02:17] Brian Schoenborn: I remember that like, cause I was sitting there just kind of minding my own business.

[00:02:21] I don’t remember where I was going. I was going somewhere, but uh, doesn’t matter. But, uh, I was sitting there minding my own business and I saw this girl being talked to and I saw her responding and stuff. I heard like. Western Chinese, right? Like non native Chinese speakers saying like how, and stuff like that.

[00:02:38] I’m like, ah, this guy.

[00:02:41] Bert Diggs: I was telling her, well, you have a boyfriend, you’re hateful. And that’s how I always talk to the girls, you know? And that’s how it works, man. You know? I mean, Chinese people are very, uh. At least in my experience. Like you said, they’re very, it’s very easy to make friends. You know, they’re very warm. Uh, they like to work hard, but they like to party too.

[00:03:04] Brian Schoenborn: They’re very appreciative if you come and enjoy their culture and their country, and if you even make like the slightest attempt to try trying to learn their language, it goes like miles.

[00:03:15] Bert Diggs: It really helps a lot when you’re meeting the local Chinese. If you can speak even. You know, a bit of Chinese, you know, 30 different sentences very fluently and understand 60 sentences or 80 sentences or just even.

[00:03:31] 200, 300 words. It’s good. It’s all helpful when you live in China. Yep. That’s for sure. Absolutely. And just, you know, I kind of segwayed really quickly away from the Corona virus and don’t we, we’ll get back to that. I know, I know. Bird’s got some stuff he wants to talk about. Hell yeah, that’s what I’m talking about right there.

[00:03:49] Brian Schoenborn: Cheers, man. Oh yeah. Just casual beers. Um, but, you know, we’ll get back to some of that coronavirus stuff as well because, um, you know, Bert’s got a pretty unique perspective on it. Um, based on his experiences. Um, but I want to kind of cover some of those things first, right? Like, you know, uh, tell me about like, how long were you in China?

[00:04:07] I mean, I’m on the other places, like, I want to talk about some of these other spots too, but like how long were you in China? And like, what was, you know, what were you doing there? What was your overall experience?

[00:04:16] Bert Diggs: So, right when I got into China, it was January 14th, and coronavirus was still just kind of an up and coming topic four.

[00:04:26] Woah. And we knew that we’ll handle a couple hundred cases, possibly. And they didn’t know. No one knew exactly how bad it was until 22nd or 21st, I think it was 23rd they locked up one. Mmm. And. Close it down. They didn’t close the flights like exiting Mohan going to other countries, but they locked the country up just to contain the virus.

[00:04:49] They didn’t know that it was so bad at the time and like how many people were really infected. It’s, it’s such a big delay. So they, they did probably didn’t know at that time that there was a 14 day lag on everyone who got infected and how big the situation really was in the end. It was, it was really a shock to everybody.

[00:05:10] I was in Portugal on January 5th and first heard about this virus, this pneumonia. And that’s why I decided to buy a couple of masks from, be shocked in Portugal, like maybe 50 masks or 25 masks. I just bought them randomly and just to keep them. And then later on they came in really handy after this all came out, you know, cause there was no masks in Beijing.

[00:05:39] You could not buy a mask that was a proper surgical mask. Or in 95 you would have to spend a lot more money, like four times the amount. Geez, well, I mean, but even just the concept of getting a mask, when, when you start hearing about things happening, I mean, that comes from time spent in China, right? Like, they’re very, like, at least, you know, at the time that I was there, people are very conscious, you know, whether it’s because of the pollution, the smog, right.

[00:06:04] Or whether it’s, you know, if they have a cold or something, like they’ll wear a mask to prevent other people from catching whatever they have. Um, and, and, you know, you spend a couple of years there, like you and I both have, um. You kind of become, I don’t say I ever got used to it because I hate wearing masks.

[00:06:20] I like, it drives me crazy. Um, but I’ll do it when it’s necessary, but even just knowing that that’s kind of, you know, having spent that much time there where, you know, you get used to that culture of people wearing things when you know, when whatever is not perfect. Um, it’s probably an easier decision or more natural decision even to make, like when you’re sitting there in Portugal and you’re first hearing about those.

[00:06:43] Yeah. Because you know, you’re getting on a flight for 15 hours to get back to China or go to a United States. Um, I mean, no, that you’re going to be exposing yourself to more viruses. So, I mean, I didn’t actually wear the mask on the flight from Portugal to United States. But from the United States to Beijing, I did actually wear a mask for part of the flight cause I was just a little bit, you know, worried, paranoid, whatever you want to call it.

[00:07:11] In the end it was, it was for good, for the better. For every one’s better. Yeah. I think I did. I did actually have a little bit of a sore throat when I was leaving. America to go to China. I had like a little sore throat, so I was wearing a mask. People were wearing masks actually on that flight cause they did hear about this ammonia and Woolwine.

[00:07:33] And so that was the 14th of January. So you were, you were in China on January 14th how long were you there before you. Before you came back to the States? Oh, I was in China until February 6th but I didn’t come back to the States on that flight. I went to Malaysia for about 20 days, and then I was in Indonesia for almost a month, so I was outside of China because I just wanted to get out of turn.

[00:08:02] I didn’t know how bad I was going to get by February 6th when I was leaving. Already. You could only go to very select countries like Italy. You could go to Malaysia, Thailand. You could not go directly to Singapore. You’d have to wait in Thailand, if you want to go to Indonesia or Australia, like these two countries decided they need people out of China for 14 days before they’ll accept them into Australia or Indonesia or Singapore.

[00:08:31] So you had a self quarantine even that earlier. Uh, yeah, kind of self quarantine. It wasn’t a mandatory quarantine. It was a, according to you, the I decided to do with myself because I don’t want to be one of the people spreading this virus. Very careful. I just wanted to quarantine myself a bit. I still went out, but I wore a mask if I went out and.

[00:08:53] I stayed away from people like at least 10 feet away. I typically stayed. Uh, there was some little roads in Malaysia where you really couldn’t stay 10 feet away, but I did my best to wear a mask and waited 10 days until I took off the mask. Any time I was outside, I want to get back to Malaysia and Indonesia because I love those countries.

[00:09:12] But I’m curious first, like, uh. You know, you were in Beijing for what, like three weeks it sounds like. What was the overall, uh, like feeling or vibe while you were there during that time? The feeling. Was like a ghost city, like apocalypse, just kind of like it is now in America. It was really interesting to go out and kind of film.

[00:09:38] I was also very careful when I went out and Beijing was not a hard hit city at all. Only a couple of hundred cases at that time. There was like 24 cases in Beijing. When I first started filming. By the time I was leaving Beijing, there was uh, around 200 cases. So it grew really fast. Because the people from Mohan left for aging and other provinces around, and.

[00:10:01] Luckily they didn’t go to Beijing that much. They mostly went to Hong Jo Fujin and also they went to like Shanghai area, just like more nearby cities. Right. So for those that don’t know Chinese geography, um, Beijing to Shanghai is roughly the same distance of like, I want to say San Francisco to San Diego.

[00:10:24] No, it’s, it’s, uh, there’s a further five hours, five hours on a bullet train. So, um, I mean, it’s like a three hour flight, three hour flight. I mean, it could be, it could be like Boston to like Orlando. It’s almost like that, but not quite, it’s kind of like that. Maybe Boston to Virginia. Okay. Yeah, that’s, that’s pretty much close enough, I think.

[00:10:54] Anyways, it’s fair. It’s a fair distance. And those other cities, like Uber is, it’s fairly close to Shanghai. It’s not, uh, it’s much further away than Beijing is anyways. And then Fujian is near the, near the sea. Uh, basically the city that, um, is on the sea with the streets of Taiwan, with Taiwan on the other side.

[00:11:14] Um, and then Hong Jo is, uh, next to Shanghai. Anyways. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, uh, very close to Shanghai. And then you’ve also got Sue Jo, very close to Shanghai. All of Amway is pretty close to Shanghai. Uh, that’s really famous for the yellow mountain and whey province. And then, um, I don’t know, there’s just a lot of different places.

[00:11:38] Shanghai is actually a better place geographically because you’ve got a lot of interesting places around it. Beijing is great. It’s an amazing city, but there’s not many places to go. If you’re looking to go venture out to other cities and explore and see other places, honestly, like Beijing, there’s hub a and there’s Shannon young, and these places are really dry, cold, really not places you would love to go to travel to.

[00:12:07] Well, yeah, all around Shanghai. You got really beautiful places to go. Like hung Jo, Sue Jo. So Joe is supposed to be the Venice of China and how Joe is like this beautiful Lake, and like everyone goes there for vacation and then yeah, Juan Shawn is the mountains. You’ve got that only a couple hours away from Shanghai.

[00:12:27] So. But yeah, you do have really beautiful places around Beijing and high row and some other places that have got some cool mountains, but just not as much. It’s definitely different. But also like, I mean, I would even say like, at least for me, a possible reason why they might be traveling to those other cities more is cause it’s closer.

[00:12:46] You know? It’s also got the natural beauty and you know, Chinese people love getting outside. So I, you know, I’m in LA, right? One of the most populous cities in the country, if not the most populous. Um, I don’t know my numbers, but you know, it’s notoriously bad with traffic. Yeah. Right now, traffic is starting to pick up a little bit.

[00:13:05] I think it’s starting to tick up, but for like the last month or so, it’s been. So listeners, if you’ve never been to LA, I’ve never heard about it. Heard about the traffic situation, like people measure distance and time in LA versus miles, because like, it could take you an hour or more to go five to 10 miles, right?

[00:13:27] Depending on the traffic. But these days, you know, going five to 10 miles could take, you know, 1520 minutes. Like it’s, it’s not stewed. The roads are so empty. Even though there’s been a bit of an uptick, and that’s really the way it should be because otherwise, I mean, this virus can spread so many different ways, and even when you’re on a bicycle, someone breathing really heavily driving right past you with a bicycle.

[00:13:54] If they’re not wearing a mask that. That breath of air, not even a cough, just a breath. It gave me air and blow in your direction and actually infect you, and maybe it will be a small inoculation, but it we’ll still infect you. It could be a really good thing to get inoculated with a very small part of this virus if you get a big inoculation.

[00:14:17] A lot of people say that. That’s the people that go to the ER and have to get the breathing tubes in there in their throats, and the ventilators and the PPD machines and all this stuff that you need to do all this stuff. So the best thing, I mean, I’m not saying get infected, but it’s good to get a smaller infection.

[00:14:36] That’s why if you wear a mask, you can get a smaller inoculation into you. And if they’re wearing a mask, it’s also a smaller inoculation into you. So if everyone is wearing a mask. Everyone is giving each other less dose of this virus, and if not even just eliminated the virus completely. So that’s why I think everybody should have been wearing masks many months ago, or even just a facial protection head thing, even though it may not be a CDC certified mask and 95, uh, whatever surgical mask, even just a cloth.

[00:15:11] A towel napkin. The best napkins they say are the blue napkins that are, they used to dry cars a lot of the time that you heard about this, the blue napkins inside of your. Mask, like this is the best way to protect your, like it blocks a lot of that air. The virus particles, the breathing particles. So yeah, there, there is actual studies been done on the best materials that we can actually get access to right now.

[00:15:39] That blue fiber, what they wash cars with, it’s kind of a cloth called, I’m going to look it up real quick. It’s disposable. I’m from Michigan originally. Dude, it’s a big car state, so I know, I know what you’re talking about. Blue cloth or cars. What the fuck is it? It’s just as 50 pack blue shop towels. So shop towels.

[00:15:57] Yeah. Shop blue towels. Look at this one right here, Scott. Shop towels. Exactly. That’s, that’s exactly what they say. It’s a 200 pack right there too. So that’s a 200 rent, 200 shop towels in a, in a box. You can just lie in that in front of a T shirt or something. Right. Or your mask, however you make your mask.

[00:16:17] I mean, everyone’s going to make their mask differently, but if you put that and the area that’s like right next to your face, you are blocking a lot of the particles, very similar to a surgical mask. And the closer we can get to having that kind of surgical mask protection or. And 95 protection without that little tiny ventilator.

[00:16:36] The little plastic thing that lets the air out. That’s actually not what you want for this because it doesn’t protect the people around you. You don’t want that little plastic thing. They kind of a little bit ventilator. You don’t want that one. There’s an 90 fives without that little plastic thing on the outside.

[00:16:52] Well the United, so I’ve been doing some research on this as well cause I, you know, I know some. Mass manufacturers and different parts of the world. So I’m trying to do my part, it’s not that easy. You know, it’s kind of a shit show right now as far as all that’s concerned. Um, but, uh, I have learned quite a bit about mass over the last couple of weeks because of that.

[00:17:10] And from what I understanding the end 95 just basically means that 95% of particles that are in the air that you would inhale are blocked. So you’re only getting 5% of whatever that is. So, you know, whether that’s a mask with a ventilator or without a ventilator. Um, it’s still the same amount of blockage.

[00:17:31] I don’t know if it’s called a ventilator. It’s just that little plastic thing that, um, or maybe it’s not a, maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s not a ventilator, but it’s, I know what you’re talking about is that plastic piece where it’s like it lets you breath easier. Yeah. We use those things in Beijing when the smog is really bad because you know, you want to breathe.

[00:17:51] In a little bit easier, but you also breathe out easier too with that little plastic thing there. And so for smog and pollution, that is the perfect mask. So that’s what we were using in Beijing. Whenever it got to be. Very high PM 2.5 if it was super high and it makes it so like you breathe out easier, you can breathe out the particles that are coming from your mouth, your lungs.

[00:18:16] But unfortunately, that’s exactly what we don’t want. Right? Because then if you’re infectious or you’re contagious, then it doesn’t stop that spread. Yeah, and that’s the whole point. We just want to cut this thing down and make the. The are not, which is the transmission level. So this one has gotten or not one person is infected and it affects two to three people on average.

[00:18:41] No matter what we do, and if we really bring this down, we can bring that are not down to below one, which will make this virus go extinct, but it’s going to be very hard for that considering this virus is a airborne virus that all you have to do is breathe in a room for a certain amount of time and you’re going to infect anyone that walks in that room.

[00:19:02] Well, it’s crazy how much information is coming about coming out about it. You know, like at first they were like, don’t worry, at least the U S government at first was like, don’t worry basket’s it’s not going to help. Then they changed their fucking mind and then the saying, Oh, it’s, you know, three feet of distance now, six feet.

[00:19:17] And I read something the other day that said, it can spread on the sole of your shoes up to 13 feet. Like it’s fucking crazy, dude. Like nobody knows what’s going on with this right now. The only thing we can do is. You know, try to be safe, you know, keep ourselves inside. And if we have to leave, you know, make sure you’re wearing a mask and gloves and sanitizing and all that other shit.

[00:19:37] Yeah, definitely. Wash your groceries. I mean, depending on if you think they could have been touched multiple times by multiple people. I see lots of people touching the things inside without buying them. I mean, it’s, it’s just habits that we do. Yeah. We have to try to learn to break. It sucks, man. I miss human touch.

[00:19:59] I want to hug. I want a hug more than like anything else, right? I’m just like, come close. No, I want a real skin on skin contact. I had a dream last night that I kissed a girl. That was my dream. I was like, Oh my God, it’s crazy. I’m like, man, I missed that. You really don’t know what you got until it’s gone.

[00:20:25] Right. The feeling is touch and you know, you could just, how’s that feeling of you don’t care about. Hugs and cuddles. Yeah, you can be hard. You can be hard all you want, dude, but you know, you’re just taking it for granted. You know, you get it. You just like, man, maybe it’s going to, some dudes are like, Oh, I’m so hard.

[00:20:42] No, don’t touch me. No. Get the fuck outta here, man. You know, when you can’t be touched, that’s when you want to be touched. It doesn’t take a fucking hard ass man to fucking turn that shit. I’m a hard man. I was a fucking 50 caliber machine gunning Marine active duty, and I just want to fucking hug, man. I want a hug.

[00:21:03] No, I know. I know what you feel right now. Things that we go through, like when we’re with the significant other, at the time. And you know, we’ve had too much of them and too much of that amazing special time with them, and then go for a one month without them or whatever. Then you’ve got literally, you could go for anything.

[00:21:26] Like you’re just so desperate for affection, thirsty. I was hanging out. I was, um. You know? So I’m, I’m also, I’m managing a Chipotle right now in Beverly Hills. It’s of my side hustle, keep my finances stable while I work on my other stuff. And this old lady came in and actually the the, so first of all, it’s super fucking slow.

[00:21:47] We’ve lost like. 60 to 75% of our business. Um, but secondly, like the people that are coming in the last few days, I’ve been so like, they just don’t want to leave. They just want to have a conversation. You know? I think there’s like, I think there’s like 67 year old lady who was like flirting with me and she’s just like, she’s just like, don’t you think this is all over blown?

[00:22:09] I’m like, no. I’m like. We’ve got to, we’ve got to take care of people. We’ve got to stay in. We’ve got to keep the distance still. Everything that she goes, I am almost 70 years old. She’s like, I don’t care if this thing kills me. I’m like, you fucking, you’re gonna have like 30 more years of life. Are you kidding me?

[00:22:23] Like, come on, especially in this day and age, like you can’t really live to be 120 if you’re 50 right now, you might live to be 120 they might come out with some machines that can just rejuvenate yourselves. You never know. So. The thing is, you know, I don’t think the people like. Elon Musk or bill Gates, they’re not going to die early.

[00:22:44] They’re going to be 120 hundred and 30 if not, they’re going to be a mortal dude. They’re going to live forever. They’re going to find a way to like put their brain into like some sort of like robot contraption, like the teenage mutant Ninja turtles live forever progressive on the finding of helping them live for a longer time.

[00:23:07] I mean, maybe not bill Gates, but I think they’ll get. He might want to live forever. I mean, he’s got enough money. Why not just one person? He his mind, he’s so smart. I mean, he’s a literal genius, but the fact that he was able to predict the pandemic and talk about it in details back in 2015 and talking about how.

[00:23:32] Everything would happen, how we are not prepared and how it would be a coronavirus from a animal. You didn’t say bat, but he said everything else was pretty much directly correct and that this could have been from a bat or a. Pig or I guess a one of those are middle pangolin or whatever. It’s maybe, maybe, I don’t know, man, like I don’t want to, I don’t want to conspiracy theorize too much, but like from what I’m kind of gathering, like just my hunch based on the information that I’ve read over the last couple of months, it doesn’t feel so much like it was a wet market thing.

[00:24:15] It feels more like, you know, and those virus, the CDCs and , the, the virus  virus lab or whatever it’s called, and they’re both fairly close to each other and they’re both, you know, a hundred, 200 yards away, something like that from the wet market that they blamed it on. Yep. I wouldn’t be surprised. I’m not saying it’s a manmade thing, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were researching Corona viruses and bats and somehow it got out, you know, like, like accidental or on purpose.

[00:24:48] Like I’m not, you know, I’m not trying to, I’m not playing that game. Like I’m not going to sit here and think like, China did this on purpose to fucking like. Bring the world to its knees and like take over. I’m also a saying that, you know, if it was an accident, they sure as hell are taken advantage. You know?

[00:25:08] I mean, that’s, that’s just my impression. I mean, you know, they, they suppressed information like they always do. Uh, and now suddenly they’re, you know, they’re trying to be the heroes and you know, maybe. Change the world, order that kind of stuff, and send people to other countries to help out with this whole pandemic, which is good.

[00:25:26] That’s a nice thing of them to do, but it’s good. I think, yeah. I wish that we did take it more seriously back in the early times of January, and I guess it’s just, it was really unforeseeable that it would come to this and how it, it could be 14 days dormant in your body and spread and get so infectious and so contagious with the people that you come in contact with.

[00:25:50] Even though you have no symptoms, it still is going to be giving you all the people around you presence. They don’t want. It’s the gift that keeps on giving. Three weeks ago, if you told me, Hey, Robert, I got a present for you, Corona man. Be like, yeah, maybe I’m going to get a 12 pack of curls. I know. It’s definitely not a good present.

[00:26:17] Again,

[00:26:21] I sit there, you know, I just think like, I remember in like December, I’m going, all right. 2020 is going to be the year we’ve got a 2020 vision. This shit’s going to be, this is the year everything’s going to fucking rock. Everything’s going to fucking change. Here we are over a quarter of the way in and the entire year has been fucked and just like.

[00:26:49] I hear, I hear this thing goes away by April. Yeah. All better. By April we got 15 and we’re going to be down by zero. By next week, it’s going to be zero by next week. It’s gonna be magical. It’s gonna be as if this never happened. Yeah, right. Dude, LA, I dunno. I dunno. San Diego is, but LA is like, Oh, I guess California in general is shut down until may 15 for sure.

[00:27:16] But I do. I’ll tell you what, based on, did you hear the governors, um, the press conference the other day? It’s talking about the criteria to reopen. Yes. In saying that we have to wear a mask. If you work in the restaurant, you got to wear a mask and maybe a face shield and gloves, whole new procedures. Like we’re not opening up in the way that we think we’re opening up.

[00:27:37] We’re going to be in a bio containment center everywhere. It’s going to be a safety zone. Yeah. Um, but like, what we should be doing, how he’s doing it is the safe way and the safe way is the best way. When it comes to this virus, we might even have to close off the border to our friends in Nevada and Oregon and whoever else is not taking this thing seriously right now because we’re in Ohio.

[00:28:02] Those guys are writing and in Michigan too, like I’m from Michigan, dude, I watched these guys just the other day. They did this whole fucking riot in their cars, and then they all get out of their fucking cars and real estate capital. Like, what better way? What better way to fucking kill yourselves protesting assholes like Jesus Christ?

[00:28:22] You know? It’s like, it’s almost like now’s the time for survival of the fittest. This is the Darwin awards right now. This is how we’re going to avoid idiocrasy from happening. Idiocracy to beat. All the dumb asses are going to die from protesting, and it’s not funny, but it’s not what will happen to the irony.

[00:28:42] What will happen is actually their grandparents will die, not them. They’re going to be okay because their immune system’s fine. They’re going to be spreading this thing with their parents and their grandparents and whoever else is got a little bit autoimmune disease. So. What they’re doing is really not fair to anyone.

[00:28:59] It’s not them who’s going to die. If I get chronic tomorrow, I’m probably not going to die considering I’m drinking a smoothie every day with like, yeah, I don’t know, kale, blueberries, lemon peel, lemons, just so much good stuff in there, and then I’m taking my zing, taking my , taking my vitamin C. These things are the Corona killers.

[00:29:19] I mean, people. Or talking about like, you know, Corona cures. There’s no cure on a Corona cure. There’s only making your immune system very high and very Mmm alert, right? To make sure that you’re always going to be killing that Corona. If you end up getting that Corona, at least you’re not going to be getting it in your lungs.

[00:29:38] You’re going to get B. Cutting it off at its source. So yeah, the more zinc you got, the more vitamin D three, the more vitamin C, uh, you get  B3 comes for free. It comes from the sun, so sit in the sun. Sunbathe for 15 minutes in LA. If you’re in Washington like Washington, the state, it’s a bit more cloudy. So maybe you’ve got to sit out there for 30 or 40 minutes.

[00:30:03] Well L is a bit difficult too though, cause it’s a densely populated city. It’s a, you know, it’s a concrete jungle. The beaches are closed. So the only place, the only people that have the luxury of sitting out in the sun is, you know, if you have like a rooftop in your apartment building or if you’ve got a yard.

[00:30:18] Right? Yeah. Um, but there’s a lot of people, I mean, I have a yard, I guess, but there’s a lot of people out there that don’t, and you know, they can’t exactly lay on the sidewalk. I mean, I guess they could, but. You know, then you’re exposing yourself to other people, like walking around you or whatever, you know, like it’s not ideal.

[00:30:35] Yeah, you’re right. LA is definitely not the best place for this, but it’s a lot better than New York city for sure. For sure. If you have a back porch, you’re pretty rich, so that’s good. I mean, there’s, if you have a balcony in New York city. I mean, you’ve pretty much got millions of dollars, I’m guessing, because it’s not cheap to get like a massive balcony.

[00:30:54] And I have a nice size apartment. I think in New York people are like typically sitting in their living rooms and they have a small window. That’s the typical New York apartment. Yeah, no, I know. I lived in New York for like three years and yeah, real estate comes at a premium. If you have a nice balcony, like a decent balcony, you would actually want to sit out.

[00:31:14] And hang out on and look at the sun and emphasize even shining on you. That’s good too. But like, yeah, that’s, it’s going to be costing you like four thousand five thousand seven thousand dollars per month if not 10,000 I don’t know. Like it’s a lot. If you got the room, just one room in that apartment, that’s probably quite a few thousand dollars I don’t know.

[00:31:35] Right. I just, I mean, I just think about my time in New York. I mean. I was there when I feel like I was a trained for this for my time in New York because I was there when hurricane Sandy hit. So, uh, where I was, I was actually in Hoboken. So just outside of Manhattan on the Jersey side, and we, you know, we lost power.

[00:31:55] For like two weeks, I think. Something like that. Uh, everything was shut down. Um, red cross was outside my building. National guard was in town. Uh, people were people. People were, um, taking an inflatable boats. And like paddling down the streets because it was so flooded. And even that was dangerous because you don’t know if there’s like a down power line or whatever.

[00:32:20] Right? So like most of us were stuck. We were confined to our homes for like two weeks. Um, I thought that was shitty, you know, and, and we didn’t have power. Right? So like, here, like, this is like, you know, the whole world, it’s been months, right? At least we have power. At least we have the ability to, you know, talk to each other from Las, San Diego or.

[00:32:41] Or other parts of the world or wherever your families and friends may be from, you know, we have that ability to see each other, but I mean, just imagine if like, it feels like a global hurricane, right? Where power was knocked out all over the globe, you know, for like a mother fucking crazy. It’s really crazy.

[00:33:01] And the fact is that when we go out. And we get Corona virus, we may need some medical attention and we end up overwhelming our hospitals. And that is what really kills a lot of people because people need the hospital, not just for Corona, but for other normal procedures. And people can’t get their normal procedures done.

[00:33:23] And that is also what’s killing people. People need their x-rays to make sure their cancer is not getting bigger, but they can’t go to the hospitals now because Corona is best, the hospitals. So when people are saying, yeah, we’re going to have church on Sunday and we’re going to be having a blast with everybody in need, people need to have.

[00:33:44] The Jesus Christ during this time around, everyone’s going to be depressed and it’s not going to be good. Okay. No, I mean, we need to all stay home and not go to our Baptist church in Louisiana or Florida or Ohio apparently. I mean, these places are all having their church service, worship God, and that’s really good, but we cannot be doing this at this time.

[00:34:07] It’s just such backwards thinking. People are dying, not just from Rona virus. It’s from cancer. Somebody died in my family today because they couldn’t go to the hospital. They were more scared to go to the hospital and get coronavirus then to go to the hospital to get themselves fixed up. And someone died this morning in my family, my aunt died because she told me last week, I can’t go to the hospital right now because if I go, I’m going to get Corona and I’m going to, in fact, the whole family.

[00:34:37] My grandma died a week ago at 98, man, and she, um. Her kids were allowed to see her finally. Mmm. After they had to like Pat, they had to get tested and all that other shit. Um, and then like the funeral, like nobody was allowed to go to it, the gathering of 10. So it was just basically her children and theirs and their spouses.

[00:34:58] So like me and all of, she’s got like 25 plus grandkids. And even more great grandkids. She was 98, you know, and like none of us, none of us could even go to the funeral. Did you see it coming from months or is it something that happened? No, it wasn’t Corona related. She’s old. She’s 98. She’s had dementia for like five to 10 years.

[00:35:21] Um, she’s lived in an assisted living home for like the last three years. So, you know, we, we knew it was calming, but then apparently like what had happened was she. I think she got pneumonia and then, but the doctors are like, no, we don’t think it’s Corona. Maybe it is. Maybe, you know, it’s, I’m like, what the fuck it was?

[00:35:42] Maybe it wasn’t right. Like regardless, because of the, um, you know, the small gatherings order or whatever, like there couldn’t be any more than 10 people there. And so it was her kids and her and their spouses. Um, so it happened kind of fast, but it’s just, it’s just crazy for me to think like, you know, all of these people, not only the 30,000 people, what is it?

[00:36:00] What’s the number? Right now, I think it’s like 33,000 or something. 30 something thousand people that died from Kroger virus. So over 30,000 deaths so far. I mean, if, if my, like if my grandma, for example, there’s, there’s other people that are dying for other reasons as well, and you can’t have your last moments.

[00:36:20] No. Like it’s fucking crazy, dude. I think that last moments are overrated. I think that the best moments are weeks before your last moments, and me talking to my aunt last week is a lot better than talking to her. Right on her last moments, talking to her last week, it was like I wasn’t even expecting her to pass away.

[00:36:41] I didn’t know she was. It’s going to be so sick now. It was just one week ago. I talked to her and she was fine. She was just talking about how they’re not going out there being really careful. They’re cleaning the groceries. Uh, my, my cousin is in charge of the grocery shopping and cleaning them and making sure nothing, it’s getting inside the house, but the fact is Pennsylvania is affected so much with the coronavirus.

[00:37:08] I think they’ve got more numbers now than California and Pennsylvania is a. Smaller state. It’s a big state, but it’s a smaller state than California. So, um, she’s in Pennsylvania right now, and that is why she did not go get her normal routine doctor to check her up and make sure that she’s fine because of coronavirus.

[00:37:30] I mean, that’s the real reason. We are like ending lives early. Because of coronavirus and that just goes back to that lady that I was talking to at the store. She said, Oh, I’m almost 70 it’s okay if it kills me. I’m like, not okay. People are sudden this and that. Well, that too. Of course. Yeah. Anyways, stay safe.

[00:37:55] People. I want to talk about something else. Let’s talk about something nice. We’ve been talking and we’ve been hammering hard, pretty hard on the Corona virus stuff. Um, I want to talk about some, some lighter stuff. I want to talk about some good memories. Like I want to talk more about the travels. Like I want to share some travel stories, man.

[00:38:11] Like, yeah. So how long were you in China? Like in total, cause you were there for awhile. Yeah. I’ve been living in Beijing for almost 10 years. It’s coming up on 10 years now, so yeah, it’s actually a full on nine years, but yet almost coming up on 10 years, and I really love Beijing as a city and coming there.

[00:38:35] For vacation is also really fun. That’s how I originally fell in love with the place, because you know, going out clubbing, you know, you never know how your night is going to end. It’s the most exciting thing to go out and you just. Don’t know what will happen when you expect it to be home by 11 or 10 30 at night.

[00:38:54] You’re like, yeah, this is a quiet night. I got to work tomorrow, seven in the morning, got to teach some classes, ABCD for the little babies or something. When I first came to China, this is what I was doing. But um, yeah, you just decide you’re going to be. Going out for a couple of drinks with your coworkers and then you ended up, you know, it’s seven in the morning and you are still out, and you’re like, well, now I gotta go to work.

[00:39:19] I know like I was there for less than four. I was about three and a half. But, uh, you know, when I, when I went to China, I’d never been there. I’d never been to Beijing. There’ve been anywhere in China. My Asia experience was limited to Japan at that time. So I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t speak the language.

[00:39:34] I didn’t know anybody. I just, I went because I was going to try to find my path, right? Find my passion or purpose or whatever. But one of the things that I found amazing was. The Chinese put such an importance on Guangxi, which is, you know, it’s a Chinese term that basically means relationships, right? And like that’s how they do business.

[00:39:52] That’s how you like go places in the world, move up, whatever. A lot of building that she is sitting around a plastic table and shares outside of a restaurant. Eating a shitload of food, uh, drinking beer, you know, smoking everybody else’s cigarettes. Cause you know, they’ve all got regional cigarettes. Um, that’s the reason I started back smoking.

[00:40:15] Actually. I didn’t smoke for nine years until I went to China. Um, now that’s a habit I gotta kick again. Um, but you gotta play with them, right? You gotta, you gotta play, you know, and you’re eating and drinking for hours, smoking cigarettes. Eventually the bite geo comes out, the Chinese rice wine, especially at those weddings.

[00:40:31] You know, you got Joe with those grandmas that want to drink with you at the weddings. Like if it’s an old grandma, of course you’re going to drink with the old grandma. Like she only drinks every year, and she’s having a great day to that day, and you’re going to. Tell her you’re not going to drink with her.

[00:40:48] So yeah, you have to drink the by Joe. I’ve never actually been to a Chinese wedding in China. How is that when you first get to the wedding, everyone is a little bit awkward and not really feeling really that like friendly. And then right about after everyone does like the first three toasts, they start warming up to you and as the only Y, the only foreigner there at the wedding, you’re getting asked to drink with everyone.

[00:41:19] When I say everyone, I mean everyone’s, and you’ve got to tell them, Oh, shall eat yen nigga by Jack. Hi, she do Ty Gola. Alcohol is too high portion. I need to get less. Yeah. Like basically give me a small shot because alcohol is too high and I’m going to get super drunk. Yeah. And then those grandmas are saying, no.

[00:41:43] Gone Bay and like full glass and drink it all. That’s what the grandmas are doing to you and you’re just like, Oh no, this is, this is not good. How many shots of by Joe? 8% alcohol. You’re feeling pretty ripped. You have it by Joe Berks. Come on. Right about. Now I want to describe by geo first, like, let me, so before we get into the Baidu of birds, let me describe what by geo looks, smells and tastes like.

[00:42:13] Okay, so you can get by. GBG is the number one selling alcoholic drink in the world because it’s the drink of choice. It’s like a national drink of China, you know, purely by mass. Everyone drinks it at 1.6 billion people drink it. Yeah. You can get bottles of Baiji from his cheapest $2 to like thousands of dollars.

[00:42:33] Right. Exactly. The, the cheaper stuff, but it all looks like water vodka when it’s clear. Right. Uh, the cheaper stuff smells like paint thinner, and I think it might even taste like paint thinner too, now that I think about it, like it says. It’s rough. It’s rough. So there’s a pineapple flavored by Joe that’s a little bit more easy to drink.

[00:42:59] It still tastes horrible, but the pineapple one, you know what I’m talking about, right? It’s a pineapple flavored by Joe. Actually. It masks the taste a little bit. Yeah. That one is only around 35 to 40% alcohol, which is a lot more doable than the. Arigato by Joe Wood, which is the North Chinese stuff by Joe.

[00:43:20] The Argo is like, that’s the real stuff that puts it hair on your chest, and it’s literally like. Rocket fuel. Once you save it automatically just makes your throat hurt and you know, you already feel your liver working really hard after just one sip of that stuff. The next day, you just kind of, if you can remember what happened that night, you’ll realize, yeah.

[00:43:47] Yeah. That’s a big help though. Yeah. You’ll realize you don’t want to drink by Joe again for real until the next time they push you into doing it. Normally you’re not going to get pushed into drinking crappy by Joe. You’re going to get pushed into drinking the like. $50 range of by Joe, maybe 30 40 $50 range, so that’s a bit easier.

[00:44:14] It’s a bit easier on the lungs and the stomach and the taste buds for sure. The biter that you’re talking about though, is the one that you get from the supermarket called . This is the bio that kills people’s liver a lot faster than the other by Joe that they say is. Better. But yeah, they’re all pretty bad for you.

[00:44:32] I mean, directly translated means two fish head. Take everyone. It is, right? Yeah. No. So the best bio that you can get is in the Southern province. Made it like a, like a special old factory or whatever it’s, it’s called. Um. Oh, what’s it called? Mmm. Oh, sorry. There’s  and then there’s the, uh, again, no, I know. I know what you’re talking about.

[00:45:04] I just can’t think of what it is right now. It’s, uh, uh, uh, shit. What the fuck is it? Hold on. I’ve drank it so many times. I know. We do. It’s, um, hold on. I’ll look it up. I can remember. I’m looking it up. I’m going to pay it. Uh, the really good brand of by Joe, which everybody drinks. It’s made in great Joe, I think.

[00:45:31] No, no, it’s high. It’s called . I’m out of time. So Mount Tai by Joe is the one that they make you drink at the weddings typically, and there’s a very expensive Mount side by Joe, and then there’s the cheaper one, and normally you’re drinking the middle range wine that’s like $50 or $60 a bottle like Mount height can cost.

[00:45:53] Around $1,000 if you get like a vintage bottle of now, Ty, or even a lot more than that. Um, I don’t know if you recall, but I, I produced a English premier league soccer event, uh, Manchester United versus Liverpool down in Melbourne. Then after that happened, I was working on putting on another event just like that in, um, Kwaito, which is right next to Shinjin.

[00:46:19] Uh, next to Hong Kong. Like that area? No, clay with an H Joe. Yeah. Kwaito is like right next to Shenzhen. It’s kind of a suburb of Shenzhen. Anyways, uh, I went down to visit this guy, this, this investor guy, like four different times, and he, he owns like a bunch of different hotels and a bunch of businesses and shit.

[00:46:42] Cheers. Cheers. Boom. Uh. And every time we went down there, he treated us to lunch in one of his hotels. So we had free Chinese food, but he also kept busting out this type of bio geo. It came in a box, you’d open the box, and I was a, it was a ceramic bottle with a seal that you had to crack. You had to like crack the seal to prove that it’s real shit.

[00:47:11] And it’s not like bathtub bide, you know? But that’s high quality shit though. You know what I’m saying? Like you gotta crack the fucking ceramic seal on the top and then you can open it. Yeah, you gotta you gotta make sure that’s real. Because in China they got little fake alcohol everywhere. Man. Blind.

[00:47:32] It’s like India and China both produce a lot of fake alcohol. Beer can be faked and it, Oh dude, die dude, beer. I can’t even, I’ve heard so much about Yanjing is like the bud light of China basically. Um. But, okay, so Yanjing maybe is like the Bush lighters. It’s like, it’s not that great, but it’s, it’s all over the place.

[00:47:56] It’s cheap. Like you get these big, like one liter bottles basically. And I heard that there’s so much, um, counterfeit Yanjing that nobody even knows. The retailers don’t even know what’s real and what’s not. So like there’ve been times that multiple times where I’d buy two bottles of Yanjing. Right? Take a sip of one and I take a sip of the other one, one after the other, and it seems completely different.

[00:48:22] Yeah, fucking nuts, dude. But like they just don’t produce the beer very well. Like it could be 3.3% to higher. That’s what they say on the bottle. Like, so for Chinese alcohol, they don’t measure the amount of alcohol. I think they just row. The stuff in there into the batch and the main, whatever you get is what you get.

[00:48:45] You know, sometimes you can get a really good Yanjing and Qingdao and then another beer could be so bad and really awful tastes. He cannot even drink even to subsidize because it’s just so nasty. Yeah, but chin chin dies a little bit more consistent though, because the Qingdao beer comes from the city of Qingdao, which was once a German.

[00:49:06] Uh, I don’t know if it was a German port or there, there was some German control there sometimes. So Qingdao down actually plays and acts a lot more like a German city than it does a Chinese city. Yeah. Qingdao is really nice city to visit in China and very touristy, and they do have some tourists are touristy architecture.

[00:49:28] Some of it is fake and some of it actually is real. Like the church, I guess is real. Apparently that is like from the early 19 hundreds it was around doing like the boxer rebellion kind of era. So actually Ching dollars made all throughout China. It’s not just made in Qingdao. They make it all around, so it’s not right.

[00:49:47] So it could be faked and it could also be made for real. It doesn’t matter. Like which beer. It’s better to drink the local beer when you’re in China because you know it’s more likely to be. Really made there cause it’s cheaper if it’s locally produced. They don’t have to import it. Like a lot of fake beers are a Qingdao actually.

[00:50:06] Cause Qingdao is a more desired brand. So if in fact he’s going to make a beer, they’re going to make Qingdao. Oh, you’re actually worse off getting the Chine doubt. If you were in a city. It’s in like, um. No shit and John or a city that’s in inner Mongolia or dong Bay like, Hey, long Chong and these places, you’re a lot better off getting the local beer over the Qingdao beer because chin dock could be made by the factory cause

[00:50:35] Brand that they really like to tap the lies on these, these fake beer makers and the beer could be fine. You can drink fake beer and you’d be fine, but you know, one out of a hundred batches or one out of a thousand batches are going to be the beer that has got a little bit too much formaldehyde that ends up killing some people.

[00:50:55] And you know, there’s been foreigners that have gone to these countryside places in China. That drink the, and they just have the worst hangover after drinking five or $16. It’s even the same as being in a place like Beijing. Like you’d go to the like, so there’s huge clubs in Beijing, right? And they’re all right around the soccer stadium.

[00:51:15] They’re all like right. Literally right around the soccer stadium. And they offer free alcohol, free liquor to, to foreigners. And nine times out of 10 it’s fake shit. And you wake up with the worst hangover ever. Uh, that’s not a good idea to get the alcohol from them. You can get one free booze free for a reason.

[00:51:35] Yeah, you could, you could get one or two drinks, but you will feel it in the morning. But don’t be drinking that one all night. You will feel it for two or three days. So like I would say that, yeah, two drinks from the free place. It could be okay if you’re just drinking the rum, the Bacardi is. Maybe not fake.

[00:51:54] It’s what somebody promoters have said, like the party said, maybe not. We don’t know if it’s fake. If the Procardia is fake, that’s okay. It’s made with the sugar and it’s not the same as whiskey where they gotta like get that concoction made just right. The chemicals or Cardi is just, you know, sugar and it’s rough.

[00:52:17] I mean, rum is just a lot more easy to make. And not mess up then having fake whiskey, and I can understand they want to make their fake whiskey, but no, actually there’s one club I went to that has got a really good blueberry flavored whiskey. That is one that doesn’t give me a hangover and it’s free. So there’s a club called, Mmm.

[00:52:43] Oh wait, what’s it called? Oh, okay. Um, it’s been a while since I’ve been there. Elements goatee, don’t teach. Shimmer. So go to your West gate. And that’s where most of the clubs aren’t as something like elements. It’s circle. Uh, it’s not circle. It’s next to circle though. It’s the newest one. Like, I guess that one.

[00:53:07] You probably have been there before. I went away for two years though, dude. So, I mean, it’s been around for two years. It’s been there for two years. Anyways, sorry that I can’t remember the name, but, uh, no worries. Uh, it’s the same place that live used to be, you know, the, it’s called life. I think they remodeled it and turn it into a new place.

[00:53:29] And so live was the biggest club in Beijing for that short amount of time. You know, it’s just like, who has the biggest club is the best live bar. Live bar was massive, and now that they reopened it again, we branded it. I guess a new owner or something and yeah, they, uh, call it something else, and that is the place where foreigners can actually get a free drink and have a whiskey that’s blueberry flavored whiskey.

[00:53:57] It’s a bottle that’s made, I think in Taiwan or China. It’s a Chinese whiskey or Taiwanese whiskey. It’s really good though. Uh, anyways, it’s a really off topic thing. It’s pretty silly to talk about a blueberry whiskey in one club in Beijing. But that’s okay. Mark it right there. Exactly. But I mean, if you can see, if you can get 1% of the population in China, you’re fucking made.

[00:54:18] Right? Like that’s what people always say, but no. So, so we went off on this little tangent, but I’m sitting here thinking like, the whole, like, the whole thing about that was like, this guy, uh, treated us to, you know, lunch and Baiji or they had a crack with a ceramic, like a little off the top of ceramic and had to crack it with a hammer kind of thing.

[00:54:37] And he would go around from person to person. Like we had a table of like, you know, the big round table, right? With the lazy Susan kind of thing in the middle, like we so often see in China, right? So you can move the food around. There’s probably like 10 people at the table and he’s just going from person to person to person, just like shot anybody.

[00:54:55] Like before we do the shot, he would say a little something nice. Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. You know you’re a vital part of this thing, blah, blah, blah. Shot. Alright, next person. Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. You’re part of this thing, but shot, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Then he makes his rounds and then the next bird, like the person who was right starts making his rounds and then the person after that makes their rounds and then it’s just a whole fucking circle.

[00:55:20] So like, you know, you get. Every single person is just getting fucked, you know? And it’s, and it’s, it’s one of those things that I’ve experienced in China at least. I mean, I’m sure you feel the same way. Maybe not, but like in China, in America, it’s like if you’re the guy that gets too drunk, you’re that guy, right?

[00:55:40] Yeah. Nobody wants to be in China. If you get really fucking drunk, that’s like a badge of honor. Yeah.

[00:55:52] No, but they respect you for it. They respect you for it. They want to keep you around. They can trust you more when you get drunk with them and like hang and not give away cigarettes, like to be the whorehouse and get to go do their things that though her house and everyone’s going to keep their secrets even though.

[00:56:11] Everyone’s got a family at home. It’s, it’s kind of a trustworthy thing. It’s just in general, this is a lot of Asian culture, like Japanese and Chinese and Thai and whatever, Korean and whatever. I mean, I even think of it like this, like growing up, I’ve got two brothers, right? Growing up. If, if me and my brothers did something naughty or bad together, then we had that on each other and stuff.

[00:56:36] One of them would try to tell him the other one. Oh, well, I can do this too, or I can do that. You know, like, fuck up. Don’t say a word because I can do, I can tell you about that. You remember that time? It’s kind of like that, I think, you know exactly. Like, I got one finger pointing at you, but three fingers are funny right back at me and we’re all fine cause we’re all going to be in trouble.

[00:57:04] If you give away any secrets, I can trust them. When they got secrets from them, you got dirt on each other, you know, you can move forward. Exactly. Um, I want to talk a little bit about, um. Some of these. I love Southeast Asia. I want to just talk about that dude. I’ve been looking like the last week I’ve been looking at like cost of living in places cause I’m just like, once this shit all blows over, I’m just going to fucking move to a fucking Island and Southeast Asia.

[00:57:34] But you know, something like looking at different spots or whatever, but like, you know, you’ve been at, you’ve spent significant time in Southeast Asia. Yeah. You’ve made some videos about like me and Mar and Malaysia and other places, Vietnam, I’m sure. Um, I’m just kind of interested in like, you know, where, where have you been?

[00:57:53] And like, tell me your kind of impressions of each of these places because this is, it’s fantasy time since we can’t go anywhere.

[00:58:02] Yeah. I mean, so to break it down, you’ve got Southeast Asia, which is probably one of the most diverse places in the world for having like so much cool, great food that’s original. That’s unique. Um, the epicenter is Thailand. Like Bangkok is the melting pot of Thailand. So yeah, Bangkok is great for the food.

[00:58:24] And then you got Cambodia, which is also a cool place to go, at least quite a few years ago. It was a really awesome place to go. It’s changed a lot. So I can’t say that it still is. Amazing experience that it used to be. Well, yeah, Vietnam is still amazing. It’s probably the second best food in all of Southeast Asia.

[00:58:45] Just like amazing, absolute gourmet French food and Asian food mixed together in a melting pot. So don’t get me started on Southeast Asia. I really love getting you started on Southeast Asia. Let me ask you about Cambodia. I’ve been to Cambodia. Okay. I spent, since you went there five, five, five years ago now, five years ago, I spent eight days in Cambodia.

[00:59:12] I love Cambodia. Five years ago. Well, let me, well, let me tell you, I, um, I spent four days in SIEM reap where Angkor is anchor watt, whatever, all the time. Yeah. Anchor Watson. That’s about as much time as you want to spend in SIEM reap. I started running out of shit to do. Yeah. It’s got some fun like bars and stuff.

[00:59:30] Some pub. Yeah. Bar street. Yeah, sure. Um, I’ve got plenty more to talk about when I put out my story, which I’m working on, um, about that stuff. But like non Penn, the capital city, that was, I spent four days there as well. And that was a completely different experience for me. Man. It’s a little bit dangerous there, but like if you just watch it back, kind of like, Oh, you’re going to be fine.

[00:59:54] Well, like that, the minute I fucking landed, dude, like I was taking a took, took from the airport to my hostel and, uh, I just felt like everybody was looking at me like, they’re either three, they’re hungry or they’re plotting something. Yeah. And sure enough, my phone got jacked and nom pen. I, you know, I’d already been through Southeast Asia for like two months and then a non pan of all places.

[01:00:21] My phone got jacked. Yeah, no, it’s definitely like the South America of Southeast Asia. It’s a little bit wild West over there. I don’t know. Another place that’s got so much stuff going on as far as crime goes. Out of all of. Southeast Asia. I mean, there’s some pockets in the Philippines that could be not so good, honestly.

[01:00:47] And even Vietnam could be bad in some areas. Cities. And Thailand too. And you know, everyone’s got some pockets, but you know, but Kim, Cambodia, Cambodia is a unique though. And here’s why. Like if you understand the history of Cambodia, right? Like the late seventies or the Kemiah Rouge, when POL pot took over and said were declaring this year zero and they committed genocide on their own, people, you know, killing, they were killing everyone that was educated.

[01:01:14] Plus their parents, you know, their grand parents, grandparents, whatever, plus their children and all that shit. Um. So to quote poll pod, it was something like completely killing the tree from branch to root, right? They eliminated an entire multiple generations of educated people, you know, so like I feel for Cambodia, I love scenery.

[01:01:40] I want to go back to Cambodia and hope that it’s getting better and that they have been getting a lot better over the last five, 10 years, from my understanding. Um, but there’s a whole generation from like 79 to like. The late nineties basically that it was a country of just uneducated people. And so when you, I mean, when you have some of that, sometimes the crime can be a little bit higher because people are struggling for food.

[01:02:04] They’re struggling for their way of life. You know, they’re, they’re struggling too. They’re struggling. Everyone’s struggling. The entire country is struggling together. And this communistic a utopia. Facts are the facts right. I was just going to talk about these days, Cambodia is changing and it’s not in a good way.

[01:02:25] So you, it is. Okay. You know, SIEM reap is almost the same as it always was. It’s got more Chinese tourists, which is really good. I like Chinese tourists bring a lot of cash and a lot of things coming into the economy, so it’s really good. And. The people in see me speak amazing English. Their English is almost like low level of like friends, you know, friends or friends, TV show all grew up watching friends.

[01:02:52] So they can all sing you the friends theme song. Everyone is

[01:02:59] It’s like you’re back in second gear. Okay. But it hasn’t been your day, your week, your month, or even

[01:03:11] for you. Yeah, that’s this year for sure. It’s not been our year. It not bad. Our day, our week, our month, or even our year. God damn. He’s a comeback. I’m calling for friends episode. So anyways, Laos and Cambodia and some places in Vietnam that got into tourism, they all grew up watching friends and they. They learned English from watching friends.

[01:03:37] Honestly, it’s the best class. I’ll be honest with you. My best friend in Beijing, he’s a very successful dude. Uh, shout out to Aaron Kaisan. Um, he learned his name. He speaks excellent English back. He learned his English by watching friends. Yeah. He’s embarrassed to admit it, but he’s told me, and dude, his English is phenomenal, and it’s because he watched friends all the time.

[01:04:02] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s boring. Friends is now to us. Like now we’ve got all these other new shows that we’ve also seen it like five, six times, 20 times. You know? It’s like, Oh, it’s old news for us. Right. But it’s. Yeah. They’d show Ross breaking up and all the drama, and you know, seasoned knives, he’s in 10 you know, went on for over 10 years.

[01:04:25] It was such an amazing show. And you know, it taught so many people, English and the tourism industry in Cambodia. All they did was they didn’t go to school. They just watched Fred’s, and that was their life. I mean, imagine that. Yeah. So yeah, those people in Laos that speak really good English and Cambodians, I don’t know anything about LAUSD.

[01:04:46] I don’t know anything about Laos. Yeah, they both. They both love friends the same like any place you go, they’re watching friends. At least five years ago, they were all watching friends. Maybe not now. Maybe they’re watching big bang theory now, but girls

[01:05:07] in those days, like five or six years ago, they really, that was the thing was watching friends and learning English as they were growing up, and. Anyways. Yeah. It’s just a fun time in Southeast Asia. I love Cambodia, but it’s got its problems. I think that, you know, see you Nick Phil, which is the Southern, the Southern area that’s got the beaches.

[01:05:34] That area has been transformed into casinos that are made by the Chinese, and it’s just changed so much. I was there just five years ago and it was amazing. It was such a paradise for any traveler, just why to go to the beach, but also. Hang out at some bars on the beach and you know, go to some islands and you can stay on the Island.

[01:05:54] I mean, I got bit by a spider right here on the Island. And then, uh, three days later it turned into this big massive infection and I had to go back to the mainland and Cambodia. I met this doctor. He was actually from China. Very nice. He’s from Hunan and I was speaking them in Chinese. I said. What’s your love?

[01:06:17] Why will yo Mayo chin  I said to him, I’m a foreigner. I don’t have too much money. I lived in China for many years and I also teach kids English and that’s why it makes very much to price arm, which was like double the size of the time, like literally all red and it was a massive resection, like the guy poked a hole in it.

[01:06:42] Pulled the POS God and like literally it should have been like a $300 $400 thing. Even in Cambodia, maybe, maybe just $200 thing. In the end I told him I got only $30 to spend or whatever, and when I got up to the front desk. It was only $30. Like the guy gave me such an amazing deal because he was just nice and I was nice to him, but I spoke some Chinese and he’s from Hunan, which I love.

[01:07:13] Hunan. It’s a great place. Uh, and. Yeah. Like he, he just got all that infection out of my body and then he gave me some antibiotics. So at the end, yeah, like normally a doctor would be like, well, I can’t do the bargaining. I can’t bargain on this. Like it’s this price. But yeah, it depends. If you’re in America, they’re gonna still charge you.

[01:07:38] They’re going to send you that bill over years and you’re gonna get in trouble if you don’t pay that eventually. But. Luckily this guy was just so nice and he ended up just charging me $30 I’m sure everyone else in that place, which I also was translating for him. So there was a Cambodian guy that spoke only Chinese that worked at the hospital.

[01:08:01] There was a Cambodian lady that only spoke English and come here, here is the language of Cambodia, which you know Amir, and then the Chinese guy. I spoke only Chinese, literally, so I could speak Chinese and speak English very well. So I actually hung out at that hospital for many hours cause they were giving me an IV of antibiotics because I needed that.

[01:08:25] It was really a serious infection and I was hanging out and I was watching them do their translation gives that day the Russian doctor was not in the building, just the Chinese doctor, only one Chinese doctor and then a Kamir guy that speaks Chinese and come here. And then there was a lady that speaks, come here.

[01:08:46] And English. And so the Chinese guy is playing telephone with the come here, guy that speaks Chinese and no English. He just takes premiere in Chinese and he’s an old guy. And the reason why he speaks Chinese is because he’s from that time period where they were learning Chinese very well in the pole pot era.

[01:09:08] It was like 50 or 60 years old. That translation guy. And that’s his job is to translate for the doctor to come here and then come here to English is from that lady. So this is a really complicated telephone game of, of languages. So imagine go from. Chinese to come here, come here to English, and then someone who doesn’t speak English as a first language to translate to another foreigner.

[01:09:35] That’s not even, uh, their main language is not English. All these different translations. And then this guy is Dutch, so he’s, his language is. English and Dutch. So let’s say, so yeah, she is just a big telephone game. So I was able to bypass while I was in there getting my Ivy done. I was able to translate for the Chinese doctor and get it straight to the, the guy that’s going to be, um, you know, getting that operation done.

[01:10:04] You know, I was watching this whole mess go on and it was very hard. Because the girl that spoke to me or to English was not that good at English or just the translation was not making sense. So I was able to come in and actually be the translator for that day. Hmm. I think that’s one of the reasons why they gave me a little bit more of a break on the discount cause I could speak some Chinese.

[01:10:26] So he liked having me around. So Chinese level right now. Curiosity, definitely a lot better than it was five years ago when do that translation type thing. Yeah. Uh, but yeah, it’s, it’s not the best, but it’s not bad. I mean, it’s, it’s always getting better when I’m in China and when I’m out of China. It’s, how about 12, you know, hybrids for means, of course, you know, your Chinese is good.

[01:10:53] I mean, you know, everything I learned, I learned on the streets. Exactly. I learned on the streets. That’s the only way I learned on the street. I got the streets Chinese man. I’m a, I’m a heard as Chinese language speaker. I love that. Anyways, I hope that you liked that, that story. That’s cool. You know, it’s interesting, a translation scenario that literally, well, what’s in chocolate that much?

[01:11:20] So what’s interesting to me is you’ve got this fat ass album from who knows what the fuck, four different people that. Speak one or two languages kind of. And you’re kind of like the linchpin to make it all happen. Like that’s fucking crazy, dude. Like I appreciate that. Yeah. Yeah. It can happen, man. Uh, I think it was a centipede.

[01:11:43] The doctor was saying that it was a centipede possibly. Like you can sleep in a place and you know, you’re laying down and it’s inside the sheets, you know, that spider or centipede or whatever it is. But I think it could have been the centipede acid. It was huge. Yeah. I remember my first night in Malaysia, I went to melodica, uh, because my roommate, my roommate in college, my freshman year of college was from a LACA Malaysia.

[01:12:10] And so I, when I was backpacking, I visited him and, uh, he showed me around a little bit. And the first night I woke up the next morning and my, I was like, I had like this thing on my, I was just like bubbling out, right? And I’m looking at him and go and do it. What the fuck? What am I doing, man? Like. What is this like?

[01:12:31] It’s crazy. And he goes, Oh, it’s like, I know that is like, yeah, I’m going to go to the pharmacy of airbag. And he gave him his fucking drop ship. I had no idea what it was. I’m like, what the fuck? He had given me like, this is what, you know. I hadn’t, I wasn’t an experienced internet, a very experienced international traveler at that point.

[01:12:49] You know, I’ve been to a few countries, but nothing too crazy. And, uh, he’s like, no, just take the drops. And I go, okay, that’s fine to do it. And I had still to this day, I have no idea what it was, but whatever the fucking drops were this shit work, man. It was crazy. But like it made my eyelid like, it was like fucking blew right out like a balloon.

[01:13:10] You know? It’s crazy. What is it from an insect or from something else? I don’t know. I’ll never know. I’ll never know. I wanted to go to Milwaukee so bad. Actually. I really. Uh, I’ve only been to like quite a rapport pinning and, uh, I think that’s all I’ve been to minima Locka and kale, kale school, Malacca school.

[01:13:33] I’d like to check out some more spots in Malaysia, but having to learn how to find comedy school. Uh, no, no, no. But I’ve heard from a lot of people, a lot of people that I’ve met and stuff, they’re like, Oh, you have to go to long. Kawi. It’s like a little Island just at the border of Malaysia and Thailand, right?

[01:13:52] Yeah. It’s like right there. And it’s also kind of a, yeah, it’s kind of like the Hawaii of . A lot of people put it, but after going there, I think I agree with that. It’s like a why of Southeast Asia. Amen. It’s been so great talking to you. Uh, we’ve, we’ve had. We’ve talked about a lot of different shit, you know, Corona travel and all of a sudden stuff.

[01:14:19] Um, hopefully, uh, some of these listeners, Johnson stuff out of this. Um, I think we’re at a pretty good point to stop right now to, to end this, wrap it up. Um, anything you want to plug real quick. I hope that everyone stays safe here during this Corona time. And, uh, do you check out my channel six pot and.

[01:14:41] You know, I talk about lots of healthy things you can have to fight coronavirus plus a lot of travel tips and I mostly travel when it’s not Corona time. It’s a special time right now where I feel like it’s an emergency and I need to educate people as much as I can to be alert and do the right thing for your family and friends.

[01:15:01] And that is not just to stay home, but the things that you can do after we open up our country again, which is promoting to wear a mask and you know, keep your vitamins up high and keep your health up high to make sure that you are keeping your immune system in a good place to combat Cove in 19 if you end up getting it, which could happen to anybody at this point.

[01:15:23] Right. And in case anybody’s looking for an outlet. Get away from this whole thing for a minute. What is your, I mean, you said loss ex-pat, but how do you spell it? Like what’s the, what’s the YouTube channel exactly? A L, O, S T, X, P. A T, so with no E, so  without the E. There’s no either. Uh, but you can also find it if you put the E on accident and just type in last ex-pat, I put many different playlists around in YouTube, so you can find it no matter what you type.

[01:15:58] Uh, but yeah. LOSC XPA T is how you find my channel the main way. I’m going to be opening up a lot of other channels and just trying to focus on other content that is going to be maximizing everyone’s life. Hopefully, right on, man. Well, uh, hope you’re staying safe. Uh, I hope your family continues to stay safe.

[01:16:19] Same. Same with everyone else out there. Appreciate the time we’ve spent together and you know what’s going to happen. Again, Burt digs. Everyone you’ve been listening to half the city with Bryan Shinn barn presented by AB media. Be sure to subscribe to this podcast, share it with your friends, and leave a solid five star review to ensure these stories get spread far and wide for more information, as well as listen to other shows, including relentless, a survivor’s search for passion, purpose.

[01:16:49] An inner peace and beyond relentless. Be sure to check out 8Bmedia.com. Thank you for listening.