So for long as I remember, Vancouver has been a little bit
of a different place. Little quirky marches to its own
drums. Maybe it's due to its isolation
from other major cities. It's always had its own kind of
unique culture. When I was growing up, it was a
kind of a combination of laid back hippie working class and I
grew up in East Vancouver in the 80s.
When I did, it was a very working class neighborhood, kind
of tough, actually quite tough. In the 90s.
I spent my life in Kitsilano, went to Kitsilano High School in
Grade 10 to graduated in Grade 12 and it was very different
from my childhood in East Vancouver.
Obviously it wasn't as tough. It was very laid back, it was
still kind of a hippie beach kind of neighborhood and in a
lot of ways it kind of helped me detox and rehab myself mentally
and emotionally. But looking back in my life in
East Vancouver, I would never trade it for anything.
It made me who I am today. In that area of East Vancouver.
You really got a held accountable for your behavior in
action. If you thought you were a tough
guy, well, there was always someone tougher than you that
was very willing to challenge you.
If you were mouthy, you definitely got checked.
The way to get respect from people is to be authentic, to
walk the walk, not just talk to talk.
We'd call those kind of people posers, you know, fake tough
guys, fake gangsters, fake skateboarders.
You know, they had all the cool skateboarding gear, but they
didn't know how to skateboard or BMX.
You know, they have the coolest, nicest shiny BMX bike, but they
didn't know how to ride it. Inauthenticy, Being inauthentic
was very looked down upon and that always stuck with me
because in that neighborhood that I grew up in, we were all
from different nationalities, Italian, Eastern European,
Ukrainian, Russian, Yugoslavian, Chinese native, and it didn't
really matter who you were far as there was not really, you
know, the racism was more teasing more to poke someone's
soft spot. What we cared about is being
authentic. Do what you're saying you're
going to do, being reliable for your friends, have each other's
back and look out for each other.
And that's how I've always treated people and that's how I
always want to treat people. But on the other hand, in East
Vancouver, I did see, you know, the community could be quite
cruel to outcasts. And I did see a lot of kids get
viciously bullied. I had some blight, bullying,
minor stuff compared to some other kids.
But I was always a scrappy kid. I was skinny, but even if I
didn't win a fight, I would always really willing to fight.
So that kind of helped me out, even if the kid end up beating
me, I made sure I got a few good shots in and a lot of the fist
fights I had at a young age, you know, we would shake hands after
and they became my best friends. But the kids that couldn't do
that or played the victim or tattletaled or squealed or
ratted as we would say they would, they would bring on more
trouble to themselves. And I'm not excusing bullying
behavior, but some of the kids really brought it on themselves.
They would stir up shit, they would gossip, they would pit
people against each other. And there was quite a ferocious
reckoning when you did that. A lot of my friends that I grew
up with, a lot of them had good families.
The ethnic for kids, the kids that were Chinese, Indian,
meaning India, not native, the Eastern Europeans, the Italians
had very close knit families. I enjoyed their family dynamics.
I enjoyed how they were a tight knit, how they took care of each
other, how they helped each other out.
When one of them was working on a house or painting or needed
something fixed, their whole families would show up and pitch
in and help. I also liked that if someone
messed with a member of their clan, their whole crew would
show up. Like I remember this one kid, he
was Indian, tall and skinny, nice kid.
I liked him. He I actually got along really
well with him and you know some shitty shit bird kids were
messing with him. He went home, told his older
brothers he had a big family, he had a huge family.
His his brothers got on the horn, got on the phone, all the
uncles showed up. And then the shitty kids in the
park thought they had the victory over the skinny Indian
kid. And then the whole clan showed
up. The whole crew, car after car
after car. There is tons and tons of uncles
all piling out of the car. They fucked with the wrong dude.
I love that shit. You know what I mean?
Hey, no one ever messed with that kid again.
But The thing is, is we were all were different, but we're all
were the same because we all were outcasts.
A lot of my Canadian friends, you know, their dads were very
blue collar, very construct, were heavy drinkers, you know,
and my mom would let them over at our house, would feed them,
you know, sometimes they just couldn't go home because dad was
drunk, right? So my mom would take care of
him, you know, dinner time, you know, spend the night if you
need to. You know, my mom was more of a
hippie, but man, she would give some of these dads shit, you
know, when they get a little bit too rough with their kids.
So we're all grew up in this E Fen neighborhood.
We all came from different parts of the world.
Some of us were multi generation Canadian, some of us were fresh
off the boat, Vietnamese, Portuguese, Italian, Eastern
European and we're all in the same boat.
We're outcasts right? Trying to make our start.
The rest of the city looked down on us because we were E fanners.
My mom's side of the family were actually quite wealthy, but she
was cut off for all her hippie bullshit in the 60s and 70s.
So, you know, she was in exile in East Vancouver with the rest
of us outcasts. Because of that, my my mom's
side of the family still sent me to this fancy summer camp with
all these rich kids. And when I would tell them I was
from East Vancouver, my God, you think I was from the ghetto, you
know what I mean? The projects, which wasn't the
case. I lived in a house, had a nice
backyard. My mom had a beautiful garden.
My especially the, my Italian friends had beautiful houses,
swimming pools, big wine Cellars.
They're probably their houses were nicer than these kids that
lived on the West side that looked down upon us.
But there was a stigma is my point, a class divide.
You know, we were working class, we were blue collar.
You know, we weren't as quite as good as the, you know, the blue
ribbon kids, you know, went to the fancy schools and dads had
nice white collar jobs that but we had pride.
We had pride in our group, our multi ethnic Mötley Crüe.
My I'll tell you a funny story. I remember my mom took us to a
movie, right? So there was myself, there's my
brother. There was a guy named Mark Bow
who was really big, but he was like a big, big kid, right,
massive. And he had like a big reddish
blonde Afro. Then he had his best friend who
was Samoan. It was, it was from Tonga.
And he had a big, big fuzzy Afro, but he was big.
They're the same size. Then there was my East Indian
friend, my native, my sorry, my Indian friend from India, a
friend from Fiji, another friend who was half black, who was his
mom was blonde, so he was black with blue eyes and had a blonde
Afro. And then my Chinese friends and
we're all we're dressed to say, wearing our Jean jackets with
our, you know, our patches of our favorite bands on the back.
Iron Maid and ACDC, Black Sabbath, Ozzy movies were cheap
back then. It was like, you know, it was
250 Tuesdays. They still have.
So mom took us all to a movie and this man looked at my mom
all up and down and saw this all these multi ethnic kids that
kind of looked the same, but different races because we're
all dressed the same. We kind of look alike.
And he looked at my mom and gasped and said, where's their
fathers? And my mom snorted at him,
really got mad at him. She goes, they're all at home.
I'm just taking him to a movie. So there was, you know, there
was like this weird, I don't know, attitude that the rest of
the city had towards kids and people from Easton.
So I understand right from a young age to be looked down
upon, to be judged, to be, you know, that sort of thing.
In Grade 10, I ended up going to Kits High School, and I went
from there from Grade 10 to Grade 12, and Kitsilina was a
very different neighborhood. It was very chill, very laid
back. It was still a very hippie
neighborhood, and in a lot of ways it was.
It was almost like detoxing. It was almost a rehab mentally
and emotionally for me when I first started Grade 10.
I still try to keep this tough persona, you know, the Jean
jackets, the Iron Man, still love metal music, but it was
kind of like a defense mechanism.
Cuz again, you know, you're used to always having to put up this
image that you're ready to fight at a drop of a hat at any type
of disrespect. And, and, you know, it's a bit
of a persona, but it's also a survival mechanism when you're
in a very, you know, a hostile environment.
So he's found like, again, it wasn't always hostile, but it
can get hostile very quick. So you got to be ready to step
up, you know, at a, at a moment's notice.
So in kits that was unnecessary. It really wasn't, you know, it
really was. So in grade 10, you know, I, I
carried this tough guy, you know, try to be the tough guy.
And, and, and then I realized in grade 11, I didn't have to do
this anymore. It was almost like a relief.
I can just be myself. Just.
Be myself and and grade 11 I really transformed into a
different kid because, you know, no one bullied me no one
bothered me there right. Everybody was chill, everyone
was hippie, everyone was laid back.
And, you know, we, we had a term then we just call people
alternative. Everyone.
There was a lot of alternative kids, you know, that was a big
scene, you know, like the alternative music and stuff.
And it's kind of, you know, quirky and it's a mixture of of
of, you know, different genres, kind of granola kind of hippie,
kind of very West Coast, right? And it was nice to be in an
environment where I can just chill, just relax, right?
And you know, everyone smoked weed.
No one drank. And it was kind of funny in East
Vancouver, everyone would heavily drink.
No one smoked any weed. And in kits, see how people
drank a little bit. I'm talking when you got to
house parties and things like that.
But you know, everyone smoked weed, maybe did mushrooms and
listen to Pink Floyd and you know, chill, right?
So it was, it was nice for me to be able just to pursue my
interests without any harassment, without any
bullshit. You know, I got into I, I did
well at school. I really applied myself, really
got into athleticism and sports. I was into boxing.
I played rugby. I went to the gym like twice a
day. My workout partner Kevin, we'd
get up at 6:00 AM, go to the gym in the morning, go to school,
I'd work out at lunch sometimes and then work out after school,
right. We, we were just at fanatics.
And like I said, for the first time in my entire childhood, you
know, even though in grade 1112, I felt like I could just be
myself without any. And I didn't like cliques
because after E Vancouver, where we were one big massive clique
and you did have to really conform, if that makes sense.
Because it's like we were all different, but we all were the
same, if that makes sense. Where since I felt free now in
this kitsilino environment, I didn't, you know what I mean?
I did my thing and I was friends with everybody.
I was friends with the skateboarders, I was friends
with the jocks, I was friends with the, you know, the drama
kids, 'cause I love drama, you know, I used to, I was always,
you know, took lots of drama classes.
So I was friends with the actors and the actresses and I was
friends with the goth girls. I'd always smoke weed with them
'cause I like the same kind of music as them.
I was kind of the kid that floated around and I really
stuck to myself. But of course, that just made me
more intriguing and stuff too. So anyways, moving forward past
high school, and I want to talk about a certain stage of my life
where it was a time of my life where I had a very terrible set
of circumstances. And if I didn't have a resilient
type of mindset, this could have been the end of me.
This could have seriously crushed me.
This is the, these are the, the situations where I truly
understand how people get lost and get crushed.
And I truly understand how people become homeless and
become addicted to drugs and cast out by society.
Because it almost happened to me.
And it happened in a way that I, so this was about a four or five
years after high school. You know, I've, I've done
different stuff in my life. I did construction.
I worked in bars and I was really into working out because
I just enjoyed working out because it was my outlet, you
know, venting all my childhood trauma.
And I like the idea of putting some effort into something where
I saw the results. If I work out every day.
If I run every day, If I hit the bag every day.
You can see yourself. Gradually improve and I was
never in competition with it with anyone else.
I was always in competition with myself.
I never did any competitive bodybuilding.
I knew a lot of competitive bodybuilding and I didn't,
honestly, I'll be just straight up, I didn't like the amount of
drugs and steroids and all the stuff they had to take because I
truly, if you know, behind the scenes, if you know, you know,
like I had friends that would take up to 30,000 dollars,
$50,000 worth of steroids a year.
And, and they look big, but I didn't really think they look
that good. They just look big, massive and
bloated. And, and it's like I, I get
people using steroids. I don't have any judgement
against it. But if that's all what you're
about, right, then you're just using, you're just chasing
drugs, right? You know what I mean?
That's just my opinion. You know, do what makes you
happy. But I didn't want to be on
massive amounts of boatloads of steroids, right?
So the, the competitive bodybuilding became less and
less appealing. And because I had kind of a
guest, you know, a handsome face looked like the boy next door,
clean cut with muscles. I got print work, I got modeling
work. And I was grateful for that
because that meant I was able to do something with all the work I
put in the gym while other guys were, you know, going on these
crazy starvation diets half the year and taking mass amounts of
steroids. And, you know, their love them
were kind of lunatics, right? I'll turn in the story some
other time, right? Just didn't didn't seem like a
good lifestyle. I was able to balance my life
out, if that makes sense, Do the things I wanted, not be so
extreme, if that makes sense. I like training.
I like training people. So I started doing personal
training and I built up, you know, pretty good clientele of
people that personal train. I had some housewives.
I had, you know, some guys, some, you know, more business
type of dudes that, you know, got a bit of a beer belly and
they want to get back in the shape.
Because I worked out at neighborhood Gym, which is a gym
that no longer exists. It was right across from the
Cecil. It used to be a strip bar.
And that strip bar, you know, Gee, I went there a few times
and a lot of the strippers worked out there.
And I knew one of the agents and he would send me strippers to
train because, you know, strippers, they, they, they're
paid on how good they look. They would do contest mis nude
this and mis nude that. So the better they look, you
know, the more money they make and the more money they make,
the more the agent makes. So he would send me, I had about
6 strippers that I used to train regularly.
And then I had this one really rich client, a millionaire.
He was from Hong Kong. And at first he was super cool.
His workouts were pathetic. I could never ever get him to do
or commit to a, a decent workout.
But I worked out this guy, he worked out three days a week,
paid me $200 a session. First, I didn't even want to
bother with the guy cuz I, you know, I maybe it was gut
instinct. And he asked me how much it
would be cost to personal train him.
I just said 200 bucks, 200 bucks a session.
And I was like, oh, and he's like OK, no problem.
So 200. So 600 bucks a week and his
workouts were, were pathetic. I tried, you know, try to push
him and no, he'd whine and cry and you know, he was probably
like 5 foot two and maybe about 180 lbs.
His workout consisted of him on the exercise bike for 10 minutes
where I had to stand beside him, hand him a towel, right?
Get him a bottle of water, right?
Change his weights on the machines.
You know what I mean? You know, I tried it, you know,
at first, you know, writing programs and this wasn't
happening. So it was kind of frustrating.
It was really frustrating. But hey, 600 bucks a week, you
know what I mean? For three hours, you know what I
mean? Not bad, right?
And at first he was cool, right? He would, he'd go to trips to
Hong Kong and he'd bring me back designer clothing because of
him. I had a polo shirt and every
single color and I had all those lacrosse crocodile shirts and
every, I think I had about 50 of them, you know, bought me like
nice, like cashmere sweaters and he'd buy me nice shit, right?
Kind of cool. In Hong Kong, he owned
restaurants and you know, he, he was rich.
He was like, you know, multi millionaire.
But again, like I said, you know, I always try to be
friendly with him, try to be cordial and, you know,
sometimes, you know, just to show off for his, his, his other
rich friends. He'd invite me to parties.
And sometimes I quite to be totally honest, I didn't like
that because I just felt like he made me always feel like I was a
servant, if that makes sense. But part of his entourage, and
trust me, wasn't my style at all to be someones entourage,
especially, you know, a middle-aged man who's 5 foot 2
and you know what I mean? Like we weren't friends is my
point, right? He was my client, right?
And sometimes I felt he kind of blurred that line a bit and you
know what I mean? But then then, you know, I'd
rationalize like, hey, but you know what?
You know, 1200 bucks every two weeks, 2400 bucks a month.
My rent was a whopping like $700.00 at the time.
So I thought good client right? You know I was making good money
with my clients right? So finally had the personal
training business. Like, I felt like I could relax
a little. Anyways, make a Long story
short. But to give you some idea what
was like, you know, personal training him.
And then he would send me clients and they never worked
out. They just got really
aggravating. So again, there was another
woman from Hong Kong, nice lady and really liked her.
We went out for lunch. She was a businesswoman, you
know, again, very wealthy and she wanted to get in shape.
So I said, OK, cool, right. We, I, I sat down, we asked her
what her goals were. And I took her to the gym.
And the she's, this is a lady who's probably never even did
APE gym class, right? She was, at the time, she was
probably in her 40s and she wasn't really in bad shape, but,
you know, a little chubby, right?
Not, not nothing terrible. You know, she didn't look that
bad. She was kind of pretty, right?
She didn't, you know, I didn't think she anything was wrong
with her far as her body went or whatever.
But, you know, she wanted to get in better shape.
And so because she's never worked out, the first workout is
just showing her how the machines work.
This is a lat pull down. This is the bench press machine.
This is the PEC deck machine. This is the leg press machine.
These are the cables. You know, you get the idea.
So I took her through the workout and again, I am not
pushing her. I'm just teaching her how to use
the gym. The next day she calls me up and
says she's all upset. She sees no difference.
You know, I'm basically looting. I'm a bad trainer.
Like somehow, you know, putting the responsibility on me for her
to burn calories. You know, I'm the teacher.
I teach you. You have to do, right?
You know what I mean? And look, we're saying one
workout and one thing of a workout.
It was more an instruction. So again, I'm on the phone.
I roll my eyes and I said, OK, can I ask you a question?
What did you have for breakfast? In course, as I guessed, egg,
pork bun, right. And I said, well, first of all,
to lose weight, you got to be in a chloric deficit.
I, I didn't want to, I didn't want to have this headaches,
right? This client, even though we'll
call him Raymond, the Hong Kong guy, you know, he was already a
pain in my ass. I didn't need a bunch of these.
I'm like, listen, you know what you should do?
I'm just saying because I don't want to charge you money and I
don't want you to be unhappy. Why don't you start doing
stretching, start power walking, start running, you know, just
get, just move. Learn how to move.
Learn how to burn calories. When you're back ready for the
gym, my door is always open, right?
So sometimes, you know, again, in the personal training, it's
managing people's expectations, right?
And like I said, you know, most of my clients, you know, again,
it was like I felt like I was more of a therapist.
The housewives, you know, bitch about their husbands.
So God, they teach me. They learned too way too much.
Husbands are not putting out and this or that.
And, and, and I could totally understand why some personal
trainers really crossed the line because, you know, these women,
especially in my case of the the housewives, they're very, you
know, they're, they feel very neglected.
Just leave it at that, right? And then there's now me, a young
guy, you know, buffed and some, at the time, some people thought
I was handsome, giving them one-on-one attention.
And I always didn't want to cross that line, but it was
like, whoa, like, you know what I mean?
And, and there was personal trainers that were complete
savages when it came to that kind of stuff, you know,
teaching them, you know, Kegel Kegel exercises on the 1st gym
session or, or, or the sleazebag male personal trainers.
My favorite is the. First ones free.
Baby. And it's just like, you know,
it's just a guy just completely hitting on her and oh, I'm going
to stretch you out and teach you Kegels, right?
Which is to me very inappropriate.
And I don't want to get in shit with some woman's husband,
right? So, you know, there's that.
I always maintain being professional and managing
expectations. But you're, you're entering is
my point. You're entering into what I call
it like a, a mental mind field because when people, many people
are insecure about their bodies and you know, I am too, right?
We all are, right? We, we all want to look a
certain way. We all want to present a certain
way, right? Our bodies is our image.
And if we don't feel that our bodies align with our image, it
can be quite dysfunctional. And that's how people do crash
dieting and and dangerous stuff. And maybe that's why a lot of
males, especially, you know, do excessive amounts of steroids to
the point where, you know what I mean, they're chasing the drugs
or it's, it's, it's, I've seen it.
I really seen it, right. So we're, we're getting into the
realm of, we're getting in this realm of psychological, you
know, image and trauma and. It's it's a very.
Emotional minefield. Let's leave it at that.
So anyways, moving forward, right?
Moving forward, Yeah, I like personal training, but I also
hated it as my point because it wasn't what I expected to be.
I thought, you know, to boil it all down, that these people
would have. You know, maybe.
Even 20% of the enthusiasm that I had for working out and then I
would just have to guide them and not at times I've been
saying you're you're a psychotherapist.
The strippers psychotherapy bitching about their boyfriends.
I don't only want to play video games or how their agents are
treating them or other girls or other strippers or God or get in
the middle of their drama because they want to say what
test check said and not check said and blah, blah, blah.
And you know what I mean? You, they want you to take their
side for stuff. And yeah, it's tough, right?
You know, it's, it's crazy, you know what I mean?
I like working best with like more like professional athletes
because they're already there. You know, a lot of times they
know what they want and they just need you to push in that
extra 510%. Where in lot of my cases with
the clients, I got to do like 95% of the mental emotional
work, which can be quite exhausting.
It really is. It's very exhausting.
So anyways, back to Hong Kong guy, right?
So first, you know, I tolerated him pretty well.
He'd buy me shed all the time when we went to Hong Kong and,
you know, shirts and polo shirts and things like that, dress
shirts. He was moving to a new, fancier,
bigger condo. He asked me, Hey, can you help
me move? And I think, oh, how how bad is
it to help somebody move, right? I didn't, I didn't know how much
shit he had. So I'm just thinking he's going
to have a normal because I knew he was, you know, he didn't have
any family, didn't have a wife, didn't have kids, at least not
in Canada. And so I'm thinking, how much
shit can this guy have? Well, Oh my God, this guy lived
on his own in a three bedroom large condo that each room was
filled with heavy oak furniture, marble furniture, like stuff
like, you know, just just everything he had weighed a ton,
you know, bookshelves that were made out of marble.
You know, these big massive oak cabinet trees like that had like
marble lining and giant enormous antique mirrors that look like,
I swear to God, they weighed like 300 lbs with antique frames
on him. His, his dining room table was
a, a table of a, a medieval castle that was like probably
about 12 inches thick. And then the thing was so old it
felt like it was petrified. And then of course it had like
this thick layer of like lacquer on it, right?
And it was just like, I swear to God, that thing probably weighed
like 5-6 hundred pounds, right? So everything in his apartment
was super heavy. And then he had boxes and boxes
of heavy crystal figurines and crystal glasses and like, you
know, hundreds of books of like these thick volume coffee table
books of photos of, of stuff like, you know, the guy was
really rich and he collected expensive things that all
weighed hundreds of pounds, you know, statues and Buddha statues
and, you know, pillars to put stuff on like this, all this
fancy stuff that just every bit of it weighed so much.
And of course, like most Vancouver buildings, everything
is narrow. The hallways are narrow.
And you know where he did hire professional movers and he had
like this big when I arrived in the morning, there was like a
huge semi truck with a huge trailer, right?
Because he had so much crap. Like I was in shock.
Like it was, it was not what I expected, not at all.
So I get there, I think I got there about 8:00 in the morning.
There was about four professional movers.
It was like a professional moving company.
And they were pissed. They were just like, Oh my God,
right. They're having a hard time with
this stuff. They're using trolleys.
They have blankets to cover stuff and it was really hard to
get the stuff out. Like it really was like you,
you, you move a table like, and like I'm saying, it was heavy
stuff. So, so, you know, things didn't
really fit on trolleys well. So we try, you know, you know,
all of us, we put it on a blanket, then drag it and then
we'd roll it on. It's like we're all maneuvering.
Like it was like the only way to describe it.
I felt like I was like a slave back in the Stone Age.
And I'm just with these other workers trying to move these big
massive stones like in but in narrow hallways.
Like I said, he had all these tables that had like, you know,
an inch thick of granite on top. Like he just seemed to have a
fetish for anything that weighed a ton.
And I'm like, even I was even thinking like, how did he get
all this shit in here? Like, and so by noon, the
workers from the moving company quit.
They're like, fuck this. They're like, seriously, like
fuck, fuck, fuck this. They're so frustrated.
And what doesn't help, he's like a little nag, like, you know
what I mean? Like, he was smoking cigarettes,
always sipping on coffee and nagging at all of us.
Be careful for the wall. Be careful.
Be careful, right? Which there was times where I
actually thought in my head, like, how satisfying it would be
to, you know, punch him in the face as hard as possible because
I wasn't expecting this. I thought it would just be, you
know, moving is never fun in the best of times, But I thought,
you know, I didn't think it would be this.
So the the movers quit. They're like.
Fuck this. And they and they, they abort,
they, they quit, they quit the company.
They, they're like, you know what I mean?
They they were done. No way they cuz they couldn't do
it. They were having trouble and I
and knew I was helping the best I could.
And it was, it was like just. Back.
Breaking it it honestly, I've done some pretty hate labor
intensive jobs and construction, rebar, things like that.
This this was up there with one of the hardest.
Moves of that. Time in my life, like just the
sheer number of stuff this guy had and how heavy everything was
weighed and trying to maneuver it like massive sectional couch
that you're trying to maneuver down a hallway and then down
another corner into the elevator.
And yeah, it was. Brutal.
So workers quit. He's all pissed off.
He gets on the phone right and the company sends some other
people. These guys were pretty senior in
the company. They had a lot of experience
moving. They were they were cool.
So we worked together while this guy is a smoking cigs nagging at
us and we were all that kind of bonded together like oh, fuck
this guy, right. But we got it done.
We got it done. It was hard.
So I think I, we finished around like 6-7 and you know, I felt
pretty defeated because you know, at the time I was pretty
strong. Like I was really, you know,
again, I was pretty strong in the gym.
I was, I was able to bench like 405 lbs on, on the flat bench,
315 on an incline, was able to do like sets of squats with, you
know, 5 plates, which is about, you know, just under £500.
Like it's like 495. You know, if you maybe if you
had the collars, maybe just under £500.
But I used to do that for reps and, and this, this move just
destroyed me. And I noticed I started, I was
limping like, you know what I mean?
You get that adrenaline. Then as I started cooling down
like it started, I started getting this throbbing pain in
my lower abdominal area, kind of where you, your upper thigh and
your abdominals meet like this pain.
I'm like, oh, I'm going to have to go ice that right.
And into my my shock, you know he pays me 200 bucks, the
training fee. So I am just like tired.
Right, You know what I mean? Like, oh, you mother effer,
right? Gives me two.
Yeah. It gives me $200 bills.
I ice my leg next morning. I can't move my leg.
I I, I'm seriously, I can't put any weight on it.
You know what I mean? I'm like, oh, this is fucked,
right? So I hobble.
I live downtown. I hobbled to Saint Paul's
Hospital. The doctor looks at it, sends me
to an ultrasound appointment in the hospital, right.
Back then, at least I didn't have to wait 20 hours in the
emergency room. I was seen by a doctor pretty
fast. You know, their medical system
was still good back then, and they had me set up and just go
see an ultrasound up. You know, of course, they now
I'm in a wheelchair, right? They wheeled me up.
This doctor, Oh my Lord, he, he, he, he seemed to be a little bit
enjoying this examination, like with the ultrasound, the Jelly,
rubbing the Jelly all over my stomach and a little bit, a
little bit too close to my groin like, and, and being kind of
accepted, like I, I'll be straight up.
I felt molested by this guy. I'm even looking at the nurse.
The nurse is looking at me. We're, we have eye contact the
whole time that she's just like kind of in shock.
What was going on? And and you know, again, I'm in
this like fucking pain, like it was like throbbing, burning
pain, right? So I can't really react, if that
makes sense. If I watch this happen to my
son, I probably would have punched the doctor out, right?
So pretty gross, pretty creepy, right?
But whatever, I didn't complain. I didn't whatever.
I'm just because I'm just so at this point numb.
I'm numb because now I got to cancel all of my clients because
I can't go in the gym. I can't even put weight on this
foot. I can't go to the gym myself.
So that's how I got paid. I didn't get paid.
If you didn't come to the gym with me, I didn't make money,
right? So I'm pissed, this fucking
shitty move, moving all the shitty stuff and now I'm fucked.
And the doctor said the most dreaded words.
He goes, I have to send you a specialist that you have to go
see a surgeon and the surgeon's going to decide if he if he's if
he needs surgery or not. So that's not an appointment
that you get right away right now, especially in Canada, you
got to wait for that. That was going to be a couple
months, right? So in the meantime, he said,
I'll write you painkiller prescriptions.
And I said no weight on it. And now I had to use a walking
stick, you know what I mean? A cane because I can't put
weight on it. I couldn't put any weight on it.
Plus it's in that area. What I like your stabilizer
muscles, right? You know what I mean?
So you move this way, move that way, sharp pain, blinding hot,
you know, like a it felt like the way to describe it, it felt
like someone heated up like a knife and then like with a torch
until that tip of that knife is like red hot and then stuck it
right into my, you know, right in the abdomen.
So pain, right. So I'm at home.
I did the first prescription, but the problem is with
painkillers, they work so well now you don't feel anything.
And I was afraid that, you know, it was in such a vulnerable
area. You know what I mean?
You can't feel if you're re injuring it.
So yeah, all of my clients are now cancelled, right?
Cancelled to further notice, right?
I am beyond pest like just, you know, wasn't expecting to get
like a catastrophic injury. And this guy didn't even give a
fuck. I called and told him what
happened. He's just like, oh, oh, oh, oh,
oh, right. Oh, I got oh, and then he's just
like, oh, I guess you won't be able to train me for a while.
And I'm just like, oh God, if I see this guy, I'm going to kill
him, right? I'm not like I'm beyond pissed
off. Like didn't give a shit
basically. Oh yeah, I forgot too.
Yeah, before I left. Yeah, this is the other thing.
So before I left that night, like, I'm so like, I was already
pissed off at him because of the, I felt like a little Oh
yeah, after moving all that heavy shit, he wanted me to
clean his oven. I was like, Nope, not cleaning
your oven, dude. I gotta go.
Yeah, so he want me to clean his oven too.
So I was the, I was like, yeah, fuck this guy.
And then then no shits given. And then he calls me and says,
oh, oh, I need you to come and paint my apartment because all
the scruff marks, all the scruff Marks and he was trying to
actually blame it on me, right? So in my injured state, he calls
me up and says, oh, can you come and paint my apartment?
I'm like, I can't paint your apartment.
And then he was trying some manipulative shit.
See, back then, you know, I just thought I didn't really
understand narcissism. I didn't really get that that
wasn't a big thing. We just called you an asshole.
You know, he's an asshole, right?
But now I understand narcissism. Like I had experienced it so
much so this guy was a absolute narcissist.
So he's. Trying to manipulate me and
guilt trip me to come. Paint his apartment because it's
my fault and the movers fault for causing all this damage.
And now the people that want to take control of it, they're all
mad because all the scruff Marks and blah, blah, blah, blah.
And I'm like, and then I had I said, OK, I have a friend that I
do painting with because he knew it.
He also knew I did painting too because me and Kevin at this
time we did painting. So I said I'm going to send my
friend Kevin over there and I told Kevin what happened and
Kevin's just passed too right, right.
And I said, Kevin, you know, do what you got to do, Get every
fucking cent out of this guy. This guy's a mother fucker.
So at first he only wanted to pay Kevin $800 to paint 3 rooms
and a pet. You know, we're talking like a
living room, the kitchen, you know, bathrooms.
I think he had two or three bathrooms and three bedrooms,
right? It was a big apartment, you know
big place and like it had two balconies like it was quite big.
So originally wanted to do 800 bucks.
Kevin's like fuck it not doing it go find someone else and it
would have been a lot more than 800 bucks.
So anyways ended up settling for like 1800.
Kevin was cool enough, gave me 300 bucks out of it and and the
whole time Kevin told me that he could try to talk to him and
Kevin would be like listening to heavy metal listening to Slayer
and he would just take off his headphones as if the scowly
face. What what?
So the guy got really intimidated by him, like because
the guy was annoying. Like he would sit there and oh,
how about there? What about there?
Like what about that spot, blah, blah, blah, blah, like just just
like pick, like fucking be big. That's what he was doing to us
when we're moving right? That's just like fucking
hovering, breathing down your neck.
And I remember I remember one of the movers like we took a little
like this is back to the move we.
Move something. We finally got it in the
elevator and got it off the elevator like it was, it was.
Oh I remember he had this leather couch that weighed like
it felt like it weighed like £5000 because it had one of
those iron height of beds in it. It was so.
Goddamn heavy. So me and this dude, we finally
got and and what would be worse when when we were trying to
maneuver it, the the the height of bed would would uncollapse
out. Oh, it was just and the whole
time this guy is this like yap yap yap yap yap yap in her ears.
And then even the mover like this is the the second mover.
He goes oh dude, he looks at me and goes I wanted to grab him by
the head so bad and just smash it in the wall.
Those older movers like that came in the in the second one,
they said he was by far the worst client.
And that was one of the most challenging moves that they've
ever done. And this guy was, you know, he's
been moving, moving for God, like 10-15 years.
So anyways, yeah, so try to manipulate me to compete.
You know, you didn't give a fuck what happened, right?
So I'm just like, yeah, this guy, this motherfucker, right?
So now, you know, I'm injured, can't work.
Money is drying up and I'm in a lot of pain so I go through the
1st bottle of prescriptions and I didn't renew it.
So now I'm just on Advil and you know, stuff you can buy at the
drug store. And I'm walking around in a
cane. I try to walk as best I can.
I try to move around but I'm kind of couch locked, right?
I'm kind of like, you know, I can't really do anything.
That's it was, it was like one of the shittiest injuries I had.
I've had some bad ones, but it was up there because, you know,
you literally can watch TV, right?
That's it. Now money's drying up.
You know, I'm fucked, right? I'm seriously, I'm fucked.
And then because I was like, you know, in my own business, right?
I, I could get EI, no, no EI for me.
And, you know, it was probably, it was a private contractor.
So, you know, I, I, you know, we're now about two months in
and haven't worked for two months.
Rents coming up. You know, it's starting to get
scary, right? In a bad space, in a bad
headspace, you know what I mean? Can't go out, can't do anything
I can't do. I'm, you know, I'm feel like I'm
just homebound watching TV, right?
I'm reading books. I'm trying to keep in a good
headspace. You know, I'm pretty miserable.
So I bite the bullet, I take my cane and I hobble down to the
welfare office to get on welfare.
I get in there, never done this before, go up to the counter and
I remember I have, I have, I have a note that says I can't
work. I have to the the the process of
waiting to see a surgeon show the person behind the counter.
And this woman is the second worst woman I've ever talked to
the site. The worst woman is going to get
is going to come up. And this woman was just a
complete fucking bitch. She just looked at me to start
scowling. Just use like this voice like
you're a piece of shit. This is very just like, like I
was just scum and just this is kind of threw the note back at
me. She goes, yeah, you're going to
have to go to a training session.
I go, what do you mean I have to go for a training session?
She goes, yeah, she goes to get on welfare, you have to go
through a mandatory training session for two days, then you
can apply. And I'm like, OK, but my note
says I can't work. Doesn't.
Matter. Did you hear what I said?
Just being a total bitch and this and getting mad and
pounding her fist. Like it was just so dramatic.
I was like almost looking around like am I on camera or
something? Like this doesn't make any
sense. That walk in.
I'm being played. I'm using proper, you know,
polite speech. I'm not presenting as a threat.
And she's like talking to me like I'm some scumbag that's
been avoiding her and I owe her all this money like that kind of
like this, just like I'm like I'm some St. piece of shit, you
know, I'm you know what I mean? And so I'm kind of really taken
aback by it. I'm just kind of staring awkward
goes and then she's just looking at me like, do you want anything
else to say? Because it's just kind of like,
you know, a little overwhelming, right?
And then she just she makes this sound and then she had some book
in her hand or I guess like some like a binder and she just slams
the fucking binder on the table and stomps off back into some
office. So I'm just like, OK, wow, what
a bitch. So anyways, go to the
appointment, the for the training session and you know,
arrive with all these other miserable people.
We're all miserable, right? We just look, I don't know,
everyone is misery personified, You know, pouring rainy
Vancouver day, right? I, you know, now I'm getting,
you know, as I said, this is getting not fun.
It's ending like, you know, month in and out, like we're in
the two mark past the two-month mark.
You know what I mean? Money is really starting to
fucking be gone. And you know, I'm, I'm worried.
I'm genuinely starting to get stressed out by the situation.
I'm in a lot of pain, right? And I'm, you know, I'm waiting
for the specialist appointment. So again, show them the notes to
explain what happened. This guy was actually nice.
He who ran the train, he was actually pretty nice.
He was respectful. And he says, well, since you
have a valid reason of why you can't work, you only have to
come for this one day. And the one day it just tells
you about how welfare works. And you had to sit around watch
these horrible like info commercial with these two dip
shits that explain the whole welfare system.
Yeah, it was, you know, pretty miserable.
And the guy said, yeah, you don't have to come back the next
day. He told me that don't have to
come back the next day. I can set you up an appointment,
right. He sets me up with the time to
get this caseworker to get on fucking lovely welfare.
And this I asked you, you know, this was like a fucking low
moment. Like I remember, you know,
especially in E van, we didn't look at people on welfare very
high, right. Like, I remember when I was a
teenager, I was working on this construction site and it was
actually near a welfare office. And it was like a welfare
Wednesday. We see all these really nice
cars and Cadillacs and Mercedes. And these people would come out
of the car, mess their hair up and wearing shitty outfits, you
know, coming out with their checks.
So we always felt like people, a lot of people gain the system,
you know what I mean? Like it just, we always look
down upon it. So now here I am, one of those
people now in these lineups and hanging out with the same type
of people. Like I said, everyone in that
office, every one of us, like we were just beyond miserable.
Like right, life has just kicked us all in the nut sack, right?
That's how it felt like. So he said I didn't have to do
the second right. And this appointment is not for
two weeks away. So now I'm now heading into the
three month mark, right? Three months.
I'm like, oh, this socks, right, this socks.
So anyways, two weeks goes by, right?
Go to my appointments first thing in the morning.
Get to I get I walk in the office.
The worst, shittiest bitch I've ever met in my life is now
behind the counter. She's like middle age boomer
kind of Husky and she has this deep baritone voice and she says
my name more. That's what it sounds like.
And I'm like, yes, she goes. I can't.
Talk. To you I'm like, why?
Why can't you talk to me? You didn't do your.
Second session I go, what are you talking about?
I show her the note again. I still have the note.
I tell that guy said. I didn't have to come back
today. And she goes.
You didn't do your second she. Starts repeating herself and I'm
just kind of like now taken aback like waiting 2 fucking
weeks to see this bitch and now she's yelling at me because I
didn't do the second session. So I just feel completely set
up. I'm like what the hell?
And I'm trying to say well why don't you call down there?
I'm not calling. Anyone.
Are you finished? Are you done?
Look, she's screaming at me. Just this like, like just like.
I've never had anyone in any situation.
This again, Remember, this is a taxpayer employee.
Talking to me like I'm garbage right?
And I'm just like I just couldn't handle it.
So from the trauma of fucking losing all my clients, hobbling
around with a cane, you know, being feel like I've got fucked
over by this client. I sat down in the wait room.
I just start fucking bawling, bawled my fucking eyes out and
this other lady finally was kind of nice to me.
Started talking about she seemed really upset at the other woman
and like I was a hysterical like I couldn't, I couldn't, I
couldn't take it anymore. Just like, and I'm thinking in
that moment, I go, that bitch has some notches on her belt.
She likes doing this there. I could totally understand why
people even worse off with me would have to face her and she'd
find some bullshit reason to completely fucking utterly
destroy him. And they're going to go out and
fucking overdose on drugs or commit suicide because you're
already at the lowest moment of your life.
And now you have this fucking monster that gets a taxpayer
check to kind of push them over the edge.
And I even said to her, I said, I go, yeah, I bet you have some
notches. And I don't know what you mean
by that. She was just like just just,
I've never ever experienced anything like this in my life
ever. Right?
Honestly, if this was a dude, I probably would have went to
jail. If it was a guy, I probably
would have beat the fucking shit out of this guy because the
utter disrespect, the dehumanized right, It was beyond
anything I experienced. And like I said, the other lady
was kind of she came out, talked to me and you know, Tris Oh no.
And she and she didn't really quite understand.
She was kind of confused. And I said this guy said because
and I showed him a note. I'm not, you know, I had a valid
reason, right? So then I just realized, you
know what, fuck welfare. I am not doing this shit.
Fuck you. All right, and I walk out of the
office felt I felt lower like then then slime.
I felt like I fucking had to ooze my way.
And while I'm hobbling down the street with this cane, get home,
right, have a hot bath, feel make myself feel better.
And and then I said, you know what, fuck this.
I get a newspaper. I apply for a bunch of
telemarketing jobs. Got easy.
I already had some sales experience.
I'm pissed off, I'm hungry and they hired me right away.
I think, I think it was selling like Vancouver Sun newspaper
options, you know what I mean? I was able to work at night time
because I was now complete night owl.
I just killed it. I just, you know, as I said, I
said, well, I guess I'm going back into sales because I won't
be personal training for a while.
I can't even work out myself. You know, I went in there, I was
able to sell, you know, I was good, I was hungry, I was pissed
off right away, one of the top performers.
So that right away got my started feeling better about
myself, started gaining some self worth.
I'm not just a slimy scum according to this woman at the
welfare office, right? Like I said, that woman had no
business working with people in the public like she was beyond
anything I've ever experienced in my life, like the the, the
ability to talk to someone like that.
She's lucky that she hasn't done it to the wrong person yet,
because like I said. Her gender was the only thing
that protected her. And I'm going to be straight up
with that. I've never, ever had anyone
treat me like I wasn't worth anything, right?
Just Pierce. Scumbag.
I was just thinking, did I look like an old husband or
something? This was your big victory, You
know what I mean? So anyway, it's kind of funny,
but a month into the job and this, because I was doing so
well, Yeah, you know, I got promoted and I'm already in a
month. I'm already like helping
training other people and you know what I mean?
And about a month in the job, I get a call and it's a it's a
caseworker. And she's like, she's wondering
why I never followed up with my appointment.
And I'm just like, I'm calm. I'm like, really?
Are you, are you kidding me? They go, do you, do you
understand what happened in that office?
I go, if I was at any lower and emotional point, I probably
would have committed suicide having been treated like that.
And she's like, oh, just just just just like another just
complete shithead. Oh, well, yeah, we were just
wondering why you never came back like you like, is that a
serious question? Like, are you being serious
about that? I go and I said I'll go.
Why do you do this job? Is it just for the paycheck?
Oh, well, we just some bullshit answer.
I go, you know, I don't need your services.
I will never need your services, Right?
I go. I go.
That woman you work with that spoke to me, she is a horrible
human being. She is a monster.
She's a serial killer in a way, because she destroys people
emotionally. And then she sucks out all the
hope out of them that they feel that the world is so cruel that
the therefore their lives are no longer worth living.
If I was any weaker, I probably would have succumbed to her
monsterness. She should not be doing her job.
OK, well, if we could help you, if anyway, please let us know.
And I was just like, fuck you. I am not usually this hostile.
But when someone's so numb and so indifferent and just hide
behind policies and, you know, they have a nice little
comfortable job, they're checked out.
They lost it. They're they're no longer on
Team Humanity anymore, regardless of their little title
or whatever they call themselves or whatever, whatever rationale
they give themselves. You know, there's a lot of
shitty people like this that you'll come across.
And this is kind of the the meaning of this, this talk.
So I'm now the telemarketing king, right?
And then, you know, money is not good, but it's better than
welfare. Like, you know, I've already had
some experience doing some broker working for brokers and
things like that. And to give you perspective,
what I would make in a two week paycheck is what I would make
sometimes it a single day. But you know what?
It's about getting my pride back.
It's about gaining my confidence.
It's it's about being good at something.
It's it's it's about someone saying you can't.
And I'm saying big middle finger I can.
Right, that's that. Sometimes that's all you have.
Just like back in the East fan days, you everyone looked down
at us. We're from East Fan, right?
But we had our pride because we had each other's.
Backs right, They couldn't take that away from us.
They can look down at us, they could spit at us.
Like like when I, when my mom would send me to this fancy
summer camp and I went to one of my friends houses because he'd
get like, you know, we, I was working at the camp, right?
This is when I was working at the camp as a camp counselor.
And we'd get. Days off and so on the days off
we'd go party Hardy and sometimes we'd go to one of the
my Co workers house, right, And they lived in the fancy part of
West Vancouver and the kid was like, Hey, mom, you know, Mark's
from East fan and she looked at me like I was like the weirdest
curiosity, which I didn't like, but I was just polite.
You know, my mom raised me to be polite, you know what I mean?
And you know, these people weren't like filthy rich.
You know, they were you know, they were comfortable.
You know, they're not saying anything against it, you know,
and in all honestly, my mom's side of the family were probably
10 times richer than them. But because they hear E fan
right away, judgement judgement. Right.
Mark lives in E Van and she's like, oh wow, like you know what
I mean? Like I'm from the Compton, the
ghetto or you know what I mean? Grab her purse, you know, take
it with her when she leaves her room and I'm just.
Like, oh God, wow, wow. Right.
You know, you get what I'm saying?
So finally see the doctor, he decides it's healing pretty
good. He's not going to do surgery.
Just keep what I'm doing, stay off it, rehab it when it feels
stronger. I could.
I'd start doing light workouts. Still had to rely on the cane to
walk. Slowly getting better now, about
the five month mark after the injury.
Back in the gym. I could do light leg presses.
I could do the stationary bike. I could do some moderate
exercise. Right.
Getting a little bit better, getting stronger.
I get a phone call. Raymond.
Oh, how are you? I'm great.
I'm awesome. He's like, are you able to
personal train? I go, maybe I'm just at this
point I'm like, if I'm gonna train this guy, it's double like
fuck, it's fucking $400.00. Take it or leave it.
I don't give a fuck, right? He goes, well, why don't you?
We'll go for dinner. We could talk about it.
It'll be good to see you and blah, blah, blah.
He's all brown, nosy, right? And I'm just being kind of like,
indifferent to him, like, whatever.
Yeah, but I didn't give him the price yet.
But I'm just gonna say, yeah, 400 fucking bucks.
Take it or leave it. I don't care.
And so we meet somewhere, I think it was a nice restaurant
on Robson St. It was called Ziffirelli's.
It's still there. It's a good Italian place.
I said I'm pissed at this guy. This guy cost me almost like
like, jeez, we're we're in the five mark, the five month mark,
no clients real time. So conservatively, right.
You know, we're talking like with my other clients and stuff
because of this guy's bullshit. And then this move, not only the
humiliation that I had to go through, but the loss of
clients. You know, we're God easy 25
thirty, $40,000, right? And lost revenue because of
this, this shit bird. So I'm mad, right?
I'm but I'm hiding. I'm not overtly hot head mode
yet. And I go for dinner.
I order super expensive stuff. He's there with these two
friends from Hong Kong and then he's with these other two people
and you know, they're all rich and Rolex watches and designer
clothes and talking about going to this place and that place and
traveling there and Singapore and 1st class this and 1st class
that. And it's just like kind of
nauseating because especially what I've been through, you
know, I'm just like, whatever. So I'm just like I I get the
Scotch menu. I'm ordering the most expensive
Scotch, the leg oven 16. I'm just ordering double S and
then as fast as a as a waiter can bring them to the table.
I'm just like, yo, keep them going.
And he's kind of looking at me side eyes and I'm just almost
with my facial expression like. What?
Like, yeah, you know what I mean?
Like, got a problem, right? You'll Yeah.
You've cost me a lot of money with your bullshit and not even
cared, like didn't even fucking care and then wanted me to paint
after. Right?
So you know, we have the dinner. We didn't talk, bring up
personal training stuff. He was too busy yapping with his
friends and things like that. I didn't even really understand
why you've invited me to this dinner.
And you know, I feel totally out of place.
They're all talking amongst themselves.
I'm just sitting there, just sit basically at the table just
drinking, you know, just drinking at the as as much as I
could get down my gullet. And I already, I had a date
lined up across the street at Milestones.
This is because it was on Robson St. and everyone's finished
eating gets up and he has this big package beside them.
And then he pulls out this like packaging string.
I didn't even know where the hell he got the packaging string
from. And he starts tying it around
the package and he starts making this kind of makeshift handle,
right? And it's like a big heavy
package. We're talking like the thing was
at least like this, like a three foot long box.
Like it was like a big giant box.
And it's wrapped up like kind of in brown packaging paper.
And like I said, he's tying the string around it like a like a
twine and like wrapping it around like, you know, packing
twine, wrapping it around it a whole bunch of time.
And then he's making this handle and then he hands me it and I'm
just like, Oh, is this for me? Like thinking, Oh, he got me
something. Maybe he feels bad about the,
the, the injury and stuff. And he's like this totally point
blank goes, no, carry it to my car.
And I just stop for a minute and I look at the other people and
they kind of look at me, you know, they're all looking blank
in the face. I'm like, no, I'm not carrying
it. Like I was just totally calm,
super passive aggressive. I'm like, no, I'm, I'm not
carrying that. You're going to have to carry it
yourself. Sorry, not carrying it.
And then he tries again. Like he actually tried again,
like he actually had the balls. No, no, no.
Please, please, he said. Please, please, please, please
carry. I'm like enough.
And I just looked at him. I go, I'm not carrying your
fucking package. It's not going to happen.
Right, especially after all that bullshit and I just started
walking, walked out, never talked to him ever again.
Like you son of a bitch, like you know what I mean.
You invited me to carry some heavy.
You went shopping. This is how I, you know, I what
I deducted. He went shopping with his hit
with his dipshit rich friends had probably bought too much
because he was a bit of like a pack rat, you know, compulsive
spender and then called me to, to come have dinner to carry it
because he didn't want to carry. It was too heavy.
So, so I, I, I walked out and then I'm across the street and I
see him harshly struggling with this fucking package, right.
I was like, you know what I mean?
Like, so that was the end of fucking Raymond.
He would call me once in a while and I would just be like super
rude to him. This one word answers, he'd get
a what? What?
Right. And then you'd be like, oh, you
want a personal train? And I think I said, oh, yeah,
it's 600 bucks. Oh, can you go lower?
No, no, No 7. And and then then he kind of got
the idea right, because if you said anything, it was 08/9/10.
That could just basically, yeah, no, you're, you're, you're
you're an asshole. You're a narcissistic asshole.
Even at the time, I didn't really understand narcissistic
abuse and shit like that. But this guy was a bona fide
narcissistic asshole. But my point of sharing the
story is, is that it was one of the the darkest chapters in my
life. I truly feel that if I was a
different person, I could have really like this could have
really been the end to me. I could have got, I could have
kept staying on the, the prescription drugs.
I only did one prescription, but let's say I kept renewing them.
Then then at the end of the 5-6 months of this injury recovery,
you know what I mean? I have now a dependency on
painkillers and you build up a tolerance and now I got to get
off. Plus, they weaken your body,
right? You know, this is what it is.
You're on these pain pills that just, they suck the life out of
you, right? So there's that.
And then it's the emotional trauma, the humiliation of the
welfare office. The, the monster, that woman, it
was a bona fide monster. I've never had anyone I've ever
dealt with since then that was as brutal to me.
You know what I mean? Just look at me and make some
kind of snap judgement. What do you think?
You're think you're some hotshot?
What are you doing here? Like, you know, that kind of
attitude, like just that, just that sneer, like I'll never
forget that sneer on her face, that look right, that that
judgement. And then something funny
happened, right, which I just course right, just to, you know,
adds another kind of like bow on the story.
So now I'm, you know, I'm good at sales.
I'm, I'm working on it. I, I've, I'm dedicated to being
good at it again. I start applying for better jobs
and then I, you know, I interview, I get a, you know,
pretty good job, good base salary, you know, real step up,
right? Solid base salary, good package,
medical benefits, you know, nice office downtown.
And I remember, like as I said, this was like a beginning of a
new chapter for me now. No more humiliation, no more
telemarketing, no more cane. I'm not using the cane anymore.
I'm back in the gym and I get that first paycheck and nice.
So my coworkers, I'm like, Hey, let's go and have some drinks.
It's been a rough 6 fucking months.
It's been a terrible six months. If you guys even knew that half
of it right, You know, I didn't really tell anyone what
happened, but trust me, I'm going to go.
I want I'm going to out for a few drinks tonight after the you
know, the the mountain of bullshit I just had to climb.
So we go to this bar. It was in gas town.
We're having a good time and there's a group of girls there
and we're interacting with them. There's a girl I like, she's
kind of cute, right? I'm buying her drinks.
We're chatting and this and that.
And now I know better. But yeah, she was nice to me
because I'm buying her, you know, non-stop drinks.
And then I shoot my shot, right? I shoot the shot.
I'm like, hey, can I have your number?
We seem to be getting along. You have a good sense of humor.
We're laughing lots, all that kind of stuff.
She goes, wow, I don't know, what do you do?
And I go, oh, I just got, I just got to start a new job.
I I'm doing business development for this high tech startup
company and blah, blah, blah, right.
Oh, she says, I don't know, I don't like capitalism.
Yeah, I'm a guy. I couldn't, I, I don't think I
could date Someone Like You, someone that's seems to be
really into capitalism. And I just kind of like I said,
like, course you don't, right? And then I'm just like, OK, you
know, it wasn't bad, you know, whatever, you know, just, you
know, no big deal. And I said.
Well, but what do you do? She goes.
Oh, I work for an NGO. We do sustainable, blah, blah,
blah. I don't even remember something
sustainable for helping, you know, the downtrodden.
But now she was so much superior than me.
She's just now looking down at me because I'm an evil
capitalist. I'm thinking, well, weren't you
a capitalist when you're taking the $100 worth of free alcohol I
gave you this evening, Right? Again, no judgement.
I'm just kind of now amused, right?
Just everything I've been through, I'm just almost
chuckling, right? And then, you know, a bunch of
dudes show up with, with the girls, right?
And, and you know, they look very alternative, right?
You know, just the way they're dressed and stuff, they all
look, you know, they're, you know, I'm wearing dress pants
and a dress shirt and so I'm the capitalist pig enemy, right?
And they're all wearing, you know, they're alternative,
they're NOLA gear and the guy's talking to me.
But same thing again, you know, judgmental, looking down at me.
Oh yeah, you're the capitalism and telling me about all the
benefits of the socialist system.
And you know, I'm just accent. I'm just fucking amused at this
point. I'm like, hey, right.
But, but it's like this scolding lecture.
I'm better than you because my belief system is better and all.
At this point in my life, all I care about is I have dignity
again, right? I'm not fucking telemarketing.
I'm able to pay my bills, I have extra money, I'm able to feed
myself. I recovered from a strata of a
fucking one of the worst injuries up to this time, right?
I'm recovering from this injury, you know, I can walk without a
cane according to them. I'm a piece of shit capitalist,
you know what I mean? I'm just happy that that I'm
paying my bills again. I'm on my own 2 feet.
And I also recovered from a severe emotional injury from
that woman at the at the welfare office, right?
So, you know, I'm resilient. I'm just like, wow, that's cool.
That's cool, right? And then I'm thinking it's like,
you know what? I miss a time where, you know,
again, when I was working for, you know, stockbrokers, we'd go
to these crazy parties. It'd be all they'd be goth
chicks, it'd be punk rockers. We'd go to Adam and some after
hours with, with, you know, crazy drag Queens that we'd
have, you know, having, you know, it was fun like no one.
There was no violence. There was no judgement.
They were just like, you are cool, I'm cool.
You have your unique thing. I missed this time in Vancouver
where people were allowed just to be them.
And that's what I liked about kits from going from E Van.
It was that one period of my life where I could just be me,
right? You can be you, right?
I, I get it. If someone's, if someone's mean
and cruel and horrible to you, then you have the right to be
judge mental. But this became this weird
culture of, well, I believe in this system and my system is
better than your system. And then I started noticing this
in Vancouver, where this attitude became more and more
and more and more and more, right.
And this is what I'm going to be getting into the next podcast,
the next the next podcast. What I'm going to talk about is
the behind the scenes. Of running a large platform, I
interact with a lot of people like for example if I looked at
my analytics for this week. Alone I've reached close to
about 300,000 accounts. I talked to people all over the
world, the United States, Australia.
I talked to doctors, I talked to business people, I talked to
housewives, I talked to blue collar dudes.
And I'll talk to anyone if you're cool.
I don't care, right? I don't care if you have woke
ideologies, as long as you let me have my ideologies, I don't
care. You know, of course, if you, if
you, if you advocate for putting people in ovens, yeah, we're
going to have some problems. But there's been like this.
My point is like this superiority complex that I faced
a lot of in my life, hence the story, right?
I let people be you, be you, right?
Like I was thinking about it like when I had, you know, in
another podcast, if I, you mentioned I went through rehab.
I got in touch with more of my spiritual aspects.
I'm not going to get into it right.
And I believe that people's spiritualism, their religion is
important to them. Yours might be different than
mine, but yours is different to you because it's for you.
That makes sense. Some people, a religious
experience is walking through the forest, doing a power walk,
baby taking mushrooms, being out in the forest, being of nature.
That could be a very spiritual moment, right?
And, and, and that could bring meaning to your life, the
connection to nature. Some people is going to a
Catholic Church, right? I like going to a Catholic
Church. I go to the Holy Rosary downtown
Vancouver when I'm stressed out. I light candles for all my dead
relatives and my dead loved ones because I, I, I feel a
connection. You know, you walk in there.
It's a beautiful old church. I go to the section where they
have the candles. I put money in there.
I light candles for them. I say a prayer for them, I say a
prayer for their souls. That's my moment where I
reconnect to those memories of those people and I have that
thought to them. I would never force and say that
you have to do that or else. But that's my thing, right?
You see what I mean? And then some of my belief
systems, I'm not even kidding, back in the Middle Ages, I'd be
burnt at the stake for being a heretic.
So in some ways I'm a heretic, right?
I have my belief systems. I don't push them on anyone
else. I, I, I don't want anyone ever
to agree with me. But I, I do hope that you will
understand me. So This is why I shared this
because I'm going to get in more into it because running the
podcast and like I said, I've been a construction worker, I've
worked across Canada, at bars across Canada and promotion
companies. I've worked in the corporate
world. I've done high volume
transactional selling where I had to make hundreds of calls
each and every day connecting with people, having to convince
people to buy stuff. You have to connect with people
to do that. To be good at that, you have to
connect to them. And and one of my specialties
when I was in my sales world is a thing called solution selling
is and what the solution selling is.
It's not forcing an idea down someone's throat.
It's finding a solution for them that helps them.
If I don't have a solution, I walk away.
If I can't help you, hey, maybe when when you need this, you
know who I am, you can reach out to me.
But if I have a solution for you and you agree that you need this
solution, we together are going to find a way to solve this
problem. And in that, and by doing that,
in that transaction, I make a Commission by helping you solve
a problem. So that is my mindset, right?
I come from a place where, like I said, I used to go to parties
and there's every walk of life in there.
Everyone got along, everyone was cool.
Right. I miss those days.
I miss those crazy after hours. Used to go to the world at 5:00
in the morning. You know, half would be drag
Queens. I'd give high fives and fist
bumps because they were cool, they were fun, right?
They made my life fucking magical, right?
You know what I mean? But that movement and
everything, you know what I mean?
Everything got twisted politically, like people.
For who they are, long as they're not harming people, as
long as they're not monsters. I don't like monsters.
That woman at the welfare office was a fucking monster.
I know she's hurt people and she enjoys hurting people, right?
I hope karma has gotten to her right?
I hope she'll get what she deserves because.
She has a massive karma debt, not just to me but that's her
practice. Get the behind behind her
government job and all that kind of stuff and hurt people.
So one of the things I'm going to be really getting into the
next podcast is the thing what I call gatekeepers.
I have been researching Major Crimes in Western Canada,
British Columbia, ranging from the 1980s all the way to present
day. In every major case, when I go
out and meet people, talk to people, most people, you know,
their families, the people infected by it, I always run
across these people that are self appointed gatekeepers and
I've had them ruin my podcasts. I had them drain the life out of
me. These people actually can be
quite despicable because just like that woman at the bar who
would take my alcohol, right? Right.
But when I asked for her number, oh, I was a piece of shit
capitalist and she was the cool kid because she works for the
NGO, right? Capitalism, evil socialism is
where it's at, right? Superiority.
This is what these gatekeepers are like.
They are giving to, to provide for the case.
And sometimes they do good work, sometimes they do good services,
but somehow they became self appointed.
The narrative of these cases that someone had a tragedy of,
and I really am starting to. Resent them I'm not calling them
out by name, but I want you to be aware kind of behind of a
bigger picture, right there are multiple layers to a lot of
these cases and to a lot of these stories and.
Many of these cases, you know, there's like the JFK case, oh,
Oswald did it all by himself. Anyone that looks at it, they
say it's impossible, right? We're not going to talk about
JFK right now. But that's just a prime example.
They are gatekeepers. And then if you disagree with
it, guess what? You get your name dragged
through the mud, that you're a lunatic, conspiracy theorist,
troublemaker, smear, untouchable, and gatekeeping's a
massive problem. It's an absolutely massive
problem. It's a massive toxic problem
that causes more harm than good because the truth never comes
out. Canada, for whatever reason, and
I call it the Maple syrup curtain, the Iron Curtain.
Iron Curtain. Secrecy.
Can't share news stories, can't share information that are
important. Most news stories have some
importance because they affect people, right?
This crazy blockade that most people cases are shrouded in
secrecy. Stonewall media does shit jobs
of covering these cases. Lukewarm reports, right?
A bunch of gatekeeping experts on that.
Just blah, blah, blah talking points, politicians that are
stone deaf, that don't listen to people, don't try to solve
problems. We got to start listening to
people. We got to start caring about
each other just like we were when I was talking about in East
Vancouver. Weren't perfect, we are a bit
rough, but we cared about each other.
We had each other's back and I missed that.
I'll be back for the next podcast.
We'll talk to you soon and then I'll get back to my Picton
research because quite frankly, I'm just saying the case is
exhausting, right? So it's exhausting.
The research is exhausting. The impact is exhausting.
Talking to victims families is, is, is emotionally
heartbreaking, heart wrenching. The other day I spent an hour on
the phone with Mike, the father of Chelsea Portman.
I'll get into that case someday. Horrible, monstrous case.
Get along really well with him. I love talking to him, right.
I'm glad he's doing better, but the gatekeeping on that has been
horrendous. Absolutely horrendous.
His daughter goes missing and found in some fancy mansion
that's under construction in the Shaughnessy, the fancy rich area
of town with their head missing and reports nothing suspicious.
And then what? Does the shithead media do this
parrot like a bunch of assholes? Yeah, please say nothing
suspicious. She isn't head.
What happened to journalists? What happened to sermon critical
thinking? There is none.
There's there's cocktail parties.
There's there's shindigs. There's hopefully.
Oh, advancements by the government like that one
journalist in Canada. He got a $9 million condo in New
York. Guess he played pretty good ball
for them, right? Little reward, right?
That's where we're at. So anyways, thanks a lot.
Thanks for listening.