The day that never ends

After spending nearly the past 6 months in SE asia…again I find myself trapped in a time capsule sending me back in time. Of course I am referring to the plane that sends me across the international dateline.  And what would this trip be without a bit of adventure and reflection.

Fresh on my mind I thought nothing better than to sum up the adventure of my work experience since I departed Canada in January. Reviewing my tally’s I completed work for:

•        2 tv commercials
•        5 magazines
•        2 billboards
•        more fashion shows than I could imagine have ever doing around 8
•        1 advertising campaign
•        6 ultra luxury events
•        5 lookbooks

There is possibly more but that’s about as far as my memory serves me with this regard. It’s been a relatively productive experience, but as that goes I have also managed to grow more as a person.

Last year around the same time (possibly a week later), I wrote a post called, reason, season and lifetime. (Reason Season Lifetime Post)This was related to an outstanding email I received from a past client. To prevent blatant repition I thought best to just some it up before continuing to my next point. 

People are introduced to your life in many ways, each person serves a purpose in some respect or another. For some the role is small, and others it grows to serve a larger impact in your personal development.  Without placing people into specific boxes you naturally discover where someone sits in that scale of reason, season and lifetime.  Using my past adventures as examples I thought I may enlighten you:

Photobomb Success

The reason: The easiest example for this would be a client on a job. Maybe a photographer or stylist, While sometimes you get along great and others its an oil and water separation you work together for the purpose of completing a job.

A season: I will continue with a model example again. A seasonal influence on your life is frequently a roommate or classmate, maybe someone that you work on a project with. For the month, 2 months or an extended amount of time, you help each other out. However, at the end of that period, lets say a modelling contract, you essentially stop communicating. The relationship provided what it needed during the season, but no longer is something that has extended influence. I find many of the people I meet slide into this category whether it was university, modelling or otherwise.

Lastly, a lifetime. As you travel about your daily life or around the world there are people you connect with on a deeper level. These people, make extended efforts to maintain a line of friendship and you do the same. Sometimes its that gym rat buddy from university, a roommate from travels abroad or even just a happenchance encounter that blossomed into something more than a passing of shoulders. These are my favourite obviously, at the same time they are also rare. 

As I go back and read this I can name specific people who each sat into a particular category I mentioned above. While some influenced me more than others each person is very important in my life and I thank them for it. My travels have extended my friendships far beyond the reaches of Canada’s vast boarders and interestingly enough introduced me to some amazing people on my global doorstep.

Oops, almost forgot about the adventure of the day. The genius I am booked a 7 am flight out of Singapore to come home. Silly and smart at the same time, I realized that by pulling an all nighter with a friend and a few coconuts would help me crush 8 hours of the 20 something of travel time.

In standard fashion I arrived 2 hours early for my international flight. Upon boarding we sat waiting on the plane for an additional 3 hours while one of the doors was not closing properly. Eventually we were all deplaned. The good news is, the plane was safe to fly, the bad news was the door would be inoperable and safety standards stated that rows 18-38 needed to board a different plane. Guess who had lucky seat number 34C.

As luck would have it I missed my connection towards SFO almost instantly, so I felt no pressure to get anywhere ultra quickly. I obviously wanted to get home, but the few empty seats I would rather surrender to someone on business or travelling with children, and that I did.  Alternatively, I was rebooked for a 12:45 flight to Hong Kong, then through Vancouver and finally making it back to cowtown. The downside I wouldn’t be flying on United’s old school fleet. Gosh darn it.

I seriously have to commend all the customer service and everyone from United, Cathay and Air Canada for their efforts. This messed up door created quite the shit storm, and while some passengers reacted poorly, these staff managed to stay calm and get shit done.

Unfortunately with all that commotion, my bag is sitting somewhere. As of this exact moment, I have no clue, and neither do the airlines. But they are seriously working hard on it and I have great appreciation for that. Lost baggage claim is all ready, and despite it originating with United’s issues all the 3 airlines have put in a diligent effort to find it for me.

I am a lucky person to be honest. My flight is taking back home, where I have most my clothes so a few days without that suitcase isn’t going to hurt me (unless I want to play squash) and despite a large delay, I am only arriving home 5 hours later than originally scheduled while following a vastly different route.

I am always listening to music as I write my blogs, one of the few times I listen to music (its usually audiobooks and podcasts). As I pitter patter across the keys I can see fingers rattling off the ivory keys to the tune of Mozart (concerto of two pianos and orchestra in e flat).

Is this real life?

We can all take different approaches to every situation; some can lead to untold stress, a feeling of hopelessness or on the positive side a series of enlightenment. The end of last week raised many stressful feelings, but in the end I refused to let it keep me down. 

Thursday and Friday were precisely days that could go either way. Starting out with 3 castings and by midday there were 5.  3 castings were for higher fashion (2 shows and a magazine) and 2 were commercial.

I am not sure if I have ever enlightened you to the two primary types of models. First there is high fashion, these are the ultra skinny, tall, and possess very unique looks. These models are usually associated with Milan, Paris and Tokyo.  High fashion models work mostly magazines, fashions shows and big name designers like Louis Vuitton and Prada. 

Contrast to high fashion is the type of model I am. Commercial models are more normal looking.  Not quite as tall, much more muscular, and often referred to as being esthetically attractive. Trying to explain this as modestly as I can, but commercial models are referred to as handsome while high fashion has this x factor that leaves you curious. Commercial models work for clients like Samsung and Coca cola.  Typically people will associate themselves with a commercial model and that’s why it’s used in more common advertising. 

Showing up at a casting it becomes immediately obvious when I don’t fit in. At 185 cm and 78 kg, I appear giant like and even obese next to the high fashion 189 cm and 60 kg guys. My barrel chest of 39.5 inches dwarfs the 34 and 36 inch chest of these boys who are barely men.  Unfortunately this is what clients like for high fashion. This could explain why after 6 years of modelling I have yet to book a fashion show from a casting.  I am fine with this though, I am happy with my body, my size and I have no desire to drop 20 kg. 

These castings can take a very long time as 80 models are asked to show up at the same time.  Right now, modelling is my job and I will continue to arrive on time to them as long as necessary. My point of stress arrives when I miss a commercial type casting (catalogue for jeans) by attending a useless casting.  The last casting of the day was quite possibly as far from my apartment as I can get along the train line.  With poor directions and a unorganized client, I arrived less than happy.  Sitting as number 15, and having 14 long gone I waited and waited. After 2 and half hours I decided “fuck this!” It was 50m down the road the client ran to get me. Apparently my booker called and told them to get their ass in gear. No longer caring about booking this particular job, I explained to the clients that they were being very unprofessional and that they have wasted my time and I am now wasting their time as I would never work for them. 

This is a long story as I am counting 2 days. After the first day of frustrating shenanigans, I decided not to let it get to me, laugh at the situation if you will.

I booked a TVC and had a fitting. The clients were great, I met some co-actors and ran around with a smile. Following I attended a casting to play a surfer getting attacked by a shark. With an espresso in hand I was enjoying life.  

Stricken by time I was afraid I missed a castings. I was not the only one. 2 other models and I met up and ventured to the furthest west we could get in Bangkok to meet the clients. Waiting, waiting, the clients stuck around until 5:30 for us.  A 3 hour trip involving bus, then walking, followed by train, more walking, another train and then taxi we made it.  A quick 15 minute turnaround and one more casting to go.

This venture would send me to the farthest north part of Bangkok, via train and then taxi. Well it would be via taxi if it wasn’t Friday at 8 pm and the notorious traffic jams are in full force.  With no taxi’s willing to take us for less than 400 baht (which may not seem like much, but my most expensive taxi to date has been 200 baht and even that was an hour and over 30 km). With the client refusing to meet us another day, I spent half an hour on the phone with my agent trying to negotiate.

With stress budding, happiness was far from my thoughts. My buddy said lets just go home its not worth the trouble. He was right, the negatives were building and I needed to remove myself from the situation.

Arriving for the model dinner I had calmed down. Laughing at how silly the situation this really was. The stress of Friday was all rather insignificant. In reality I am living an adventure everyday. Few get the opportunity to take these shots and many can only dream.  In the end I am really asking, “is this real life?”

A Full Circle

 It’s been almost a year since I first set foot in Thailand.  In my previous experience I was put up in the model apartment, and set up with roommates who quickly became friends.  With new sets of friends, I am constantly meeting people through castings and an amazing Expat community called Internations. 

A city that was once completely foreign and strange has quickly settled to become my home for the next few months. The other day I picked up the keys to my new studio apartment, and look forward to a nights sleep in my new bed.

Big thanks to Jan, my rental agent for driving me around and helping me through the entire process of choosing my place. Here are a few pictures of Chateau Zach:

Modeling is an industry that like all others grows as you gain experience.  Coming to a new country can always present challenges. In my previous experience  I built networks and became a familiar face with clients. This is something that will always aid in booking jobs. At this point, I have worked 2 and have another shoot in the morning. No TVC have been booked yet, but I am optimistic that they are coming.

A whole new world

Scuba diving is a mind-blowing experience. Obviously breathing underwater isn’t natural and for me this was the biggest challenge of everything I did. Learning to breath again, literally.

In all honesty breathing underwater isn’t difficult, but what I mean is learning to chill out, relax, maybe even have a game or two of rock paper scissors. Sitting in 1 M of water I realized, that this was my challenge. After about 40 min underwater practicing safety techniques like how to clear your mask and replace your regulator we discovered I suck at breathing. For me I knew immediately that this was due to anxiety. I would inhale fast and exhale hard. Turns out you can get very far with that kind of breathing. But as things continued, I became more calm and much more efficient at conserving air. By comparison in that 1 m for 40 min I used 120 bar worth of air, my final dive, about the same actually but it was at a depth of 24.5 m.

Hold up how do you mean you became more efficient if you used the same amount of air. To sum it up and keep things basic, you require more air at greater depths. It has to do with water pressure and the air molecules being closer together.

As we continued through the open water course it was great, although I had a slip up and think I accidentally ingested some gluten.  What a bummer that was to miss the final 2 dives with my classmates and newfound friends. Curled over in GI pain I waited on the boat for them to kick butt. Fortunately I was able to finish the following day.

The next couple days coincided with a change in plans. The original plans were to hit Koh Phangan for the Full Moon Party. Due to some negligence on our behalf and unforeseen circumstances, it would have been just me going to the full moon. Instead I opted for my Open Water Advance.

Push it to the limit. Okay well not literally to the limit but pushing the boundaries for sure. I thought why stop at 18m, there is so much more to this deep world.  During the next 5 dives, I would see a WW2 shipwreck, a Jenkins Ray, 29.5m depth, finally get a better control of buoyancy and breathing and also learn to recognize specific fish, coral and invertebrate. 

For me that buoyancy and breathing is my proudest moment. On land I am very calm, slow and steady breathing and have a resting heart rate around 45-50. Underwater, I suck wind and my heart was pounding. As a result my depth could vary by a couple meters at any given time, and I could uncontrollably surface. Not good, not safe either. By the end of this particular dive lesson however, I was able to hover inverted while writing my name on a slate placed on the sand. I also was much better at hovering for my safety stop. 

Much of my life I have lived as a natural at sport. I can pick up sports quickly and play well. Water is the one that has eluded me. My swimming isn’t top notch (I certainly won’t win any races), but I discovered I could stay afloat on my own power for at least 10 min as was required, as well as I swam my first consecutive 200m.  

Take those feats, and roll with them, you never know the new things you will discover. If I had avoided diving because of my less than stellar swimming, I would be walking around with my eyes closed to the entirely awesome beautiful world.