Return to New York And New Jersey....Pants!?
The year is 20.X.
I had had business to take care of in the New York area, and when I heard my buddy Adam was going, I asked to tag along. He said he was going to drive up there for a four day weekend over labor day. He was going to visit a friend of our's named Ross. Who was in town for a bit from Australlia.
Perfect.
Adam knew Ross from doing theater work, I knew he trained under an okinawa style Goju Karate teacher I knew.
First thing, I needed to take Bradley's Fuji Stick and give it to him in New Jersey. Bradley also wanted to join the Kyokushin Karate Honbu Dojo in New York, so I needed to check that out for him; I'd heard they had moved buildings and made some changes. Next up, visit George, who lives in New Jersey and had recently returned from a trip he and his girlfriend Aleks had taken to Ireland, and finally, visit Ross in New York.
It seemed everything was going according to plan. Adam would drive to New York, and becouse I was hitching a ride, I agreed to drive halfway. Simple.
Plans change though...
Someone else decided they would go as well.
The more the merrier, and more importantly, the less driving I would have to do.
I had been up for over 30 hours the day we where supposed to leave. They showed up at 10:30pm, drunk and high, to pick me up for the trip.
Looks like Nash was driving..
Aside from being tired, the drive wasn't too bad. I drove untill 5am, and then Adam drove the rest. We arrived in Hoboken New Jersey around noon and had lunch. In between the start of the trip and right then, I had recieved bad news... Bradley had been called on a family trip to Maine! After lunch I split off from the group and met up with George. I might not have been able to get together with Bradley, but at least I could do the things I was planning to do for him. I left his Fuji stick at George's house, safe and in the same state, though about an hour away, but at least it was almost back to him. After some quality time together, George and I took off for the New York Kyokushin Karate Honbu dojo.
After some searching we found the place. They had, in fact, moved buildings. I walked in to find two japanese people wearing karate gi, sitting behind the main desks doing work. They looked up and asked with a heavy accent if I could be helped.
Is this the Kyokushin Karate U.S.A. Honbu dojo?
"Yes it is."
What faction are you?
"What faction are YOU?"
Maybe I've never trained before.
"You haven't trained before?"
Maybe.
"Maybe you tell the truth? Wich one are you?"
Matsui - Ha.
"Us too! Where do you train?"
Shinjuku.
"...."
....
"... I know you... Josh?
Nash.
"Yes! Zenjuro's friend! Been about a year hasn't it? How long are you in town?"
About a week.
"Well, shouldn't you be training here then?"
Well, I...
"Wait! You don't have any money do you? Yeah, I remember you are always very broke. Well you know you can't trainhere for free..."
Yeah, so I figured I'd just watch training, if that's ok. I've also got a buddy who is interested in joining.
"By all means, please kengaku."
It may be arrogent of me to say, but that day the students did not look very good. Very out of shape, and these where top kyu! However, the instructor of course looked great. 5 minutes of 5 point kicks (gohongeri) didn't seem to phase him.
We talked after training was done.
"you know the open weight American championships are in two weeks don't you?"
!?! I didn't know.
"Your friend Kamada is coming to fight."
Shohei!?
"Yes. You should come and cheer him on."
I would love to.
"You should be fighting in that you know."
....
When the conversation had finished George and I headed out into the night. He took me out to get giant burritos from some hidden "underground" place, and we went to bed around 1. He and aleks where going to a wedding in the morning.
The morning came and Aleks dropped me off at my buddies hotel. Adam had split off to go party with Ross, so it was just he and I.
We decided to go on a three hour boat tour of manhattan. While in line to board the ship, two things happend.
1.:
A paper recycling plant, right next to us, caught fire. Black smoke and helicopters filled the sky, and sirens rang loudly.
2.:
Do you ever go someplace and think you see someone, but you know there is no chance that it could actually be them? While in Japan a couple years back, I met a guy named Burt. He lives in Seattle, but decided to come to Japan for a few months. I hadn't seen him in years, but I thought I saw him that day walking by. The guy was going by really quick, but looked just like him. I decided to go for broke and just yell to him anyway. Might as well right?
Burt!
(the guy turns around)
"Nash!? What are you doing here? I thought you would be adventuring somewhere!"
It was him! We talked for a bit, and it turns out, he was just in New York with his family becouse he had never been, and it seemed like it would be interesting. I told him I was out somewhere adventuring. New York. He still lives in Seattle. What are the odds that I would run into him then and there?
After our chance encounter, I got on the ship and took the tour. It was great.
That night, I met up with Adam and Ross, and Ross's very Australian friend, who's name is Joe (I think). We all caught up, and I got to know Joe.
“Wait... are you THE Nash!?” Probably... “I heard you walked like 800 miles as a monk on a pilgrimage and all you had with you was a samurai sword!” …. close enough. I feel like that story is amazing enough that it doesn't need embellishment, I had no sword on that journey...
Joe is in the post production television/movie business apparently. He suggested I get a T.V. show, so that he could come along on my adventures. I told him he was more than welcome.
"You're the type of person I got into this stuff for. I wanted to go see the world and do interesting things! Now all I do is sit and work at a computer. You've got to get a show!"
Sounds good to me. Anyone know someone to pitch a show to, or a show needing a host?....
At around 6am we headed back to Queens, where I had a bit of a run-in with a subway turnstyle... after an amazing counter-attack by the turnstyle, I came out on top, but it was a much more worthy adversary than I had originally anticipated. By 8am I was up doing my morning exercises and heading back to Manhattan to take the path to meet George again.
When I arrived I met George and Aleks in Hoboken, on the board walk. George had the excited gleam in his eye of a little kid on christmas, and I was about to find out why....
"Guess what I just found on the way over here!"
....
"Just come with me! Me and Aleks where JUST talking about this!"
He led me back along the boardwalk and to a bush. He pointed under the bush, where I finally saw it.
A coconut.
"What is it doing there!?"
What Is it doing here? There's no trees around... this is a really high quality coconut... coconuts don't even grow here!
"I was just telling Aleks the other day how I've never had coconut, but I really wanted to try one... but I wanted my first to be one you had chopped open. Now I can!"
hmm...looks pretty strong....
"You can do it. You've gotta do it in one shot though, or it doesn't count."
Of course, breaking the coconut is not difficult, it's using the correct amount of power. Hit it too hard and the coconut explodes - you've wasted it. Hit it too soft and it doesn't break - you'll look like a jackass and maybe hurt yourself.
"One shot."
I placed the coconut on the ground and started focusing. I didn't realize that while I was doing this, some passers by had stopped to see if I could do it. The moment of focus...
THWAK!
The coconut split perfectly. I stood up and turned around to people saying "yay!". George was cheif among them. I drank the coconut water in victory, and offered George some. When the water was gone, we filled the cocount with gatorade and drank out of it unitll it was gone. When we ran out of liquid we sat and ate all the meat.
How is it? I asked.
"Good." I'm really glad we found this."
Me too.
When we where done pillaging what was surely some un-lucky homeless person's coconut, we went to the park and played frisbee for hours. We did Handstands and hit passers by with our flying disc (unintentionaly) for the majority of the day before parting to go meet back up with Adam, Ross, and Joe.
We met at a bar. Ross asked how I was still awake on no sleep from the day before. Adam answered "That's Nash. Not only has he not really slept, he got up and worked out then played sports outside in the heat all day!" Ross and Joe seemed surprised, but they got over it by getting drunk and taking Adam and Myself on a midnight tour of Manhattan... while still drinking. And riding skateboards. Those two have more ability skateboarding while drunk then most people have at all. It was an impressive sight to see. We eventually stumbled on a wreched horribly burned car in the middle of the road. Photo - opp. Next I decided I would fulfill my own personal mission: get an egg and cheese bagel from a deli. The ones in the New York/ New Jersey area are the best. Best I've had anyway.
At some odd hour in the morning Ross and Joe decided they would call it a night becouse they had to work that day....
I went and got some sleep and then met up with George again. We went to Chinatown where I got my favorite food: Red bean paste!
Perfect. We also passed a table in the middle of the night with bananas just sitting on it in the middle of the side walk...
On the way back, george echoed Joe's sentiment from the night before. He talked about how he wanted me to have some kind of a show or something so he could come and take photos. Afterall, he is a photographer by trade, and taking adventure and nature photos as an occupation seems to be his dream. I told him if I was ever given the opportunity, he and Joe would be on crew for sure. Now, if only major networks would quit stealing my show ideas....
(I'm looking at you, MTV's bucket list show....)
Now that I had occomplished everything I set out to, it was time to leave. My to do list had looked somthing like this:
Give Bradley his Fuji stick/ get together with bradley
Get together with George
Get togetehr with Ross
Go to Kyokushin Karate U.S.A. Honbu Dojo
Go to China town
-eat red bean paste
Eat an egg and cheese bagle
Work out
Sight see
I am a simple person. All I need is food, travel, and the combative arts, and I've had a great day.
Now it was time to end our trip. All three of us prepared to make our many hour journey in reverse, then set out. Of course, since Adam and I drove there, our third agreed to drive the way back. After 8 or 9 hours though, the road and excessive drug use began to take their toll on our driver. The driving had become erratic, and I told him I would drive.
"I've got it, no problem. You just relax and get some sleep."
Yeah. I would have liked to, but it's difficult when you are heading into oncoming traffic and the driver is looking down into his lap, preparing a joint.
I wouldn't want to take advantage of you, why don't I drive? I said, trying to be as non threatening as possible. I didn't want this to turn into "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". "No no, I didn't drive on the way here. I've got it."
The war of politeness went on for awhile before he finally conceeded to switch the next time we needed to get gas.
After we switched, I had been driving about an hour when I heard a mumble. "I need to pee."
Do you want me to stop?
"No. I can hold it, we've only got a couple hours left."
Ok.
"I do need to pee though."
Should I stop?
"No it's fine. I can hold it for like 2 days."
Ok.
"But I have to pee."
This exchange went on for maybe 15 minutes, before I'd had enough and pulled into a 24hour grocery/ gas staton. He ran in. After 10 minutes had passed, Adam and I began to wonder if he was allright.
Then he came out.
With no pants.
He was wearing a shirt, some shoes, and tighty-whitey underwear, but no pants.
Where are your pants!?
"Oh. I had to walk all the way throught he grocery to get to the bathroom, and by the time I made it, I really had to pee. I wound up getting some pee on my pants. So I took them off."
WHY!?
"So I wouldn't be embarressed."
...
"..."
This guy walked all through the grocery like that. With no pants. Becouse he didn't want to be embarresed. Drugs will do that to you. I was so glad he wasn't driving anymore.
After that litttle incident, we made it back somewhat uneventfully.
It had been a good trip, despite the fact I hate driving and wound up driving alot. I had seen George, got some training in, got the Fuji stick closer to Bradley, saw Ross, made a new friend in Joe, had a bit of adventure, and ate some good food.
Plus, I still had my pants.
-Nash
I had had business to take care of in the New York area, and when I heard my buddy Adam was going, I asked to tag along. He said he was going to drive up there for a four day weekend over labor day. He was going to visit a friend of our's named Ross. Who was in town for a bit from Australlia.
Perfect.
Adam knew Ross from doing theater work, I knew he trained under an okinawa style Goju Karate teacher I knew.
First thing, I needed to take Bradley's Fuji Stick and give it to him in New Jersey. Bradley also wanted to join the Kyokushin Karate Honbu Dojo in New York, so I needed to check that out for him; I'd heard they had moved buildings and made some changes. Next up, visit George, who lives in New Jersey and had recently returned from a trip he and his girlfriend Aleks had taken to Ireland, and finally, visit Ross in New York.
It seemed everything was going according to plan. Adam would drive to New York, and becouse I was hitching a ride, I agreed to drive halfway. Simple.
Plans change though...
Someone else decided they would go as well.
The more the merrier, and more importantly, the less driving I would have to do.
I had been up for over 30 hours the day we where supposed to leave. They showed up at 10:30pm, drunk and high, to pick me up for the trip.
Looks like Nash was driving..
Aside from being tired, the drive wasn't too bad. I drove untill 5am, and then Adam drove the rest. We arrived in Hoboken New Jersey around noon and had lunch. In between the start of the trip and right then, I had recieved bad news... Bradley had been called on a family trip to Maine! After lunch I split off from the group and met up with George. I might not have been able to get together with Bradley, but at least I could do the things I was planning to do for him. I left his Fuji stick at George's house, safe and in the same state, though about an hour away, but at least it was almost back to him. After some quality time together, George and I took off for the New York Kyokushin Karate Honbu dojo.
After some searching we found the place. They had, in fact, moved buildings. I walked in to find two japanese people wearing karate gi, sitting behind the main desks doing work. They looked up and asked with a heavy accent if I could be helped.
Is this the Kyokushin Karate U.S.A. Honbu dojo?
"Yes it is."
What faction are you?
"What faction are YOU?"
Maybe I've never trained before.
"You haven't trained before?"
Maybe.
"Maybe you tell the truth? Wich one are you?"
Matsui - Ha.
"Us too! Where do you train?"
Shinjuku.
"...."
....
"... I know you... Josh?
Nash.
"Yes! Zenjuro's friend! Been about a year hasn't it? How long are you in town?"
About a week.
"Well, shouldn't you be training here then?"
Well, I...
"Wait! You don't have any money do you? Yeah, I remember you are always very broke. Well you know you can't trainhere for free..."
Yeah, so I figured I'd just watch training, if that's ok. I've also got a buddy who is interested in joining.
"By all means, please kengaku."
It may be arrogent of me to say, but that day the students did not look very good. Very out of shape, and these where top kyu! However, the instructor of course looked great. 5 minutes of 5 point kicks (gohongeri) didn't seem to phase him.
We talked after training was done.
"you know the open weight American championships are in two weeks don't you?"
!?! I didn't know.
"Your friend Kamada is coming to fight."
Shohei!?
"Yes. You should come and cheer him on."
I would love to.
"You should be fighting in that you know."
....
When the conversation had finished George and I headed out into the night. He took me out to get giant burritos from some hidden "underground" place, and we went to bed around 1. He and aleks where going to a wedding in the morning.
The morning came and Aleks dropped me off at my buddies hotel. Adam had split off to go party with Ross, so it was just he and I.
We decided to go on a three hour boat tour of manhattan. While in line to board the ship, two things happend.
1.:
A paper recycling plant, right next to us, caught fire. Black smoke and helicopters filled the sky, and sirens rang loudly.
2.:
Do you ever go someplace and think you see someone, but you know there is no chance that it could actually be them? While in Japan a couple years back, I met a guy named Burt. He lives in Seattle, but decided to come to Japan for a few months. I hadn't seen him in years, but I thought I saw him that day walking by. The guy was going by really quick, but looked just like him. I decided to go for broke and just yell to him anyway. Might as well right?
Burt!
(the guy turns around)
"Nash!? What are you doing here? I thought you would be adventuring somewhere!"
It was him! We talked for a bit, and it turns out, he was just in New York with his family becouse he had never been, and it seemed like it would be interesting. I told him I was out somewhere adventuring. New York. He still lives in Seattle. What are the odds that I would run into him then and there?
After our chance encounter, I got on the ship and took the tour. It was great.
That night, I met up with Adam and Ross, and Ross's very Australian friend, who's name is Joe (I think). We all caught up, and I got to know Joe.
“Wait... are you THE Nash!?” Probably... “I heard you walked like 800 miles as a monk on a pilgrimage and all you had with you was a samurai sword!” …. close enough. I feel like that story is amazing enough that it doesn't need embellishment, I had no sword on that journey...
Joe is in the post production television/movie business apparently. He suggested I get a T.V. show, so that he could come along on my adventures. I told him he was more than welcome.
"You're the type of person I got into this stuff for. I wanted to go see the world and do interesting things! Now all I do is sit and work at a computer. You've got to get a show!"
Sounds good to me. Anyone know someone to pitch a show to, or a show needing a host?....
At around 6am we headed back to Queens, where I had a bit of a run-in with a subway turnstyle... after an amazing counter-attack by the turnstyle, I came out on top, but it was a much more worthy adversary than I had originally anticipated. By 8am I was up doing my morning exercises and heading back to Manhattan to take the path to meet George again.
When I arrived I met George and Aleks in Hoboken, on the board walk. George had the excited gleam in his eye of a little kid on christmas, and I was about to find out why....
"Guess what I just found on the way over here!"
....
"Just come with me! Me and Aleks where JUST talking about this!"
He led me back along the boardwalk and to a bush. He pointed under the bush, where I finally saw it.
A coconut.
"What is it doing there!?"
What Is it doing here? There's no trees around... this is a really high quality coconut... coconuts don't even grow here!
"I was just telling Aleks the other day how I've never had coconut, but I really wanted to try one... but I wanted my first to be one you had chopped open. Now I can!"
hmm...looks pretty strong....
"You can do it. You've gotta do it in one shot though, or it doesn't count."
Of course, breaking the coconut is not difficult, it's using the correct amount of power. Hit it too hard and the coconut explodes - you've wasted it. Hit it too soft and it doesn't break - you'll look like a jackass and maybe hurt yourself.
"One shot."
I placed the coconut on the ground and started focusing. I didn't realize that while I was doing this, some passers by had stopped to see if I could do it. The moment of focus...
THWAK!
The coconut split perfectly. I stood up and turned around to people saying "yay!". George was cheif among them. I drank the coconut water in victory, and offered George some. When the water was gone, we filled the cocount with gatorade and drank out of it unitll it was gone. When we ran out of liquid we sat and ate all the meat.
How is it? I asked.
"Good." I'm really glad we found this."
Me too.
When we where done pillaging what was surely some un-lucky homeless person's coconut, we went to the park and played frisbee for hours. We did Handstands and hit passers by with our flying disc (unintentionaly) for the majority of the day before parting to go meet back up with Adam, Ross, and Joe.
We met at a bar. Ross asked how I was still awake on no sleep from the day before. Adam answered "That's Nash. Not only has he not really slept, he got up and worked out then played sports outside in the heat all day!" Ross and Joe seemed surprised, but they got over it by getting drunk and taking Adam and Myself on a midnight tour of Manhattan... while still drinking. And riding skateboards. Those two have more ability skateboarding while drunk then most people have at all. It was an impressive sight to see. We eventually stumbled on a wreched horribly burned car in the middle of the road. Photo - opp. Next I decided I would fulfill my own personal mission: get an egg and cheese bagel from a deli. The ones in the New York/ New Jersey area are the best. Best I've had anyway.
At some odd hour in the morning Ross and Joe decided they would call it a night becouse they had to work that day....
I went and got some sleep and then met up with George again. We went to Chinatown where I got my favorite food: Red bean paste!
Perfect. We also passed a table in the middle of the night with bananas just sitting on it in the middle of the side walk...
On the way back, george echoed Joe's sentiment from the night before. He talked about how he wanted me to have some kind of a show or something so he could come and take photos. Afterall, he is a photographer by trade, and taking adventure and nature photos as an occupation seems to be his dream. I told him if I was ever given the opportunity, he and Joe would be on crew for sure. Now, if only major networks would quit stealing my show ideas....
(I'm looking at you, MTV's bucket list show....)
Now that I had occomplished everything I set out to, it was time to leave. My to do list had looked somthing like this:
Give Bradley his Fuji stick/ get together with bradley
Get together with George
Get togetehr with Ross
Go to Kyokushin Karate U.S.A. Honbu Dojo
Go to China town
-eat red bean paste
Eat an egg and cheese bagle
Work out
Sight see
I am a simple person. All I need is food, travel, and the combative arts, and I've had a great day.
Now it was time to end our trip. All three of us prepared to make our many hour journey in reverse, then set out. Of course, since Adam and I drove there, our third agreed to drive the way back. After 8 or 9 hours though, the road and excessive drug use began to take their toll on our driver. The driving had become erratic, and I told him I would drive.
"I've got it, no problem. You just relax and get some sleep."
Yeah. I would have liked to, but it's difficult when you are heading into oncoming traffic and the driver is looking down into his lap, preparing a joint.
I wouldn't want to take advantage of you, why don't I drive? I said, trying to be as non threatening as possible. I didn't want this to turn into "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". "No no, I didn't drive on the way here. I've got it."
The war of politeness went on for awhile before he finally conceeded to switch the next time we needed to get gas.
After we switched, I had been driving about an hour when I heard a mumble. "I need to pee."
Do you want me to stop?
"No. I can hold it, we've only got a couple hours left."
Ok.
"I do need to pee though."
Should I stop?
"No it's fine. I can hold it for like 2 days."
Ok.
"But I have to pee."
This exchange went on for maybe 15 minutes, before I'd had enough and pulled into a 24hour grocery/ gas staton. He ran in. After 10 minutes had passed, Adam and I began to wonder if he was allright.
Then he came out.
With no pants.
He was wearing a shirt, some shoes, and tighty-whitey underwear, but no pants.
Where are your pants!?
"Oh. I had to walk all the way throught he grocery to get to the bathroom, and by the time I made it, I really had to pee. I wound up getting some pee on my pants. So I took them off."
WHY!?
"So I wouldn't be embarressed."
...
"..."
This guy walked all through the grocery like that. With no pants. Becouse he didn't want to be embarresed. Drugs will do that to you. I was so glad he wasn't driving anymore.
After that litttle incident, we made it back somewhat uneventfully.
It had been a good trip, despite the fact I hate driving and wound up driving alot. I had seen George, got some training in, got the Fuji stick closer to Bradley, saw Ross, made a new friend in Joe, had a bit of adventure, and ate some good food.
Plus, I still had my pants.
-Nash