Day 15

Germany was a treat. I got to grapple with Jon Ryan on the night Westside X-treme Wrestling presented Dead End XI. Some fancy British guy got a great gig training at NOAH in Japan so the entire card was shuffled around and an imprompteau tournamant was incurred. Even though I lost I had a great time sharing the ring with him in front of that crowd. I've often said that the audience at wXw shows are the polar opposite of the ones back home for CZW at the Arena in South Philly. Where the CZW crowd is super critical about the action they watch, and rightfully so, the wXw crowd is just there to have a good time. Maybe both sets of fans are critical, but they definitely show it in their own ways.

Before the show, Tas, an official for wXw and an all around good dude put myself and Jon Gresham up at his place. Hilarity ensued:



I misplaced my passport and wound up staying with a good friend in Krefeld. I had to trek back to Bonn to get my Passport back and along the way I got to see a lot of the town of Cologne.

Above Left: Cologne Cathedral, Above Right: The Rhine River

After hanging around Cologne I went up to the town of Bonn back to a club called Carpe Noctem which I had visited on my first night with Tas, Jakobi, Walter, and Gresham. They had my passport inside. It was a funny story actually. Let's just say the Americans made quite the impression in Germany that night.

Right: SUCCESS! I'm eligible for travel!

Jule, a friend of the family, allowed me to bunk with her for that week. She's a school teacher in Krefeld, and she teaches Gym class. Using my previous tenure in high school and collegiate wrestling, I was able to teach two classes of her's some of the same techniques I learned then. I had them bridging, sprawling, duck walking, hand fighting, shooting.... for those of you who have never wrestled, I taught these kids how to beat each other up and then had them face each other. All with a language barrier! They had a great time and so did I!

As I said, Germany was wonderful. wXw arranged for me to catch a flight back to England, where I should have been for the entire week. So last Saturday I traveled to Weeze International Airport near the border of Holland to head into London Stansted Airport.

Now what I haven't disclosed was that plans by this point had changed entirely than what they were supposed to be originally... not because of the missing Passport. The main reason for me being able to make this trip was that for almost six entire weeks I'd be working at a wrestling camp for All Star Wrestling promotions. Unbeknownst to our crew, which also consisted of BJW's Shinya Ishikawa, IWA's Jaysin Strife, and PWG's Willie Mack, almost half of the planned tour had been cancelled. And to make matters worse, because of my late arrival I was out a room in the house that we were all staying in. Hoorah!

To be continued...