Meizhou, China - Everything EXCEPT the race!

Wednesday 9th of October saw me fly from Brisbane to Singapore. It was actually my first ever flight for more than 5 hours and first international flight if you don't include New Zealand. I had always figured that triathlon would give me the chance to travel the world and so wasn't ever in any hurry as a young adult to do the whole backpacking thing.

This is where my brother and I met up after he flew back in from Rome after attending the wedding of two Beijing Olympic Gold Medallists and leading an impromptu bike tour through Italy. Apparently these are worth taking if you ever get the chance - my brother's versions that is. You'll either find it entirely fascinating or hilarious.

Anyway, Singapore is super pretty. The pool we swam in was ridiculously hot, but unless they actually tried to cool it, the sun and heat was always going to turn it into a bath.  Was amazing to see two 50m pools side by side.

Following our swim we went for a jog in the beautiful East Coast Park. Unfortunately, we stepped off the footpath and possibly onto something some feral dogs wanted to eat. It was not a pleasant introduction to the area to have over 10 dogs surrounding you growling, barking and baring their teeth. The amusing part is that I'm not particularly afraid of the gnashing, noisy animal that could open a jugular, I'm afraid of the teeny, tiny, little bacteria in their saliva - that stuff can mess you up!

The next morning we flew on to Guangzhou, staying in the Pullman at the airport. It was great. I give it two thumbs up and recommend it. The fact that they serve western food tops it off...

On Friday we were off to Meizhou for what was supposed to be my dose of China. What followed was being met at the airport by race volunteers and a bus trip. The bus headed out onto the highway after a brief sortie through the city, where according to my brother, I barely got to experience real Chinese driving. I was just excited to be living some semblance of pro triathlete's lifestyle.

The bus turned off the highway and started heading upwards. And upwards. And upwards. I was starting to guess (and freak out) as to what altitude we'd be hitting when we raced as we we'd done at least 500m of climbing before we got to stop. Fortunately the bus, turned around and went back halfway down the hill and into the little valley we would race in, our ears popping the entire way.

The venue was stunning. I call it Shangri-La - Heaven on Earth. While I sat there admiring the following sights,

Lanterns.

Recovery Area & the Mountain I was worried about racing on!

Happy Farm :D

The hill on the run course. The whole course had these highly detailed gardens.

Detour from the run course.

Swim pontoon.

One of three manicured walkway canopies.

?

Just a corner on the bike course.

This bridge was translated as "Luck Strike". I guess I had struck it lucky!

My brother grumbled to himself, feeling how ripped off he had been at all the other Chinese races. Then we got to our rooms and the grumblings became much more pronounced with our view:

The tree outside our place.

The rooms themselves were superb. It was just my brother and I staying in a three bedroom, immaculate house. As good a bedroom as you'll get in most luxury Australian hotels and it was all paid for by the organisers!

Now being a diabetic and travelling is tricky and eating foreign food is even more so. The food we had was covered in oil. One athlete noticed how he had swimming pools of it left on his plate. Oil can be a pest as it can delay the absorption of carbohydrates into the bloodstream. The other annoying thing they do is put sweeteners/sugars in everything. I actually spent the entire time before race night with a high blood sugar, struggling to get a grip on the differences.

That said, I was surprised to see how I was always able to find plenty to eat and was always happy at mealtime and never displayed the despondent looks of some of the other Aussies. I wasn't adventurous enough to try the dog meet or the Pig's blood curd.

Braised dog meat

It turns out that the resort had at some time been a sort of amusement park or at least had desires to be one.

grass sliding

I found the dilapidated state of these amusements to be typical of the Chinese mentality though. The pollution wasn't as bad as everywhere else, but we still rarely had a truly clear sky and even the resort had places that were covered in trash, as the entire city looked like it was downwind from garbage dump. It just seems that they have been/are being given this great place and just couldn't care less. It's one thing I already knew that I liked about Australia; the generations that are coming out of schools now and for the last decade and a half have been highly educated about environmental issues. Right from studying animal endangerment in the form of Storm Boy, to the efforts of people like Steve Irwin or the fact that everyone I went to school with seemed to know who David Suzuki is, what he was about and similarly Tim Flannery, at least our education can be proud of that. Simply being consciously  aware of it makes a difference.

"There are barriers all over the place! How will we get through?" "Screw it, just plough straight over the top of them"

"Oh look! A really pretty gazebo. Let's go and sit in it"

"Oh wow, it's so carefully detailed, it's amazing that it's man-made...Euw, gross! That water is disgusting. Let's get out of here, I think I'm about to be sick"

The wall here has an amazing set of little cabins, nooks, crannies and cute little staircases that would take 10-15 mins to explore and document over the 100 of walking distance so high is the effort and skill put into it. But that water is so feral that the whole area is cordoned off and entry prohibited...welcome to your future China. I feel sorry for whoever designed it, it would have taken quite some effort and creativity.

The people there are really nice and helpful. I appreciated the efforts they would often go to to communicate with us. While we haven't had much reason to learn other languages in Australia, it does feel ignorant that the people were often able to help us and we wouldn't have been able to return the favour. 

While there was a $1000 USD athlete travel subsidy, we also received a little gift from the race organisers. I never tried mine and given it weighed a tonne I had to leave it behind :(

Apart from my brother falling ill before the race and having to pull out, that covers everything. Yeah, it seems pretty boring; a few days of exercising, surfing the internet and eating, but that's actually what I enjoy doing, so I loved it! Even if it wasn't an "authentic" Chinese experience :D

Oh that's right, the airport. I have no idea why they have a gate number, but the VIP area was delightful.

Southern Wing with restaurant.

Northern Wing 

In case you got lost.

VIP and all the exclusion a couple of plastic plants provide.

It's Official

There's a reason for me not blogging for over a month. I've been a touch busy.

For the last decade I have just about ruined every opportunity I've had in life in the hope that I might get my act together and qualify for a professional triathlon license. When I'm in those meetings with groups of new people where you have to introduce yourself and say a little bit about yourself I say "My name is Chris George and I have an addiction." Much like you must at Alcoholics Anonymous. I continue "It has lost me friends, threatened family relationships, seen me end up unemployed too often and has left me close to bankruptcy. I am addicted to triathlon." At which point there is usually a sigh of relief followed by the "Glad there's a funny person in the group rather than a drug addict!" laugh echo throughout the meeting room.

It's true though. I have lost friends. I barely graduated University. I have been $26,000 in debt without a security on that debt, or available to pay it. The sad part was how poorly I was going about my triathlon training and racing.

A couple of years ago I promised my brother that if I didn't have a professional license by the time I turned 30, I would give up.

This year I turned 29 and time was about to run out. I had been pushed around a bit unfairly at work the year before and took it poorly (in my defence, anyone 3 weeks out from a World Championships have a promise broken by their boss and friend to be dumped into a high stress role, would have too). It resulted in a conversation where, despite me saying that I was just reacting emotionally as anyone in my situation would, I was told "You need to work out whether you are a triathlete or a banker." I appreciated working for these people and wanted nothing more than to make them successful in their endeavours, ahead of my own. I felt like the horse in Animal Farm.

NEK MINIT...

My professional license, my name on an Elite ITU startlist and the Visa I needed to travel to China to race.

I have actually been sitting on this for a while, but I had been so paranoid that someone would come along and say there had been a mistake and cancel my license. It wasn't quite "next minute" as the previous blogs can indicate.

So it's official. I have my pro license, achieved my dream and I don't need to quit the sport. I have just returned from competing in Meizhou, China and Hong Kong, staying in Hong Kong in between. There is a lot to write about: the race venue and trip to Meizhou, the race itself, the two week stay in Hong Kong and again the race itself which will be completed over the next week or fortnight.

I'm also trying to find out if I'm the first type 1 diabetic to have done this. As far as I'm aware no one has...