13. A Tattoo in Every Country & "Charlie Bit My Finger" | Sam Part 1

Part 1: Sam and I met while taking care of injured animals in the tropics. Since he recently got to see Machu Picchu (top of my bucket list), I also asked for tips from him for anyone who might be interested in visiting Peru in the future. After his gap year, he has then started his first year of "Uni". He gives us a life update as well introduce his passion for biology, which just might have the potential to save us all!

Follow more of Sam's adventures @samr1ce on IG.   

Special thanks to my friend Michelle for her part in producing this episode.

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Oh, my gosh. I'm so excited to see you. How long has it been?

I came home right before my birthday at the end of July, from Costa Rica. You were still there and it's just October now. So it's only been less than three months. It feels longer doesn't it? It does and it doesn't, I don't know. Time just sort of works like. But it just feels like such a short amount of time, but then also like the amount of things I've done in between makes it longer.

Yeah, I think so too. I feel like it's a long time ago that I was in [00:01:00] Costa Rica, but thinking back calendar days wise, it really wasn't that long ago. Not too long, but you've done quite a lot of things since then. I know you stayed over there when I came home. And so can you tell us, I know you went to, you started from the Southern part of South America, right?

And then you worked your way up. So what made you go on your whole Latin America trip to begin with and why you picked certain places and how was that whole thing? Yeah. Well, I mean, I didn't, I wanted to do like all of South America, but I, I couldn't because of COVID. So I went to Costa Rica first and then went to Peru and then went back to Costa Rica and I went to Mexico.

But my original plan was just to go to Peru and then see where I go from there, and I think I just, don't know why I just [00:02:00] always wanted to go to Peru I don't know. I think it's like I'm into biology and I'm into nature. I don't know, it just, it was one of those countries to me that seems crazy to go there, like go to the Amazon rain forest and it just seems mad and I never thought a bit to do it.

Cause it just seems mad. But then like you just can. To this day and age, you can just travel and see faces. But yeah, that was the main reason for it, but I've just, I've always wanted to travel. I've always wanted to travel whilst I'm young as well, and just do it rather than, because there's just a lot. I just see a lot of people say "Yeah, I'll travel after this. I'll do this first and then I'll travel" whatever and like I don't know. I've just wanted to get after it basically. [00:03:00] Right? Exactly. And you might never get to that point where you want, you say you want to go somewhere, but then when do you actually go? So you took your chance and you just did it before you got old and busy with life and everything.

Exactly, and like also I did it in a gap year before uni because I'm going to come out of uni in a massive debt. I'm going to need to go and like, yeah.

Peru sounds awesome. My favorite Disney movie is the emperor's new groove. Have you watched it? No, I haven't. You need to watch it. It's the one, yeah, it has llamas. And it's the one where the kid. Really? I don't think I've ever heard of it.

You need to watch it. And they, I don't know. I don't think we, I think we talked about this back at the volunteer center. I think you, was it you or someone [00:04:00] else that hasn't seen Mulan? Yeah. I have not seen that either. I have not seen a lot of them. Is it a musical? Well, all Disney movies kind of have songs, I guess.

So. Yeah, I remember. Yeah, I'm not a musical person. I remember we were making a big deal cause you, and some of the other people that were like, you've never seen Mulan? Like what are you talking about? And then. Yeah Emperor's New Group is like my favorite movie, my favorite Disney movie of all time. And it has this emperor from Peru and it's just like these quirky, funny antics that he gets into.

And there's llamas in the movie. You would love it if you watch it, if you like Peru, you would like it. Okay, cool. And then yeah, Machu Picchu. It's on the top of my, and my husband's bucket lists. Like before we even met each other, like knew we wanted to go to Machu Picchu and we still haven't been able to go yet.

And I heard that it's. Not [00:05:00] very I guess it's not hopeful that it'll stay around for a long time. Is that what you heard also? Because I know you did get to go. And so we were kind of like, oh, we better go soon. Cause it's, it's historic and it's, they're trying to protect it and sustain as long as possible.

But with all the tourists that are going, I think they've started limiting numbers or something like that. I don't know if you learned about that while you were there. To be honest, I didn't, I wasn't aware that it was not going to be around a lot. When I was walking around, there was a lot of people like working on the site and fill in cracks and cement stuff like that.

I don't know, it didn't, it didn't seem like it was going to disappear, but like at the same time, it's really, really, really high up on a mountain a lot. I don't know that anything could happen to it. It's very exposed. Yeah. I mean, that's the main limitation at the moment is because of the Corona I think.

[00:06:00] But I don't know maybe you are right. Okay. I hope I hope I'm wrong. Hopefully what I heard is just something they said at the time, but hopefully it's been preserved well now, So that people can go for a long time to come. Cause that's the one of my top places to go to. What would you recommend? Like did you guys get to hike up there or stay nearby?

We had a very unique experience because like, obviously I was with Eden, my friend, I was traveling with and like he is same age as me, both young, both don't have a lot of money, so we just did it as cheap as we can. So we basically have to get like a Peruvian person to come in with you as your sherpa.

Just got like the cheapest tour guides we could because, and he was the smallest man you've ever seen. He had like a walking stick, [00:07:00] even though he was like, I don't know, not, not old. It wasn't like he was an old man. Like he hurt his leg in a motorbike accident or something like that. Like he literally, we got in there and he was just like, just go, like, he didn't know anything about it. What is it called? A sherpa?

I think it's a sherpa, but yeah, it's basically just someone I think sherpa is supposed to be like, you know, those people that will walk up a mountain with you, and then they have tents and they pretty much just do everything for you. And they're just the tour guide, but bring the tents and the food and supply that as well. So the guy you found was not legit?

Not really, but like we got, we did that for two days. Machu Pichu thing for like a hundred dollars. Where as like, I'm not like those people that spent over $500. Yeah, I don't regret going [00:08:00]with them. Like, it would have been cool for them to learn more about it from an actual tour guide, but like, yeah, I don't regret it.

Like we got to see it and that's all that mattered. Really? Yeah. That's and then what else did you get to do in Peru? I mean, I work to another animal show. That was pretty cool right there from them. It was very different to the one that we worked on because it was like me and my friends were the only people there.

It was a lot more work because we're the only ones that, well, the only volunteers there. And like, I don't know, that was just a lot less to do. It was a different sort of vibe. It was raining quite a lot but it was a good experience. So they had less animals than the one that had maybe, but they still have quite a lot of animals.

They just have a lot of a lot of monkeys, a lot of Harlem monkeys. Yeah. Do you [00:09:00]remember, do you remember the name of it that way? If anyone's listening, they want to go help out since it sounds like they need more volunteers. I think it's just called Amazon shelter. What city in Peru?

It's called Puerto Maldonado.

I can give you the information about it. If you find it later, we can always tag to it on Instagram or something. Yeah. Okay, cool. And then you stayed at Cusco, right? Yeah. So that was a cool experience as well. We we only were going to stay in Cusco for a week to do like all the tourist stuff, but ended up getting job at a hostile, or like a voluntary job sort of thing, and work there. There's not much more than just partying all the time. 

Yeah, basically it was all, it, [00:10:00] it was the only place in like at least Cusco, but like maybe even all the Peru that was actually open all night because the had a lot of restrictions on. We just, we just got a full night because the locals came, all the tourists came.

And so we were just like the night staff. We just woke up at like five in the afternoon and then went to sleep at like seven in the morning. To be honest, that was probably one of my favorite things is working in a hostel because. I love hostels because you meet so many different people, but if you work in a hostel, like you, you have a reason to talk to everybody.

Like, even if you're very confident, you talk to most people there's still a few people that you won't talk to, but if you work at the hospital, then you do actually talk to everyone and it's good. [00:11:00] That's a good tip for people that are trying to achieve solo travel and not really spending much money. They can volunteer at a hostel and they get to meet all these interesting people.

Do you remember some of the, I guess, most exciting or interesting things you heard from people while you were working there, you were there for a whole month. So that was quite a lot of time. Yeah. I'll don't know. It's hard to say really just for us, just before I forget, just because you said "that's a  good advice", there's also an app called work away. I've not actually used it, but so many people told me about it and I think you get a subscription and it said in pounds it's like 40 pounds so it's about $50 a year, or you, you get like access to all of these different work aways, which is like volunteering in a hostel.

So if you work in the hostel, then you'll get free accommodation. [00:12:00] Sometimes you get free food. And yeah, like, I, I wish the I'd known that before I started traveling but I'll know for the future, you know? Yeah. That's really cool. That kind of reminds me of the animal sanctuary that we've volunteered. How did you find out about, about them?

Well, to be honest with you, I shouldn't have gone through this company because they charged me more than I should've paid, but like it's a company called global work in travel. And to be honest, there's parts of me that I am glad that I managed to do, like, I did go through them because, but solely because of the whole, the world situation right now. Like, if it wasn't for them getting me the right letters to be able to get into the country. Then I wouldn't have been able to go and they were good about that.

They did help me out.[00:13:00] Well I just like, I paid way too much for it. Pretty much. Yeah. I went through something similar, but my program was called Go Eco, and they're also all over the world are in Africa, Asia, everywhere. And I know that people could have, I guess, contacted that these shelters personally, to, to plan their arrangements and live there and pay a fee and whatever.

But I also went through another company and that's honestly how I even found out about them. I wouldn't even have known the name of the shelter or where they were if I was to try to do this on my own. So I am glad I went through them and they did help me with the yeah, like the COVID you have to do like a pre-screen health screen and all that before you get into the country and all that. So they were helpful there.

But yeah, we're just talking, cause we already know each other, but for anyone who's [00:14:00] listening, it's like just to explain how we met. So we met at this volunteer center at an animal sanctuary in Alajuela, Costa Rica.

And then I remember I was there for, I think, a couple of days already and that you had gotten there and then we just started talking and then we just learned a little bit about each other. And tell us a little bit about where you're from and where you've lived, if anyone can guess by Sam's accent already and where you currently live and what you're, what you're up to.

So I'm from a place called Tinkler but it's near to Leicester, or how a lot of people like to pronounce it like it's Leicester. But somebody you probably know more as Birmingham.

I remember you were trying to teach me how to say it. And you were like, [00:15:00] and I was like, I was like burning ham. He's like, no, not burning ham. I think I got it now.

There we go.

But I'm currently living in Liverpool for university or college. Liverpool university. Yeah, I know we were talking about this, how you guys call it uni or university, and then we call it college. 

That's why I said university rather than just uni. Yeah. I'm used to it now, I guess. But so what do you guys call Elementary school? Is that like primary school?

[00:16:00] Oh, in fact, I don't know what elementary school is. Well, I don't know the age, like, I don't know. Yeah. We have pre-K, which is pre-kindergarten. And then we have kindergarten, which has probably like four or five years old. And the elementary is like six years old and then you're in elementary for five years and then you're in. Middle school. And then from middle school, you go to high school and then from high school, you got to college, which is uni. 

So what is it called for you guys? I know it's all different. So we have nursery and like when you're not a baby baby, but like pretty small. And then, and then we have primary school.

Which was mine was like, the same school, but like two different buildings, [00:17:00] I think that's the same as, what do you say? Kindergarten and elementary, middle school. Middle school is  high school for us, and then we have college which is your high school, then we have uni which is your college. Oh my gosh.

And then what's, I guess we call it masters or. Yeah. Yeah. We, we have the same sort of label for that sort of thing. I think it's like masters or Post-graduate something like that. Okay. So the main difference is that college is you guys as high school for us. Yeah, but I know a lot of other countries, they call it Uni too like in Australia.

The difference between college and uni in America. Aren't they just the same thing really? [00:18:00] Yeah, so we call your college, we call it high school here. That's the four years you do before you go to uni, which we just call it college. Yeah. No, but I mean like, cause isn't. Universities. And then colleges, basically the same thing?

We have some, I guess, community colleges where there might be only a two year program, but you don't get your full bachelor's degree. And we have other colleges. But we, the four year ones, that you're the main ones that people go to our call universities. But even when we're talking about universities would just say college, but I catch myself saying uni more now just from speaking to other people, I say uni now too yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you are okay. Say the name of [00:19:00] the city that you were born in again? I don't think I caught it. I was born in what was it?

I was born in somewhere called [city name]

What was it?

[City name]

And then you lived in [city name] for a while and then now you're in Liverpool.

Cool. Cool. What are you studying in Uni? Doing biology. I could have specialized into like a specific type of biology, but I didn't know what sort of biology that I want to do. So I just went for biology. Okay. And how old are you? I don't think I ever asked you. Cause you had to take a gap year right before college? 19.

Oh, my gosh. Okay. Yes. I think I remember now I was like, he's so young. I'm here on the side. Yeah. Uh, like, like, obviously I'm young, [00:20:00] I'm 19, but like, I don't, I don't feel young at all

I don't like it when people judge me of my age and some people do.

Yeah. Yeah. I just remember you from like your personality and the things that you were interested in and would talk about and your whole vibe, but yeah, not, I don't really look at you as just your age either. I think I started college or university, I think. I think I was 17 or 18. I was always like one of the younger ones in my class.

So this is your first year of uni. You went through a pandemic, you went and traveled and took a gap year. So how are you adjusting to college life? Are you living in okay. We call it dorms. Dormitories. I don't know what you guys call it.

We call it halls. But like, I don't know. [00:21:00] Don't you have to share a room? We don't share any rooms. We got our whole own room. Oh that's so nice? I could not share a room.

No. How many people did you share a room and in Costa Rica? Like there was actually, it was just the two of you in a room. I mean yeah. and not dorms, but I went to a lot of different dorms. There was like 18 in a dorm, a lot of people. Wow. Just through your other trips that you took in Costa Rica?

Yeah. Yeah. I think the dorms, they put us in, it was guys, girls separate, and then we had. We had like 12 spaces. We had six bunk beds at our volunteer center, 12 spaces, but the top bunk, the top bunk was really not usable because of all the bugs and [00:22:00] dust that was on there. And then in my room, it was me Sihon and then it was Clemons from France.

And it was the three of us for awhile. And then when the French people left, we had the Israeli girls Yael and Jovel come in. So then they were our new roommates. So luckily we just had the four of us. And then you guys had guys dorms. And same situation. And I don't know how many people or who was all in there.

Cause there was people coming in to the center like left or right day after day, just coming and leaving. But I'm happy with my roommates. I'm glad that there was only the most of us the most of the time, there was only four of us to that, which I'm very thankful of. Cause my, my friend Sianna was there, you know, her, she might go to London next year.

So you might be able to see her again. She does not do roommates. Like she tolerates me just cause we've roomed [00:23:00] before and other things, but she does not do roommates. So yeah, she was like very worrisome about the whole situation. Like, I don't know who our roommate was. Luckily, it went well for us.

Did anyone snore?

I don't think so. The only thing was my bunk bed was so bad. Like my mattress, I think whoever was there before had flipped it the opposite end. So I think I was sleeping on the back part of the mattress for a while and I just, I eventually had to flip it over. Cause I was like, this is not right. I don't think this is right.

And it was so dusty, at least the top bunk. And then my mattress was super squeaky. So I felt like I was waking everyone up in my dorm every time I tossed. And I think I did, it [00:24:00] was everyone else's mattresses were okay. Mine was the only one that was super, super squeaky. I think I might've been that bed frame too.

And then we had the mosquito nets covering. We didn't even get mosquito nets. You guys didn't?

Well, I think, yeah, it was, yeah. I think in the other girl's dorm that I walked into, they all have mosquito nets too. I want to say. So, I'm not sure about you guys is room, but we all have mosquito nets. The boys, I guess just didn't care about it. Yeah. Well, I would very happily taken some mosquito net, but they're just walking wasn't there.

Ah, okay. Yeah, we came prepared. Cause again, go eco the agency. I went through it, [00:25:00] they gave us a packing list of things to bring. Some mosquito bites, spray, anti itch after bite spray. That was all on there. And we used all of it, to be honest, by that point, like I was just past the whole getting bitten thing.

Like they didn't really bother me anymore. Yeah. Cause you were already in south America for awhile. So yeah, back to the subject, we in America, in our universities, we do have dormitories, I guess you could call them halls. They have names like, like whatever hall, like I live in whatever hall I live in this hall.

But we do have dormitories where. There's different levels. Like the amount that you pay for? I think usually for freshmen, like the first year students, you have to share a room and it's usually two, they're very tiny. They're two people to a room. I've seen it on [00:26:00] movies. They don't look good, but my room is actually pretty big.

To be honest, this is probably bigger than my room at home.

If you could turn the light on, this is, this is on YouTube, everyone. So just after you listen, go to the YouTube link and you can watch everything on video

and it's just like this. It's nothing special at all.

Do you have your own water closet?

Do you guys call it? Oh, shoot. Okay. Okay. I know people in Canada call it water closet. So I was like, just trying my luck.

Like definitely you [00:27:00] see water closet now. Okay.

What do you guys call it?

No. Toilet, we just call it. Okay. I prefer, I usually say restroom in America. We say bathroom or restroom, and then I know the Canadians call it a water closet. I mean, that makes sense. Now the upper into WC like. I've never, yeah, I've never considered that. Yeah. In China, the bathroom signs, state WC. And then until I learned that now I'm like, oh, that makes sense now.

Is it not different in China? Do they not have like different symbols or they use there is WC? Yeah, they use WC In China.[00:28:00]

Yeah. I don't know. I mean, a lot of China uses British English. Yeah, like growing up. So I, I did a few, I went to school until I was third grade or like eighth my eighth year of life in China. And. They would teach you English, but it's English, English. It's like proper English. So the people that learn now, it might be different.

But when I was growing up, they taught you proper English. So you would say "Don-sing" instead of dancing.

Oh, my gosh. I don't know. How do you say thank you?

Okay. I'm [00:29:00] okay. I'm working on it. Okay?

That's a hard one for me, but yeah, they would say like dancing and water, I really want to learn mandarin actually. That's right! We were talking about it. Did I teach you any?

I don't really know where to start. I think I taught you a couple of words, which you probably already forgot 19 year old brain. Yeah. There's just a lot going in and out. Yeah. Maybe there's a course you can take or your uni for Mandarin. Yeah, I was thinking about because as well, the uni has got like a partner union in China.

So I think that that must be like society or, uh,[00:30:00]

Yeah. Here we call it study abroad where you take a summer or semester. You should do it.

Yeah, I do. I'll do want to do that if I was talking to my teacher about it and he said, you need to be really smart because if you miss a whole semester if your course, then you have to comeback and catch up on a whole full semester of work because the work that you will have been doing in the different country won't be the exact same, but stuff.

That's on the course. And I really don't know. To me, it's worth catching up on a whole semester. I'd probably prefer to just spend my time better and then travel because I'll want to work abroad when I'm older. I know that I'm going to travel more. Like I know that I'm going to see these different places.

It would be cool to get to [00:31:00] uni there, but like I might as well. Like he said, But even if, even if you can catch that work, like you to need to learn Mandarin as well. And it's like, I don't know.

I'm already feeling like it's a lot. And it's second week, second week of uni. Yeah, maybe just a summer. Like my husband did something where he just went to Spain for three weeks over the summer for like one class. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe something like that. I think I can go to Australia or New Zealand as well.

So that might be on the cards. I don't know. Okay. But if you could go not for a whole semester, but maybe for a couple of weeks or something to China that I would highly recommend it. And that's what I'm getting ready for. [00:32:00] Yeah. Well, if you need to learn a word or two here and there, let me know. Yeah. I've been fortunate that I still remember to speak my Mandarin because I did go to school there for.

My kindergarten and three years until elementary. So I did have to learn how to write Chinese and read it and everything. It's very tough. I'm not going to lie to you. It's so tough. Cause it's not like a Latin language. It's not based off of Latin. So like French, Spanish, Portuguese, English, Italian, those are all kind of similar to each other, but Chinese is just it's whole things.

There's really nothing to base it off of.

Yeah. I was trying to teach one of my taxi drivers in Costa Rica, a few words in Chinese, and I'm pretty sure he already forgot it too. Yeah. [00:33:00] Honestly, the best way to learn a language is just being forced to learn it. Just being in a situation where everyone else is speaking it, and you just have to.

Did you feel like you learned Spanish a bit when you were in Peru?

Yeah, to be honest though, I don't know how much I'd say, like, if someone asked me, do you speak Spanish? I feel like I can't be like, yeah, I speak Spanish, but I usually say like I can, but it's not perfect, but I can understand that more or less And it's, it's the same thing. To be honest, I did, I taught myself some Spanish before I went traveling just from YouTube and like just the basics, just help me because I could recognize things and I could understand where things came from.

But yeah, definitely. But then I lost it all [00:34:00] again. Like when I left, when I left Peru, I was actually quite good. I was speaking to everyone in Spanish, but then I spent like a month in Costa Rica and then they, well, yeah. Just like even thought people from Europe pretty much everywhere. Speak in English.

That's how I felt too before. Cause we spend a few days in San Jose and Costa Rica and the city and other places before we went to the animal center too. So Sianna and I, we were at our host family's home and they only spoke Spanish. So. I spoke a ton of Spanish. Like I only spoke Spanish with them and we had like hour long conversations.

I was like really proud of myself. And then when we got to the center, it was like everyone was from France or from Germany or England, Ireland, Israel. So [00:35:00] everyone was speaking English. Yeah. Even Mexico people were from, so everyone was just using English. Basically. I lived, I would try, like when I got to the center, I started just speaking Spanish and then everyone was replying to me in English.

And even the manager there who was, I was trying to come conversation with him in Spanish and he would reply in English. So I'm like, okay, well, there goes my practicing. Sometimes it was like a try but like because I'm not fluent and they probably were fluent in English. It just wasn't even worth it. It just took a lot longer.

And I couldn't say exactly what I want to say. It's wasn't worth it. Yeah. I will say that the workers, they had the, from Nicaragua, the Nicaraguans they only spoke Spanish. So the [00:36:00]Sienna and I would try to speak to them in Spanish, Uh, do you remember my first day? Yeah, I was made to carry loads of bricks.

Not, not, yeah. And with one of the guys from Nicaragua. Yeah. Julio, right? I think it was the Julio. Yeah. I am so bad with names.

And then we had, we had the, our mama Nika from the kitchen. So all of the workers, we did speak to them in Spanish. Yeah. I remember they, they used you for construction and for manual labor

until the voluntold to be on that team. But then you got a break from doing all of that, but then you had to feed squirrels and baby raccoons. Yeah, you have to [00:37:00] tell the Charlie bit my finger story.

I feel bad about it though. No, I will tell it.

I mean, I think people are going to be able to get it, and then you have to, and I have to say Charlie bit my finger.

So the vet told me to get the other squirrel when we were already letting, some of the squirrels out. So I went in and grabbed another squirrel from like where that cap on. I didn't know, but it was the wrong one. But he wasn't there to tell me that it was the wrong one. So I brought it out and like opened it's little cage, and then it wasn't coming out.

So I like tried to get it, to bring it out so that it could run about and stuff. And then it bit me. Charlie bit, my finger,[00:38:00]

and then, yeah, and then it bit me and then ran up a tree. And then I was told it only had. Three legs or it's back legs didn't work properly or something like that. Maybe mobility issues. It was able to climb up the tree

It got away from me very quickly as well. And then, and then later on, we found out that it fell out of the tree. Yeah, tragic. It happens, but it's like it nature. It's survival of the fittest.

And you did some, you did some really good work. We, we, we kept some, some animals [00:39:00]alive there, some really injured or born with defects animals. Giving them a second chance. So don't feel bad. How's your finger now? Is it healed? Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't a, it wasn't a big cut. Yeah. You had like bandages around.

That's what always happens. I would get a wound. And it won't really hurt but just like blood everywhere.

Speaking of blood, you get tattoos in every country you go to is what you told me. Are you still doing that? I kind of ruined that because so you don't know this on my way home. So I was in Mexico and Mexico got added to the red list. For England. So that means if [00:40:00] you fly straight home from Mexico or haven't been anywhere else and stayed 10, 10 days anywhere else, then you have to like pay for this government hotel, which has thought 2000 pounds for like two weeks, a lot of money.

And like, I couldn't afford it. So instead I went to Austria, which was a green list country. Which meant I didn't have to quarantine when I got back to England. Austria, like  Austria, wasn't a good time, really, to be honest, because I had to quarantine for 10 days when I was, uh, so I had the flight booked for the 10th day.

And also there's the added bit that I left my phone in the top. Um, so then that was probably eight or nine days in quarantine and without a phone, literally nothing today. And [00:41:00] then tested positive for COVID yeah, and had to do another 10 days saw basically did 20 days in a room without my phone.

The one thing that kept me going was drawing, I did a lot of drawing. But yeah, that, wasn't good because of, uh, couldn't get I tattoo in Austria. I didn't really want one in Austria. You weren't supposed to go there to begin with. True. True. Well it still been cool.

Yeah, I know. I tried to go to somewhere. like the, it was the day before I actually got my flight. I got my negative COVID test and I tried to go to what's it called Vienna, trying to go into Vienna because I was staying. In a town just [00:42:00] outside. I literally waited at this train station for like two hours and none of the trains stop.

None of them. I bought a ticket, but they just didn't stop because I didn't know what train I was supposed to get on either because everything was in German and I don't speak any German. So I was just thinking, the next train that stops I'm just going to get onto it, and just go. None of them stopped. I didn't understand it.

Were there other people waiting at the train station? No. So you were the only one you couldn't really ask for help. That was no one there. I got my ticket from a machine.

Well, yeah, apart from that, I've got a lot of very nice tattoos from a lot of very nice places and lot of good memories. Which one did you get in Costa Rica?[00:43:00] I've got two actually. Got a knife. Well, it's supposed to be a machete and then also the snake. And let me see. Oh yeah, that's right. Cool. Yeah, that looks cool. And then in Peru, did you get a llama?

and maybe open your window for more light. See if that works. Okay. Let's see everybody bear with us. Okay. Do you see it? Yes. Yeah. It's like an Eagle, right? With like Aztec designs. Incan. There you go. Cool. Yeah, let's say it was one of it's actually the tattoo that I had the least thought about. [00:44:00] I just saw it at and I was like , yeah, that one. This one, this got a cool story.

This is a bullet ant and that's because me and my friend went out to try and find one, and we got them and put them on ourselves and got stung by them. Wasn't that bad. I was quite disappointed. Yeah. I like always being told that it was the worst pain in the world. I thought it was supposed to be like a bullet. But to be honest tough dudes hurt more than bullet ants.

Oh, okay. Well now we know. Yeah. Cause I think there was one crawling on my leg and I think one of the workers saw and he's like, like swatted it away. He's like, oh no. So luckily I didn't get stung, but you're crazy for volunteering to be stung by a bullet ant. yeah. I mean, it's just an [00:45:00]experience. And like  they do, they do like the tribal initially.

I think it's when they get married to prove that they're a man, they have to wear a glove filled with bullet ants which would obviously be a lot worse. But that's the thing that we saw like 1, 1, 5.

Well, that's cool. And then did you get one Mexico? Yeah. Yeah, that's my newest one. It's quite hard to show this one properly even like in-person. so this here.

This blue part. It's supposed to be like like, you know, an actual biological heart that has like the veins coming out. It's that but made out of water [00:46:00] made out of waves. Um, I mean, that's got a cool story. It's basically the person that did that one did the first tattoo that I got when I was traveling to this one in Costa Rica.

And then I met with them again in Mexico on, because I knew he was good. He's done like my friend's whole forearm so, I knew he was really good at color. So I got him to do this and it's a massive piece and he did really well, but the meaning is. From, well, not his book, his daughter wrote it, but it's Bruce Lee's philosophy and it's called the book is called Be Water, My Friends. And it's just about, I mean, I'd recommend it to anyone. I think it's an amazing book. It's it's just the philosophy about being like water. Really like water can give life. It can take life, it can be. Uh, it [00:47:00] can fill any like thing that you put that into.

So it takes the shape of its container. It can be hard, it can be soft, cold, hot. Like there's a lot of different things that you can do with that one like simple analogy. That's when you flow like water and adapt to any condition. Exactly. Okay. I wrote that down. I'll read it. Okay. Yeah. I listened to the audio book actually.

It's written by his daughter because I didn't actually know this. Bruce Lee died when he was in his thirties.

He died suddenly and out of nowhere. Okay. And then the daughter read the audio book. I don't know who read it. [00:48:00] Okay. I like, I like listening to audio books when the author writes them or when the author reads them. Yeah. Nice. Well, thanks for showing us and the people watching on YouTube, your tattoos. I enjoy all the stories and hope that you get more in every country that you go to. Hopefully COVID, doesn't come in between that in the future. Yeah. I actually want to get into tattooing. I'm going to dedicate a whole leg and just do it on myself really. I'm going to start like a little catalog as well. Like if anyone wants a tattoo or just like look at my leg, pick one.

This is my work choose one that you would like. well, you have to keep us updated on that then. I'm all about learning a new skill or a new hobby. So [00:49:00] yeah. So I know you wanted to talk about biology a little bit because you're passionate about it and that's what you're studying in school. So enlightened us. So something that, like not, I've not been, I've not known about this for that long, but like within the past year, probably I've learned about the potential for artificial photosynthesis.

So what I mean by that is photosynthesis it's essentially just plants they take carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight, and then make glucose like food and oxygen. You can also rewire that so that doesn't make glucose. It doesn't make food, but it makes electricity. It makes some, and it's similar to petrol. Like you can make a lot of different things out to that.

And essentially once we [00:50:00] have the capability to build a machine that can effectively do that, but probably in a very efficient manner. Then we can we can solve problems. For example, we can take so much carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere

and use that to make food and oxygen and electricity and in principle, So we're all free as well. The only one thing that we would start to run out of is water. Not run out of it, but like you need fresh water for it. So I don't know if this is a thing that I can imagine more if water prices increase in as we go into the future.

But like I've interested in it for a while, but then I also saw that it's what Elon Musk is hoping of doing on Mars because [00:51:00] Mars has. I really done dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and it has like ice deposit. So yeah, I don't know. It's just, uh, I think it's the next step in human evolution kind of, because it, it, I don't know, it's kind of like a godly power, like just being able to take these elements and make anything we need out of it essentially. Right. Like redirect that energy process to get a different production with, but you have to use plants. Not necessarily. No. I think eventually they'll be able to build a machine that can actually do it, but something I'm also interested in is potentially genetic modification so that certain plants are more efficient in photosynthesis.

So that means that you could have like a forest. [00:52:00] That's the same size as a separate forest, but it's more efficient enough, therefore, more CO2 from the atmosphere. So overall, like it would just be better for the environment. Oh, okay. So genetically modifying trees, anything literally, anytime, because they take, the carbon dioxide in and store it as carbon.

So, yeah. Which is start with new plants or can you effect that in current forests that exist? See, this is where it's hard because you if you create a lot of advanced species, then it would, out-compete all the other species and throw it all off.

So you do need to be careful with it, but at least for now, I'm interested in looking into these sort of things in like a controlled [00:53:00] lab environment. Where there's no chance of it spreading to the actual environment itself. That's true. I appreciate that for being careful. That's exciting. So it's barely your second week in uni and you have all these ideas and interests already.

So it's good to hear that you're in the right field of biology and all these futuristic things that biology can advanced to. It's not just about the study of organisms, but maybe future human sustainability and environmental protection and artificial photosynthesis. I've never heard of that one before.

Yeah, honestly, I think, I think we're all going to start hearing about it a lot more. Yeah, but like, there's just, there's so many. Pretty much all the problems that we have in the world can be solved by using biology. [00:54:00] Well, at least a lots of them, like for me, one of the biggest things that jumps out to me is world hunger.

Well, you can pretty much solve that with biology. That's something else I'm interested in like going into sustainable food and agriculture and stuff like that. Fungi, micology, I find that really interesting. I think that's going to take some big leaps in the future. But yeah. Yeah. Fungi don't get enough credit for all they do. They don't

Cool. That's awesome. It sounds like you're really passionate about it. And as long as everything is in a controlled lab environment, hopefully people keep it that way for now until they can get the tests going and just, we don't want to mess up the earth more than it already is. So hopefully it's first do no harm and then we can try to improve it.